Page 55 of Trip Through Your Wires

The guard on the left flicks the toothpick he’s chewing on and takes a step toward me. “I don’t know, can you?”

Really, Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum are grammar wizards? It’s going to be a long four years if this is the level of idiocy I have to deal with.

“I think my friend here said show us your ass, girlie,” he says with a leery grin.

Deciding two can play this game, I dig around in my purse and pull out my Cover Girl compact, opening it and holding the mirror up to his face.

“Oh shit, Darryl.” The other guard laughs. “She got you with that one. She can go in for that.”

Reaching for the door, he yanks it open, and while shoving the compact back into my bag, I make my way inside with my chin held high.

After following a short, mirrored hall, I find myself at the end, with a black door to my left, a hallway to my right, and an opening to the club straight ahead.

“Ah, Ms. Miller,” Richardson says coolly as I make my way into the club. “Good, you are here.”

My eyes whip forward to where he is sitting at the end of the bar, a stack of papers next to him and a crystal tumbler in hand. “Come,” he taps the stool next to him, “sit.”

As much as I hate being summoned, I make my way over, looking around. Soft music wafts out of speakers from above, while more than a dozen staff in black T-shirts and trousers straighten the cocktail tables situated around the stage.

“Seems like this may have been a bad place for a business,” I note dryly while coming to a stop next to the bar. “It’s pretty dead in here.”

He lifts his drink and takes a sip. Looks like whiskey, neat. “You like that word, don’t you?”

“Swamp?” I question blithely.

“Dead,” he says pointedly, while setting the tumbler down harder than necessary.

I clench my jaw and straighten my shoulders. “I like many words. In fact, I am thinking of two right now. Care to guess what they are?”

“Sit,” he says for a second time, ignoring me.

I pull my bag close to me, digging my nails into the fabric. “I’ll stand, thanks.”

“You know,” he eyes me coldly. “This arrangement of ours is going to sour pretty quickly if you do not do as I say, Ms. Miller, and I do not think you want that.”

There’s actually nothing I want more than to rile this son of a bitch up. But unfortunately, right now, he holds all the cards.

Begrudgingly, I slip onto the stool and bring my bag to my lap. “So I’m here. What’s next?”

He studies me for a moment, then snaps his fingers and sticks out his hand. Like a magician that’s conjured something out of thin air, a bartender appears and hands Richardson what looks like shoestrings and scraps of fabric.

“Here,” he thrusts it at me.

I look down and shake my head. “What is that?”

“Put it on.”

“Are you high?” I laugh. “I’m not wearing whatever that is.”

He shakes his head and grins. “One day, you will wish you had this much to wear.”

The way he says it makes my skin prick and stomach roil. “I’m not putting that on. Who knows where it’s been. I don’t want to get crabs.”

“Oh Ms. Miller,” he laughs. “Every girl here is clean. We see to it that they are. Our clients are family men. Respected.”

“Right,” I scoff. “Whatever you say. Doesn’t change the fact I’m not—”

“For the next four years,” he cuts me off, “you belong to me, Ms. Miller. If I want you to scrub the toilets, you will. If I want you to dance, you will do that as well. That also means, if I tell you to put this on, you will put it on. Am I making myself clear?”

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