Page 102 of Arran's Obsession

Shade emerged from the stairwell and gave him a shove. “Dick.”

We passed the staff entrance to Divide, a glance in showing me all the lights on and a cleaning crew hard at work in their black skeleton shirts.

“Student night tonight,” Shade informed me. “Cheap pints. Naw so hectic as the end of the week. The strip club and upstairs will have the usual crowd and be rammed from ten onwards.”

“On a Monday?”

“Businessmen away from home. They start the week as they mean to go on.” He raised his eyebrows.

More insight into the undertow of the city. This place was another world.

Someone called us, and we paused in the corridor and turned back. It took me a second to recognise Alisha, the operations manager, coming from the stairwell. In day clothes, her mousy brown hair in a messy bun, and no makeup accentuating her features, she was barely recognisable to the glossy creature I’d seen when she was working.

Arran’s comment about why she never wore a mask made sense. Her street disguise was effective.

Her gaze flicked over me then to the man holding my hand. Hostility crawled off her. “Why do you all have to go out this evening?”

Arran shrugged. “We’ll be back by the time it picks up.”

Her lips flattened. “You can’t keep doing this.”

“I’m not having the same argument again. Four hours, then I promise I’ll be here for the whole night.” He took a breath. “There’s something I need your help with. Does the name Flora sound familiar?”

Alisha wrinkled her nose. “Who is she?”

“That’s not important. Do you know anyone of that name?” At her headshake in the negative, he sighed. “Can you ask around the OG crew?” He gave the description I had.

Alisha shrugged, noncommittal.

I watched their interaction with a sinking heart. Arran called her one of the most important people in his life, and yet they were barely speaking. I was the reason.

“Mr Daniels? There’s a visitor here for you,” someone else said from the other direction.

Manny, the head of security, approached, another man at his side. Jamieson, one of Arran’s Scottish friends.

Arran embraced his friend. Jamieson nodded to me then fist bumped Shade. I wasn’t sure how much Arran’s worlds overlapped, but he’d clearly brought his friends here in the past.

“Walk with us,” Arran told his friend. “Tell me what the fuck you’re doing here?”

Jamieson fell into step, and the four of us moved on.

“Cassie,” he said with a frustrated grumble. His hand flicked a lighter wheel, a spark flying. “She got upset over something then took off. My guess is she’ll end up here.”

I drew my eyebrows in. “Have you checked with her friends?”

“Doesnae have many. We’re kind of an insular family.”

My heart gave an unexpected pang of understanding. I didn’t have many friends either, though for different reasons. Then a memory hit me. “She said something about coming here. I’d forgotten until now.”

Cassie had said she wanted to dance, but in case that meant on the pole rather than the nightclub’s floor, I kept the details to myself.

“Fuck, she mentioned that to me, too,” Arran said. “I’d assumed it was a joke because she said she wanted to dance here. I warned her off.”

Jamieson’s lip curled. “Red rag to a bull, man. She’ll be around somewhere. She’s not called?”

Arran snorted. “Like she’d give me notice of showing up. None of you fuckers do.”

There was no malice in his tone, only the tolerance extended to family. But worry was there, too. I shared it. Cherry had been murdered by someone unknown. That killer was still walking the streets. Even if he’d killed Cherry for a specific reason, that didn’t ease my concern for any other woman out on her own.

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