Page 33 of Assassin's Obsession

The music shifts to Nine Inch Nails again and she moves into a familiar pose she does on the bar, but there's no bar there to support her.

Candi repeats the moves she did against the bar in the air right in front of me. Her hand holding her leg up in a vertical split as she spins, her hair flying around her. I'd like to see the men I train in hand-to-hand combat with show that kind of core strength and agility.

As the music reaches one of its crescendos, she drops to her haunches, offering me her tits like she did on the bar.

I know it was just part of her act. I'm not that far gone, I do realize that even when it feels like she's dancing for me, I'm sharing her with a room full of other guys slavering in lust over her.

But as she shimmies her ass and shakes her tits, undulating her body with sensual abandon, it feels like this dance was designed for me.

It's not true. She designed this dance for the guy she was willing to take into the backroom.

When her next set of moves brings her onto the sofa, straddling my hip, but not touching it, my desire is back to warring with rage at the thought of her doing this for another man.

She grabs my wrist and lifts my hand to the side of her generous tit. Her skin is every bit as soft as I dreamed it would be and for a second I am completely lost in the sensation of touching her for the first time.

Her eyes meet mine, her pupils blown, like she is as sexually excited as me.

Or… "Are you high?" That would explain a lot.

Candi falters in her attempt to slide my hand down her body and stares at me. "What did you just say?"

"I think someone put GHB in your water, Candi. This isn't you."

"What do you mean it's not me? This is what I do. "

"You don't come into the backrooms for anyone."

She stares at me as if she doesn't understand my words, and it convinces me even more that someone slipped a roofie in her drink. I'll kill the son of a bitch but right now I need to make sure she's safe.

Ignoring the need raging through my body, I grab her by the waist and lift her away from me. "You need to go home, Candi. You're not safe with your decision-making impaired like this."

Neither are the men she could invite into the backroom after me. Them I don't care about.

Her I do.

Even knowing I have to let her go, my fingers reflexively squeeze the soft skin under my hands.

But she's not looking at me with sexy need anymore.

Dark eyes narrowed in a glare that would kill if it was a bullet, she yanks on my wrists, trying to dislodge my hold. "I'm not high and you don't get to make me feel bad for doing whatyoupretended to want."

"I don't pretend shit."

"Right. Why did you come back here with me?" she demands.

"Because I wasn't letting you offer what you were offering to me to someone else," I tell her honestly. "Fuck, Candi, who would drug you?"

"For the last time, I'm not drugged." She shoves at me.

I step back because she's clearly distressed.

"I know exactly what I'm doing. Do you think I could dance like that…" She waves her hand toward the bar. "If I was under the influence of GHB or K?"

"Don't try to tell me dancers never work high."

She shakes her head, kicks her leg up into another split and spins with smooth strength that gives lie to the idea that she is high. Dropping her leg, she cocks her hip. "If I was impaired, I never would have been able to keep my hold on the pole doing that, much less do it standing."

"Then what the hell is going on?" I demand. "You don't take men into the backroom."

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