Page 50 of Bite Marks

Vi threw herself into the chair opposite my desk, setting the plates between us. My office—Cherie’s old office—wasn’t spacious thanks to the army of filing cabinets that lined the walls. It turned out that a couple hundred years could turn anyone into a pack rat. There was hardly enough room for an L-shaped desk with my computer and printer, and the chair, usually occupied by Elsie or Juniper, sat at an angle across from mine.

I shoved a stack of overflowing folders secured with thick elastics out of the way, making space for the two of us to eat.

I preferred my old office. This one felt cold without Cherie sipping a Malbec to the sound of Miles Davis. Tomb-like as it collected dust, waiting for someone who was never coming back.

“So…” the human asked conversationally, popping the tab of her cola with a fizzy hiss. “What has you scowling at your computer like it threatened your mom?”

I hesitated, unsure of how much I should reveal to someone outside our coven. But as I looked into Vi’s deep brown eyes, I couldn’t help myself as all the anxiety and frustration burst out of me between vicious bites of pizza.

“My wife’s brother is trying to take the club out from under us while her will is missing,” I explained, watching her eyebrows disappear behind her bluntly cut bangs. “We can either fork over a fuckload of money—” I nodded appreciatively as she opened my drink, sliding it toward me, “—or the fucking prick is going to sell the club.”

“Can he really do that?”

“He’s her next of kin. Without a written will, he can do whatever the fuck he wants.”

Vi swore loudly, shaking her head.

“Okay, so how can I help? What do we need to do?”

“That's the problem,” I sighed, grabbing a tissue from the box beside my monitor to wipe the corner of my mouth. “I can’t figure out how to increase our attendance, and if we can’t get more bodies, we’ll need to raise prices, but if we raise prices, we risk the business we already have and?—”

“Dana,” Vi said softly, reaching across the surface of the table to catch my hand in her warm fingers. “Breathe. Valentine’s Day is coming up?—”

I laughed bitterly. “Not exactly a strip club’s best night, Vi.”

“Yeah, but we’re not a strip club. We’re asexclub,” she said, tilting her head to the side with a thoughtful hum. “A sex club that caters to clientele that’ve had more than enough stuffy Hallmark holiday dinner-like dates, right?”

A second slice of pizza stalled halfway to my mouth. “Well, yeah… I guess so.”

“We don’t have a lot of time, so it doesn’t have to be anything, like, crazy.” Vi turned in her seat, swiping some paper out of my printer and a pen from theWorld’s Greatest Bossmug sitting on my desk. “An ad campaign, mostly on social media, since traditional advertising would mean planning more in advance. We would offer, say, a one-night-only package where non-members get two entries at a slightly discounted rate.”

“Get more people in the door,” I said, tossing the pizza down onto the plate. “Okay, so that solves one problem, but if it’s a discounted rate we’d need?—”

“Hey, I’m not done.” She shoved the plate closer to me as she smoothed the paper down, her hand moving in quick, decisive strokes as the silhouette of a retro pinup girl began to takeshape. “We have Elsie pose for something like this and send it to your most active members—they see her all the time and will be expecting it. Plus, she’s always a draw for them. And then something like this…” She sketched another pose under the first, the shapes of two women artfully suggestive as she continued to add careful lines. “To the least active members to get them excited to come back. Then we need to address the average ticket.”

“I… Uh… Right?”

Where the fuck is this coming from?

“A couple of custom cocktails with inexpensive but premium-feeling garnishes that allow us to hike up the cost like a smoking cloche, some rosemary, or whatever—and a deal on full bottles of champagne. The markup is high, and they’re so beautiful on a table that they’ll really set the mood. We should give them the option to pre-buy a bottle at a discount with their tickets so they’re already half-drunk before they have to actually order anything.”

“Vi—”

“And, in my fantasy land, we manage to find a caterer with some time to supply some light snacks and desserts. Get people in early for the stage show, keep them here late enjoying playtime.” By the time she was finished, our lunch was cold, and she’d filled four pages of notes, pushing them toward me along with the pen. “Or something like that.”

I blinked, silence stretching between us as I looked from the notes to the life-saving genius seated across the desk.

Even with the discounted ticket cost, the add-ons she’d proposed would earn us a healthy profit.

It was fucking brilliant.

It wasexactlywhat I needed.

Maybe I needed a girl—thisgirl—to walk into my club and fix things.

“This is a really good plan, Vi.”

“I know,” she said, puffing her chest with a cocky little smile. “I worked in marketing until I got laid off last year.”

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