Page 7 of Ravaged
CHAPTER 3
Teagen
“I forgot my eye shadow,” I said. Iris pursed her black-painted lips together. With her black bandeau singed tight around her chest and a black jean skirt, her hair fringed outward, we were the exact opposite. I was the innocent-looking American sweetheart, complete with long, flowing brown curls and green eyes, while Iris was someone who instantly made club members tense up. We shouldn’t have been best friends or even acquaintances, but the truth was that our personalities worked well together. They had since day one.
“You don’t need eye shadow,” Iris said. “Your eyes look fine without it.”
“No. It’s these brows,” I said.
She rolled her eyes. “You and your obsession with eyebrows.” It was easy for her to say; she had no problem shaving them off when she didn’t care for how her plucking turned out. Me? Not so easy.
“Hold on,” I said, pulling her arm towards the Greenhouse.
Though both of us had dorm rooms in the Greenhouse, we sometimes liked to find a spot in the dressing rooms, to be part of the camaraderie of servers that actually had places to live outside of here. There were some things I liked about the Dahlia District. You could hardly tell that it was basically a high-end brothel on weekend nights in the dressing room. The chatting from the servers, the metal clicks of curling irons, the clinks of glasses while everyone took shots while getting ready. It could have been a green room in a theater or an actual dorm room in a college. Being in the middle of everything, I didn’t have to despise Dahlia, because even if we had been coerced into working there, at least we had each other.
I left Iris in the dressing room and went to grab my bag of shadows off of my bedroom dresser, but my eyes caught the harp necklace. It shined, flashing as it moved through the light. I picked it up, turning it over in my hand. Still the same, worn and well-loved harp necklace. I clasped the ending around my neck, then walked back to the dressing room. When did my dad have a chance to drop it off, without me seeing him?
I popped back into the dressing room. “Did you see my dad come in here?” I asked.
“Not since yesterday,” Iris shrugged.
I turned down the dressing room and said in a loud voice: “Did anyone see my dad here today?”
“Nah,” a server said. A few grunted. No one had seen him.
It gave me a weird feeling, but I squashed that instinct down. My dad had always been strange, showing up one minute and disappearing the next, though most times, he had delivered the harp necklace by hand. It felt good to have it around my neck again, the harp weighing on my chest. It was part of my signature look. Without it, I was practically naked.
I wasn’t supposed to perform, but Dahlia had switched me around with a few others so that I would play the harp that night. I wore a midnight blue strapless bustier with a thin, sheer cover. Playing an instrument as big as the harp meant that I had to be stationary, which meant I couldn’t dance or undulate enticingly as the other servers during their performances. I held onto the fact that music was powerful, but Dahlia insisted I performed in lingerie. I didn’t mind; it got hot under those stage lights.
My eyes landed on a man sitting in the lounge. Dark hair styled neatly, facial hair groomed, an expensive-looking suit. I didn’t recognize him. A server approached him as we made our way across the club, and he dismissed her.
“New club member,” I said in a low voice to Iris. I motioned toward him. We went up the stairs to the wings of the main stage, and Iris studied him from the corner.
“Something’s not right,” she said. “I don’t trust him.”
“You think he’s the new owner?” I asked, raising a brow.
“Nothing like that. He’s—” She wrinkled her nose. “I don’t trust him.”
“You never trust anyone,” I teased.
“Look,” she said. She pointed at him. Another server approached him, and he waved a hand, dismissing her advances too. “Most new club members want all of the attention. Flashing around their money like they’re driving a Lamborghini all the way down to the supermarket. But he’s not acknowledging anyone. He’s waiting for someone. He’s searched this place out, for a specific person. And it’s his first time at the club.”
She had a point, but it didn’t mean that the guy was inherently evil.
“Maybe he knows what he likes,” I said.
Iris smirked. “You just like him because he’s hot.”
“I’m just saying,” I tilted my chin, “Give him a chance.”
“Fine. Once you go up?” she asked. I nodded. After she helped me bring the harp and music bench to the middle of the stage, the lights dimmed and the spotlight turned on. In the wings, I removed the sheer cover, then went to the bench.
I playedDespacito, a song that I knew at least a few club members would know, and the rest would think was pretty. Though I could play many instruments, the harp was my favorite. I knew the way to pluck my fingers, to dance my limbs in time with the melody as if the strings were an extension of my body. It was the first instrument that I had taken lessons for, back when I was four, when even the smallest lap harp was too big for me. But Dad had found a patient music coach, and with their encouragement, I kept at it.
And in some ways, I achieved my childhood dream. I played frequently for a crowd, just not in the capacity I envisioned.
The new club member was still there. His dark eyes peered up at the stage, and though I was technically placed above him, I felt like I was shrinking, even though I had the height advantage. Iris bent down to whisper in his ear, but he gestured away, making her leave. She looked up at the stage, exchangingI-told-you-soeye contact with me, and I gave a small, imperceptible shrug. She went to the lounge to find her regulars.
