Chapter One
Well hell.
Standing in the middle of the empty club, Bodie spun in a slow and careful circle, taking in every inch of space, light, and potential she was being offered. Her performing heart gave a contented sigh of delight, thrilled with the opportunity at her fingertips, while her logical brain assessed not only what she had to work with but the where.
It was a dream job, she couldn’t deny that. The location was prime, the pay undeniably generous. The travel aspect was a bit daunting, sure, but doable. The reports from the club manager showed attendance was not only holding steady but increasing slowly.
She paced around the main floor with all the elegance and grace she’d nurtured for years. A dancer through and through, to the point where music burrowed into her marrow and hummed. Dodging tables with the chairs upturned on their tops, skirting around the sunken seating pit big enough to hold over a dozen people, trailing her fingers over the squeaky-clean wooden frame of a padded loveseat.
A lot of room for a lot of people.
A great deal of space for a great deal of debauchery.
What the hell was she doing, considering taking on something like this?
Oh yeah, that’s right—she needed the money.
Footfalls tapping gently on the polished wooden floor, Bodie sighed and scrubbed her hands over her face. The decision was niggling at her, one way then the other. It wasn’t like dancing here would hurt—she had no intention of joining in the club festivities—but she didn’t know whether her professionalism would hold up to performing in front of a heaving audience of kinksters.
“Boadicea.” The club manager called her name from behind the bar where he worked on inventory while giving her much appreciated time and space to assess the situation. “You don’t have to take the position if you don’t want to. The boss understands that this kind of venue isn’t for everyone.”
For a moment, she dug her fingertips into her closed eyes, pressing hard to alleviate some of the pressure building in her head. It wasn’t about what she wanted to do, it was what she could and couldn’t afford not to do.
Right now, she couldn’t afford not to dance here.
Dropping her hands to her sides, she walked over to the bar and sat heavily on one of the padded barstools with short back supports. Hooking her feet onto the lower rung, she slapped her hand on the gleaming oak bar. “Double jack, hold the rocks.”
William Carradine, more fondly known as Liam, lifted his eyebrow at the order. Who knew such a good-looking guy would sprout from the short, skinny boy he’d been? They’d been friends forever, from the day Bodie shared her lunch with him in kindergarten when his junkie mom forgot to feed him for the third day in a row.
Standing at just under six feet, Liam had not only grown upwards, but he’d filled out deliciously. Fit, muscular, he was every woman’s dream...and every woman’s disappointment. Who wouldn’t be disappointed to discover the hot blond with subtle ink and funny, witty outlook on life hit homeruns for the other team? “Baby, it’s ten a.m.”
She moaned and thunked her forehead down on the bar. “That’s what my life has been reduced to, Liam. It’s an absolute fucking mess. I don’t know what to do.” She let her head roll to one side when a glass clinked in front of her, offered her best friend a rueful smile. “You caved in to the crazy person’s demands.”
Sad gray eyes met hers. “You’re not crazy, Bodie. Life’s thrown you a curveball and you’ve faceplanted, that’s all. Just gotta get your feet back under you and get past this.” He passed his hand over her hair in a soothing stroke. “I still don’t get why you did it.”
She closed her eyes and let him work his fingers on her scalp. He had magic fingers—it was such a shame he was bisexual; she’d have married him in a heartbeat. “You know why, Liam. They hate me for what happened to her, so they figure I should be the one to pay for it. Maybe they’re not wrong in their thinking.”
Her big buff best friend huffed out an angry breath. “Maybe they’re full of bullshit, Bo. What happened to Alicia wasn’t anyone’s fault but her own, and they know it. You’re the handy scapegoat, the one who pulled herself out of the shit and made a life for herself. The one they can exploit for their own gains.”
Her sigh was long and shuddering. “Yeah, well, there’s nothing left for them to exploit. Bank account is reading a big fat zero and I’m just...so fucking tired. I need this job, Liam, but I don’t know if I have the guts to step up there and dance in front of...”
Liam’s hand settled on the side of her head, a comforting weight. “Don’t think of the club as being full of perverts, Bodie. That’s a huge mistake and it does an injustice to every single member who walks through that door. You’re not that small-minded; I know you’re not. Think of it as performing for a crowd of people who will appreciate your gift. Making people happy, entertaining them. That was always your dream when we were kids.”
“I had a lot of dreams as a kid. They all died, burning to ashes.”
“Then make new ones. I recommended you for this because Fitzpatrick wants a performer with the confidence to wow his clientele. He wants vibrancy, passion, the motherfucking wow factor. I can’t think of anyone who fits the bill better than you.”
“Thanks for that,” she muttered. “At least one of us has faith in me.”
Liam’s hand fisted in her hair, sending prickles of pain radiating over her scalp. He tugged her head off the bar and made her look at him even as her hands flailed to try and loosen his grip, ignoring her squeals and yelps. “I’ve always had faith in you, Boadicea. From that day you took me under your wing in kindergarten, my faith in you has been unshakeable. If you told me you could fly to the top of Mount Everest, I wouldn’t doubt you.”
Goddamn him. The more she struggled, the harsher his grip became. It wasn’t the first time he’d used hairpulling as a method of making her listen to him when she was so miserable she passed into the whiny stage of living, but knowing now where he worked and why, she had to figure he was high up in the ranking system or whatever BDSM used.
She went limp after several painful minutes of struggling, and her reward was the release of her hair and the skim of his knuckles over her cheek. It made her feel...weird. She didn’t know much about this stuff, didn’t want to. She had far too much on her plate right now to even think about the details of what went on here beyond what she needed to know about the job.
“Now, pull your big girl panties up, get your head out of this funk, and think. You have the power to change your life, my little Boadicea. Yes, you might not have two nickels to rub together right now, and that sucks. But if you want to get back on your feet, I’m offering the hand that can do that.”
“Fitzpatrick,” she said, shoving herself into a sitting position and cautiously touching her head. With a disgruntled sigh, she undid the casual ponytail and shook out her mane of shoulder-length black hair, straightening out the locks her asshole friend’s fingers had ruffled. Within a minute, she’d restrained her hair back into order. “Why the hell does he want a dancer for exhibitions anyway? Surely he’d be better having sex demonstrations.”