Hard Core (Hard As Nails Book 3) (2 page)

The silver tray is full with Jack and Cokes. For whatever reason, that seems to be the go-to drink in shady joints such as the one I find myself employed in.

I carry the tray to the table nearest the entrance, parked in front of the left wing of the ‘T’.

“Good evening, gentlemen,” I scream over the blaring music. “These are a treat from the management,” I say as I place the drinks, one in front of each of the nine middle-aged men in pressed suits. I spin the tray and park it under the pit of my arm. “I will be serving you tonight, just let me know if there’s anything I can do for you.”

“Will do, sweetheart,” the man sitting next to me says as he raises his glass to cheer his friends or coworkers.

I turn and head back to the bar. Making my way through the dense Saturday evening crowd, I glance at the stage that’s painted in a red glow. At each point of the ‘T’ are women dancing their way to freedom one song at a time. They’re acrobatic magicians, putting on a show that leaves the audience captivated and wanting more.

I’ve been working here two months. Like me, most of the girls, strippers and waitresses alike, are trying to make fast money in the hopes of moving on to bigger and better things. Two are fellow actresses. One is saving for medical school. Several just enjoy the feeling of power that dancing on a pole gives them. Most of them have kids with deadbeat fathers who are behind on child support. We’ve all lost something, or stand to lose something. It doesn’t matter which. For the moment, we’re stuck in this place for better or worse.

Smack!
A hand slaps against my ass. I flinch, the tray almost fumbling from my grasp. I purse my lips and prepare myself before craning my head to look at my assailant with a fake smile plastered across my face.

“Mr. Goodwin.” I twist to face him fully. “What are the rules?”

He bites his lip, trying to look seductive and charming, but succeeding only in looking creepier than normal. With any luck, he’ll be blackout drunk soon. If he doesn’t try to instigate a fight before the night is over, it will be a miracle.

“Maybe you’ll be up on that stage someday,” he suggests. “I’d love to see you put on a show.”

I look around, but see no sign of Rhett or Hector, the two bouncers on duty. I’m not surprised. They often disappear with Walt, the manager; the joke is that they’re having illicit three-ways in Walt’s office. Regardless, we’ve all learned to look out for ourselves and each other. Girl power has never been a more necessary than it is in here.

Inside I’m seething, but I keep a smile on my face. I tell myself this job is doing wonders for my acting skills. “We’ll see, Mr. Goodwin,” I say dryly, and the smile slips from my face as I turn away and sigh.

Little does Mr. Goodwin know I plan on getting on that stage soon. Not because it’s what I want—hell, my current uniform of tight shorts and a snug, well-fitted top is showing too much skin for my own personal comfort—but because it’s what I need. When Mr. Prince, the owner of the club, hired me, he’d told me I could waitress for a couple of months while I got the lay of the land, so to speak. Since I’d told him about my dad, he’d even said he’d pay me a stripper’s salary while I waitressed, but that he wanted me to take some lessons from a friend of his, and then start stripping on stage soon thereafter.

How could I say no?

Before my dad got sick, I was just another actress dreaming of hitting the big time. Now I’m here for reasons much more important than pursuing my dream career.

I’m here to save the only man who’s always been there for me. And I’m not going to let a butt-slapping Mr. Goodwin or my preference for wearing clothes over stripping for a bunch of horny toads stop me from making sure my dad gets his treatments.

Mr. Prince will be contacting me soon to get me in touch with his “friend,” the one who’s going to teach me all I need to know about working a pole. And I’m just going to have accept my fate.

I reach into the pocket of my apron and retrieve my cell phone to check the time. A relieved smile hitches across my face because I’m due fifteen minutes away from all this noise, chaos, and debauchery.

I make my way down a narrow hall, where girls in skimpy clothing line each side, mentally preparing themselves to cross the threshold from privacy into exhibitionism. I push through the thick, green, metal outer door and inhale a sharp breath of the cool autumn breeze, but with the night air, I also inhale the last remnants of cigarette smoke as Becky twists her heel against a cigarette lying on the asphalt.

I’d started smoking when I was sixteen, but after my father was diagnosed with cancer three years ago, I’d quit. Sometimes, I want to take a hit so badly, and working at the club has made it even harder to abstain. Sometimes, I think a cigarette might be the one thing capable of calming my nerves when I’m most frayed. Sometimes, I think one quick hit of nicotine could pull me back from the brink when I feel like I’m going to lose my mind.

But I refuse to let my cravings rule me. Cigarettes are not important. My father is. He’s the reason I breathe in an increasingly claustrophobic world, and because I want to be around for him, and because I don’t want to someday end up in the same predicament as him, I shake my head when Becky offers me a cigarette from her open pack.

“No, thanks.”

“No problem, Ally Cat. See you inside.”

She heads back into the club, but no sooner is she gone than the door opens again. It’s only with quick reflexes leftover from my high school volleyball days that I’m able to avert the blow of the metal door against my back.

“Shit,” Marley crows as she digs into her pocket for a lighter to light the cigarette dangling from cherry lips. In the past two months, she and I have gotten tight, mostly because my first day here I’d felt like a fish out of water, and when some guys had cornered me by the restrooms, Marley had stepped in and made them back off with nothing but her sharp tongue and her observation that only guys with needle dicks would back a woman into a corner. I reach across the thin space between us and offer her a light from the lighter I carry around in my apron, and she graciously accepts. “Thank you so much, babe.”

“You know I’m always here to lend you a hand.” I elbow her playfully and stuff the lighter back in my pocket. Walt says we should always have a lighter on hand in case a client should require one, never mind the fact that smoking indoors is illegal statewide. “You doing all right?”

“Always,” she says through a forced smile and takes a puff. “Why?”

“Because,” I shift my eyes to her left hand, the one not cradling a cigarette. “You’re shaking like you’re running away from something.”

“Yeah.” She nods her head, still with the same forced smile. “It’s those damn lights.”

“They are hot,” I point out. “But that’s not what’s bothering you.”

“You’re always so observant.” She eyes me back. She’s beautiful, with mocha skin and cocoa brown hair. But she’s also too thin, has dark shadows under her eyes, and looks strung out half-the-time, not from drugs, but nerves. “How did you get so observant?”

That’s not the important question though, so I bypass her inquiry and skip back to mine. “It’s not the lights that are bothering you. Tell me what’s up.”

She purses her lips and cocks her head back to the club behind us. “It’s nothing really.”

“Fine,” I huff. “You don’t want to talk about it. But if you ever need to, you know I’m here for you. Always.”

“You’re so sweet.” She nods and takes one last hit of her cigarette before she tosses it to the ground and scrubs it with the back of her six-inch heels. “You’re not like the rest of us.”

“Maybe not.” I inhale smoke as it passes, and almost choke on the second-hand cloud of cancer. I wave away the remainder of the smoke and clear my throat. “But I’m here, same as you, and I’m glad we’re friends.”

“Like I said,” she says as she places her palm on my shoulder. “You’re sweet.”

Before I can respond, she’s ripping the door open, and I’m hit with an obnoxious blast of hip-hop as she barrels down the long and narrow hall. I watch her disappear into the fog of red neon lights until the door comes to a close. I take one last glance at the city noir around me before I head back inside.

* * *

Since starting work at the club, my sleep schedule has been utterly destroyed. I used to be an early morning girl, back before life went haywire. Now, if I’m awake by noon, it’s a miracle and the days I sleep until two or three are not uncommon.

It’s affected my friendships and any chance of a real relationship. It’s hard to connect to others when my world revolves on a different time schedule. My days are their nights. My nights are their days.

I miss sunrises, because I thrive in the sun.

Now it’s late afternoon and I’m staring at the kitchen counter, thinking of tackling the pile of dishes when what I really want to do is throw them away. Unfortunately, I’m not in a financial state to be able to afford such a lavish fit of laziness.

My phone rings on the other side of the counter, and I reach over the laminate space to grab it. I swipe the ringing phone in my hand. It’s Dad.

“Hey, baby girl,” he says and my heart melts.

He’s been calling me that since I was a toddler. I don’t even remember when it began because I was so young, but he says it started sometime around the time my mother left the both of us.

“How are you doing?” he asks.

“I’m doing great.” I prop myself up onto the counter, my feet kicking against the cabinets below. “How are those mean old nurses treating you?”

“You know me,” he says, and I can almost see the grin plastered across his face. “Women love me.”

It’s an inside joke between the two of us. He says there have only been two women in his life who’ve ever loved him. His mother and myself. Obviously, my own mother doesn’t fall into that equation because she doesn’t know how to love. She couldn’t. Not after what she did to us.

“Yeah,” I chuckle. “I know.”

“How is work?”

His question sends my heart plummeting into my stomach. He doesn’t know I work at the strip club, and he’ll never know. Every time I’m forced to lie to him, which is every time he calls, a piece of my soul is chipped away.

“Work’s great. I’ve been getting a lot of small jobs, but they’re adding up.”

“I always knew you were going to be a star,” he gloats through the phone. “From the time you were young, I knew you were going to become something special. Not just to me, but I knew the world would one day love you as much as I do.”

“Dad,” I caution him. “It’s not like that.”

“When do I get to see one of those movies?”

“You know how this business works.” I sigh. “It could be years, if ever.”

“Did you know your mom wanted to be an actress?”

“Did she?” I ask, and I couldn’t deliver the inquiry with less care. I have to remind myself I want to act
in spite
of my mom, not because of her. “You know how I feel about that.”

“I do.” He coughs.

He hacks.

He’s sick and I wish I could be there for him, but I have work in a few short hours. Maybe Walt will give me a night off soon. Not likely, but there’s no harm in asking.

“When are you coming to see me?” he asks.

“Soon, Daddy.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

“Gotta go,” he says as low as a whisper, but with some excitement in his tone. “Beth is here.”

“Who the hell is Beth?”

“No time to chat,” he says before hanging up, and I’m left staring through the empty space of my apartment, and out into the bustling city outside.

I wonder who I am, and who I’m going to be. I want to be hopeful. I want to hang on to my dreams. I want to forget the fact I’m one step away from taking the stage with my tits hanging out for the world to see.

But I can’t.

Chapter Three

Axel

Nailed Garage looks so much different during the day. Clouds roll by in the distance, but for now, the garage is painted in the hard glow of afternoon light.

I park my bike next to a row of four other bikes, all gleaming under the beating sun. I love everything about bikes: the way they purr when I rev them, the way I can swerve around traffic during morning and evening rush hour, but most importantly, I love the wind blowing through my short hair. When I’m on my bike, I have no past. No future. I’m just me in that moment. Free.

When I step onto the ground, however, whether it’s dirt, gravel, grass, or asphalt, I’m grounded to this world, with no escape. That’s how I feel right now as I walk toward the main office door. Of course, it’s not that I want to escape—I’m about to see my friends face-to-face for the first time in three years. I know we’re good. That they have my back. But I can never quite rid myself of the fear that when I least expect it, this new family I’ve found will somehow be taken away from me just like my old one.

I take a deep breath as I walk through the door and head back to the boardroom. In perfect sync, the four of them, the men that comprise my own personal brotherhood, turn to me with matching grins.

There’s Jericho, the unspoken leader of our merry little band. He’s just five feet ten, but he commands respect and attention. Of the five of us, he’s the most stereotypical-looking biker, with shoulder length, wavy brown hair, and an MC vest worn over a faded white T-shirt.