Holding her tongue didn’t stop her from making kissing noises as we loaded into the limo and pulled away, leaving the Dollhouse in our rearview.

  CHAPTER

  FOURTEEN

  Zephyr

  Listening at the bathroom door, I heard most of what was said, so I wasn’t surprised when Darby burst in a few moments later.

  His orange eyes targeted me, and his lips quirked in a grin as he gave me a quick head-to-toe assessment. Then he nodded.

  “Found yourself a daddy, huh, sugar?”

  The notion made me blush. Beck did have a certain air about him. Refined. Mature. But I got the impression Darby was referring to the more practical side of things. He had regulars who brought him gifts and booked his time in advance. Maybe I could have that too.

  The idea of Beck bringing flowers or reserving one of the executive suites so we could cozy up and sip cocktails was an alluring one. I’d much rather keep him company than flit from stranger to stranger between stage performances. It would be nice to linger somewhere familiar and safe.

  “Make sure he takes care of you,” Darby added, and I blinked.

  It was a startling realization, though perhaps not a logical one. I felt safer in a bathroom stall with my pants down than I had anywhere else in the club. Was it because of Beck? Or because I was getting the sustenance my demonic nature craved?

  I could have asked Darby, but I wasn’t sure he would understand. I was different from him—different from all of them. While their vices were mere temptations, mine was a primal need.

  “He…” I looked down at the tile floor chilling my bare toes, then muttered, “Yeah.”

  Darby wandered to the mirror and checked his reflection, adjusting the way his hair curled around the spirals of his horns. With a finessing tug on the hem of his white satin jacket, he faced me again.

  “Well, if Daddy Beck gives you any shit, tell me, and I’ll make sure he never darkens our door again. Got it?”

  I didn’t ask how he would do that, but I also didn’t doubt it. I’d witnessed enough while shadowing him in VIP to know he had contacts outside the club and customers who would do almost anything for him. Watching him work, I sometimes wondered who was performing for whom.

  “Got it,” I told him while trying to work the kinks out of my smile. “Thanks.”

  I expected someone to ask why I’d bailed on yoga, but by the time I’d scavenged a late breakfast, showered, and changed, the others had already moved on. Oz and Elliot were in the weight room. Darby was holed up in the DJ booth, sorting through tonight’s set lists. The twins… well, I rarely knew where they were, and it was usually best not to ask.

  That left the stage—and my silks—open. The thought sent a ripple of relief through me. I was ready to get off the ground for a while.

  I stepped out of the dressing room and onto the club floor. As expected, the place was quiet. Mostly. Near the stage, beneath the dark lattice of the ceiling rig, Maslow stood gesturing upward, in mid-conversation with one of the bouncers.

  I’d never thought of Maslow as classy, but lately, I measured everyone against Beck—and few fell so spectacularly short. His pinstriped suit was rumpled, and the buttons strained across his gut. Wisps of thin hair clung to his scalp beneath a sheen of sweat, and he punctuated his words with a cigar, scattering ash like confetti.

  The hellhound bouncer beside him was a mountain of a man, with his arms folded across his chest in an intimidating pose. A black shirt stretched across his pecs, and a clear earpiece curled around his ear like a snake. He didn’t speak, just nodded while Maslow prattled on.

  I was tempted to retreat. I’d made steering clear of Maslow a matter of course. But with my silks beckoning, I decided to cut a wide angle around the pair.

  “Bump the red gels and turn that spot three degrees to the left,” Maslow muttered. “I want them looking like the devils they are, not high school theater rejects.”

  I weaved around a booth toward the stage steps, believing I was beneath my boss’s notice until he called over.

  “Zephyr, baby?”

  A chill crept up my spine as I turned slowly to find him aiming his cigar-bearing hand toward me.

  “Get up there and strike a pose,” he said. “Show us what you’ve been giving all our high rollers.”

  Both he and the bouncer tracked me as I gave a quick nod then hurried up the steps. The stage was farther from Maslow, after all—out of his range. I could cock my hip or wiggle my ass to appease him, then carry on.

  It was easier to move these days. Everything flowed. Gone was the way my blood used to crawl through my veins like sludge. Now I felt light, graceful, like I was rediscovering a part of myself I’d thought lost.

  Stepping into the spotlight felt like slipping into joy. I widened my stance, turned one leg out, and slid a hand beneath my shirt. The hem rose slowly—just like Beck had done. I imagined it was his hand instead of mine, inching higher, tracing fire across my skin.

  “Enough!” Maslow shouted, though I’d barely begun.

  The wraith strode toward me, stomping up the steps in his leather loafers. As he approached, I took a swaying step backward before he caught my arm to prevent further retreat.

  “That was nice, baby boy,” he said, his breath choked with smoke. “Maybe you could show me a bit more backstage?”

  He said it like a question, but it was definitely a command, and one I knew better than to refuse as he squeezed my bicep then tugged me toward the curtains at the rear of the stage.

  Fear spiked, and I glanced toward the DJ booth to find Darby watching with his brows pinched. He didn’t say anything, just watched as Maslow hauled me into the darkness and out of sight.

  Backstage was the least polished corner of the Dollhouse. The narrow, utilitarian space had been clearly overlooked in the club’s otherwise meticulous design. The walls were scuffed black drywall, patched where someone—probably Colt—had kicked through it, and the floor was a dangerous tangle of gaffer tape and cables. A single strip light buzzed overhead, casting more shadow than illumination. Through a worn doorway, the dressing room offered a little more light and a lot more chaos. At night, anyway. Everything was quiet during the day. Vacant, which was what I imagined Maslow counted on by bringing me here.

  He slung me around so I was pressed flat against the wall. I braced for the assault. Maslow never smelled like lust, but I had to assume that was what he wanted. It was what everyone seemed to want—to touch, taste, and feel—but in the wraith’s case, I was right about only one of those things.

  Maslow took a final drag of his cigar then flicked the butt away to die on the wooden floor.

  “Look at me, sweet thing,” he said, calling my gaze from where it had fixed on the fading ember.

  I searched his eyes for some hint of what was in store, and how soon it would be over with. The idea of the wraith entering my body made my stomach lurch. I felt claimed already by a man who was perhaps too happy to keep our interactions secret. But Beck said he’d come back. To “settle,” whatever that meant. I didn’t care because it was a promise I knew he would keep. It was also something I found myself fantasizing about while Maslow squeezed my arm until it ached.

  “You selfish bitch.” His lip curled with disgust as he brought his other hand around, grabbing my chin and tipping my head from one side to the other.

  I swallowed a cry of protest and let him look—inspect—until realization settled on me.

  This wasn’t about sex; it was about food.

  For me, they were one and the same, and Maslow wasn’t so different. Not as different as I wished he was. What he was doing now, taking in my scent, feeling my essence like a second pulse, was reminiscent of how I sensed Beck. How his desire made my mouth water. How I wanted to languish with his cock inside me, connected to the thing that made me feel whole.

  But I was the meal now. Full of provisions I’d wanted to hoard so I could enjoy this satiety for a while longer.

  “You’ve been getting fucked on my property, under my roof, and not telling me about it?” The wraith shoved my head aside, and I kept it that way, dodging the fire in his glare.

  “Where’s the footage, you dumb cunt?” He grabbed my other arm and pinned me to the wall while he loomed inches away, nearly spitting with every word that left his thin lips. “There’s dust collecting on the bed I made for you while you’re stealing from me?”

  I swallowed again, trying not to whine or wince while his grip burrowed into me.

  “Do you know how lucky you are?” Maslow asked. His hot breath made my skin bead with sweat. “I’ve got a line of bitches waiting to take what you have. Do you know what that is, baby boy?”

  My lower lip quivered as he rushed to inform me.

  “A chance. That’s what I’m giving you. Don’t fucking blow it.” His brow dipped, and he chuckled darkly. “The only thing you’d better be blowing is whatever lust-struck sap you drag to the fuck palace I built for you.”

  He was right. I’d been avoiding the “Private Area” like I was running from my own reality. This was better than Hell, wasn’t it? Maybe better than whatever life I’d had before, though that version of me felt so distant that I sometimes wondered if he was real at all or someone I’d dreamed up. An imaginary friend I liked to play with on those nights I lay awake watching the watercolor lights paint my bedroom ceiling.

  “What have you been charging?” Maslow’s question roused me to awareness. “Better be a lot because this is a classy establishment, and I don’t employ cheap whores.”

  Tears stung my eyes.

  I didn’t want to be bought or sold for any price. Beck had offered, and maybe… oh, fuck, maybe… Had he been trying to pay me in the bathroom? “Settle things,” as in his debt? The fee for my services?

  The dig of Maslow’s fingers tethered me to the moment. When I said nothing, he shook me. My skull knocked against the wall so hard it must have left a dent.

  “You didn’t fucking charge?” the wraith snarled.

  Shame held my tongue, but he expected an answer, so I gave my head a stiff shake.

  A growl rumbled up from Maslow’s gut, and his hands became like pincer claws, trying to cut through me.

  “The next time you take a dick,” he said, “I want it on film. And paid for. This is not a charity, and I don’t pay you to give handouts.”

  I wanted to remind him he didn’t pay me at all, claiming the money I earned paid for my clothes, or the food in our shared kitchen, or rent on my room.

  “Figure it out, or I’ll start picking your clients for you,” Maslow continued. “Do you want that?”

  One more choice taken.

  Another liberty removed.

  I shook my head again, emphatically this time.

  “N-no,” I stammered.

  “No,” Maslow confirmed. “Because you know where you’ll be, right? Collared and leashed to the bed like a goddamn dog waiting to get boned.” He chortled an abrupt laugh. “Fuck, that was fucking clever. Blowing and boning, baby boy. Bet it gets your heart pumping, doesn’t it?”

  Tears were flowing freely now, glossing my cheeks and dripping from my lashes with each frantic blink. He could do it. Exactly what I’d feared. He could turn me into a piece of furniture. A living fuck doll with no life at all.

  “Doesn’t it?” the wraith repeated.

  My arms throbbed where he held them, cinching down until my skin stretched tight.

  “Yes, Mazzy,” I replied.

  “Good boy.” He released one of my biceps to give my face a pat that conveyed more annoyance than affection.

  Expelling a breath, Maslow looked me up and down. His anger had been replaced with an almost ravenous sneer.

  “Now,” he began, “I’m gonna take what I’m owed plus a little more. Call it a late fee. A small penalty.” Maslow’s features took on a more severe slant as he added, “Next time it’ll be a bigger one. But there won’t be a next time, will there?”

  My head wobbled through a shake. “No, Mazzy.”

  “No, Mazzy,” he agreed. “Because if anyone uses your holes, you’re gonna come straight to me, loaded with cum and cash. Am I making myself clear?”

  I wanted to gag. To cry more than the slow leak streaming down my face and dripping off my chin. Maslow was clear. Beck was clear. Everything was painfully clear. As someone who thrived in the spotlight, having my existence cast in such a harsh glow made me appreciate darkness. I thought I wasn’t ignorant, but clearly I had been.

  “Yes, Mazzy,” I whispered.

  The wraith smiled. “Good. Now hold still or I’ll make it hurt.”

  At first, nothing changed. He was already touching me, already unbearably close and prepared for what had been inevitable from the start. Then something happened. Like a flicker in the club lights. A wrong note in the music.

  My limbs went heavy, and my eyelids drooped. It hit me, slow and seeping: the pull, the pressure, the drain.

  Maslow’s fingers curled, and it felt like he’d hooked something deep inside me, some invisible thread stretched from the base of my spine to the back of my skull. Then he pulled. Fist clenched, he yanked it free, and I came undone, unraveling from the inside out.

  I gasped as my knees gave.

  My vision swam. My lips tingled with numbness.

  I couldn’t tell if I was shaking or the world was.

  When the wraith finally let go, I slid down the wall. My whole body echoed with emptiness, a shell scraped hollow and discarded.

  Maslow stepped back and adjusted his sleeve cuffs while I sat slumped, still alive and breathing because he didn’t take everything, only the best parts.

  I was subsisting on scraps again. Crumbs I tried to gather into a pathetic pile as the wraith left without a parting word.

  As the sound of his footsteps faded, I wrapped my arms around myself. Not for warmth, but for something to hold. My skin throbbed with the aching heat of bruises, the shape of the wraith’s hands stamped into me like some sick signature. I’d ask Darby to cover them later, pretend they weren’t there. Pretend I was fine.

  Around the edge of the parted red curtain, I caught sight of my silks hung high in the rigging. So far away. Out of reach.

  All I ever wanted was to fly.

  But now I felt more grounded than ever.

  CHAPTER

  FIFTEEN

  Beck

  It took me a week to work up the nerve to return to the club.

  Really, the delay was less nerves and more logistics. I spent one day researching rates for prostitutes in Vegas, then another debating whether a tip was customary or expected. If so, was it calculated in terms of percent or performance? What message did I want to send the man who’d let me fuck him twice? Who I’d called Beauty because it suited him so well, and who suckled my fingers in a way that spurred me to waste an entire afternoon pondering his head game?

  I’d gotten off to it. Multiple times. So, should I tip him for the masturbation material that was the memory of his legs, neck, and the lips that I definitely did not kiss?

  I patted my money clip where it bulged in my suit coat pocket. A less scrupulous demon would have taken the free goods without a second thought, and maybe that was my problem. I was a scrupulous demon. Or I had become one.

  “You’ve changed, Beckett,” Maslow had said. That truth stuck with me. The wraith probably wished I had taken something else away from our meeting: thoughts about his new construction on Fairmont and my ability to see it through. Instead, my focus was wrapped up in my own shortcomings and the six dancers at the mercy of whatever the Devil’s Dollhouse was, or would soon become.

  “You’re thinking about him again,” Colette quipped from her seat beside me. She tested her gloved hands on the wheel of the limo before tagging on, “The incubus.”

  “I’d say that’s logical since I’m going to see him,” I replied.

  Colette hummed. “Oui, but you don’t often sweat so much when you are being logical.”

  I frowned at the implication, then tugged open my suit coat to check my underarms for dampness.

  “You’ve been sweaty for days,” Colette continued. “And showering more than usual. Because you are sweaty? Or a different kind of salty?”

  She smelled it, of course. The not-sweat that stemmed from an area south of my underarms. She should have been a bloodhound for how eager she was to sniff out clues about my… activities.

  “It’s the desert, Coll,” I informed her. “Everyone’s sweating.”

  “And showering.” Her lips pulled into a coy smile. “And taking too long in the office bathroom to do sweaty, salty things.”

  There was no point in denying that jacking off had beaten out FreeCell in the list of ways I passed the time. Colette’s hound senses were too keen for such a confined space. I could get away with nothing.

  “I think it’s more musky than salty,” I muttered.

  “It’s both, and it’s also rather noisy,” Colette replied. If she’d provided sound effects of wet skin slapping, I might have wilted from mortification. Thankfully, she carried on, sans accompaniment. “Maybe that’s why they make the club so loud, to cover up all the… moaning.”

  My narrow gaze cut over to her. “I don’t moan.”

  Despite the warning I conveyed, the hellhound held my gaze without a hint of remorse. “What do you call it, then, when you say another man’s name and he’s not even in the room? Or the building?”

  “Pretty sure I don’t do that either.”

  She huffed a laugh. “Not when you’re awake…”

  I bolted upright in my seat, causing the belt to strain across my chest. “You’d better not be coming into my room again! I confiscated your key card for a reason⁠—”

  “I get peckish at night,” she whined. “And your minibar is so well stocked.”

  “Because I don’t eat from it,” I retorted. Then added in a grumble, “Six dollars for a bag of M&Ms is highway robbery.”

  “Never mind the chocolates.” Colette flapped her manicured hand. “The dream moaning is nothing to be ashamed of. C’est naturel.”