Bare for the Mafia Brothers

1. Elle

ELLE

“I’m going to kill you for this,” I mutter to Tia, gripping the phone harder as I make my way down a dark street at ten on a wet London night. “Seriously, do not hang up.”

“Relax,” she says. “No one is going to jump you.”

“You can’t know that for sure, but I’m warning you now. If I die and get robbed of my last tenner, I’m going to haunt you for the rest of eternity.”

“I doubt it, but noted,” she drawls. “Look, you wanted the gig. You said you needed the cash.”

I grimace at the phone. “I do, but that’s not the point. I didn’t know I was going to be wandering around looking for this idiot place.”

“It will be worth it, but you’d better hurry.”

“I’m trying,” I grit out, splashing through a puddle. “It isn’t where you said it would be.”

“Hey, I just got the directions from Mack. Take it up with him when you get there. Just keep walking toward the river.”

I huff and shove my free hand deep into my coat pocket. The rain dampens my hair and drips into my eyes. Every shadow between the streetlamps looks like a person waiting to strike. I pass a row of tall, black iron gates and realise the buildings here don’t have numbers.

I turn a sharp corner and come to a stop. “Through the arch?” I whisper to Tia.

“Through the arch, second, no, third, no, second, yes, second door on your left. You can’t miss it.” She hangs up.

She fucking hangs up, leaving me alone on the dark street. I shove my phone into my pocket and move forward.

“Once you’re inside, you can relax,” I mutter to myself, knowing that is only partially true. As a stripper, I can never truly relax on the job. There is always one arsehole with grabby hands. But it’s better than being a sitting duck out here.

I move under the old stone archway into a back alley that sends goosebumps down my arms and the back of my neck. “Second door on the left,” I mutter and move forward.

The first door is boarded up. The second one is the exact opposite.

A massive steel door breaks the line of crumbling brickwork.

There’s no sign, no flashing neon, just a small brass keypad glowing in the shadows.

This has to be the place. The air feels heavy and damp against my skin, making my blonde hair stick to the back of my neck.

I feel like a lamb walking into a butcher shop. The dread in my stomach won’t settle.

I pull the handle. The door opens without a sound, and a long hallway stretches ahead. Thick carpet silences my footsteps as I move toward the light at the end. The muffled beat of bass hits me as I move closer.

I reach a pair of double doors, take a deep breath, and push them open.

The room is vast. Dark velvet covers the walls.

There is no one here to greet me or tell me to get lost. Just an empty room.

I frown and move further in, looking around.

“Tia, I’m going to kill you twice,” I mutter as I realise I’ve been stitched up.

My shoulders slump. My bag slides off and hits the floor.

I grip the handle and hoist it back up, turning to leave when I see a door that is almost part of the wall.

It’s covered in the same dark velvet and is barely noticeable.

I don’t even know how my eye caught it as I move closer.

My hand closes over the small black knob, and I hesitantly pull the door open.

The bass hits me in the face now, along with a cheer from a crowd.

“What is this?” I practically whimper as I hover on the threshold.

Strip joints and their adjacent, more upper-class cousins don’t usually have cheering crowds.

Lewd remarks, hands, the occasional exposed cock, yes. Cheering on the strippers is a new one.

With a gulp and second thoughts crashing through my mind, I step through the doorway and find myself on a narrow mezzanine. The door closes silently behind me.

The cheering gets louder, as does the bass.

I force myself to move forward, wondering what the hell I’ve got myself into.

There is a narrow, metal spiral staircase at the end of the level.

I peer down, but can’t see anything. I turn around and take two steps back up before I think of the tenner in my purse and promised five hundred pounds this job is supposed to give me, cash in hand and, essentially, tax free.

“Dammit,” I mutter and turn around, taking the two steps down to return to where I was. I lean over the railing to see if I can see anything, but there is still nothing to see.

I jump when footsteps hit the bottom of the staircase, and two people chatter as they come up. A man and a woman, both dressed to the nines. The woman carries a glass of Champagne.

The woman laughs, the sound bright and sharp against the low thrum of the music.

She doesn’t even glance my way. They squeeze past me like I’m part of the velvet wallpaper, disappearing through the hidden door I just exited.

Their presence gives me a tiny jolt of courage.

If people are drinking Champagne in evening wear, maybe I won’t get murdered after all.

As I take the next step down, I know that is the dumbest thing I’ve ever thought, and there have been some that are hard to beat.

Like becoming a stripper in the first place.

Why I thought that was a good idea is beyond me, but I’m stuck in this job now.

No reputable company will touch me with that on my CV, and even less so with ‘school dropout’ listed as my last foray into education.

Gripping my bag handle in a white-knuckled grip, I head further down the spiral stairs.

At the bottom, the space opens up into a sunken lounge that looks like a cathedral for the rich and depraved.

The air doesn’t smell like the cheap bleach and stale beer of my usual clubs, but rather expensive cigars and money.

I scan the room for a bar or a manager, moving backwards slowly as I try to find someone who can help me.

A loud grunt echoes around the underground room, and I spin quickly as a man, twice my size if not more, lands at my feet in a bloody heap.

I gasp, my hand over my mouth as I look down at him and then up to where he came from.

In the middle of the lounge, there isn’t a stage as I expected.

There is a roped-off section, and inside there is a dark-haired man, shirtless, in suit pants, knuckles taped up, with tattoos covering his torso.

He is tall, and that lean kind of muscular that I usually find sexy.

On this guy, I find it terrifying. He is staring at me with a gaze that makes me wish I’d never been born.

“Fuck,” I mutter and back away. I’m definitely in the wrong place.

The man, possibly in his mid-thirties, tears his gaze away from me and looks at someone over my shoulder. He gives a single nod, and I turn, ready to run for my life, but a man built for destruction blocks my path.

“You’re in the wrong place, girlie,” he growls, his Irish accent distracting me from my fear for all of half a second before it crashes around me and nearly makes me wet myself.

I stumble back and accidentally kick the downed guy with the heel of my boot.

The Irish giant doesn’t move. He stands there, a wall of muscle and ink, effectively cutting off my only escape route.

My stomach drops somewhere below the plush carpet.

“I’m looking for Mack,” I stammer, my voice thin and reedy. “He sent me. For the gig.”

“No Mack here,” he says and reaches to grip my upper arm. “You need to leave.”

“Am I in the wrong place?” I ask, staring down at his big hand clamped all the way around my upper arm.

He smiles. It does not light up his clear green eyes. In fact, it makes them more terrifying. I lick my lips, and his gaze drops to my mouth before scanning lower and finding me lacking in my tight blue jeans and cheap black puffer coat.

“I’m sorry,” I choke out, my heart beating in a rhythm that makes me feel sick. “I must have the wrong address. Just let me go.”

He doesn’t say anything. He starts walking and drags me along behind him.

I trip over my own feet, but he holds me up as I drop.

We reach the metal staircase, and he hauls me up, moving faster than I can keep up.

My boots clatter against the metal treads as he hauls me upward.

He doesn’t slow down, even when I lose my balance and skin my knee on a sharp edge.

The giant keeps his grip tight on my arm, his fingers digging into my muscle through the thick fabric of my coat.

I want to scream, but the air in my lungs feels like lead.

He drags me back through the hidden velvet door and into the empty room.

He stops and pushes me up against the wall.

He presses close, and I stifle the urge to scream.

It will be pointless and probably turn him on, or something.

He lets go of my arm and places his hand beside my head as he bends down to my height.

“You didn’t see anything,” he says.

“No, I swear, I didn’t.”

“Good girl,” he says.

His words slither over me, and I hate that I like it.

He doesn’t move away. Instead, he stays in my space, a mountain of expensive suit and cold intent.

“I’m just going to go,” I whisper, my eyes darting toward the double doors that lead back to the hallway.

He lets out a short, dark laugh that makes my skin crawl. “You’re not going anywhere, princess.”

The velvet door slams open, and then the guy from the ring looms in the doorway, doing up the buttons on his crisp white shirt. He adjusts his cuffs, and my eyes drop to the action, feeling a quiver go through my body.

“Who are you?” he asks, coming closer.

The other man steps back. I can see the family resemblance and gulp. I also recognise the face of the one from the ring. Fuck. Shit. Fuck.

Lorcan Keane.

I freeze. My breath gets stuck in my throat, and I pray the floor swallows me whole.

Everyone in London knows the Keane name.

They aren’t just rich; they own the city and its shadows.

Lorcan Keane stands two feet away from me, and the air in the room suddenly feels too thin to breathe.

He finishes with his cuffs and looks at me.

His blue eyes are like ice, sharp and devoid of any warmth.

“Well?” he prompts. His voice is a low, dangerous velvet Irish accent that washes over me, calming me before I remember who he is and that I appear to have walked into something they definitely didn’t want me seeing.

“Elle,” I whisper. “I’m a stripper. I... I had an address. I think I’m in the wrong place.”

“You are definitely in the wrong place,” Lorcan says and steps closer, invading my personal space until I have to tilt my head back to look at him.

He doesn’t touch me, but the threat is heavy.

He looks at my damp hair, then his gaze slides down my body to my feet and back up again, lingering on my mouth.

A slow smile turns his kissable lips up.

“A stripper?” Lorcan asks. “Why don’t you dance for me?”

He steps back and waits expectantly for me to what?

Fucking strip off in front of him and his brother to no music as they glare at me from a place of wealth and privilege?

No fucking thanks.