CHAPTER THREE
Jelly
I hadn’t been working at Sugar long, and it still felt awkward to me.
But I had gotten a couple of paychecks so far, plus the nightly tips, and I’d been able to register for school.
I couldn’t believe how much money I made.
I’d have had to work for two months at both of my old jobs to make half the amount I made in a week at Sugar.
I hadn’t ended up staying pregnant for long. I lost the baby due to miscarriage before the end of my first trimester. It felt awful. I worried that I’d done something wrong; that it was my fault somehow. But the doctor had assured me that it was common.
I knew it was ridiculous, but I sometimes wondered if the baby had left me, too, on purpose, like almost everyone else in my life had. But I knew I had to keep ugly thoughts like that at bay. They would eat you alive from the inside out.
Thank God for Nadine and her mama. I’d found out for sure I was pregnant after Nadine had left for West Bay.
I’d moved in with Nadine’s mama when my grandparents kicked me out for being pregnant and keeping my baby.
After I lost the baby, Nadine’s mama took care of me for about a week.
Then she told me I needed to buck up, get tough, and go get myself a life.
She put me on a bus to West Bay so fast my head was spinning.
She’d told me to call Nadine, have her pick me up at the bus station, and see about getting me set up in that fancy strip club she worked at.
I didn’t think they’d want me, considering how I looked.
But Carmen Salazar had taken one look at me when I got to Cinnamon House, the residence Carmen put girls who were considering taking part in her sugar baby-style auction, and taken me upstairs for a makeover.
When she was finished, I hadn’t even recognized myself. I had been hiding under thick makeup and overly big clothing for so long, that I’d forgotten how I actually looked.
That had all happened a while ago now, and tonight was my first night on my own as a hostess. I’d been shadowing Glory and Daisy, two of the best hostesses at the club. But tonight was a test of sorts.
I blew out a breath slowly, trying to calm myself down. I knew I looked like I didn’t care much about anything, but I did deep down. It was just easier to not to get hurt if I distanced myself from everything and everyone. So, I usually put on kind of a bitchy front to protect myself.
“Ray Ann?”
I fought to keep from rolling my eyes. I hated my real name, but Carmen thought Jelly was too weird, and she was the boss.
“Right here,” I called out as Madeline, a stripper who looked like a Barbie doll and was one of my roommates at Cinnamon House, finished my makeup and hair.
I was dressed in the very revealing uniform the hostesses wore.
It was a black corset top that made my boobs look like I was in a Regency romance.
It stopped about two inches above where my tiny skirt started, showing off a decent amount of my abs.
I wore fishnet hose and fuck me heels to finish off the look.
It was slutty-ish, but it was also somehow kind of classy looking.
Carmen looked at me with a critical eye. “You need a tighter uniform.”
My eyebrows shot up. “Seriously?”
She nodded. “You have a great body, but I want to make sure you stand out from the other girls.” She turned to Madeline. “Can you get her one a size smaller?”
“Sure,” Madeline said, fluffing up her perfect blonde hair in the mirror.
She was the most popular stripper and was getting ready to go on for her first set of the night.
I appreciated that she was taking the time to help me.
She was like that, I was realizing. She had the outer appearance of someone who would be bitchy and think they were better than you, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.
She hurried to the back to get a new uniform for me.
“Tonight, you’ll be serving the premier table.”
Oh, shit. “You mean…”
Carmen smoothed her hair down as she looked in the mirror. “It will be me and all my brothers—Enzo, Javy, Joaquin, Leo, and, of course, Nico.”
I swallowed hard. It would be the entire group of Salazar siblings. And the Salazars were by far the most powerful family in West Bay. They all intimidated me, but Nico was… scary. Sexy as hell, but scary. He was also the co-owner of all the Salazar nightclubs with Carmen. I needed to impress him.
“Just do your best, girl. I have faith in you.” In a rare display of compassion, she grabbed me by the shoulders and looked me straight in the eyes.
“You’ve got this. You’re drop dead gorgeous, Ray Ann.
I don’t know what the hell you were doing with all that shit on your face when you first got here, but you were hiding how goddamn hot you are.
So,” she clapped her hands together, “get in the smaller uniform and get your ass on the floor. I guarantee my brothers are going to love you.”
I smiled tightly. I hoped they did. Glory, who didn’t sugar coat anything, had pulled me aside and told me that if the Salazar brothers didn’t like me, I was a goner.
Especially Nico.
***
Oh my God. The uniform. My breasts were practically popping out of the corset top, and I was pretty sure I could feel cold air on my ass.
But both Madeline and Carmen had declared it perfect.
“It takes those nice D cups of yours and makes them look like at least double Ds. I guarantee your tips will be astronomical,” Madeline said, swiping on some bright red lipstick.
She glanced at me. “And with that shiny black hair and those big blue eyes? You’re fire, girl. ”
“Remember what I told you,” Carmen said. “And how Daisy and Glory trained you. Let the men touch, but not too much. That’s how things work around here.”
I was trying to get used to that idea. I wasn’t super big on people I didn’t know touching me. Hell, I wasn’t really into people I did know touching me. I wasn’t what you’d call ‘a hugger.’
But I nodded.
“I’ll see you out there,” Carmen said, gave me a quick smile, and hurried out to join her brothers at the premier table before the next set of women hit the stage for their sets.
“You got this,” Madeline called out to me as I left the back dressing rooms. I turned and gave her a quick smile.
I walked over to the bar. “I’ve got the premier table,” I told Nora, the sexy bartender. She was also very nice and was another one of my many roommates at Cinnamon House.
“Fun,” she grinned at me. Nora was shy, and she thought I was, too. But that wasn’t it. My default attitude when I was nervous or upset at all was to be quiet, sarcastic, or kind of mean.
But damn. The Salazars might have me killed if I acted like that. Everyone knew that if they weren’t actually mafia, they were at least ‘mafia adjacent.’
“Yeah,” I gave her a quick grin while she filled my tray up with the drinks she knew they all wanted. “Thanks,” I said as she finished.
“Good luck, girl. You got this.”
I hoped so. I somehow balanced my drink tray without my tits popping out of my corset top, all while walking on my four-inch stilettos.
They had a red bottom, and I knew they were the nicest shoes I’d ever owned.
By a mile. But Carmen had explained the men who were members of the Salazar group of exclusive nightclubs, including Sugar, were wealthy and used to a certain level of style.
And by wealthy? She meant mainly millionaires with some billionaires thrown in. It was a bit intimidating.
“Good evening,” I put on my best smile as I made it to the premier table.
I’d seen a couple of the brothers checking me out as I approached.
I had been glad it was the less intimidating brothers, Leo and Javier.
The other three? Well. Enzo was the heir to the Salazar empire and the oldest. He was also hot as hell, smooth, and intimidating.
Then there was Joaquin. He was one of the twins, who were the youngest of the siblings.
Though he and Leo, the other twin, looked and acted nothing alike.
Joaquin looked like a cross between Enzo’s refinement and Nico’s roughness.
And all three of them had black hair and blue eyes.
Javier looked more like Carmen with his dark hair and eyes, and Leo looked like he was adopted.
The Salazars’ dad Carlos was Spanish. He’d immigrated to America and fallen head over heels for Gloria, the blonde-haired, blue-eyed, debutante pageant queen that every eligible bachelor for miles around had wanted to marry.
But Gloria chose Carlos, who was almost penniless at the time, and caused a scandal. They had the last laugh, though, because they now sat atop West Bay society as its unofficial king and queen.
Leo looked just like his mom. Pale skin, light blue eyes, blonde hair. And a smile that made panties drop left and right.
I had to admit, though, that I found Nico the most attractive. He was big, six-five and muscular, with dark blue eyes and black hair. He had an olive complexion and always looked as if he’d gotten back from a tropical vacation.
And then there were his tattoos. He had lots of them.
They showed above the white collar of his button-down dress shirt, and he even had some on his fingers.
I thought they were hot as fuck. I liked the way he looked.
He wore the same extremely expensive bespoke suits his brothers wore.
On him, though? They looked… different. As if he’d been plucked from a motorcycle club and told he had to dress like royalty.
He was rougher looking than the rest. And I was all about it. I wouldn’t do anything, of course, because he was my boss. But I sure as hell wouldn’t mind fucking him. I was in a serious dry spell. I’d only ever slept with Evan. And the last time I’d done that was several months ago.