4. Colin
COLIN
The moment the strip club door seals behind me, memories flood in.
The first time I came to Chacha’s, my older brothers took me.
Tic gave me the rundown of the place, while Dean emphasized the need to not fall in love with a stripper.
Even though he’s my twin, he’s two minutes older and he’s never let me live that down, always acting like he knows everything.
He’d come to the club one time before me. One. But that’s Dean, always trying to keep everything under control.
Tonight, citrus-and-champagne perfume rides the recycled air, bass rumbles through my sternum, and overhead spotlights scatter holographic glitter across the black lacquer floor.
A neon sign in cursive pink claims Chacha’s — Members Only , as if purchasable exclusivity still impresses anyone these days.
Reuben “Call-me-Reub” Jackson—mid-thirties, software-sales smile surgically soldered in place—ushers me forward like a talent agent introducing his prized star.
“Penthouse table’s ours all night, Mr. Copeland.
Top shelf on me.” He pats the small of my back the way dogs pat the earth after burying bones.
I nod, producing the bland polite grin that says lead on, champion while broadcasting absolutely nothing else.
In truth, I’d rather conduct the demo in my office, with dual monitors and decent coffee. No dancing girls needed to seduce me. Though, maybe I should bring our CFO here to convince him.
Marcus, our C-suite’s resident octogenarian, won’t fund a system overhaul even if this Reub fellow recreates the Sermon on the Mount in SQL.
So tonight isn’t about procurement. It’s about letting a hardworking salesman feel like he has a chance.
Maybe talking to him will give me the right angle to approach Marcus about the upgrade.
We weave between low cocktail tables where men in tailored coats pretend they’re here for “networking.” Dancers rotate on chrome poles, muscles shimmering under cobalt gels, the choreography equal parts athletic and impossible. Chacha’s is a legend for a reason.
Reub settles us into a curved velvet banquette on the mezzanine, exactly level with the dancers’ platforms. A server glides over, stilettos clicking. Reub orders a bottle of Rémy Martin Louis XIII and a “light bite platter”—a corporate-card flex I pretend not to notice.
“So.” He places a matte-black tablet on the table, flips the cover, and wakes the screen. “StarConnector Cloud Ops: zero-downtime migrations, predictive analytics, POS-to-ERP sync at—wait for it—under three milliseconds. Copeland Restaurants would be our marquee client.”
“Your latency benchmarks look solid,” I admit.
They do. I read the white paper on my phone in the ride over.
“But we operate in multiple time zones and several compliance regions. HIPAA overlaps in the wellness kitchen division in the US, which can be problematic. EU cookie laws bounce from Brussels to Birmingham. Cost of retrofitting our legacy endpoints?” I make a low whistle. “Marcus will never go for it.”
Reub’s smile falters, then resets. “Well, that’s why we’re here—to strategize.” He gestures to the stage, where a dancer in emerald-green latex lowers into a controlled handstand split. “Work-life balance, right?”
I cough a laugh. Balance. Sure. I glance at the dancer—long lines, confident grin, physics-defying pewter heels—and feel the familiar tug of primal fascination. At least the scenery is interesting.
Still, I didn’t come to ogle. Or rather, I didn’t come only to ogle.
Stress has welded itself to my spinal column the past few weeks.
With Marcus stonewalling every tech request, Dean growling at the ledger, and Tic newly retired, staring off balconies like a bored lion, I’m in the middle, like the little Dutch boy with my finger in the dam.
My brothers assume I’m the carefree one.
Just the CTO, what’s the big deal about computers for a restaurant?
They haven’t seen my private spreadsheets of cost-benefit deltas glowing red under three a.m. fluorescence.
They have no idea what I do for the company, and if I do my job right, they’ll never have to.
All it takes is one computer crash, and boom.
No money comes in from that location. Restaurants, no matter how successful, run on thin margins, and we’re no different.
If a location closes for a few nights, we lose employees.
No table server is going to stick around for a restaurant on the promise of making money.
No chef is going to stay if they can’t cook.
Computers are the lifeblood of global restaurant brands.
As long as I keep the metaphorical lights on, everyone is happy.
When the lights go out, my ass is cooked.
That’s why we need the upgrades. Thanks to their computer systems, Buenos Aires and Shanghai lost a few good people due to a few days’ closure.
Austin was closed for a week and lost a chef.
We can’t allow this sort of thing during the holidays.
Two seats down, Reub prattles about micro-servers while covertly scanning the stage for the next rotation.
I don’t blame him. Running enterprise SaaS numbers in a cathedral of flesh feels like explaining game theory at a carnival—the spectacle drowns nuance.
A dancer in midnight-blue feathers finishes a sequence with a corkscrew drop.
Applause erupts, bills flutter. It was impressive.
Reub’s phone buzzes. He excuses himself to “clarify wine pairings” with the manager—AKA, tip housekeeping to prep the champagne room. He’s going full cliché, and I’m too tired to stop him.
Left alone, I let the remainder of my polite mask slide and simply watch the women work. I tune out the treble laugh track of the finance bros behind me and let my pulse slow to baseline. These women are artists, truly.
A shadow falls across my table. The dancer in emerald latex—closer now—rests her forearm on the chair back. Her hair’s a platinum waterfall, her gaze savvy. “Gentleman at the bar paid for a private dance, said choice of dancer is yours. Champagne suite’s ready whenever you are.”
I glance at the empty seat, weigh the odds of escaping without crushing Reub’s morale. He’ll insist. If I refuse, he’ll assume the deal is going nowhere, jeopardizing future price breaks we might actually need. Easier to accept, slip away for ten minutes, and give my nerves a reboot.
“Lead on,” I say, letting courtesy drive.
The suite is plush. Tufted white leather, starburst chandelier, mirrored ceiling reflecting a kaleidoscope of neon.
Enough stimulation to overwhelm the senses, if a half-naked woman wasn’t enough to do that already.
The dancer closes the door behind us, music muffled to a heartbeat thump. She gestures to the tufted seat.
I raise both palms. “I appreciate your time. But I’m not actually after a dance. I needed distance from my associate before my ears molt.”
She tilts her head, appraising, then shrugs with a half smile. “Hey, paid is paid. What do you want instead? I can recite a haiku, debate crypto, or pretend to be your therapist for the next song.”
Therapist. God. “How about a private break? Consider it PTO.” I pull a hundred-dollar bill from my pocket and pass it to her. “Keep the playlist running. Sit in the hallway if you want.”
“Are you certain? We also have male dancers on staff, if that’s more your speed?—”
“No, thank you. Honestly, I’d just like some solitude for a song or two.”
“If you’re sure.” When I nod, she slips out, closing the door with a judgment-free click.
Silence—well, the slinky tunes of a dancer’s background, but close enough for government work. I exhale, shoulders slumping against the leather. Twenty feet and three walls away, Reub probably thinks I’m getting the deluxe circuit on the G-string stock exchange.
Good. He’ll leave me alone.
As much as I want to do business with the guy, it’s the product and not the company that sells me on it. I tug my phone free, thumbprint unlock, auto-open to the Just Desserts chat.
Tic posted an update: All set for tomorrow. Dean added a bullet-point grumble about having a humidifier in the hotel bedrooms. I grin—he’ll deny it, but the man nests like a tradwife influencer.
I switch to SnowLass’s profile photo—Thalassa, with that bright smile—and my grin softens into something else.
She stands on a windswept rooftop in what must be autumn sun, strawberry-blonde hair whipping behind her.
Defiant joy radiates off the image. Something inside my chest rearranges, like a Rubik’s cube aligning two sides at once.
The suite’s playlist cycles to a down-tempo remix of “Wicked Game.” I let the chords crawl over me and imagine the long weekend to come.
If she’s nervous, I’ll tease the tension.
Nerd flirting is my lane. It comes with the territory of computers.
Let Dean play the stoic, Tic the orchestrator.
It’s my job to make her laugh until she’s disarmed.
Funny. The more I think about the girl, the more the undeniable throb of possibilities steals my attention. I haven’t even met her yet, and I’m hard as hell, wondering what her mouth would feel like on me. I want to weave my fingers into those long, rosy curls and give them a tug from behind.
The champagne room is meant for fantasies, right?
There’s a bowl with tissues, wet wipes, condoms, and lube next to me.
Fuck it. I grab the lube, unzip, close my eyes, and let my imagination run wild.
Thalassa’s a virgin, but that’s not what I’m there for.
I want to see her shiver with anticipation as I trail my tongue all over her body.
Taste that soft skin. She would look incredible in black lace, and I would like to unwrap her like a present.
Slowly. Methodically. Until she’s too warmed up to speak, and then I’ll memorize the way she shudders with need for us.