Chapter 3
Tyler
“A sex club,” I said. “We own a sex club.”
I turned to look at Nico “Junior” Trocci, my business partner in this venture. Dark hair, olive skin, Napoleon complex. The neck tattoos would be a problem if he ever tried to get a normal job, but since he’d been born into Mafia royalty, he probably didn’t have to worry about that.
He and I had a somewhat complicated acquaintanceship. I used to fuck his cousin, Aly, who happened to be engaged to my best friend, Josh, who I was beginning to suspect was also Junior’s best friend.
The traitor.
Junior and I didn’t get along. I wasn’t sure if it was a territorial thing, or if we just rubbed each other the wrong way, so the fact that we were now in business together was the last thing I could have anticipated. Unfortunately, there’d been no way to avoid it.
He’d shown up at the ship party last week looking to buy someone’s debt off me, and we’d essentially blackmailed each other into a corner.
He’d threatened to tell Josh about my gambling operation.
I’d threatened to tell Junior’s dad (who was almost as bad as Josh’s) about his interest in this building.
We’d ended up going halfsies on it, and now I was more convinced than ever that it was going to blow up in both our faces.
Junior scowled. “It’s actually called a play club.”
I eyed him. He really was a handsome sonofabitch. His dad’s dark features with his mom’s green eyes. Too bad he was also the straightest man on the planet and this tension between us couldn’t be . . . eased. People were much easier to deal with after they’d been fucked senseless.
“Is it even profitable?” I asked.
“It is,” said a soft, feminine voice.
Junior and I turned to see his girlfriend, Lauren, stride into the room. She was short, stunning, and absolutely out of Junior’s league, with long dark hair, large brown eyes, and sun-kissed skin. I was still confused how such a moody bastard had pulled her.
“Can you prove that, or am I just supposed to take your word for it?” I said.
Junior elbowed me. Hard. “Watch how you speak to her.”
I locked eyes with Lauren. “Why? Are you as hypersensitive as your boyfriend?”
Her answering smile was megawatt. “I have a habit of tasing people who piss me off. He’s trying to save you from yourself.”
I snorted, because bullshit.
Junior caught sight of my disbelief and lifted the bottom of his shirt to reveal an ugly, half-healed burn.
My eyes snapped back to Lauren, and her grin gained a sharp edge. Okay, so maybe these two psychos deserved each other after all.
“A fucking se—play club,” I corrected, taking in the room.
The club wouldn’t open for another several hours, but even in the middle of the day, it was dark and intimate, with black damask wallpaper, comfortable furniture, a gleaming bar along the far wall, and a set of stairs along the right wall that led up to the . . . sex rooms? Scene rooms?
Jesus Christ, what the fuck had I gotten myself into?
I rubbed a hand over my face. “How am I supposed to explain this to my seventy-year-old accountant?”
“Tell him you’re exploring your brat kink,” Lauren answered.
I frowned at her.
She scoffed. “Oh, please. I have never, in my life, met a man who so obviously needs someone to order him to kneel at their feet and shut the hell up until they’re ready to hear him speak again.”
I grinned. “You offering to break me in?”
Junior made a sound close to a growl, confirming his hypersensitivity.
Lauren just laughed. “Brat taming isn’t on my kink menu, but don’t worry, we have people who can teach you to behave.”
“Pass,” I said. “Misbehaving is so much more fun.”
Junior, his patience waning, waved a hand toward the staircase. “Can we get this fucking tour over with so I can move on with my day?”
I motioned him forward, for once on the same page because I also had places to be. “After you.”
The urge to add pipsqueak to the end of the sentence was strong, but if Junior and I had any hope of surviving this partnership, I probably needed to rein in the urge to constantly mock him.
What can I say? The man was easy prey, and while I might not have the brat kink Lauren thought I did, I had always enjoyed getting under people’s skin.
Because they were much more likely to slip up when their emotions were elevated, say something they wouldn’t have otherwise, reveal more than they intended to.
And those little slip-ups were easy to exploit.
Junior and Lauren showed me around the rest of the club, which I learned was named Velvet.
The first floor consisted of communal spaces, and the bar setup was unique because city zoning meant they couldn’t serve alcohol on the premises.
Luckily, BYOB was fine, so they hired bartenders to pour and mix whatever the patrons brought in.
Past the main room, there were several smaller spaces: dens filled with cozy seating and soft lighting, hidden nooks and alcoves, and even a small library that smelled like leather and old books.
It wasn’t much different than any other swanky club in the city.
Or so I thought, until I was shown the play rooms on the second floor.
Their layouts were all similar: square, with seating on one side that faced a slightly raised stage.
The first one we entered—the voyeur room—held just a bed and a chair onstage, and the way Junior and Lauren shared a long, meaningful look when they thought I wasn’t paying attention (spoiler alert: I am always paying attention) made me think the space held some significance for them.
I displayed no outward reaction, but the thought that Junior Vanilla Trocci liked to watch other people fuck rocked my world a little.
Then again, his cousin Aly and my best friend were heavily into mask play (knowledge I wished I could scrub from my brain), so maybe the kinks ran strong in their family.
Next, we passed through a slew of other spaces, Lauren helpfully explaining what happened in each, before we moved up to the third floor and the private rooms that were obviously designed for fucking.
Lauren turned to face me in the middle of the largest one, which contained a massive, velvet-draped four-poster bed on one side and a wall of mirrors on the other. “We’re planning to rent these spaces out during the day to boudoir photographers and camworkers.”
“Every day of the week?” I said. “Not just the four the club is open?”
“Every day,” Lauren said. She’d done almost all the talking so far, Junior nodding along and staring at her with open adoration. Being with them was almost as bad as being with Josh and Aly. Everyone around me was disgustingly in love, and it was starting to make me nauseous.
“How much are you going to charge per hour?” I asked.
Lauren answered, and my mind went to work on the math, tallying up the number of private rooms and how many hours they could logistically rent them each week.
“That will do a lot to help cover the cost of renovations,” I said.
During the tour, Lauren had explained their plans to turn Velvet into the safest, most profitable play club in the country.
I was fully on board with that, because money flowing into my accounts from a legal business would always be welcomed.
My revenge had an expiration date, and after that, I planned to be done with gambling for good, which meant I’d need to replace that income with legitimate sources like this one.
I turned to face Junior. “You need any help looking over the books?”
He shook his head. “I’m good.”
Lauren slipped her arm through his and stared up at him with hearts in her eyes. “He’s a secret math whiz.”
That didn’t really surprise me. Junior was a cautious man. He wouldn’t be so hell-bent on buying this building if it weren’t going to be profitable, regardless of how in love he was with one of the club’s owners.
“I still want to see them,” I said. “Just to double-check. If I’m going to be a silent partner in this little venture, I want to make sure we’re squared away first.”
“I’ll send you the numbers later,” Junior said.
I glanced at my watch. I had a lot on my calendar for the rest of the night and wanted to hit the gym before I went to my last, and most important, appointment. “We done here?”
“We’re done,” Junior said.
“Good. Don’t fuck this up.”
With that, I saw myself out.