20. Chapter 20
Chapter 20
Victor
I drive around the city for an hour before I finally head into the casino for my shift. The late-night shifts aren’t my favorite because there are more drunk people to deal with, but it’s a midweek shift, so hopefully the night will pass without incident. It’s a busy week for conventions in town, though, so I’m not holding my breath.
The four of us work jobs outside the club as part of blending in and keeping a lower profile, but we’re all high in the chain of command, and we don’t have to worry about a lot of oversight from supervisors. The few supervisor types we do interact with are friendly to us and understand who we are at least tangentially.
We try not to resort to violence… or rather Matteo, Luke, and Owen hold me back from resorting to violence. In my opinion, it’s the only way sometimes. And I admit that when I get to take that route, I enjoy my work.
I’m standing at my post watching dealers and players alike for any shady behavior when the hair on the back of my neck stands. My senses are on high alert, and I immediately scan the room for someone or something out of place. It takes a moment for me to recognize him, but sure enough, Phineas Draven is coming straight for me.
Or it seems like it anyway. He doesn’t stop at the tables, and instead heads for the hospitality desk a few feet away. I act like I’m checking on a dealer and move closer to overhear his conversation.
“My wife checked in here and never came home. I need you to open her room and make sure she’s not dead or injured.”
The hospitality host’s eyes are wide, and I’ve got my cellphone out texting Owen. I’m praying he’s in the building, but he usually works days.
A few minutes later, I get a thumbs up from him and a terse message.
Owen: On it.
But Owen isn’t the one who appears a few minutes later to calm a very irate Phineas Draven. Instead, it’s his second in command who usually works as the night chief of security. I stay back so Phineas doesn’t spot me, and when the two men leave the casino floor, I call another pit boss over to take my place. “There is an emergency at home,” I tell him. “If you need me, I’ll be in my office. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
The man nods, and I walk to my office with my phone to my ear.
“Phineas knows his wife is missing,” I say to Matteo as I shut the door.
“Owen already alerted us. Can you get away or do you need to stay on the clock?”
“I’ve got someone covering my shift for now, but there are three massive conventions happening this week, so traffic in and out of the Strip is insane, I’ll just stay on the phone with you.”
“We’re meeting in thirty minutes at the warehouse.”
The warehouse is where we meet when we don’t want to bring danger to the club. The High Card is our safe haven, and we don’t want to do anything to risk that. Like kidnapping the wife of our enemy and keeping her there. I slam my head against the back of my chair, cursing my stupidity and hot-headed nature.
“Don’t beat yourself up,” Matteo says, as if he can read my mind.
“Too late. I should move her.”
“Don’t do that either. So far, no one knows where she is, and Owen wiped every surveillance camera he could find with footage of you driving her to the club. We’re good for now.”
I breathe out a long, slow breath. “Bless Owen.”
“Bless me indeed,” a British voice says.
“He’s in the car with me,” Matteo clarifies.
“Call me back when everyone is gathered. I’m going to clock out and go to my car, so I don’t have to do this here.”
The call disconnects, and I inform my replacement I’ll be gone another hour. We have floating pit bosses for situations just like this, so it’s not an inconvenience.
In my car, I consider calling Grace to check on her. Matteo won’t be calling for another ten minutes. But she seemed pretty adamant about getting away from me at the museum, so I respect her space and scroll through her social media instead.
She shares too much of her life online. I make a mental note to talk to her about it just as my phone rings. Matteo, Owen, Luke, and Tobias sit around a laptop inside the warehouse.
“I think Grace is really getting close to Lili,” I say as the meeting begins. “I can talk to her and see if she’s willing to convince her to help us, but if she says no, we need to respect that.”
“It’s about time you admitted to being in love with that girl,” Luke says with a smirk.
I flip off the camera, intent on insisting I said no such thing, but he’s not done talking.
“I could ask Zara to check in on her. It seems like Zara can talk to anyone.”
It’s true, Zara has a skill with people that made her a sought-after escort before she met Luke and gave up most of her adult work, though she refused to give up all of it, and the two make it work somehow. I don’t understand it, but that’s not any of my business.
“Zara is an excellent resource. Let’s try that before I involve Grace any further. She’s always been adamant about not being involved in our… business dealings, and I’ve already gone too far past that boundary by bringing Lili here.”
Luke agrees to talk to his wife, and we move on from that subject.
“Are the claims of him cheating true?” Matteo asks.
Owen laughs. “They’re true and highly under-reported from what I’ve dug up so far. He has a penchant for dominant women with big strap-ons.”
“Good for him,” Tobias says.
I’m not entirely comfortable with Tobias being in the room, but I’m not questioning anything since I technically got us into this mess by bringing Lili to the club. He’s an outsider, though Owen trusts him with his life and with Bellamy, so that says something. I reluctantly agreed to bring him on as a part owner in the club after he married Bellamy and Owen.
We share a chuckle, but I experience a pang of sympathy for Lili, and silently plan to check on her as soon as I can.
“That penchant for hiring professionals is another reason to use Zara,” Owen points out. That woman knows everyone in the business.
“Don’t remind me,” Luke mutters.
We wrap up the call, with Matteo reminding everyone of what their next steps are. Owen will keep tracing finances, Luke will brief Zara and get her on board, and I’ll continue to monitor our prisoner and report back if I learn anything. Matteo is swamped with his job and escorting Skylar to and from her shows, so he’s monitoring the rest of us in case we need background support. Tobias and Bellamy will step in and keep the High Card running.
At the end of my shift, I race across town to the club. Or rather, I drive at a snail’s pace for thirty minutes before finally getting on the 215 and then I race across town.
The casino was able to convince Phineas that his wife left of her own accord, but it won’t be long before he comes looking for her. We didn’t come to any conclusions other than having Zara and Gracie talk to her together sometime tomorrow while Grace is at work.
At the club, I don’t turn on any lights in the front of the shop, and I only turn a dim light on in the actual club. At the door of Lili’s suite, I realize it’s very early in the morning, technically still the middle of the night, and I probably should have waited to check on her. But I’m here now, so I use my phone to unlock the door. When I step inside, I find Lili curled up fast asleep. It looks like she’s been crying though, and I feel a twinge of regret, which pisses me off. Regret has never had a place in my life.
I pull a chair from in front of the vanity and sit next to the bed and allow myself to doze.
I’m not sure how long I’m out, but I wake to a harsh whisper.
“What the fuck are you thinking? He’s going to kill you.”
I blink my eyes open. Gracie is standing in front of me, her mouth agape, and I try to raise my hand to wipe the sleep from my eyes. But I can’t.
“What the hell?”
I try to stand, but again I can’t.
I hear a laugh next to me and whip my head from Gracie to Lili.
“Take them off,” I snarl.
“Not happening.”
She stands and heads for the door.
“That door better be fucking locked from the outside,” I say to Gracie. “Get these things off me.”
The woman handcuffed me to the chair with the restraints we provide to our members when they rent the suites. I should have thought to have them removed.
“Come on, Grace. You understand it’s wrong to keep me here. And when they get arrested for kidnapping, I’d like to be able to tell the authorities you helped me escape.”
Gracie looks at me and I scowl. “Don’t even think about it, Gracie.”
She runs her hands through her hair and growls. “I fucking hate this!”
A hard twist of my wrist is all it takes for the chain in the center of the leather cuffs to snap before I lunge upward to grab Lili by the throat. I don’t care that my ankles are still attached to the chair.
“Did you enjoy that little stunt? I hope it was worth it. Life is about to get extremely complicated for you, Spitfire.”
I toss her on the bed and bend to undo the cuffs on my ankles. The fact that she got them on me without waking me up is a testament to how tired I am and how much I’ve been pushing myself lately. I have to do better at getting rest if I’m going to make it out of this with everyone I care about alive.
“Gracie, go call Matteo or Owen and ask them to get the warehouse ready for a guest.”
She stares at me and shakes her head. “No. I won’t do that. I know what you do with people at the warehouse, and I won’t participate.”
On the one hand, I’m pissed that she’s not listening to me. But I’m also proud of her for standing her ground.
“Butterfly, listen to me. We’re not going to kill her. You have my word.”
Lili’s face turns white at the mention of her potential demise, and I don’t blame her.
“I’ll call Matteo,” I say, kissing Gracie’s forehead. We haven’t seen each other since our trip to the mob museum that ended badly, and I’m still not sure how she feels about me. But her shoulders relax when I kiss her, so I take that as a good sign.
“Stay here and make sure she doesn’t get out. While you’re in here, go through all the cabinets and pack up anything that can be used as a weapon or a restraint.”
I grab one of the sets of cuffs and pick up Lili’s wrists. “I’ll just put these on her so she can’t give you any trouble.”
When she’s secured to the bed, I step out. Do I really want to put her in a cell in the warehouse? Moving her poses more risks than leaving her put.
Still, I call Matteo and tell him what happened.
And the bastard laughs at me.
“She tied you to a chair?” he manages to ask between gasping laughs.
“It’s not funny, you bastard. She was trying to talk Grace into letting her go when I woke up.”
“You’ve got to get more sleep, man.”
I want to reach through the phone and strangle him, but I keep my temper at a simmering level instead of letting it boil over. “Just fucking tell me what you want me to do.”
“You’re right about moving her. It’s too risky. We’ll just have to keep an eye on her. We can put a camera in the room too. Maybe she’ll accidentally say something to Gracie when they’re alone.”
We don’t put cameras in the suites because of what takes place in them, but we do have a sound system that acts like a smart speaker to listen for safewords and assault happening. It’s never been needed, but it’s still good to have the technology.
When I end the call with Matteo, I stalk down the hall to the suite and find Grace packing up the equipment like I instructed.
“Thank you, Grace. Take the box to my office, and then you can open the shop as usual.” She’s silent as she obeys, and I can tell she’s still mad at me. That’s a problem for later. Right now, I have to deal with a brat of a hostage.
“Was that fun for you?” I snap when I’m alone with Lili.
She smirks from her spot tied to the bed. “Kind of. Poor Grace almost had a heart attack when she walked in. She thought for sure you would kill us both.”
“Why would I kill her? She didn’t do anything.”
“Why were you here, Victor? It was a shock to wake up and find you sleeping in a chair next to my bed.”
I drag a hand through my hair, unsure of what to tell her. I can’t exactly say, “Your husband is a bigger cheater than you thought and has some interesting kinks, and I felt sorry for you.”
Instead, I drop back into the chair and look at her. “Phineas is finally looking for you. He figured out where you stayed on the Strip and showed up there last night, causing a scene.”
“That’s only the beginning. If he suspects any of you are involved, he’ll pull out all the stops to get me back. Last night I decided I want to try and help you. This morning when I woke up and found you sitting here, I snapped.”
I clear my throat, ignoring the fact that she just told me she wants to help us. That can be discussed later. “We found out some… interesting things about him.”
“You mean his penchant for paying women to dominate him? Yeah. I found out about that too. It was just too embarrassing to tell you about, so I stuck with telling you about my best friend. That part is true, by the way.”
“Do you happen to know who he hired?”
“The women?” Lili wrinkles her nose. “Not specifically, but I know who he used to find them.”
“That would be helpful.”
She frowns. “How?”
I reach out and pat her knee, but she pulls away from me.
“Just trust me,” I say. Though it’s rather ludicrous to ask that of her in the current circumstance. But I’m not going to tell her about Zara and all her connections. There’s no reason to believe any of it will pan out.
“Don’t be mad at Grace,” Lili says.
I shake my head. “I’m not mad.”
“She seemed upset when she came in to check on me last night. Did you fuck up dinner with her?”
I glare. “I’m going to leave you tied to that bed and put a ball gag in your mouth if you don’t stop sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong.”
Her lips press closed, and I know I’ve struck a nerve. Apparently, the idea of a gag scares her because her lips tremble and her eyes fill with tears.
Just what I need, two women pissed off at me.
“I just want to go home,” she whispers a few minutes later.
“I wish I could give you that. But do you really want to go home to that monster, or do you want a new home for yourself?”
“I wish it were that simple.”
“Just answer the question. Do you want to be with that monster again?”
She blows out a long breath. “No. I really was working up the courage to ask for a divorce.”
I nod and reach over to unlock the cuffs that are holding her to the bed. “Good. I’ll help you when this is all over. But I can’t do that if you keep pulling stunts like this.”
“Go check on Grace,” she says, sitting up and rubbing her wrists.
I back out of the room, hating how we are leaving things, but she’s right. The way I yelled at Grace wasn’t right. I need to make sure she is OK.
It only takes a minute to find her sitting on the floor outside my office with her head in her hands.
“I wasn’t trying to sleep with her,” I say, dropping to the ground to sit next to her.
She looks up at me and lays her head on my shoulder. “I’m sorry I left last night. After the Uber dropped me off here, I came in and talked with her for a little while.”
I kiss the top of her head. “It makes sense why you felt like you needed to get away. There’s nothing to apologize for. You do realize we don’t really kill people at the warehouse, right?”
She sighs. “I hoped you didn’t, but I’ve heard you threaten to before. And you know I didn’t help her do that to you, right?”
I let my head fall against the office door and laugh. “Yes, Grace. I know you wouldn’t do that. You’re too much of a service sub for that sort of behavior. Lili, on the other hand, is a brat.”
“Lili is a switch,” Grace says with a giggle. “I didn’t think you would ever fall for a switch.”
My scowl deepens as I lean back to make eye contact with her. “I haven’t fallen for Lili.”
“Right. That’s why you sat by her bed and fell asleep instead of just waking her up to interrogate her about what she knows about her husband and his sexcapades.”
“Stand up,” I snap, as I rise to my feet.
Her face goes pale as if she knows she slipped up.
I don’t say anything as I open my office door and push her inside.
“I’m only asking you this once, Grace. Are you in service to me?”
She ducks her head and nods. “Yes, Sir.”
“Even outside of club hours?”
She blows out a breath. “I don’t know. But I want to be.”
“Were you listening in on my conversation after you left the room?”
Her face flames and she covers it with her hands, but I pull them away and make her look at me. “Answer the question, Gracelynn.”
“Yes, Sir. I know it was wrong. But I was curious.”
“The other night I let you out of a punishment because I was being an asshole, and you didn’t deserve it. You’re not going to get so lucky today, little girl. I want you bent over that desk with your skirt up and your panties down. In fact, take the panties all the way off and put them on the desk.”
I have no idea if this is the right thing to do, but I’m going with my gut here.
“Were you trying to get me to spank you, butterfly?” I ask as she follows my instructions without hesitation.
She bends to pick up her red cotton panties and shakes her head as she places them on the desk. “No, Sir. I promise.”
I reach for the buckle on my belt, my go to spanking implement, but change my mind as she bends over the desk, presenting her perfect ass for me to see.
Suddenly, I want my hand coming into direct contact with her soft, pale skin.
“A warm up since it’s been a while since I’ve spanked you.”
I put one hand on the small of her back and raise my other to bring it down on one perfectly shaped cheek. She hisses as my hand slams into her, and I don’t give her more than a second or two before it lands again.
Soon I’m peppering stinging swats all over her backside, and she’s squirming beneath my punishment.
“Is it polite to eavesdrop?” I land a half-dozen to each of her thighs, and she squeals out an answer.
“No, Sir.”
“Will I catch you doing it again?” Now I’m focused on the tender crease where her ass meets her thighs.
“No, Sir.” It’s a whimper this time, and I spy tears landing on my desk.
I slip the red panties on the desk into my pants pocket and leave her where she is.
“Stay there until I come and fetch you again. If you move, you’ll get twenty with my belt.”
She grips the other side of the desk, and I know she’ll be in exactly the same spot when I come back, whether that’s in five minutes or two hours.
I’m leaving because if I don’t, I’ll ask if I can fuck her tight pussy, and I can’t go there right now. Not with everything happening with Lili. But when this is all over, I fully intend to explore this attraction to Grace and find out what it can be. As long as I don’t scare her off before we can get to that.