Chapter 33
C H A P T E R
MONEY FELL LIKE RAIN FROM THE SKY AS HONEY SPUN DOWN FROM THE TOP OF THE POLE TO THE BOTTOM FOR HER LAST MOVE.
The club was packed more than usual, and not only could she tell because of the number of people, but because of the amount of money that was beneath her too.
As Honey walked off the stage, she grabbed her bra and slipped it back on.
She nodded at Roland, who came on stage to gather all her money.
As Honey walked down the stairs, her eyes roved over the crowd, ready to settle on the two men who she would give floor performances to tonight.
She never did more than two. One, because she wanted to return home at a reasonable time to be with her son, and two, because it left the men practically begging and hoping to be one of the few men who would get an exclusive dance from her.
It always resulted in her johns paying more, which she greatly appreciated.
She continued to search until her eyes settled on the one man she didn’t want to see— Nikos.
He sat with a group of men at the table the girls referred to as the Lion’s Den.
It was a large round table slightly elevated in the center of the room, and only powerful, important men got to sit there.
It wasn’t a table to be brought into. You had to know Antonis and be associated with the underground work that Nikos was now a part of.
By no means would Honey call herself a coward. She was far from it. She faced everything head-on, didn’t run away from her problems, and didn’t fear anyone— not even the man in a coma who once had made her life hell. But Nikos was a different story entirely.
After what happened last time in his office, she knew she needed to avoid him and had been doing a good job of it so far the past few days, especially since he had been busy with work, and she didn’t plan on changing that tonight.
Instead of going out to find a man to dance for, she headed for the back.
She had already made more than enough money from the amount of people here.
She would just skip the floor performances tonight, so she wouldn’t have a run-in with Nikos.
She didn’t fear Nikos, but she feared that he would change her mind, that he would be able to persuade her into giving in, and that was not a risk she could take.
Honey stepped into the changing room, sighing in relief when she saw there wasn’t anyone else in the room, which wasn’t surprising.
With so many people out there, all the girls were out on the floor trying to drain every man and woman out of the money in their pockets.
She should have been out there too trying to squeeze money into her own pockets, but instead, she was in here.
Annoyed, she opened her locker, getting ready to change.
After that, she would remove her makeup and pick up her pay so she could return home to Kai.
She went to remove her bra when she heard someone come inside.
She glanced to her left, expecting to see one of the girls, but to her surprise, it wasn’t.
She felt her heart drop as her eyes locked on Nikos.
“Nikos,” she said his name, baffled that he was back here. She was hoping he would be too busy to come to find her and, to be honest, she hadn’t expected him to come back here.
“Honey,” Nikos replied as he stepped into the room with an envelope in his hand.
He dropped the envelope on her vanity without stopping in his pursuit of her.
Honey wasn’t one to fear anyone, and yet, she found herself taking a step back with each step he took forward.
It continued like that until she found her back pressed against the back wall in the changing room with Nikos cornering her with nowhere to run.
“Why have you been avoiding me?” Nikos asked.
“I haven’t—”
Honey bit back the rest of her words because it was far from the truth, and they both knew it.
“This is why I’ve been avoiding you,” Honey said, folding her arms together indignantly as she pointedly looked at his arms that were pressed on the wall on either side of her.
But Honey’s words didn’t deter him; if anything, they spurned him on more as he leaned in closer, and Honey felt her heart flutter as Nikos’s blue eyes came closer to her than they had ever been before.
He smiled.
“I’ve missed you.”
Her mouth parted, yet a word would not escape.
She had heard many of Nikos’s flirtatious lines before; not only to herself, but to every woman Nikos had ever come across.
It was why she never took anything he said seriously.
But ever so often, he would say something like this, and it would sound genuine, not like he was trying to flatter her, but that he meant it.
The flutters in her chest turned into pounding. It was an odd feeling, one that she hadn’t felt since she was a teenage girl.
Nikos’s lips brushed against her as he stepped closer.
“Move,” Honey said as she tried to turn away from him. He was so close to her that she felt nothing but the heat emitting from both of their bodies. It was too much, making her heady, and she knew if she were that way, she wouldn’t make the right choices.
“Do you really want me to?” Nikos asked her as he chased after her lips.
Wherever she turned, he did too. Back and forth, they went until she could no longer run, and when his lips brushed hers again, she brushed back.
That was enough for Nikos to lurch forward and kiss her deeply as if he were a man dying of thirst and was getting his first opportunity to drink.
They kissed, and kissed, and kissed; their lips greedily sucking, their tongues skillfully tangling, and their mouths molding together as one.
He kissed her as if he wanted to devour her, and Honey felt herself drowning.
She knew she shouldn’t kiss him, especially with this much passion as if she were a person who had been without their lover for months, but it was as if a dam broke within herself, and she could not control herself.
She kissed him back just as deeply, letting herself get lost in the kiss that was nearly making her lose all of her senses until she heard the click of heels.
Immediately, her eyes popped open, but it seemed as though Nikos did not hear those footsteps as he continued to kiss her.
Honey placed her hands between them, trying to shove him back but failing miserably.
“Nikos, someone’s coming,” Honey whispered fiercely, somewhat panicked. She did not want anyone to see her kissing Nikos.
Nikos pulled back but did not release his arms that had snaked around her waist while kissing her.
Honey got ready to push him again until Nikos moved them over to the side in the corner behind the curtain that they had there for girls who wanted extra privacy while changing, but most of them didn’t use it unless they were new.
The curtain hung low enough that their feet couldn’t be seen, and although Honey was grateful for that, she was pissed that she was even hiding behind this curtain.
She glared at Nikos with disbelief.
Heels clicked and laughter was exchanged as a group of girls entered the room. Honey could recognize some of the voices, including Brittany’s.
“It’s so busy tonight,” Brittany exclaimed. “I need to freshen up.”
“Lots of money out there. We got to hurry up, so we don’t miss out,” Krystal, one of the dancers and Brittany’s friend, said.
Honey strained to hear their voices but was distracted by the press of Nikos’s lips on her neck.
She froze in disbelief, wondering how he could even think about doing something like this when other people were in the room.
She was ready to knock him upside the head until his tongue slid across her neck, sending a shiver down her spine.
She squeezed her eyes from the pleasure that made her unable to ball her fist up and smack him away immediately.
“Did Honey leave already? I didn’t see her out there after her performance.”
More kisses peppered her neck without regard to the conversation happening outside the curtain.
Honey bit her lip as Nikos sucked on her neck.
It felt so good that her nails bit into her skin as she did everything to refrain from moving too much, which would only draw attention to herself.
But Nikos didn’t care about that as he trailed kisses down her neck all the way to her stomach until he was on his knees.
“Hopefully, she left. Otherwise, all she’ll do is scoop up all the money,” Brittany said bitterly. “That bitch.”
Under different circumstances, Brittany’s last comment would have been enough for Honey to come out from behind the curtain and whoop her ass.
But she was too preoccupied with Nikos, who had already skillfully untied each side of her bikini bottom that she had worn for her performance tonight.
For the briefest moment, he looked up and their eyes connected.
Honey knew she should be giving him a firm no to end this, and knew that was exactly why Nikos was looking at her now— for permission.
But, for some reason, she was at a loss for words, and when a glint appeared in Nikos’s eyes, even then nothing fell from her lips.
Nikos continued to stare into her eyes as he lifted her right leg up gently, anchoring it over his shoulder before he buried his face between her legs. Honey’s mouth formed into the shape of the letter O.
“And did you see the men Nikos were with? They look like they’re made of money. I saw them throwing up C notes when Honey was on stage.”