18 #2
Justine’s eyes went wide. To everyone’s horror, she reached for a trash can, doing exactly that.The contents of her stomach all came up at once.
“Whoa. Are you sure you should be back?” I asked, rubbing a hand up and down her back as she took deep, gulping breaths.
It took her a minute to answer—it came out scratchy, probably thanks to the way the acid had burned her throat. “I don’t have a choice. The longer I’m out, the more money I lose. It’s not like we get PTO around here.”
Raven laughed. I glared at her. The look didn’t seem to faze her as she backed away from us, pinching her nose. “Hate to break it to you, Jazz. That smell alone will chase away all the customers.”
She walked away with an air of superiority. I crouched next to my friend as she proceeded to vomit in the trash a second time.
“I really think you need to see a doctor. This isn’t normal. You have me really worried.”
Justine gave me a weak smile, but relented. “Maybe you’re right. I just hate missing even more work.”
I nodded in understanding before giving her a loose hug. We both stood. I helped her make her way to the back exit. Once she was outside, the fresh air seemed to make her feel a little better.
“Please let me know what happens?” I asked.
Justine leaned in, placing a light kiss on my cheek. Raven had a point about the smell, but I would never push her away in her time of need.
“You bet. I think there’s an urgent care open late. I’ll probably get checked out there.” Justine turned, walking off down the alleyway. I watched her until she turned the corner out of sight.
When I went back into the changing room, everyone was standing around watching me. I didn’t like how they were all paying so close attention to what was happening with Justine, but it wasn’t like that whole ordeal had been all that quiet.
The only person who wasn’t showing any interest was Raven, who was leaning over her vanity with her eye pencil drawing on her eyeliner. I wasn’t a violent person, but I’d wanted to throat punch a bitch for talking to my friend the way she had. There was no reason for any of it.
“You all know she’s pregnant, right?” Raven said it like it wasn’t that big of a deal.
I crossed my arms over my chest, my glare intensifying to the point where I swore it could melt her through the floor.
“Rumors like that aren’t funny,” I said, tapping my toe against the ground.
Raven only laughed before setting her eye pencil back on her vanity and spinning to face me. “It’s not a rumor. Think about it. The girl has been sick for over a week. That’s not normal. She doesn’t have any other symptoms of illness. The girl is knocked up.”
I growled out my irritation. Justine had been there for me since I started at Faded Sins.
While things could get tense between the dancers from time to time, for the most part, we were like family.
We didn’t make claims that were dangerous or could ruin someone’s job.
Raven was taking things too far. She was new and maybe didn’t understand that about this place, but the rest of the group would set her straight.
But to my horror, no one else stepped up to tell her to stop.
“I mean, it would make sense.” Victoria said as she grabbed a new corset from the clothing rack.
I dropped my jaw open as my eyes widened in horror. “Seriously? Fuck you guys. This isn’t how we do things. If something was going on with Jazzy, she’d let us know. We shouldn’t be speculating about what’s happening to her before she even knows. If it’s something serious, she’ll tell us.”
Was I being a little overdramatic? Probably, but I didn’t really care. I hadn’t seen anyone act like this in the years I’d been there.
But it was time to stop messing around. The club was opening, which meant it was time to get our acts together and be prepared to please our audiences.
I was the only guy working that night. I sort of wished I’d had the other two to back me up, to defend Justine.
Maybe I was just living in my own little fantasy world where I imagined we all got along.
There had to be something more to the picture if everyone seemed to be jumping on board with Raven’s theory.
Okay, so it was one person. I was being dramatic, but dramatic was what I did best, and I couldn’t focus as Henry came back to greet us.
It wasn’t all that often that he did it as the owner of the club.
He was mostly hidden in his office a lot of the time.
He only showed his face when something serious was going on.
It made my stomach roll to see him because I worried that he’d overheard our previous conversation.
He wouldn’t fire Justine, would he? Surely not.
It wasn’t like there was a rule against it.
Not that I really knew that. I was a guy, I had different rules than the female dancers did.
“Good evening, everyone,” he said as he entered the room. Everyone quickly quieted down, rushing to sit in chairs. When Henry spoke, we listened.
“It has come to my attention that there’s been some questionable activity going on in the club lately. We already tread on very precarious ground with what we do here, I’d like to keep the attention off of us for other reasons.”
Magenta, a dancer so named for her pink shade of hair, raised her hand. “What exactly is happening, so we know what to watch out for?”
Henry crossed his arms—it caused his suit jacket to lift a little. The man’s suits were always pressed within an inch of their lives, so I was surprised to see him do anything that could potentially cause wrinkles.
“Drugs. I am tolerant of a lot of things, but the last thing I need is for the DEA to come sniffing around in here. This place has always been safe for you all as dancers as well as for our patrons. When there was a report of someone getting roofied at our location a week ago, I knew I needed to say something.”
There was a chance whoever did it to the other person had gotten the drugs elsewhere, but it was more probable that he’d gotten them on location.
It was a common occurrence in cases like that.
A shiver raced its way along my spine as I thought about the few assholes that had tried to take things too far with me lately.
What would have happened had they tried to use drugs on me. There would have been no stopping them.
The room was silent as we all took in the information because that was one of the things we had all agreed to in our contracts when we were hired.
There would be no dealing or participating with drugs.
Maybe it was a little weird to have a strip club that subjected its dancers to routine drug testing, but I understood why Henry did it.
It kept his nose clean, making us one of the most reputable places around.
It helped hide the prostitution that took place under the law’s nose.
Who the hell would mess up a good thing by bringing drugs into the place or start dealing?
Without further instructions, no words of encouragement, because that wasn’t Henry’s style, he turned and left the room. The second the door clicked closed behind him, everyone started whispering amongst themselves, no doubt trying to figure out who would do it.
Raven looked smug as she sat back on her little stool, resting her elbows on her vanity as she watched everyone start to gossip.
Things like this had the capacity to break our family dynamic worse than the rumor that Raven had tried to start.
It could close the entire club if it brought us under too much of a microscope.
It was hard to keep my focus on what I needed to do as everything shifted so quickly.
It went from practicing to Henry’s announcement, to time to go on stage.
My head wasn’t in the right place. I only hoped that I didn’t fuck up whatever dance I was doing for the night.
At least I’d had the chance to practice before things went down, or I’d be up shit creek without a paddle.