Shutout (The Renegades Series Book 5)

by Melody Heck Gatto

  His hand stung, and his knuckles were red. Moving his fingers, he deduced that he should be okay. So long as it didn’t swell, he’d be good for the game tomorrow night.

  “Guys, I should ask you to leave, too,” the security man said as he returned. “We don’t put up with fighting in here.”

  “Bruno, pretty sure they didn’t mean to cause any problems. Those creeps had their hands all over Hailee. Even I was worried,” the girl with the black and blue hair said.

  Dominic put his hands up in defense. “Really, I was just worried about her. Sorry if I caused any problems.”

  “Hey, I know you two,” the man said as he looked at Kaden and Dominic more closely. “You’re hockey players, and you guys were here the other night for the bachelor party.”

  “That’s us.” Kaden smiled.

  “Well, I guess I could let you stay, as long as you keep out of trouble.”

  “We intend to, trust me.” Kaden pulled Dominic back to their table. “Dom, we can’t afford to be put in the spotlight, not here.”

  Yeah, a strip club would be a bad place to draw any attention to ourselves. Dominic took a long drink of his beer. His hand ached. Why did I punch them? Not the smartest move.

  “Dom, I think we should probably leave now and avoid any further altercations. Paige will kick our asses if we can’t stay out of trouble.”

  “We haven’t even had lunch yet.”

  “Here honey.” The bartender with the black and blue hair set a bag of ice on the table. “You might need this.”

  “Oh, thanks.” She wasn’t kidding. His hand was on fire. “Is Hailee okay?”

  She winked before she said, “Yes, hon, she’s just fine.”

  As she walked away from their table, Dominic looked at Kaden to say something but noticed his eyes were trained on the backside of the bartender. “Yo, O’Conner.” Nothing. “Kaden!”

  Finally, Kaden focused on Dominic. “Yeah?”

  “You still want to leave?”

  “But we haven’t had lunch yet.” Kaden smiled.

  “Yeah, that’s what I figured. I was thinking about some nachos and chicken fingers. Oh look, here she comes now.”

  Hailee was walking towards their table, a scowl on her face.

  “Uh, D-man, she doesn’t look very grateful.”

  “Hailee, I’m so glad you’re okay.” Dom plastered the flirtiest smile he could on his face in the hope that she wouldn’t be too mad about his caveman actions.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  “Uh, we’re waiting to order some food for lunch? Do you think we could get some nachos?” Even though he could see that she was poised and ready to yell, he just kept talking. “I’ll take another beer, too. Thanks.”

  “Forget about food. What the hell did you think you were doing? You make a habit of punching people out?”

  Dominic paused before he answered. After all this time, she still couldn’t accept help. Taking a breath, he calmly answered. “You mean getting those creeps off you? You’re welcome, by the way.”

  “I was handling it just fine.” Her face froze in an angry look, her eyes intense and trained on only him.

  “Sure you were.” Dom finished the last of his beer and pushed the empty bottle to the edge of the table.

  “I didn’t need you to save me.” Her voice lowered. “They weren’t going to hurt me.”

  “Well, it didn’t look that way from here.” She was so hell bent on being self-sufficient that accepting help from anyone was unacceptable. Or maybe it was just accepting help from a man. Or just from him. He’d bet it was him. Too bad he wasn’t letting this go. “How do you know they weren’t going to hurt you? Did you know them?”

  “Not that it is any of your business, but yes, I did.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “From where?”

  “Excuse me?” Hailee asked, as she cocked her head and put her hand on her hip.

  “Where do you know those dickheads from?”

  “If you must know, my birthday, at the Cupcakery.” She rolled her eyes before sighing, then continued talking. “Alison, my friend, set us up.”

  Heat raced through his veins. Why did that bother him? Biting the inside of his cheek, he tried not to comment. It wasn’t his place to say anything, or to care. “Like in a date?” But he said it anyway.

  She scrunched her face up and shook her head. “No. I mean, sure, I guess that was her plan. But neither of them were my type. They were too… I don’t know…” She wrinkled up her nose. “They were squirrelly.”

  “Squirrelly?” He’d never heard her say that before. It must mean snotty punk ass brats, ’cause that’s what I saw. Hearing she had no interest in them made the twinge of jealousy fade.

  “They aren’t the issue right now, you are.”

  Titling his head, he watched her. How can she even say that after what just went down? “Me?”

  “You come in here with your arrogance and still think that I need you to take care of me. Well I don’t. We do have security here, and they would’ve gotten those guys off me. Why are you here, anyway?” Her face got darker red with every word.

  “To answer your question, we came in for lunch.” He kept his voice calm and steady. She was trying to rattle him so he’d get upset and probably leave or get thrown out. It was obvious that by being here, he was getting to her, and that’s just how he wanted it. If he was under her skin, it meant that she still cared.

  “You came in to check up on me and found a reason to be my savior. I don’t need saving.”

  “Okay, you caught me. Honestly we came here because I needed to make sure it was actually you. I mean, the hair, the tattoos, I couldn’t be sure.”

  “Well, now you’re sure. It’s me, violet hair, tattoos and all. Happy?”

  He raked his eyes over her body, all the skin she was showing and very little clothes. Her tattoos were hot, but why was she on display for the world to see? Happy is not the word that I would use. “Not really, but I didn’t expect to see you getting manhandled by those creeps, either. Instinct just kicked in.”

  “Look,”—she bent down and lowered her voice, since folks were starting to stare at them—“I’m no damsel in distress and I do a pretty good job being on my own. I chose to do this job and I’ll only be here until I get my art off the ground. I don’t need anyone to swoop in and take care of me. So if you think you can come in here and flash some money around and I’ll fall all over you, you’re wrong.”

  “Uh, okay.”

  “Can we still get some nachos and chicken though?” Kaden interrupted.

  Hailee huffed and rolled her eyes.

  “Oh, and we still need more beer,” Dominic added, before she stomped off towards the bar.

  “So, that was the girl who broke your heart?” Kaden asked, once she was far enough away not to hear their conversation over the music.

  Dominic took a minute to watch the girls dance on the stage. His mind wandered to Hailee dancing up on him then peeling her top off. If it was any darker in that room, neither of them would’ve been able to see each other and she would’ve finished her dance, grinding on him and doing her best to take him to the brink. His chest tightened. What made him sick was knowing that her sensual dance wasn’t only for him. She didn’t even know it was him. That was a carefully planned dance she did for anyone who paid her enough.

  He moved his stare to Hailee. Her back was to him while she stood at the bar. “Yes. Minus the purple hair and tatts.” Putting his focus back on Kaden, he added, “And she never dressed like that, either.”

  “So, she’s from Toronto, then? Funny how she ended up here in Pittsburgh, huh?”

  “More ironic.”

  “Ironic? Why do you say that?”

  “Hey guys, I’m Sasha,” the girl with the black and blue hair said before Dom could reply. She took their beers off her tray and set them on the table. “Here are your beers, and your food is on the way. Can I get you anything else?”
>
  “Hailee?”

  “She’s behind me with your food, but I’m around if you need anything.”

  Kaden’s eyes were on her ass again as she walked away, his hand almost knocking his beer over as he groped for it.

  Hailee quickly approached the table, her face still frozen in a bitchy expression. She was apparently good at keeping that poker face, as hard as he tried to break it. She tossed the plates onto the table. They landed with a small clink. “Chicken. Nachos. Enjoy,” she said before turning and strutting away. He didn’t even have a chance to come up with anything to say before she disappeared into the back.

  “I’m guessing ordering a second plate of chicken might be out of the question,” Kaden said, helping himself to a mouthful of food.

  After a while, Sasha walked over to their table again, her hips swaying. She seemed to be working for a nice tip. “Can I get you boys anything else?” Her breasts were popping out of her top and Kaden’s eyes never left them.

  “Actually, we’d like to get a second order of chicken.”

  “No problem.” She winked at Kaden before retreating to the kitchen.

  “So what happened with you two? Hailee seemed like she was mad at you.” Kaden took a nacho, scooping as much cheese, beef, tomatoes and sour cream onto it as he could before shoving it in his mouth.

  “Thanks, Captain Obvious.” She may have looked mad, but bet she was more upset that I found her. “You know how I am, I love the ladies, but I also have respect for them. She had me wrapped around her finger. We were young, but we had a plan. She was going to travel with me and be by my side in whatever city I ended up playing for. I wanted her to know how serious I was, before I was in a position where there’d be fans and bunnies.” He ran a hand through his hair as the events of the worst day resurfaced. “I planned a day of beauty and shopping with my sisters for her, then they brought her home to our place for a special dinner. She looked rattled when she got home, but my sisters said she was fine, that they’d had a good day and discussed a lot of things.” He swallowed hard, fighting against the knot that formed in his throat. “When I proposed, she freaked out and ran. That was it.”

  “You actually proposed to her? So it was that serious?”

  “It was, to me anyway.”

  “So why’d she run?”

  “She told me she wouldn’t compromise her dreams for anyone, and she wasn’t looking to be stuck in the kitchen and given an allowance.”

  “What did that mean?”

  “I have no fucking clue. I always talked about a good contract that would take care of her forever, but she lost me with the stuff about the kitchen.”

  “Now it’s all ‘How dare you try to save me?’ Right?”

  Dominic nodded. “She was the one and she left me without any other explanation than that. The other night was the first time I’d seen her in a few years.”

  “So why aren’t you more bitter towards her? You act like she’s still important to you.”

  Dominic shrugged. “I’m not mad at her. Sure, she tore out my heart, and I’m sure someday I’ll understand what it was I did, or maybe I won’t. But, I could never hate her. She’s the only girl I ever gave my heart to.”

  “And all the bunnies?”

  “They’re just to pass the time. They know I’m not into it for any more than that. I’ve always wanted Hailee. No one else has ever measured up to her, and I don’t know if anyone ever will. And I’m not about to let any bunny get close enough to do that to me again.”

  “Well Romeo, it doesn’t seem like she wants much to do with you.”

  He flashed Kaden a grin. “That’s too bad, because I think this is my new favorite hangout.” If her overreaction to seeing him again was any indication, she still had feelings for him. Dominic dug into the nachos and also grabbed a chicken finger. “Outstanding nachos, don’t you think?”

  He was going to figure out why she was so mad at him, one way or another. And if this was how he had to do it, so be it. Naked girls and all.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Hailee

  “They’re really going to sit there and eat nachos and chicken after what he did? The only reason security didn’t throw his ass out of here is because he plays for the Renegades.” He plays for the Renegades. Ugh. The words made her head hurt. How did I not know that when I moved here?

  “That’d be a good enough reason for me. Damn. So the tattooed one isn’t with you then? Because he might just be able to make me into a hockey fan,” Evie said, her red hair falling over her shoulder as she drooled over Dominic from across the room. Evie was a new dancer at The Cat House. “I mean, the other one isn’t half bad either. I wouldn’t kick him out of bed for eating crackers.”

  “Where do you get your weird sayings?” Sasha laughed and shook her head.

  Heat rushed into Hailee’s cheeks and made her dizzy. Mentally shaking off this territorial feeling about Dominic and his teammate, she glanced in their direction.

  Evie pushed up her boobs and fixed her lipstick, but before she could strut off in the boys’ direction, Sasha put her hand out to stop her. “Hold it, Red. What about Marty? You know, the boy who put that ring on your finger?”

  Evie huffed and pushed her bottom lip out into a pout. “I’m engaged, not dead.”

  “Exactly, so remember, look, don’t touch,” Sasha added.

  “Boring!” Evie called as she stomped off backstage.

  “Honey, what was that look on your face when she was drooling over the hockey hunks over there?” Sasha asked. She took a drink of her bottled water.

  “What look? I didn’t have a look. There was no look.” Hailee turned her back on Sasha and walked over to the kitchen food window. “Where’s my damn food?”

  “Girl, you’ve got the look of a jealous girlfriend.” Sasha sang. Moving closer, she lowered her voice dramatically. “Hockey players have big egos. Better not let him see you looking like that. He’ll never let you forget it.”

  “Too late for that, she already has.” Max, the cook, was a greasy, dark haired man with a thick European accent. Hailee never knew exactly what kind, and she had no intention of asking him. He was known for his inappropriate comments and sexual advances to the girls. He peered out of the pick-up window then slid the two plates of food onto the ledge. “But he probably didn’t notice since he was busy ogling her tattoos. And who could blame him?” His eyes ran over her exposed skin.

  “Shut up Max! No he wasn’t,” Hailee said a little too loudly.

  “Too bad you’re not dancing tonight, Hailee. You could probably make a ton of money off those two. Just sayin’… You in that outfit and them with those deep pockets.” Max just shrugged his shoulders and disappeared back into the kitchen.

  Sasha sent her a look of agreement, eyebrows raised and smile on her lips.

  Hailee pointed at her friend. “Don’t get used to them and their deep pockets, as Max says, because I’m sure today is a one-time visit. He said he just had to be sure it was actually me. He came, he saw, it’s over.” Realizing what words she used in combination with the fact they were in a strip club, and the fact that her strip tease for him the other night almost went too far, she gasped and added, “In that order!”

  Sasha chuckled. “If you say so, girl.”

  Hailee grabbed her plate of food for Dominic’s table and headed out on to the floor. She didn’t like what they were saying, and there was no way it was true. She had left any feelings for him behind long ago, and there was no way he could still have feelings left for her. And if he did, well…

  “The extra food’s here. That was quick,” Dominic said with a smile.

  “I don’t stay in the kitchen for anyone!” she blurted out.

  “What?” Dominic messed his face up in question. “Why were you in the kitchen?”

  “What? Oh, nothing. Enjoy. And here’s your check. If you need anything else, Sasha will be over. I’m going on break.” She turned away quickly, but before she could leave, Dominic
spoke up.

  “Hang on, Hailee.” Dominic held up a one-hundred-dollar bill. His smirk made her question if this was just a sick joke, but his words cut too deep, joke or not. “How about a lap dance?”

  Her heart thudded to a stop. Oh hell no… “Sorry, you can put your money away unless you want one of the other girls, because I’m only waitressing tonight, not dancing. Have a good night, gentlemen.” Hailee hurried to the back as fast as her heels would take her.

  * * *

  Hailee’s alarm went off at three in the afternoon. Her morning at the pet salon had been a rough one. She had to shampoo a Great Dane who hated water. Too bad that he hated the dryer even more. Then there was the Chihuahua that peed on her. She’d never seen a little dog pee so much. Ever. Then there was the Black Lab that puked on her. Fun times. Plus, she had to fight to concentrate on the job because her mind had kept drifting to thoughts of Dominic. This nap was much needed and deserved.

  After a quick shower and a turkey sandwich, it was time to get ready for work. She liked to put the majority of her makeup on at home so she only had to get changed once she got there. Sweats and UGGs were her go-to outfit, comfortable and warm. The weather was starting to break so she didn’t need to bundle up. She straightened her hair and applied the dark eyeshadow and eyeliner to shape her cat eyes. One final check in the mirror before she left.

  She could’ve easily dressed in her work gear and put sweats over the top since she only had to walk downstairs to the club. But she preferred to keep all club business in the club. She wasn’t ashamed, but it also wasn’t who she really was, and sitting around in her apartment in her dancing get-up just didn’t feel right.

  When she walked through the doors into the dark room, her eyes took a while to adjust from the sunlight. The place was already filling up, which was something that created a lump in her throat; she hated the big crowds. It might mean more money in her pocket, but it also meant a long hot shower afterwards, scrubbing the grubby handprints off her.