“You’re disgusting. Don’t you even bother getting to know a girl before . . .”
“Don’t be so high and mighty with me! Before you were a lovesick puppy you were just as bad as me. Maybe worse.”
“I’ve changed.”
Sure he has. Or better say been changed. By one Miss Neve Knight.
“Everything I do now is for love.”
“Oh, go write that down in a song.” I can’t listen to this BS any longer.
“Already did.” Danny’s in my face now. “Just try and give me a reason to fire you, little brother. Just try.”
Chapter 1
Terrence
I like it when Danny gets angry. Always did. To see that smug little face scrunch up in anger, to see those bright blue eyes blaze in the old Blue way. Someone like Danny Blue doesn’t rage easy. Brooding, of course, but that’s whole ‘nother thing entirely. Danny Blue could brood for days and wouldn’t get a single rise out of me. It’s what he does, normally. Locks it all up inside. All that rage, all that heartbreak, all that feeling. Even when I deserve a good kick in the jollies, Danny Blue doesn’t oblige. He just clenches up his heart like a fist. But that’s Danny for you. Never wanting to give anyone else the satisfaction of seeing Danny Blue lose control. But not this time. That much, at least, I’m certain of. Danny’s coming close—thisclose—to losing it all. His mind, his heart, his temper. And I’m enjoying the heck out of it.
All my life, Danny’s been the good boy. The favored son. The one born to the only woman Clarence Blue ever really loved. Not like my mother. That good-for-nothing trash whore—that’s how Daddy dearest used to refer to her. A pin-up model who had the audacity to age out of my dad’s preferred age bracket, just when he moved up a tax bracket or two. How dare she, right? And my daddy never forgave her for it, nor for the millions she took with her when she finally upped and left one morning over the morning papers. We all saw the front page headlines: Clarence Blue—spotted with starlet. But that was many moons ago—and many wives ago.
Not that it mattered when it came to Danny and me. Our relationship was always that of the Cain and the Abel, the beloved and the despised. Clarence may have pretended to be disappointed in Danny Boy, may have pretended he couldn’t stand the sight of that dark rosebud mouth of his—his mother’s mouth—but deep down he loved the boy, loved him like he loved the woman he’d lost, like he loved his own flesh. Danny Blue was sired by the man my father was once, once upon a time. The man that knew how to love. The rest of us—we were all bastards. Illegitimate children. Sure, we were Clarence Blue’s kids—at least the DNA tests said so, when they came back—and you’ve got another thing coming if Clarence Blue didn’t insist on a DNA test for every potential progeny that came out of every starlet’s belly—but not in reality. None of us were born to the Clarence Blue back when he was a real person, a person in love, a real man: not an ice-cold statue, a shadow of his former self. Luckily, most of us—I assumed—were born to cocktail waitresses, strippers, people who wouldn’t make a fuss. Not one of his wives—or concubines, I should say. Just me. But that didn’t make me Clarence Blue’s legitimate son. I certainly wasn’t the son he wanted. The flesh of his flesh. The bone of his bone. And so my father never loved me.
But Danny—oh, boy, that’s another story. Danny was the apple of my father’s eye. But for all that, he didn’t have what it took. The Blues Empire was handed to him on a silver bloody platter—but Danny was too squeaky-clean to grease the wheel. He’s an innocent, you see. Likes to eat oysters and drink champagne, but doesn’t want to know how the sausage gets made. Doesn’t know that the big business comes not from our shiny luxury hotels or the deals made in the boardroom over skyscrapers and nightclubs, but here. In the bedroom. Reeking, filthy, smelling of sex. Here, where the businessmen make the real deals—over the naked buttocks of a stripper, dusted with blow. Here, where you could get blackmailed into signing away your fortune to my father—just by being caught with the wrong lips thrusting against your groin. Here, where desire made you lose your mind, your marbles, your millions. I knew how the game worked. And I knew how to play it. Fortunes aren’t made on oil or steel. They’re made on flesh. All the oil in the world can’t make up for the scent of a woman’s sweat.
Danny never understood a word of that. He always held himself as so much better than the rest of us, so much purer, so much more deserving of affection and love. But when he’s got the rage in his eyes and the rumbling of thunder, that blazing in his belly—then you know the truth. He’s no better than I am. Not a single solitary fucking whit. I guess that’s why I love making him as angry as I do. I guess that’s why I love goading him on. Because it’s proof: hard, solid, eye-bulging proof, that Danny Blue is no better than I am. No more deserving. And if Daddy Dearest loves him more, that’s nobody’s fault but his own. That’s the sickening chance in the universe. That you can be loved so much—and not even deserve it.
Everyone loves Danny, after all. Like Neve. That sweet little number. It’s not just that she’s pretty—you can get a dozen dimes for a dime a dozen, if you know what I’m saying—this is Hollywood, after all. She’s got something else. Some inner strength. A sharpness. I think if you showed her this business, let her get her hands dirty, she’d run it well. She knows what it takes to survive in this town. Which really means: to thrive, because only the lion, the tiger, the king of the jungle is the winner. Everyone else, even just half-a-rung lower on the ladder to success, is a loser. And you know what that means, don’t you? They get eaten alive.
Now, Roni. That was a different story. Roni wasn’t just about the sex to me. It’s true, when I first met her, I didn’t know she was my father’s latest slam piece. But I’ll be honest with you for a second. It wouldn’t have made a grain of sand’s worth of difference if I had. In fact, once I found out, it made it all the sweeter to have her squealing and moaning in my bed. It meant I had something that my father didn’t. I had something he couldn’t have. After years of underestimating me, of telling me I was worthless, of telling me I’d never measure up, my father had finally lost the one thing to me he thought he could never lose: a woman’s touch. Screwing Roni was like sticking it to my father, once and for all.
At least, it was. Until I found out about her and Danny. Found out she had a thing for Blues men: that she wanted to create a matched set. Get all three of us inside her. And maybe I wouldn’t have minded so much if I hadn’t cottoned on that she loved the bastard. Really loved him, in as sick and twisted a way as a girl like Roni was capable of loving. And that’s what got me. Right between the ribs—slice-like. That even Roni, who couldn’t love anyone, could love him. More than me.
I’m not going to say I hated my brother. I loved him—in my way. I just wish he could fall on his stupid face once in a while, you know? And you wouldn’t feel any different—if you were me. In fact, you’d feel exactly the bloody same.
“I’m trying,” I say to him. “Believe me.” Like I had to convince him not to fire me. Like I had to grovel. “I’m bringing in new acts all the time. Look at that girl up there. Singer, stripper, whatever. She’s riling up all the patrons. She’s just what we need, here. Someone fresh. Someone virginal.”
Danny looks disgusted. Still had that self-righteous little smirk on his face. “Honestly, I don’t know why we still have this place. Just because it’s dear old dad’s pet project . . .”
“Pet project?” Danny didn’t understand a thing.
“It’s twisted, Terrence.”
“It may be twisted, but it’s brilliant. A private club so elite its membership registrar might as well be the Who’s Who of the world. Who knew so many of the world’s most influential people were also the kinkiest, the most depraved, the most . . . well, I guess maybe you’d assume so, wouldn’t you?”
“But just because we have to manage this place, Terrence . . .”
“What?”
“It doesn’t mean we have to be like them! It’s all fantasy here. But i
t’s like a drug. You become addicted to it—but at the same time, Terrence, it’ll pull you in so deep. You can’t afford to get addicted to it. The sex, the smell, the feeling—it will take over everything you do. Especially since you’re around it all the time. I’m worried about you, Terrence. The patrons, they only come here once in a while, to play-act at living this life. But you, Terrence. You’re in it. You’re in it bad and you’re in it deep. And whatever sick, disgusting fantasy you’re acting out with Roni—you need to quit it, now.”
“Why?”
Danny pretends not to hear me. “And that girl on stage—”
“Yeah, the virgin.” I like the sound of the words on my tongue.
“Virgin or not, Terrence, you’d better take care of her. Make sure she doesn’t get abused by some of the rougher patrons around here. She’s not a pro—she doesn’t know what she’s doing. She doesn’t even know what kind of a place this is, does she?”
“It’s Hollywood. Every kind of place is this kind of place.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I bet she does.”
“They’ll eat her alive, Terrence. And this place—it’ll eat you alive, too.”
I can’t believe my ears. I remember back when Danny was worse than me, when he slept with more girls, took more drugs, did more everything. I remember when he was so deep in the hole it was me who had to drive him home, me who had to pour cold water on his face, give the girls some hundreds in an unmarked brown envelope and send them home with a promise on their lips never to tell another living soul what they had seen him do.
“I just want to go home.” Danny’s brow is covered in sweat. “I just want to get back home to my girlfriend, sit on the couch, watch some TV, relax. Be with the woman I love. Get away from this place, from this sickening atmosphere. I don’t want any part of this.” He sighs so heavily. “So everything we talked about. You clear?”
“Good and clear.” My voice is clipped, a mockery of professionalism. The way I bet he thinks his sounds.
“Now, I’m heading home.”
“But . . .” I can’t stop myself. “Don’t you want to hear whom I’ve booked for next week’s performance?”
“Whatever it is,” Danny doesn’t even stop to look at me. “It had better be good.”
I can’t resist a grin. Here it is. My ace in the hole. “Oh, it is. It definitely is. Even you would approve.”
“Uh-huh . . .” Danny turns to go.
“The Never Knights. Next weekend.”
Danny’s mouth opens wide with shock. I love how it looks. “How? What? Why?”
“Ask her yourself.”
That’s all I say as I close the door in his face.
Chapter 2
Unfortunately, my victory doesn’t last for particularly long. No sooner have I taken in the joyous sight of my brother’s shocked face, his mouth agape, gaping like a goldfish that had been lifted into the air, then a knock sounds at the door.
I figure it was Danny, desperate for information. I figured his plan was to humble himself if he had to, if it meant figuring out what Neve Knight was doing at the Blue Room. A perfect plan, if I do say so myself. Getting Danny’s dime onstage for all our patrons. Having her shake those delectable hips of hers in front of all those men who think they can have her. Now, when I say Neve agreed, I’m being almost completely truthful. Neve agreed to a gig. A gig at a “burlesque club.” Girls all love burlesque these days. It’s almost trendy. Didn’t quite tell her the full extent of her duties, or how much she’d be expected to take off in the process. But she’d figure all that out in good time. And Neve’s a swell girl, I reckon. A real star. The kind of girl who will do what it takes to get the audience growling. Even if it means throwing off her shirt, her bra, her underwear—but now I’m getting distracted. What I mean is, a girl like her—she’s no prude. Loyal to Danny or not, she’s got some spice in her. That much I can see, even from miles off. It was a real pleasure having her sign on the dotted line. The Never Knights: onstage at the Blue Room.
Even Daddy would have been proud at my daring. I couldn’t help but grin to myself, thinking all the while: now that’s how you handle a girl.
So when the knock sounds, I figure it’s Danny. He’s going to beg me to reconsider, to axe the gig, to nix Neve and all her Knights of the Round Table once and for all. He doesn’t want to see the girl he loves shaking her money-maker in the faces of the world’s greatest money-makers. He doesn’t want her to get seduced by a fat wad of hundreds waved into her face by men who could blow their nose with that kind of money and not even blink one of their billion-dollar eyelashes.
But it’s not Danny at all. I mean, Danny’s there, but he’s skulking in a corner, looking annoyed. Like he doesn’t want to see me again for at least a hundred years. But he has to, because Troy Baker, our head of security, is standing in the doorway, with the kind of frightened-rabbit expression on his face that men as big and strong and brawny as he is only get when faced with someone even more powerful. In this case, me.
“Sorry to interrupt.” The man’s always deferential. Not a good look on a man of his girth. “My apologies, Mr. Blue.”
“Go on,” I say, as lightly and airily as I can manage it. “What’s the matter, Troy?”
“There’s, uh,” Troy coughs and looks like he’d rather be anywhere else but here. “There’s been an incident.”
He flinches, and already I know the news isn’t good. I’m not one to shoot the messenger, but my father was, and Troy doesn’t yet know I’m a heck of a better man than my father ever could be.
“The new girl, Staci.” Troy’s eyes are on his shoes. “When she finished with her performance, just a couple minutes ago, she was walking off to get cleaned up when one of our, ah, patrons came over to her. Apparently he wanted a little tete a tete in his hotel room. Ideally lasting till morning.”
Danny rolls his eyes.
“Come on?” I shrug. “What’s the big deal? Happens all the time.”
“The lady wasn’t having it,” Troy tries to be as delicate as possible. “She told him she’d rather spend her time elsewhere.”
A rock drops in my stomach. None of my girls ever tells a patron she’d rather spend her time anywhere else than in his bed.
“He got upset?” I start thinking up damage control, concocting the numbers of girls I know would be happy to replace the skittish Staci in a heartbeat. Maybe two at once would assuage his hurt feelings . . .
“Worse.” Troy’s not having any fun at all. “He got persistent.”
“Yeah?” I’m not liking the sound of this. I’m not liking the sound of this at all.
“She kept on refusing.”
“Good for her.” Danny’s voice is sharp as steel. “Glad someone in this joint has got some principles.”
“He got handsy.”
“I’m not calling the cops, Troy . . .”
“She got handsy.”
Now I’m getting it. It dawns on me, and the feeling is sickening. “Oh, no, Troy. She didn’t . . .”
“Right in the balls, sir.”
Instinctively, I wince and look down at my groin.
“Oh, damn.”
“It gets worse, sir.” Troy’s staring at the door like it’s a naked coed covered in strawberry ice cream.
“Don’t tell me.”
“He fell back. Hit his head on the table. He’s out cold.”
“Shit.”
“Serves him right,” Danny growls under his breath, but I ignore him.
“We’d better go deal with this, then.” Danny and I follow Troy out to the main room of the club, and I find myself wondering about the effects of a concussion on short-term memory. If it’s mild amnesia, I think, maybe he’ll forget the number one rule of the Blue Room: that there are no rules, especially when it comes to the girls on stage.
A crowd’s already formed. I sighed a temporary sigh of relief for our no-cell-phones policy. At least I can be reasonably certain the paps ar
en’t getting hold of this as we speak. The balding, wiry man with a furious red welt on his forehead is Angus Martin, one of the head honchos at Walton & Brothers, the biggest hedge fund on this or any other continent. Not the kind of man you like to piss off. I gulp.
Danny looks at me, his eyebrows arched. “Your policy, brother. Your problem.”
“It’s gonna be okay!” I pretend like I’m cool with what’s happening. Like it’s all part of the plan. We get Troy to lift the man up. “He’s going to the Empire Suite at the Blue Hotel.” I whisper in Troy’s ear. “Call Brandi and Bunny. Tell them to wear their skimpiest satins and to be there when he wakes up, right in the middle of them. He’ll think he hit his head on the headboard in a moment of, ah, ecstasy.”
Troy nods and lifts up Angus, fireman-style.
When we’re alone, Danny grabs me by the shoulder, pushing me up against the wall. He’s got that gravelly, growly Tom Waits-style voice he puts on when he’s really, really angry. And for the first time, it hits me. Danny Blue isn’t playing around.
“That girl’s probably sobbing her eyes out in the dressing room,” he hisses.
“She’d better be.” I try and smooth my lapels. “After all, she’s out of a job.”
“How could you hire a girl like that?”
“Like what?”
“Like she doesn’t know what she’s getting into. A non-pro.”
“Everyone’s a pro if the price is right.” That’s what my father always said. “And that’s what the clientele like best. The virgins who go wild. Not pros.”
“It’s a different crowd, Terrence. You know that. She knows that. The girl can sing—but this isn’t a place for singers. It’s not a place for Never Knight, either. It’s a different world at the Club than it is out there. If you mix them, someone’s going to get hurt. And if it’s Neve, then I swear, Terrence, I am going to come after you so hard . . .”
I grit my teeth. How dare Danny be so self-righteous, after all the shit he used to pull? “That girl knew what she was getting into.” Didn’t she? “She begged me to give her a chance to start here. That she could take care of herself. ‘I want to make it as a star.’ That’s what she said.”
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