Page 3 of Conor
I turn back to the balcony, processing exactly what it is I’m agreeing to. This little birdie is young, probably in her early twenties like me. She’s a hot fucking mess who isn’t doing herself any favors with the baggy clothes, but even so, it’s plain as day she’s got a pretty face. It would be a shame to see her killed, but if it comes down to my brothers or her, it’s always going to be my brothers.
“How am I supposed to keep an eye on her without raising her suspicions?” I ask.
Crow slaps me on the shoulder and heads for the stairs. “I’m sure you’ll sort it out. It shouldn’t be too hard, considering I just hired her on as a dancer.”
It’s been two hours since the guy in the leather jacket told me he’d give me a job. He goes by the name Crow, and I know he runs this club, but I have a suspicion he’s in charge of a lot more than that.
He’s scary as hell, but the alternative is even worse. That’s what keeps me glued to the chair I’ve been occupying for the last week, hoping and praying nobody will find me here.
The first few times I asked for a job, Crow laughed in my face. But tonight, for reasons I’m not entirely sure of, he finally took pity on me. I could be thinking of the many ways this could go wrong, but right now, I’m just grateful. As risky as this place might be, it’s the one place I know the Locos won’t come. When you’re between a rock and a hard place, it’s always wise to choose the lesser of two evils. In my case, that’s the Irish fucking mob. They protect their territory with a viciousness that makes any low life gangbanger think twice about crossing this threshold. Now if I can just manage to fly under the radar for a month while I stash away every cent I earn, I can finally leave this city—and all of my bad history—behind.
I’m eager to get started, but apparently Crow isn’t on the same page. I’ve been here all night and the room is starting to spin. I’m tired, cold, and my stomach aches with a pervasive hunger that seeps into my bones. I just really fucking need this job.
A shadow falls over me, and when I look up, I find myself in the crosshairs of a pair of eyes so green they should be illegal. A shiver crawls across my neck as my eyes move over the towering stranger who just entered my orbit unbidden. He’s tall, built, and mysterious in a way that only a mafioso could be. I know before he even opens his mouth that this guy is part of Crow’s crew. He’s as Irish as the day is long, but he’s younger than the other guys I’ve seen lurking around here. Not quite as rough around the edges. His face isn’t as weathered, but there’s something colder about him. There’s a hardness in his features that tells me he’s not a man to be easily won over.
He jerks his chin in my direction, eyes narrowed as he examines me. “I’m Conor. Crow sent me to show ye the ropes.”
I sit up a little straighter, feeling small and unsure of myself under the weight of his gaze. “Hi. I’m Ivy.”
“Ivy.” He rolls the name over his tongue with an Irish accent dipped in sin. “That sounds like a made-up name.”
“Well, it isn’t,” I assure him. Even if it is my middle name, it’s still my name. I figured it only made sense to use that instead of my first name Elizabeth, which the Locos know me as.
Conor’s gaze cuts over my face with laser precision, and whatever he thinks he sees in me makes his lip curl in disgust. Heat climbs up the flesh of my throat and it burns with repressed hate for men like him. Men who think they fucking know me with one glance. I’ve seen it a thousand times over. They mistake me for weak. A skinny orifice with big boobs and no brains. The misconceptions are endless. I must be a user because I’m gaunt and lifeless, not because I’m starving. I must be a whore because I was with Muerto. Surely, I asked for it.
I’ve seen it all before. So Conor’s quiet judgment means nothing to me, or at least it shouldn’t. But for some reason, if I’m being honest, it stings a little more than all the others. Maybe I was wrong, but when our eyes connected, it felt like I saw something else in him. Something other than a mafia asshole.
Regardless, his opinion doesn’t matter. I have no interest in a guy like Conor or what he might think of me. The faster I can get the hell away from him and everyone else like him, the better off I’ll be.
“What do you need to show me?” I ask, my voice harder than it was just a moment ago.
Conor doesn’t budge, and neither do I. He won’t take his eyes off me, and I’m too paralyzed to move. He’s watching me carefully, waiting for me to crack while he picks me apart until I feel raw inside. My hands squeeze together in my lap in an effort to diffuse the tension, but all I really want to do is curl up in a ball and hide.
Finally, Conor turns and makes a flippant gesture with his hand. “Follow me to the back. I’ll show you where the dressing rooms are.”
I follow him down the hall, trying to focus on my surroundings, but instead, my gaze bores into Conor. There’s a pronounced swagger to his walk that tells me he’s confident in his abilities, and granted, he probably should be. He’s broad shouldered and built like a fighter, and I could almost bet he looks airbrushed underneath that jacket. His hands are so fucking big he could probably wrap them around my neck twice while he smokes a cigarette and strangles me with two fingers.
I wonder how many people he’s killed. And then I wonder something even worse. Is he banging the dancers here every night? Is that why he’s in charge? But one look at his stony jaw, and I know that can’t be right. He doesn’t look like the kind of man who gets enjoyment out of much of anything. He probably fucks like a Viking, tossing women aside when he’s done impregnating them with sons for his clan.
I shake myself out of it when he turns to me, and his eyes move over me with a roughness they didn’t possess just a few moments before. “I hope ye know how to fix yourself up. That mess ye’re sporting now isn’t going to fly.”
My jaw tightens, but I force a smile, reminding myself how much I need this job. “It’s not a problem.”
He doesn’t seem satisfied with his insult, so he adds salt. “Might want to go heavy on the makeup.”
“Duly noted,” I bite out. “Lots of makeup.”
I don’t actually have any makeup, but I’m hoping one of the other dancers will loan me some.
“There’s a shower too.” He points toward the back of the room. “You should probably use that.”
Shame blisters any pride I might have had left, threatening to ruin this opportunity before I even get started. I don’t know why he feels the need to be such an ass, but it isn’t necessary. I already hate myself enough for both of us, and nothing could be more humiliating than crawling out from behind a dumpster every morning.
I washed up this morning in a gas station bathroom, but it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to point out that I still look a fright. My hair is knotted and in desperate need of some hot water and conditioner, and my skin could do with something other than crusty old bar soap.
I cross my arms to hide the fact that I’m shaking. It’s freezing in here and with such a low body weight, I get cold easily. “What else do I need to know?”
“You get a three-song set,” he says. “Better make it worthwhile. Crow doesn’t keep girls around if the clients don’t like them.”
