A Million Guilty Pleasures: Million Dollar Duet (23 page)

So there we were, parked across the street from Foreplay in the dark, waiting for Dez to call with the all-clear. The building looked deserted and lifeless, as far as I could tell. The parking lot was just about empty, and the neon sign had long been extinguished.

Polly was decked out all in black, including a pair of black combat boots. What the hell she was doing with combat boots in her wardrobe was a complete mystery to me. The thought crossed my mind that this might not have been the first secret mission she had been a party to, not that it would surprise me.

“Is your phone even on?” she asked for the cajillionth time.

“Yes, Polly, it’s on.”

Her leg bounced up and down like she’d had way too many cups of coffee. Also, I noticed she’d developed a serious case of shifty eyes. I swear, you would’ve thought we were casing the
joint to rob it, knowing full well a whole SWAT team was waiting in the bushes.

“Check again,” she said, because apparently she thought I was an idiot who didn’t know how to work a stupid cell phone.

I rolled my eyes with an annoyed sigh and looked down at my phone, even holding it up for her inspection. Just then it vibrated in my hand, causing me to jump a little.

It was a text from Dez:
It’s a negative on the EPT
.

Yeah, that would be the all-clear we were waiting for.

“Let’s go,” I told Polly.

We got out of the car, both of us being careful to shut the doors as soundlessly as we could. Hunched over, we made our way across the street and through the parking lot, all sorts of stealthy-like. The
Mission: Impossible
theme song kept playing over and over in my head, but I knew Tom Cruise didn’t have jack squat on us. Once we reached the front of the club, we pressed our backs against the wall and I lightly tapped on the door. First two raps, a pause, and then three more.

“Is that the code you guys agreed on for the knock?” Polly asked in a whisper.

“No. We don’t have one,” I said with a shrug. “I just thought … Oh, shut it. I’m nervous, okay?”

Polly let out a squeak of a giggle and then hurriedly covered her mouth to stifle any more sounds. That was about the time Dez opened the door.

“What the fuck are you asshats doing?” she asked with a stern whisper, then turned her scowling face on Polly. “Are you trying to get us caught? This isn’t a slumber party, Gidget.”

Polly dropped her hand and did her best to keep a straight face. “Sorry.”

“Cute outfit,” she said as she looked Polly over, her tone of voice taking a sudden turn into Valley Girl land, which Dez
never
did. Polly was definitely rubbing off on her. I’d point it out later and watch her get all defensive because it would be funny.

Polly beamed at the compliment. “Thanks! You too,” she said, looking her over in turn.

Dez was dressed in much the same way as Polly. In fact, it was the same outfit she’d had on when she’d shown up at Noah’s to “kidnap” me. I was pretty sure it wasn’t what she’d worn to work.

“Did you change?” I asked her, because that wasn’t at all like Dez, either.

She gave me a well-duh look and stomped one foot lightly. “I couldn’t exactly wear the same thing for both work and this, now could I?”

I rolled my eyes in Polly’s direction. “Jeez, you are never allowed to talk to my friends again. You’re like a damn disease.”

Dez looked stunned. “What are you talking about?”

“You caught Polly’s girly cooties. No worries—we’ll get you fixed up with one quick visit to the prison on conjugal visit day.”

Polly did the giggle-snort thing again, and then Dez moved aside to usher us inside.

“Is he gone?” I asked as the door closed behind us.

“I think so, but he always leaves out the back door, so I don’t know.”

“What do you mean you don’t know? You didn’t check?” The incredulous tone was evident in my voice even though I
was still whispering. I held up my phone to show her the text she’d sent. “You said you’re not pregnant!”

“Well, I might be a little bit knocked up. Those tests aren’t always accurate.”

I was going to kill her. I was sure the murderous glare in my eyes made that fact perfectly clear, but my death glare—which I’d practiced for years to get just right—never had any effect on my best friend.

Dez shrugged like it was no big deal. “Fuck it. If he’s here, I figure we can knock him out.”

I pulled her in close so she could hear me. “Um, Dez? These outfits might make us look like super-badass ninjas and all, but um, we’re not.”

“Now what are we supposed to do?” Polly’s shoulders slumped in defeat. I knew it was killing her. Proper planning defined her life, so to have to wing it meant certain disaster in her book.

I threw my shoulders back and straightened to my full height. “We’re going to go find out if he’s here, and then we’re going to get that damn contract,” I said assertively, taking control of the situation. “Now let’s get our ninja on.”

The club was dark, though the emergency exit signs provided a minuscule amount of light. Of course Dez knew the layout like the back of her hand, and I knew the direction to the basement from my last trip there, so we were good to go.

As we descended the stairs, I almost expected the club’s doorman to be waiting at the bottom with that damn clipboard that made him think he was a god or something. But he wasn’t there. In fact, it was completely dark, so dark we had to trail our hands along the walls for some navigational guidance.
Before we got to the end of the hall, I could see light filtering out from under a door and hear music coming from inside the room.

Scott was still in his office. And then we heard voices coming from the back of the building, headed our way.

Polly grabbed the back of my shirt in her fist, and I did the same to Dez in turn, slightly yanking her back.

“Someone’s coming! Now what?” I whispered, hurriedly.

Dez yanked my hand off her shirt and turned on me. “Don’t get your thong in a twist, Lanes, and shush before they hear you. I’ve got this covered. Come on.”

Polly and I followed her down the hall, and we managed to make it inside a little closet that was right beside Scott’s office without making too much of a ruckus. No sooner had we gotten inside than the other voices stopped outside the door.

“Have fun, mate,” a male voice said.

“That’s Terrence,” Dez whispered.

“Who’s he talking to?” I strained my ears, but all I heard was the opening and closing of Scott’s office door.

“So what? We’re just going to wait here until they leave?” Polly asked.

We were packed in the tiny space like sardines, but it wasn’t like we had any other options. “Yeah, pretty much so,” I said.

“Not necessarily.” Dez maneuvered herself so that she could turn toward the wall that was on the opposite side of Scott’s office.

“What are you doing?” I asked when she started fidgeting with something that looked like a sticker on the plaster.

She pulled at it and then a beam of light shot through a
hole. “I might have had a little safeguard placed in here in the event that some hottie was down for some kinky fuckery in the form of a closet quickie.” She shrugged. “This way I could check to make sure the boss man wasn’t looking for me.”

“You’re an evil genius, do you know that?” I asked, impressed with her ingenuity. “A total slut for gettin’ down and dirty in a supply closet, but a genius all the same.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” she said with a cheeky grin. “The best part is that these walls are paper thin, so the challenge to stay quiet while fireworks explode from my girly bits is particularly erotic.”

I shook my head at her and leaned toward the hole. When I saw who was in the other room with Scott, I gasped and shot up straight, bonking Polly in the nose in the process. “Holy crap!”

Dez cupped her hand over my mouth because my whisper was definitely in danger of becoming a whole lot more than that.

“Christ!” Polly touched her nose gingerly. “You mind telling me why you’re trying to break my nose?”

I pulled Dez’s hand from my mouth. “It’s David!”

Polly dropped her hand, her nose forgotten. “That asshole is here to steal the contract!”

I heard voices, so I leaned back over to look again, wanting to make sure I hadn’t been seeing things. Sure enough, David was sitting on the leather couch next to Scott’s desk. His face was puffy and bruised from his recent beating, courtesy of one Noah P. Crawford.

Scott’s desk, by the way, was loaded down with blocks of what looked to be cocaine.

“Oh my, Jesus! Dez, give me your phone,” I told her, reaching blindly behind me.

“What? Why?”

“Just put it on video and give it to me. Hurry!”

Dez slipped her phone into my hand and I put the lens over the hole, making sure to get a good view on the phone’s screen. Dez wasn’t kidding; those walls were paper thin. I could hear every word they were saying.

“What the hell happened to you?” Scott’s voice had a bit of humor to it. I sort of wanted to laugh, too.

David put his fingers to the cut over his swollen eye. “Kickboxing accident. I missed the bag.”

“And what, kicked yourself in the face? A lot?”

“Shut up. You got another shipment of coke so soon? That’s risky,” David said, changing the subject. He sounded none too happy.

“It’s not a new shipment. There’s been an increase of in-house requests. Both from those little snot-nosed brats upstairs and the gentlemen down here looking to score a whore and more.”

“You’re expanding to college kids? That’s not something we’ve discussed. Last I checked, we’re partners on this.”

“We are. That’s why I called you in.” Scott stood and walked around to the front of his desk, leaning against it and crossing his legs at the ankles. “So let’s talk about it.”

“Nothing to talk about. It’s too risky a move. Some punk kid rats and we’re going down like the
Titanic
. Not smart. Call it off.”

The right side of Scott’s mouth drew up and he shrugged. “I suppose you’ve got a point, but it does make good business
sense to offer the coke as a package deal with the girls. Those rich bastards aren’t blabbing about shit, and you know it. They’ve got too much to lose. A two-for-one will help drive up the starting bid on the auctions.”

“Now
that
I can get on board with,” David said with a politician’s smile. “Speaking of good business sense, my friend the senator will be coming to the next auction. I can’t stress enough how important it is that we make him happy with the goods, both the flake and the ladies. How’s the search for the twins going? Any luck?”

“Yep, that’s reason number two for calling you in. Trust me, I am about to make your day, your week—hell, your whole year.” Scott reached over to his phone and pushed a button, leaving the speaker on.

Terrence picked up on the other end. “Yeah, boss?”

“Show the ladies to my office, T,” Scott told him, and then disconnected the call with another push of the button.

After a few moments, the office door opened again and two leggy redheads—twins—sauntered into the room. They had identical physical attributes from what I could tell, and wore identical short dresses in silver. Dang, even their saunters were identical.

“Be still, my beating heart,” David said, adjusting the front of his pants. He flashed them that toothy grin he apparently thought was sexy but which was just creepy even without the Elephant Man mask he was sporting. “Hellooo, ladies.”

Scott went over to the girls and stood between them. “Meet Izzy and Belle. They’re perfect, right?”

“Hell, yeah. The senator is going to be very satisfied with this package deal. Gotta admit, I wouldn’t mind sampling some of that for myself.”

“I thought you might, and really, there isn’t any reason why we can’t. After all, I did say I was going to make your day.”

David’s lascivious gaze raked over the girl on the right. Down, up, and back down to her legs again, like he was doing his damnedest to undress her with his eyes. He didn’t even bother to look away from her thighs when he said, “Why don’t you come over here and wrap that pair of milky ways around my head, sweetheart?”

Oh, gag. Fortunately for him, his horrendous pickup line wouldn’t stop him from getting laid. With a few bucks in their pocket those girls would be good to go, but I was pretty sure they were getting paid more than a few bucks.

“Izzy, I want you to be really nice to this gentleman. Really, really nice,” Scott said, taking her hand and directing her toward David.

Izzy stopped in front of him and Belle walked up behind her sister to unzip her dress, letting it pool on the floor at her feet. Izzy was completely naked underneath. Judging by the look on David’s face, I’d say he about lost his load in his pants right there.

“Goddamn, girl!” David took Izzy by the hips and buried his face at the apex of her thighs. She giggled and ran her hands through his hair, closing her eyes and letting her head fall back. I didn’t blame her about the closing-her-eyes part. It’d be bad enough to have to feel it—I certainly wouldn’t want to have to watch the man-beast as he ate her.

Scott laughed and walked over to his desk to pick up a couple of baggies of coke and returned to give one to David. “Here, Romeo. Let’s party.”

I should’ve turned away. What was about to go down in that room was disturbing on so many levels, but I couldn’t
look away. I was a very sick individual. It was like watching a freak show. I knew it was going to give me the heebie-jeebies, but I had to see it.

Belle was naked now, and both girls were sprawled out on the couch with David and Scott moving their slimy mouths and hands all over them. The girls didn’t seem to be complaining, but … 
gross!
I watched as David opened a baggie and shook the contents along the length of Izzy’s abdomen. Then he took a straw and snorted the line-shaped powder. Izzy moaned at the same time, and that’s when I saw David was pushing three fingers inside her while Scott looked on.

“Did I just hear what I think I heard?” Polly’s nose scrunched up. “Ew! What the hell are they doing in there?”