They closed ranks to protect their own.
He circulated throughout the club, sipping at his beer until it became warm. No sign of Bridget. Maybe Tom knew where the dancers’ changing room was. His coworker was pretty much blotto, stoned on a continuous supply of Scotch and female flesh, but managed to point to a hidden door next to the DJ’s booth.
Adam set down his beer and casually made his way over to the door. When the DJ bent to pick up something from the floor, Adam ducked through. Three doors lined the fluorescent-lit hallway. One turned out to be a janitor’s closet, the second was locked—probably the manager’s office—but the third doorknob turned under his hand.
He opened it to face the S and M girl from the runway. She curled her lip. “Clear out before I call security to stomp your pretty face.” It wasn’t a compliment.
“Look, I’m here to see Bridget.”
“No Bridget here.” But like the tall brunette earlier, her eyes twitched briefly toward the back of the changing room. Years of working in the deafening trading pits had taught him to watch for tiny body language clues.
“Bridget!” he yelled. “It’s me, Adam! I really need to talk to you.”
“Get out of here!” The Goth girl actually picked up her whip and cracked it.
“Whoa.” He raised his hands in a placating gesture.
“Sonny! Sonny!” the girl called.
The bouncer came running, alerted by the whip crack and her shouts. He stopped short when he saw Adam. “You again. Why can’t you wait your turn and pay for a lap dance like everyone else?” He put his hand on Adam’s arm.
Adam yanked away but bumped into the whip-wielding dancer. She planted her boot into the small of his back and shoved him to crash face-first into the doorjamb. The bouncer pinned his arm behind his back as the flesh under his eye stung and swelled. But it wasn’t so swollen that he didn’t see Bridget appear from the back of the dressing room. Her shocked, then disapproving, expression was clear as glass.
“Adam Hale. What the hell are you doing here?”
3
“TELL ME AGAIN WHY you insisted on bringing me home?” Bridget unlocked her front door and flipped on the light. Adam reached for her suitcase to carry it in but she glared at him and grabbed it herself.
“We need to talk.” Adam followed her into her apartment, his cheek throbbing. He hadn’t been there since her moving day. That heavy-ass Ping-Pong table held her sewing machine and several scraps of shiny material.
“Talk about what? How you got into a brawl with a stripper and were ejected by the bouncer?”
“Hey, I was not brawling with her. I lost my balance and she kicked me.”
“You’re lucky Jinx didn’t crack you with her whip.”
He shuddered. Totally not his scene. “That is one scary chick.”
“What were you even doing there? I thought you finally grew up and stopped going to strip clubs.”
“I did. And how do you know I used to go?”
She curved her face into a look of mock puzzlement. “Was it Colin or Dane I overheard bragging? Probably Dane, since he’s single, and Colin isn’t. Didn’t you used to take Dane to clubs when he came to Chicago for business?”
“Damn. Those brothers of yours have some big mouths on them.”
“You won’t get any argument from me. So go home, and put some ice on your cheek.” She pointed at the door.
Adam was halfway out the door when he stopped. Very slick. Her excellent offensive attack had almost distracted him from his own questions. He turned back to her. “I was dropping off a coworker on my way home when I saw you arguing with that bouncer. What the hell were you doing at a strip club?”
She paused from hanging up her coat. “The logical assumption would be that I am dancing at Frisky’s.”
He couldn’t help himself and burst out laughing.
“Why is that so hard to believe? You don’t think I’m sexy enough?” She glared at him. Uh-oh.
“Come on, Bridge. You, a stripper? You always wear the baggiest clothes possible and blush beet-red if anybody even glances at your—” He gestured abruptly at her breasts, too embarrassed to even say the word.
“Maybe I’ve changed since I moved to the city. Maybe certain things don’t embarrass me anymore.” She moved to her futon and picked up a shiny lime-green bra. “Don’t you think this would make a perfect stripper top? Not that I would be wearing it all that long, anyway.” She grabbed a matching thong off her worktable.
“Whoa, are you serious?” He ran his fingers through his hair. “You’re dancing at Frisky’s?”
She held the green bra to her chest and shimmied a bit. “What do you think, Adam?”
“Oh, my God.” He looked, really looked around her apartment for the first time. A chrome clothes rack held a black corset thingie, a Day-Glo pink bra and panties, and a white vinyl tube top. No, that was a mini-mini-miniskirt. Bolts of silver, red and gold spandex fabric stood in a corner. But the kicker was a pair of six-inch clear plastic high heels with straps. Nobody wore those except strippers. “Did you dance tonight?”
She tossed down the bra. “Did you miss my performance, Adam?”
He laughed nervously and took off his coat. It was getting hot in her apartment. “Come on, I followed you into the club and I never saw you onstage.”
“You’re the strip-club expert, Adam. Don’t dancers have private clients or do private parties?”
He plopped onto her futon. “Oh, Bridge. What will your family say?”
She just laughed. Here he was, picturing her parents’ shock and horror and her brothers’ anger and disappointment, and she laughed? She had changed since she moved to Chicago, and not for the better. “It’s not funny.”
“Adam, you worry too much.” She plucked the pink bra off the hanger and rubbed her cheek over the shiny fabric. She’d look great in the pink with her fair skin….
“No!” He’d been imagining her in the pink bra and nothing else and hadn’t meant to say that aloud.
“‘No’ what?” She gave him a puzzled look.
He jumped up from the futon and walked over to her. “No, you can’t do that. Since your family isn’t here, I’m going to put a stop to this.”
“You are? How?”
“I don’t know—do you need money? I can loan you some.”
She looked shocked. All right, so he was tight with his money. Then she smiled and trailed the pink bra over his chest. His heart beat faster. “Tell you what. You’re a gambler, big guy. You gamble on corn, soybeans,
