Page 230 of The Daddy P.I. Casefiles: The Second Collection
Logan’s taken me to his club a few times. I’ve worked out at the state-of-the-art gym with him, swum laps in the indoor pool, enjoyed a hot towel shave in the spa, and eaten several meals worthy of a Michelin star in the restaurant. Ironically, for a sex club, I haven’t had any sex there yet, although I’ve watched some very hot scenes, including a menage which happened poolside that still fuels my dreams.
But I haven’t been to the club at night. And I haven’t been to the club’s nightclub.
Logan directs the cab driver around to a different door, at the other end of the huge building from the restaurant. There’s a line to enter and there’s none of the heavy security of the entrance into the main club, just a burly, black-suited bouncer guarding the door. Logan doesn’t bother with the line. He walks right up to the bouncer, who immediately nods and unclips a red rope, beckoning us forward. I follow Logan through a huge, steel door the bouncer opens for us.
Before we’re even a step down the wide stairs, I’m assaulted by sound. The air fills with a pounding, electronic beat that immediately makes my temples throb. Brenna’s dancing better be damn good if I have to endure that racket while I’m watching her. It’s warm, too. A humid warmth that can only come from sweating bodies packed together. Way too warm for what I’m wearing. Logan sheds his coat and suit jacket, folding them over one arm, and I follow his lead.
“There’s a coat check for members by the bar,” he says, his voice nearly drowned by the music. “We don’t use that one.” He nods at a coat check booth as we pass it.
The stairs open into a huge space. It must run half the length of a city block, stretching back through a dance floor crammed with at least two hundred people, ringed with private booths, towards a massive glass and chrome bar. A dozen cages are suspended above the dance floor, as is a DJ booth. The whole area is lit with strobing purple and white lights, which pick out the four dancers currently in the cages.
Although there are a lot of wild hair colors in the bouncing, whirling crowd, there are no blue dreadlocks anywhere.
Logan leads me along a path between the dance floor and a row of private booths. The walkway is lit from underneath andwhether it’s an unspoken accord or some posted rule I missed, the dancers stay off the thick, white tiles.
When we reach the bar, Logan walks to the far end which is roped off with another red rope. Logan unclips the rope, motions me to the bar, and clips the rope back behind us. It’s quieter here at the bar, whether because we’re away from the DJ’s booth or because the bar area is soundproofed, I don’t know, but I can hear the individual voices of the crowd at the other end of the bar.
A bald man almost as big as the bouncer outside immediately moves down the bar and holds his hand across the polished wood expanse to Logan, who shakes.
“Tee, this is Mac.”
The big bartender reaches his hand to me. After we shake, he takes our coats and jackets. They disappear behind the bar.
“What can I get you?” he asks.
Logan knows what I drink, so I let him order and am pleasantly surprised when the bartender reaches up to the top shelf and pulls down a bottle of High West Bourye. He pours us generous measures into tapered bourbon sippers and sets them down in front of us. Logan shakes the bartender’s hand again and he ambles off back up the bar to serve the three-deep waiting crowd.
Logan lifts his glass and I tap it with mine before taking an appreciative sip. Mmm, spice, straight up. It fills my palate and wrinkles my nose. Logan grumbles with pleasure. I savor the berry and vanilla flavors as they develop across my tongue and fade into a nutty sweetness.
Logan sighs after setting his glass back on the bar. “I need to buy a bottle of that for the house.”
“My treat,” I say. “Least I can do, Lo.”
He smiles and shakes his head. “You’re doing me the favor.”
“How do you figure?” I ask before taking another sip of nirvana.
“Perfect excuse to get an eighty-five-inch telly. Emmy can’t expect us to each have less than forty inches.”
I snort. “That’s an excuse you’ve been working on for a while.”
“Damn straight,” he responds as two men open the red rope and elbow up to the bar next to him.
“Rob, Harry,” Logan greets them.
I tip my chin to Harry, a gray-bearded, bear of a Dom in full leathers. Logan introduced me to Harry as a fellow motorcycle enthusiast years ago when I visited New York on leave. We’ve done a couple of rides together and he’s taken me to meet his brothers in the Rolling Blue Motorcycle Club chapter he belongs to in New Jersey. I liked the bikers, all of who are ex-military or law enforcement, and have spent several days with them, most recently on a charity ride in September. Some of them gave me tips for transitioning back into civvy life that have come in handy.
I’ve also had a very quiet, very off-the-record conversation with Harry about his trips with one of the club submissives upstate, to a retreat with bikers who are not ex-military or law enforcement. They’re very much at the opposite end of the spectrum. I’ve declined Harry’s invitations to join their get togethers because I wasn’t comfortable with a gangbang being the first scene I did with one of Logan’s club brothers. And because some of the bikers are one percenters and, having had run-ins with one percenters when I lived in Florida, they make me a little nervous. But if I had my own submissive to bring to the retreat, that would be a different thing. I might even be able to work Brenna’s abduction fantasy into it. The thought makes me smile into my bourbon.
I haven’t met the other Dom, Rob, although I recognize his name from the barbed wire tattoo around Brenna’s thigh, which makes my smile fade. He’s around Logan’s age, has Logan’s rangy build, and tops it all off with the kind of open, trustworthy face I’d have been happy to have in my platoon. But the idea that this guy topped the girl I want for my own with that annoyingly-handsome face makes me hate him on general principal. I have to drag my smile back onto my face when he holds out his hand.
“Harry’s mentioned you have a Chieftain Dark Horse,” Rob says after we shake.
“I do. Do you ride?”
“Yeah.” Rob grins. “A Ducati.”
Okay, that makes him marginally more likeable.
