Chapter 3: The Protector

Lately, the office has been full of paperwork and long lists of people that I either need to fire or kill. Going back and forth between the hotel, the club and back at the shop. I am getting tired of dealing with the same things over and over, I need something new, something I've never done before. I walked out of the office and made my way to the limo there in the back seat was Garrick. "Been a while since you've gotten out, hasn't it?" Garrick looks at me with a brow raised. "I suppose so. But where are we going?" Garrick has a smirk upon his face, "Why not go back to your club in person. Just to watch not maintenance or doing the bookings or meetings." I smirk and get into the limo, and we drive away, "How have the new members at the hotel been?" Garrick looked over at me with a distasteful look, "Come on man, No more talk about work and all that bullshit. You need to relax and stop worrying about it." I sigh and pull my phone out, I look up a few of our new employees, there is only one this month. Weird, Skylar Bailey. She's very young, 19. For now, I see her birthday is coming up next week. I put my phone away and stare out the window as the rain starts to come down and hit upon the car's window. I like the rain, it's dark and gloomy. Mysterious and always calming, the rain helps clear my mind.

The limo pulls up to the club, I open the door and both me and Garrick head into the club, The dark feeling continues inside. The smell hits as soon as I walk in, Leather, Musk, alcohol and sex. We walk into the back of the club, the red room with Black leather seats and a large glass table. On the table there are already two bottles of rum and one of whiskey. On the other side of the table there is a box of cigars and three ashtrays. We sit down and two ladies walk over and one sits on Garricks lap, the other lady goes to sit down on my lap and puts her arm around my back and wraps it. The tables have smudges and handprints from the previous customers, I look around and then at the girl on my thigh, "Can You go fetch me a cigar darling?" She smiles and nods, I watch as she gets up and walks to the other room, she is gone for five minutes and then returns with a box of cigars. The girl opens the box and shows me what is inside, "We have Maple, Cider, Honey or Cannabis" I look closer at the box and pick one out, I choose the Cider cigar, I know that it also has a slight hickory taste as well. I put the cigar up to my mouth and the girl lit it for me. I took a very deep breath and held it in.

She puts the box on the table and then sits down on my lap again and starts to kiss my cheek. This place is very busy but the V.I.P lounge is very calm and there is just loud music and girls dancing on men or on the poles all around us. I look around the room and see a new girl walking around in the main area. I can see through the one-way glass window that she looks uncomfortable. She is very thin and couldn't be any taller than 5'3. Her brown hair is up in a high ponytail with small wisps coming down in the front. She is in a red dress that shows off a bit of her stomach and most of her back, it goes down to her mid-thigh. The sight of her is making me rock hard and it's hard to ignore. I made a gesture to one of my waiters. "Yes sir, what can I do for you?" I move the girl off my lap and pick my cigar back up, "that new girl, what's her name?"

The waiter looks over at her and then back at me, he takes a big gulp. "Uh she is, um…" I get impatient, "spit it out god damnit!" The waiter jumps and then shakingly looks away and then stares at her, "that is Lyla…" I looked up at the waiter and then stood up immediately, "What is her real name?" He started to step away from me, I sighed and walked away. I moved into the other room where everyone is welcome. I sat down in the back corner of the room where I could always watch her. I noticed that there is a group of men that are trying to get into pants already and she hasn't even been here for more than 5 maybe 10 minutes. They are so fucking disgusting I could ring them all by the balls and leave them hanging on the bridge. An hour goes by and she seems more comfortable, until Jacob goes up to her, why the fuck is he still here, I was told that Jacob was fired and that Garrick hired a new girl to take his stop. I gripped my drink so hard that it cracked, I let go of the cup when I saw them walk away from the bar. A few minutes goes by and then I hear the music start playing, it sounds like we have another girl coming out on stage, I wonder which one will come out. Normally I like to watch Brittley. She always interacts with the people more than just dancing for the money, she always has fun with it and tries to include some of the men. I think it's funny trying to watch them dance.

The curtain opens and the girl comes out. She looks scared, I look up at her face, it was the new girl. This girl was supposed to be the new manager of the girls and yet she's being treated like she is one of the girls, I'm going to go off on Jacob later for this. Garrick specifically told him she was not a dancer and not a stripper so why is she fucking up on strange, Anger grew inside me for now reason. I normally don't get possessive over my girls at my clubs other than Anna back then but now this one is different. She is different, there is something about that is making me want to protect her, not just from these assholes of men but also from my world but I also want her to be mine. I watched as she moved around the stage like she had only danced in the past. She was starting to grind on the floor and the men around her started to put money in their waistband and throw more around her. I signaled the waiter and he bring over a whiskey on rocks, and another cigar for me. She was getting the hang of it now by the looks of it, she looked like she was kind of okay but at the same time not. I finish off my drink and get up. I walk over to the stage, and I toss a pile of money over there from behind the other men, I walk away and go over to Tyler, "Tyler, I want that girl to be in the V.I.P section for now on. I don't want these men getting their grubby hands on her." Tyler nodded and walked over to the other side of the bar to take some orders

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It was later in the evening; I was dealing with a ton of bullshit. I had employees quite somewhere not answering their phones and then I must go kill one or two after I figure out who is talking shit about me and my family to other mafias. I was heading out of my office when I got a phone call. I answered the phone, "Hey, why did you move Skylar from the main bar to the V.I.P lounge?" I sigh, "It didn't feel right having her be in that area, I didn't Like the men touching her and feeling her up." I can hear Garrick chuckle, "What's so funny Garrick?" Garrick didn't speak for a minute "By the way it sounds to me Xander, you have a crush on the new girl." I didn't answer but I can tell that Garrick is smiling on the other side of the phone, it was a seething feeling in my face. "Keep your thoughts to yourself or We will be sparing partners tomorrow." Garrick has a sense for when I don't tell the entire story and sometimes, I am glad he gets the crossed-out details and knows them while no one else does but sometimes it can put me in a bad position. Love is a fucking waste of time and not worth it. I brought up Skylar's background, she is 19 years old, but her birthday is coming up soon. Skylar lived in Main for most of her life, looks like she just recently moved here with in the last few months. I brought up her full background profile that Garrick gathered on her while he was seeing if she was right to move over to the club. I don't let Garrick move anyone over to my club if Garrick thinks are capable of being in My line of work. I pull a file of photos and education paperwork, I see she was in ballet, and theater. I go deeper into her files and see that she was very good at writing, her entries in writing contest back in high school won every year. I see she also was in softball, had a full ride too. Her medical documents say she had torn her ACL in the last inning for the end of the season and wasn't able to play after that.

I have finally gotten through all her information and her background. Skylar Bailey is a very interesting girl; she is worth seeing if she could do more in my line of work. I will observe her for the next couple of weeks and see how her attitude and personality is, because the more I learn about her that more I am interested in meeting her, the more I need to know her.