Adoring You: A Romantic Prequel Novella (Only You) Read online

  My own rules. Nothing against the other dancers who do date their customers. Believe me, I heard some of the cute love stories shared in the back, and even I’ve dreamed about a sexy, respectful millionaire who can’t resist me after a crotch grind, a motorboat, or an hour of very fulfilling conversation in the half–nude who wants to get to know the real me. And then I remember my clientele includes… well… Bill and his ilk.

  No offense. Bill behaves (most of the time), and some of my regulars are nice. But even if I were interested in any of them (which, spoiler alert, I’m not), my stomach doesn’t get all fluttery with butterflies when they’re talking about their wives and kids. A club isn’t exactly ideal breeding grounds for a relationship… or breeding.

  That doesn’t mean I don’t pretend I want them. I do. I pretend hard.

  Winking at Bill, I peel myself off the couch and straighten as I turn around, looking at him cutely over my shoulder. “Besides, I wouldn’t be able to handle a heartbreaker like you.”

  He chuckles low in the back of his throat. “Baby, I’d never break your heart.”

  I feel a little bitter on behalf of his wife. She’s probably sitting home right now on a Wednesday night, helping their six–year–old son with his alphabets or maths or coloring homework, while he’s here, dishing out his paycheck for a few boob shimmies and butt rolls.

  But I shouldn’t complain. After all, Bill is a platinum donor to the Skylar Kay Survival Foundation.

  “You break my heart every time you leave.” I wink before walking away, swaying my hips and letting my ass shake.

  A couple of wandering eyes flit over to me as I sashay through the room. This is about as private as it gets for those who don’t have enough dough to cough up for some actual one–on–one time in one of the Champagne Rooms.

  Nothing sketchy happens back there, of course. At least, it’s not supposed to. But it’s not unusual for a dancer to take off her bikini top for the several extra hundreds she’s getting for the same hour–long session.

  I’ve never, and I won’t ever. Not because I think I’m better than any of the other women (God knows I’m in just as much of a shithole, if not in a worse one, as some of them). But I’m just not that comfortable with exposing my nips to strangers who don’t even know my real name. Only my ex–boyfriend has ever seen my bare nipples, and that’s not going to change for any amount of money.

  I envy the girls who dance here because they love flaunting their gorgeous bodies and basking in the spotlight. But I’m not one of them.

  I love dancing — heck, I wanted to be a professional dancer — but I’d rather dance with clothes on and not on a stage with a pole on it. I’m a statistical clichè working here out of desperation.

  “You can always come home with me,” Bill says optimistically, trying one last time as we head toward the exit. “You know I’ll take real good care of you.”

  It does make me wonder whether men’s bedroom skills improve if they pay for sex. Do they try to make the most of their money? Or is it an easy done deal since the sex is an expectation?

  I’d assume the latter.

  Is it terrible that I assume they’re mediocre at sex? Maybe even bad at it? Horrible? The lose–faith–in–mankind’s–manhood kind of sex?

  Either way, I wouldn’t know. I’ve only been around one and a half naked guys. The second one was a Tinder date that finished with a handjob that lasted twenty seconds. We took a longer time taking our pants off. Not our clothes. Just our pants. Like I said, he didn’t even see my nipples.

  Tinder Dude definitely made me lose faith in Tinder, and I haven’t even tried hooking up with anyone since. Why bother if I’m just a heated, fleshy replacement for some Kleenex?

  At the door, the bouncer stands menacingly with his thick, meaty arms crossed, glaring at the pasty, Pillsbury Doughboy–esque businessman.

  Bill knows the drill. He pulls his wallet out so fast, I would’ve missed it if I blinked.

  I brush my fingers along his elbow as I press my boobs against his arm, drawing his attention to my cleavage.

  “Come see me again, Bill,” I coo. “You know I’m here from Wednesday to Saturday, eight to four.”

  Maybe I should become a camgirl instead. I got the script down pat.

  Thanks for watching my strip show! Don’t forget to click on that Subscribe button to watch me fiddle my channel!

  Bill doesn’t bother hiding his disappointment when I pull away, but the tease is what keeps him coming back every week.

  “Destiny,” he murmurs, his eyes still glued to my tits. He raises them to wink at me. “You’ll warm up to me one day.”

  Internally, I cringe. I really, really doubt it.

  But winking with a perfectly practiced, sugary sweet smile, I croon, “See you next week, Bill.”

  ***

  Tugging the teal wig off my head, I shake my sweaty, blonde locks from under the net as I stalk to an unoccupied vanity mirror in the dancers’ dressing room. I toe the six–inch platform heels off my feet, wriggling them to get the stiff crick out.

  When Sage spots me, she throws me a quizzical look through the mirror, and I wave at the round, older woman who looks like she should be baking cookies for her kids’ school bake sale than she does fixing bikini strings, handing out deodorant, and soothing crying strippers.

  “Here three days in a row?” She smiles knowingly. “Freeing up your weekend?”

  “Yupp,” I admit sheepishly.

  Halloween weekend just happens to coincide with Rea’s birthday, and since I’m single and ready to mingle (with friends), I’m planning on going all out.

  My ex–boyfriend, Mike, always got unhappy if I went out without him. But he didn’t like my friends and insisted I go with him to all his friends’ parties and hangouts, so my already short college career was mostly spent following him around.

  I regret it, but I’m trying to make up for it now as best I can. It’s a year of new beginnings for me.

  “Any fun plans?”

  Fighting back a big smile, I shrug noncommittally. “Only if you consider a VIP table at Hypnotique fun.”

  A lot of the women here gush about going to Hypnotique. They joke — or not — about finding sugar daddies at Chicago’s hottest nightclub, where celebrities, athletes, businessmen, and people who can afford to blow my yearly salary’s worth in one night are often in attendance. If it wasn’t for Rea, I would’ve never even considered going.

  With a small gasp, Sage slaps my arm. “Get out of here. Who are you going with? Got any extra spot on the guest list?”

  I laugh. “My friend, Rea, got a complimentary VIP table for her birthday as part of some promotion they were running.”

  While I’ve been saving up to celebrate Rea’s birthday and to buy her a present for a while now, I would’ve had to turn down going to Hypnotique if it wasn’t an all–inclusive VIP package. The next best thing to having good luck is having friends with good luck.

  “What?” Sage’s mouth drops. “I’ve never heard of that. How’d she sign up? One of those ‘drop a business card’ raffle draws?”

  My shoulders bounce up to my ears. “No idea, but I’ll ask her.”

  Working the attitude into her pursed lips, she looks pointedly at me with an expectant air. “Ask her, and let me know. Seriously. None of that wishy–washy ‘I forgot’ nonsense, okay? And text me all the details after, even if you’re hungover as shit. I want a first–hand account on what the big deal with Hypnotique is.”

  I grin and throw up an ‘OK’ sign. My hand collides with a stack of magazines hanging off the edge of the vanity next to mine, and the glossy paper tower spills onto the floor.

  “Oh, great,” I groan as Sage laughs.

  She tuts and starts to complain about whoever left the safety hazard lying about as we both bend down to pick them up. Her voice fades to the background when one of the flashy covers catches my eye.

  Over a gritty, zoomed photo of two mosaic–censored people, the
bold capital letters slapped onto it reads:

  BLOWN AWAY!

  Getting his head in the clouds! At least close the curtains! It’s not the first time we’ve caught you with your pants down, Devon.

  My curiosity piqued, I flip through the magazine until I find the article.

  It’s a paparazzi collage of the internationally renowned Velio Technologies co–founder, Devon Leo, with all the hottest female celebrities. From Academy Award–winning actresses, Top 40 musical artists, New York socialites, to Victoria’s Secret supermodels.

  The big zinger is the cover photo of Devon and a woman kneeling between his legs in some high rise apartment. Next to it is the censored version of his leaked photo from last year, where he’s lying in bed, very naked and very hot.

  If it’d just been a nude selfie he took, it probably would’ve garnered some eyerolls and snide comments about a publicity stunt or showing off his big dick. But maybe because it was so obviously illicitly taken and shared, the photo went viral.

  One of the women he was with snapshot Devon lounging drowsily on a bed in all of his naked glory with that just–fucked look. It looks perfectly suitable for Playgirl, but lucky for the rest of the world, it was uploaded free and available to all.

  (I may or may not have Google searched an uncensored version, which wasn’t difficult to find considering it was posted everywhere.)

  “Oooh,” Sage singsongs as she peeks over. “He is a fine piece of work. Total manwhore though.”

  Pressing my lips into a thin smile, I don’t say anything as I hurriedly pile the magazines back on the vanity they were knocked down from, securing them away from the edge this time.

  Suddenly eager to get home, I quickly slip into a pair of old jeans and my worn out UIC Flames hoodie before bidding Sage goodbye and jogging to the L station down the block.

  It’s dark out, and the street lights above me flicker a sickly yellowish color, and if this were a horror movie, I’d probably be seconds away from dying. You know, distracted blonde girl who’s somewhere where she shouldn’t be. Yupp, that’s me.

  I doubt I’d even scream if Freddy jumped out at me right now. My head’s flipping through the pictures I just saw like a slideshow on repeat.

  It’s been a while since I caught up on the celebrity gossip of Devon’s life, although there’s been a lot more of it in the past year or two than before. There’s a lot to catch up on…

  I was more diligent about keeping up with his life for the first couple of years after his name started appearing in the news and in magazines for his company, Velio Technologies. Although most of that media attention back then was from Forbes, Fortune, Entrepreneur… You get the idea.

  The business magazines still rave about Velio, but Devon’s limelight shifted when he was sighted with some actress of a popular TV show… And then with a Grammy Award–winning singer… And then with multiple Victoria’s Secret models… It was inevitable that people were going to notice the dark and handsome stranger.

  His refusal to entertain his newfound celebrity status only made him seem more mysterious, and it backfired, spotlighting more attention on him when that’s the opposite of what he wanted.

  I mean, unless he’s changed from the brooding loner with a perma–scowl that I sat next to in AP Calculus.

  Well, eight years is a long time. Long enough for people to change. I’m certainly not the same girl I was in high school.

  But hey, I’m not the one who’s practically a household name.

  Imagine my shock when I saw him on Forbes’s “30 Under 30” list with his company partner, Eli Whittaker. I nearly got whiplash when I did a double–, triple– — ‘no, wait, seriously?’ — quadruple–take.

  I shouldn’t have been curious about learning what happened to him, researching everything there was to read on the internet. For days. Weeks. Months.

  Alright, alright. For years.

  But I was. I was curious. Despite the awful things he said to me when we last saw each other.

  But he seems to be doing well. He certainly looks good, and he must be happy. Famous, rich, hot, accomplished, desired. What’s not to be happy about?

  Totally the opposite of me. It’s kind of unfair how things turned out like this.

  At least I’m not a manwhore.

  A wry giggle escapes me. Thankfully, no one else is around to hear it, although I doubt the people who’d be hanging around the L station at 3:30 a.m. would find a random woman giggling to herself weird.

  Well, Devon always had a bit of a reputation, which only got worse towards the end of high school.

  As the train stops in front of me, I absentmindedly reminisce.

  Manwhore.

  Fitting.

  Enjoyed the preview?

  Coming soon…

  Table of Contents

  Table of Contents

  Author's Note

  Spring Gala Program

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Epilogue

  From the Author

  More Books by Vic Tyler