Stripping Callum (Last Hangman MC Book 6) Page 8

  “Oh, I know. You’re such a shit liar, Callum. I know deep down inside you long to have what we all have, but you’re too stubborn to let it happen. Look what happened with Le-”

  “Don’t,” I warn.

  “You could have had something good with her, and you pushed her away.”

  “She was a cop, nothing good could have come out of whatever it was she thought we had.”

  “Well, it could have if you weren’t that stubborn. You know how much I love you and want the best for you. I want to see you happy with someone. I’ve never seen you content with your life.”

  “That’s because I never really have been. I’m happy I have a family again, but I feel empty.”

  “And someone from the female gender will help you with that.” She grins, proud of herself that I confessed.

  “Shut up.”

  “Don’t tell a pregnant woman to shut up. You know I’m right. You know the right one will come along. Our first love isn’t always the right one. I know how much you loved Alina and will always love her, but maybe she wasn’t the one for you. I’m sure she was an amazing woman, but who knows what happened in her past. Maybe it’s not on you but on her. Maybe someone had beef with her and wanted to make her pay, not you. Did you ever think about that?” I’m quiet for a minute.

  “No, I never thought of that. I always thought it was because of me. It had to be. She was the sweetest woman you could ever meet, no one could ever want to do her any harm.”

  “You never know. Didn’t you say she dumped someone to be with you?”

  “Yeah…”

  “Maybe he was the one behind it. You never know.”

  “It’s pointless trying to figure it out. It’s been fourteen years.”

  “I know, and you know I’m always here if you ever want to talk about it.” She pats my arm.

  “I know, I wish I could forget all about it.”

  “No, you don’t, because if you had or did, you wouldn’t be my Callum.”

  “Maybe you’re right.”

  “I’m always right,” she scoffs.

  “You and Alina would have been friends.” I smile sadly.

  “And you’d have been in deep shit with the both of us against you.” She laughs.

  “Tell me about it.” I chuckle, thinking about my beautiful Alina. I miss her every day. It’s not getting easier, but you learn to live without the ones you love. The support from my brothers and sister is what keeps me going in moments like these. I don’t know how I managed on my own.

  Annabella

  It’s been a few weeks since I found out that Gail was stripping, and it’s been playing on my mind.

  On one hand, it would mean a lot more money for me and Elijah, and on the other hand, it would mean taking my clothes off for perverted men when I’m a young mom. I’m not sure that’s something I could cope with. Well, I wasn’t sure, that was until one night when Gail and I went to the strip club when she had a night off. We had a blast. It’s awkward to see women strip at first, but once you get into the groove of having a drink, having a laugh, and having fun, you end up having an amazing evening.

  The manager of the club came to greet us that evening and asked if I was interested. I wasn’t sure at the time, but it got me thinking. If he thought I was stripper material, then why not give it a try? I know it’s not the best example to give, but I could do with the extra money. He offered to let me try out and see if I enjoyed it, and if so we would work on a contract and schedule so that I don’t have to hire a babysitter for the nights I work.

  I thought he would be a creepy man and give me a bad vibe, but he’s such a sweetheart. He’s nice, funny, and takes really good care of his girls. He seems to make sure they are safe and happy. If they have any concern or want to break the contract for any reason, he won’t make a fuss of it and just lets the girl go.

  Tonight is the night. I’m giving it a try. It might be a bad idea to do this, but I’m young. Despite having a kid, I still have a great figure and why not. It’s easy money, and I don’t have to fuck anyone for it. The pay is good just to take off your clothes.

  Raising a kid costs a lot of money: clothes, toys, food, medical bills and school. All of my other bills are cut in half because I’m sharing an apartment with Gail. I’m really grateful for all she did and is still doing for Elijah and me, but I still wish I didn’t have to scrape so much to make ends meet. This might be the perfect opportunity to save up money for a better life for Elijah and me in the future.

  I take one last glance at myself in the full-length mirror that’s propped up against the wall. My ruby red hair is shining under the lights, my blue eyes are contrasting with the red of my hair and accentuated by Gail’s expert hand at doing stage makeup. My skin, already looking pale on a regular basis, looks even paler with my new red hair dye. My petite frame is encased in a black bodycon dress that has a zipper on the front, down the length of the dress. My legs are wrapped in black stockings, making them look longer than what they really are, or it could be the high heel shoes I’m wearing.

  I smile at my reflection. I rarely take the time to look at myself, like really look at myself, but I look good. Even if I’m about to do something I might regret, I’m feeling myself.

  “You’ll rock their world,” Gail says placing her hand on my shoulder, smiling at me in the mirror.

  “I hope so. God, I’m so nervous.” I blow out a breath.

  “Don’t be. You’ll be perfect. I believe in you. And just so you know, if I swung that way, I’d totally tap that ass tonight.” She chuckles as she smacks my ass playfully.

  “Should I worry about you coming onto me in my sleep?” I raise a playful eyebrow at her.

  “Nah, you’re safe. Jackson is enough to keep me busy at night.” She waggles her eyebrows and sits in the chair next to the mirror.

  “Yeah, I’ve heard that.” I snigger.

  “Please tell me you’re joking,” she asks, mortified.

  “Yes, I’d have told you if you made any noise.”

  “Thank God! I wouldn’t want to subject Elijah to that.” She frowns.

  “I know you wouldn’t.” I smooth my hands over the dress and turn to the side, checking the curve of my ass in the mirror. I’m not full of myself, but this dress and underwear make my ass look nicer than it usually looks.

  “Don’t worry, your ass looks fine in that dress.”

  “I know.” I smirk.

  “Ruby, you’re up next!” Lawrence, our boss, shouts through the door. “Nice ass.” He winks and disappears. Now, if your boss tells you that, you could think he’s coming onto you. I haven’t known Lawrence for very long, but he’s one hundred percent gay and loves his girls too much to try anything like that with any of them even if he were straight.

  “Go get them, tiger.” Gail high fives me before I walk out of the door.

  Here goes nothing...

  I step on the platform, trying not to break my neck with the high heels that I’m wearing and walk in the center of the small stage by the pole. This is not going to end well.

  I take a deep breath and wrap my tiny hand around the pole and start to dance around it. A part of me feels like it’s Halloween, and I’m just being a witch doing incantations around the sacred pole or fire or whatever. I try not to laugh at the images going through my mind. Anything to keep my mind off what I’m doing right this minute.

  I start slowly and dance seductively, or at least I’m hoping it looks somewhat seductive and not like I have no fucking clue of what I’m doing because let’s face it, I have absolutely no idea what I’m actually doing. I’ve seen strippers in TV shows and in movies, but I can’t say that I’ve ever studied their moves. Who knew that would have been useful?

  I look through the crowd and try to find something or someone to lock my eyes with so that I feel like it’s just me. I can blank out the rest of them because let’s face it, strip club stage lighting is nothing like theatrical one, and I can see every single guy in att
endance. None of them is a decent guy like in those movies, ready to sweep off a girl off of her feet and get her out of the stripping wo…

  My train of thought derails quickly as I make eye contact with possibly the hottest man I’ve ever laid my eyes on, while still shaking my ass as best as I can. He has his arms crossed over his chest, making his muscles appear to be bigger than they already must be when he’s not flexing them. Tattoos cover them and his chest judging by the ink that appears just above the collar of his shirt.

  I let my eyes trail up his neck to land on his perfectly shaped and plump lips. He has the most kissable lips I’ve ever seen. What I wouldn’t give to kiss them, lick them, nibble at them, hell do anything to them. They look that perfect. I need to stop thinking about that or I’m going to get myself all hot and bothered over here. A small smirk plays at the corner of his lips. For some reason that makes me snap to look at his eyes. They are full of humor and something dark. He’s clearly amused by the fact that he’s busted me checking him out long and hard, but there’s something else about him. A deep sadness.

  I lock eyes with him and dance around. I don’t attempt any of the big pole dancing tricks. I still need a shitload of training to do that, but I do some of the basic moves without breaking anything, so I consider that a win.

  Looking only at him makes me forget about everything that’s around me. It’s as if I’m stripping only for him, and that he’ll put out that fire burning between my legs afterward. Sadly, that’s not how it’s going to go. Once I’m done with this dance I have to walk the floor and whoever offers first gets to have me for fifteen minutes for a lap dance. Yay, not.

  Slowly removing my clothes, I reveal my body to the audience, but I can only see him. I faintly hear the catcalls of the other guys around, but they are nonexistent to me. Right now, in my little world, there’s only that man. But too soon, the music slowly fades out and bills are thrown at me. I kneel down as best as I can and pick every last one of them up, glancing up at the guy, but he’s gone. I didn’t see him leave, and I barely broke eye contact with him for a second.

  Somewhat gutted, I pick up my clothes and go back backstage, almost falling over as I walk through the door. Stupid heels.

  “You were amazing!!!!” Gail exclaims and hugs me tightly as I’m still clutching my dress and the bills against my chest.

  “Not sure about that.” I chuckle and place everything on my little station and hug her back.

  “You were! And the eye contact action with that guy. Wow!”

  “Who is he?” I ask, suddenly more curious about him.

  “His name is Callum. He comes in from time to time. He’s a total sweetheart, but there’s something dark about him. Either way, he’s hot. I gave him a lap dance once. Man, he’s big if you catch my drift.” She snickers and waggles her eyebrows.

  “Good to know.” I chuckle.

  “Oh, it’ll be very useful when you are the one giving him a lap dance.” She smirks at me.

  “Like that’s going to happen.” I roll my eyes and put my bra back on.

  “It will, just give it some time.” She gets ready to go on stage, and I’m called to go out on the floor.

  “Good luck up there.” I fist bump her.

  “You’re the one who needs luck. They love fresh meat. Be careful of the pinchers.”

  “The pinchers?” I look at her confused.

  “They love pinching butts and usually leave marks. They can’t touch you so feel free to flag one of the guards down if one of them touches your ass. Or just smack him, that works too. They don’t expect us to bite back.” She smirks and walks off, her hips swaying as she walks gracefully with her heels.

  I take a deep breath and get mentally ready to go walk the crowd.

  I imagine I’m at the beach, walking around in a bikini to take the edge off of what I’m actually doing, but it doesn’t help when you have perverted men staring at you like you’re a piece of meat.

  Looking around for my beautiful stranger, aka Callum, I don’t see him anywhere. I’m gutted. I kinda wanted him to be the first one to ask me for a lap dance. In my head, he’s my anchor for the night. It would have been great practice to do it with him and not one of those sleazy men.

  I walk past a group of five guys, and one grabs my hand and pulls me into his lap.

  “Hey, baby.” He holds onto me, and despite my attempts at freeing myself, he’s too strong for me to break his hold.

  “Let go of me. You can’t touch or grab us!” I exclaim.

  “I’m paying for it, so you’ll do as you’re told. If I want you to suck my cock, you’ll do just that.” He laughs with his buddies, and I just want to throw up. This is not what I signed up for!

  “This is against the policy of the club. If you want to get your dick sucked go find a hooker, or your wife, you low life piece of shit!” I yell as I see the ring on his left hand.

  “This is none of your business. I’m paying good money so get sucking, you cunt!” He grabs my left boob and squeezes hard, but it only lasts for half a second because I’m yanked away from him. I fall to the floor and a couple of guards pick up the guys and walk them out, yelling something inaudible at them.

  Sitting on the floor, I’m shaken up. I didn’t plan for any of this to happen, nor did I imagine it would happen.

  “Are you alright?” an unknown voice asks me. I turn to face whoever is talking to me and saved me. I’m met by my beautiful stranger’s beautiful eyes.

  “I’ll be okay.” I frown and try to get up, but these heels make it almost impossible to do so graciously.

  “Here, let me help you.” He holds my arms and steadies me as I climb to my feet.

  “Thank you.” I smile up at him.

  “No need. I was going to ask you for a lap dance, but I’m sure they killed your buzz.”

  “Not that I had much of a buzz about doing this in the first place.”

  “Understandable.” He nods still holding my arms, his warm hands burning my skin in a very good way.

  “I guess I could give you a lap dance to thank you for saving me from dickhead and co.” I chuckle softly.

  “No need to thank me.” He flashes me a panty-dropping smile.

  “I insist.”

  “Are you alright, Ruby?” Lawrence asks me and glares at Callum.

  “Yes, thanks to him.” I point at Callum.

  “Thank you,” Lawrence tells him through tight lips. I don’t know what’s up between those two, but I have a feeling there’s bad blood here. Hopefully not figuratively.

  “My pleasure,” Callum says as tightly.

  “Do you want the rest of the evening off? I can’t imagine you wanting to do a lap dance or get back up there tonight, or ever.” Lawrence blows out a breath.

  “I’m alright, I’m glad there were people around ready to intervene, and I’ll be okay with a lap dance. That’s the least I can do to thank him.” I give a slight nod in Callum’s direction.

  “Are you sure?” Lawrence insists.

  “Yeah, I’ll be alright. Well, I think so anyway.” I chuckle slightly.

  “Think so?” Lawrence questions me.

  “First lap dance.” I mouth at him, and he nods.

  “Stay safe.” He glares at Callum and disappears where they took those guys through.

  “Where should we go?” I know I sound like a total amateur but I really have no idea where they do the lap dances. I didn’t get a proper tour of that part of the club.

  “Follow me.” He takes my hand and leads me toward the far back of the club where there are two security guards standing by a door. They smile at me and let us through, so I’m guessing he’s really taking me to the right spot.

  “You come here often?” I can’t help but ask.

  “No, but now I have a reason to do so.” He turns briefly to look at me and smirk. Panties are now gone. Despite the incident, I’d be ready to jump on him and ride him like I’ve never done before.

  “Uh…” is all I can m
utter.

  “Don’t be nervous.” He winks at me and walks in a cubicle and closes the curtain behind us. With the dim lights, I can see that a guard is perched outside. I’m quite confused but grateful that someone has my back. “He’s there to make sure I don’t touch you or take advantage of the fact that you’re new to this, so you don’t let it time without charging me extra.” He chuckles and gets himself seated in the big leather chair.

  He makes that chair look tiny compared to his frame. His jean-clad thighs are stretching the material. They are nice and thick and makes me want to straddle them. His waist is narrow but not enough that it makes it look unnatural. He places his arms on the armrests and leans back against the back of the chair and looks at me with lust in his eyes. I swallow hard and press the button on the mounted music station, and soft sensual music is playing.

  “Don’t be nervous. Whatever you do will be fine. I’ll be your guinea pig.” He chuckles.

  “You’re too kind, letting me try my hand on you.” I raise my eyebrow at the double meaning behind what I just said.

  “I’ll let you try anything you want on me.” He winks at me and settles down more in the chair.

  I decide to just bite the bullet and get on with it. The longer I wait, the less he’ll get his lap dance, and even though I offered to give him one, he looks like the kind of man who won’t take advantage of the situation and will just pay anyway.

  I straddle his thick legs, my back facing him, my hands resting next to him. He spreads his legs, and I position my feet between his before I start undulating my body on him, grinding my hips against him.

  This feels hella awkward. I don’t know if it’s the position or just because I’m not good at this, but I just feel like shit. I have no clue what I’m doing, and it shows.

  “Relax,” he whispers, his lips a lot closer to my ear than I imagined.

  “Sorry, I suck at this,” I whisper back.

  “Nonsense.” He hooks his arms under mine and brings my back against his chest. “This will be easier for you.” I turn my head and look into his beautiful eyes as I start grinding into him again, and while this is way too close for comfort, it is a lot easier.