Good Girl Gone Bad (28 page)

The tension mounted, the expectation high, and Ty held his breath, waiting as anxiously as the men pressed tightly against him for a better look. And somewhere in the club a kidnapper and possible murderer lurked, having eyes only for Siren.

Long leather-clad legs strutted out onto the stage. A bullwhip cracked the floor, the snap of it giving rise to most men in the room. Her outfit tonight was leaner, sleek, with far less to take off.

Ty groaned. His job mandated that he watch the audience. With Herculean effort, he turned, presenting his back to Phil, and scanned the rabid group of men pressing hard against him toward the stage. Beneath the dim lighting, he had difficulty deciphering faces.

His gut churned and he realized there was a name for the emotion he experienced for the first time in his life: jealousy. He didn’t want any man to see Phil the way he had. He wanted her for himself.

He glanced over his shoulder and watched, as mesmerized as those around him by the sexy lady who took stripping to a new level.

Deeming his presence closer to her more vital than watching the crowd, Ty moved to the edge of the stage and took inventory.

He loved the way Siren’s legs went on and on, an endless luxury. He fantasized them wrapped around his head as she pulled him down to her hot soaked pussy. Ty’s blood drained straight to his dick.

“Bad boys, bad boys, whatcha gonna do?”

Possessing her again became an unbearable obsession.

She shook her ass and shimmied it. She cracked the whip on the stage, the sharp sound sending rivulets of excitement through his limbs. If it was just the two of them, he’d tie her up with that whip and have her begging for mercy.

Siren’s eyes glittered beneath the black mask. She hugged the pole and twirled around it upside down. Her full breasts nearly touched her chin.

She slunk to the floor and spread her legs, leaning forward, flashing a shot of her ripe cleavage. Seductively, she rolled over on the stage floor, then hoisted herself up. Bumping and grinding in a slow artful cadence, she unbuttoned the front of her leather bustier.

Ty held his breath the moment she pulled it away, exposing her breasts. The men around him panted like dogs after a bitch in heat. Siren strutted to the edge of the stage, her hips swaying sinfully to the wild beat of the music. Her eyes glittered behind the mask. She smiled at him, her gaze unwavering. She touched her breasts, pushing them together, making the mounds into smooth, sweet flesh mountains.

A man next to Ty surged against the stage, but Ty backhanded him three deep into the crowd.

Siren laughed and spun away. Ty resisted the urge to jump up on the stage and cover her from the rabid eyes of the crowd.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

S
iren worked the crowd. The woman who’d slipped into her skin was not Phil, hell, she wasn’t even Kat, she was Siren, queen of the dance floor. Seductress extraordinaire, undercover cop on the hunt for a kidnapper.

She used reverse psychology on the stage. The kidnapper wanted her to dance for him, he’d commanded it. What if she danced for another? Could she anger him? Draw him out of the crowd? Or would he turn on her? Take revenge by snatching another dancer?

He’d gone outside of his regular MO. Now he was taunting. Two notes in less than a week? Siren bet he was close to losing control. She went with her gut and turned her full attention on tormenting her boss.

Swaying her hips to the grind of the music, Siren extended her arm and pointed right at Ty. She smiled beneath her mask and danced to the edge of the stage. She crooked her finger and bade him to come to her. It was so easy. Like a string was attached to his chest, she walked backward and he floated toward her, as if on air. Men were so easily distracted.

When Ty stepped up onstage, she smiled, sucking her bottom lip. Cracking the whip, she slowly wound it around his chest, coming close enough to rest her breasts against him. “A little payback, Lieutenant,” she whispered for his ears only. She wanted a
lot
of payback, but that would have to wait.

She tied him loosely to the pole. The crowd hooted and hollered, each man clamoring to be
the one
. Her eyes scanned the audience for the man who stood quiet, his anger apparent. Not wanting to appear obvious, she twirled back to Ty and ran her ass up and down his thighs and groin. She wasn’t surprised to find him stiff. She twirled around him again and pretended to kiss him. “Watch the audience for the pissed-off patron,” she murmured. “He’ll be our man.”

She twirled around the pole, dragging her fingers across his chest. The beat picked up and so did Siren’s step. She swayed and swirled along the edges of the stage. Jase stood near the stage, and she acknowledged him with a sexy almost-lap dance. She didn’t bother looking for Reese, knowing he was ensconced in the shadows, ever watchful. The zealots were the men she targeted with her fanny wagging and breasts thrusted, the obvious. It was the quiet, contemplative man she wanted to draw out.

Strutting back to Ty, Siren stripped off a long leather glove. She wrapped it around his head, over his eyes. He pulled it off. She did it again, this time with the second glove. He pulled it off as well. Their eyes locked and she read heated lust there. She also read something else. Was it regret? Nonsense. This man at her mercy had no regrets because he didn’t have a heart.

She twirled, dragging one glove along the stage floor as she did a split that nearly ripped her in half, then bent toward the crowd.

For a minute she thought she recognized…nah, couldn’t be. She continued searching the crowd, her eyes watchful.

“Take it all off!” someone shouted. The music heated up and Siren rolled over and stood. In front of Ty, but facing the audience, she slowly slid the zipper down her leather pants. “More, more, more,” they chanted.

She twirled around. Her butt facing the crowd, she wiggled out of the snug garment. The men whistled and screamed. The G-string she wore tonight was about as minute as she could legally get without fully exposing herself.

Phil didn’t make it easy, torturing Ty with her sexy dance number. Without being obvious, he had to take advantage of his vantage point. How was he supposed to do that and not look like a fool? He couldn’t not leer at the bodacious body swaying, twirling, and shimmying in front of him, especially after she flung her leather pants across the stage. The room had collectively gasped when her smooth honey-colored ass wagged in front of the jaw-gaping men.

Ty was not immune. The G-string did little to hide her charms. His dick rose, and so did his anger. He wanted her, dammit, despite her willingness to share herself with the world.

She dropped to her knees and pantomimed for the world a blow job. Ty felt his hips move back and forth with her head and he grit his teeth. The crowd erupted into a wild frenzy and he realized the stage was going to get rushed again if she didn’t stop. He flung off the whip and gave the DJ the cut-off sign. She was down to a G-string, pasties, and her stiletto boots; he refused to allow her to take off more.

The music ebbed and the lights dimmed, the siren’s wail quieted, and Siren exited the stage to the roaring crowd’s displeasure.

“Shows over, gents,” the DJ said. “File out calmly or end up in the po-po.”

When Ty went backstage, he was met with Phil’s fist, smack dab in the middle of his chest. “Don’t ever do that again!” she snapped.

He grabbed her arm and hauled her along the short hallway and into one of the lap dance rooms. He slammed the door shut and glowered down at her.

“I swear to God, Phil, I’m going to give it right back to you one of these days. Keep your hands to yourself!”

She yanked free, her fury soaring. This was the man behind her father’s death, and the same man was preventing her from doing her job. She wanted to do a lot more than sock him. “If our man was out there, I could have drawn him out. Why’d you shut me down?”

He growled, the sound furious, like a dog who’d had his bone yanked away. “Because you’re a little too good at your job.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

He grabbed her hand and shoved it between his thighs. They both gasped. His erection was concrete hard.

Phil played it cool. She opened her hand and gently grabbed him. She pressed her palm against him and he reared in her hand. “Too bad, so sad, no more nookie for Lieutenant Jamerson.”

She let go of him and backed away toward the door.

“That’s the last time you get up on that stage. It’s a safety issue. If you had stripped off another piece, I would have had a riot on my hands.”

She stopped. “What’s with you, Jamerson? You want me to play the part when it’s convenient for
you
?”

“If I remember correctly, you were the one who suggested you strip for me at your house.”

“A means to an end.”

“So you used me?”

She laughed, genuinely amused. “How does it feel?”

“Like déjà vu. The age-old ploy. Delilah dances for Sampson to cut off his hair and take his power. You dance for me to take my power.”

“You powerless? Give me a break. I’ll dance until we get our man, and you’ll live with it because you know it’s the only way.”

“If you push it, you’re off the case.”

Phil resisted the urge to knock some sense into his thick head. She walked toward him and stopped a foot away. “You can talk the talk, sir, but when it comes time to walk the walk, trusting me to execute my part of the case, you can’t. Hell, you can’t trust me enough to give me information on my own father.”

“I don’t trust anyone.”

“That’s too bad. I think my father trusted you and you screwed him.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t I?”

Ty’s features sharpened before they softened. “Maybe I just wanted to save you some heartache, Phil.”

His statement startled her. “You give a rat’s ass about someone else’s feelings other than your own?”

“Yes, yours.”

Her heart lurched. She almost believed him, but Mindy’s words haunted her. “You’re the biggest liar of all.” She could kick herself for giving herself to him, for going with her desire and not controlling her animal urge to mate with him. She had wanted him so fiercely.

But that was before she knew what he did to her father.

She needed to get away from him. Now he was the last person she wanted intimacy with. As she said the words in her brain she knew who was as big a liar as Ty. While her brain might say no to Ty, her hormones and part of her heart screamed yes. It made him all the more dangerous.

“I’m going to change and see if the boys spotted anyone.” She grabbed the door handle, but then turned back to face him.

“I’m dancing again tomorrow night and every night after that until we get our man. If that doesn’t work for you, then find another job.”

She opened the door and slammed it shut behind her. She stomped past Candi, who stood open-mouthed in the hallway. Phil hoped she didn’t hear anything. As much as she was at odds with the dancer right now, she didn’t harbor any ill will. The last thing she wanted for the little blonde was for her to get tangled up in the quagmire of this case.

When she asked Jase and Reese if they’d seen anyone suspicious, they both said they hadn’t detected anyone out of the ordinary. Even the several men who left just after she split from the stage, no doubt jerking off in the dark parking lot, were regulars who checked out.

“Go on home, Phil,” Reese said, “and get a good night’s sleep. We’ll go through the tapes tonight.”

Normally, the guys went over the tapes in the morning, but she guessed because of the note they wanted to jump on them right away. If she wasn’t both emotionally and physically wrecked, she’d go through the tapes with them.

Her temper spiked when she pulled out of the parking lot only to find Ty tailing her. The urge to pull out her piece and shoot him toyed with her reality.

She tried to outrun him, but he stuck to her ass like a hooker to a john. Fine!

She pulled into her driveway and hopped out of the car, slamming the door behind her. “Okay, Lieutenant, I’m home safe and sound, no boogeyman hiding behind the bushes.”

“Get inside,” he commanded.

She dropped her bag and waited for him. She’d had enough. “
You
get inside. I’m not a little girl, and you’re not my daddy!”

He yanked the keys out of her hand, shoved the right ones into the locks, turned the handle, then kicked open the door. He pushed her through, grabbing her bag and throwing it into the hallway after he stepped inside. Then he slammed the door shut, locking it behind him.

“Get out of my house!”

He stalked toward her, knowing he was being completely irrational, unprofessional, and downright egotistical. He knew it the way a junkie stole for a fix, knowing it was wrong but doing it anyway.

She backed up. “I mean it, Ty.” She pointed to the locked door. “Out.”

“No more stripping!”

“No more interfering with my judgment!”

“No more stripping!”

“Would you trust me to know my limits?”

“I don’t trust anyone.”

“Then what the hell do you want from me?”

The question slowed his steamrolling pursuit. What
did
he want? The answer surprised him.
More.
He wanted more of her. It scared the hell out of him.

“No more stripping.”

Phil fisted her hand and raised it to his hard head. He flinched, expecting a blow. Instead, she pretended to be knocking on a door. “Hello? Anyone home?”

“I’m pulling you off the case.”

She gasped. “You can’t do that! We’re so close.”

“I lost one cop, I’m not loosing another.”

Hot tears stung her eyes. “It’s so easy for you, isn’t it?”

She whirled away from him and strode toward the living room window. “You have no heart, Ty, no soul, no feelings except anger.” She faced him again. “I won’t allow you to pull me from this case. I’ll go to Dettmer.”

“You will not.”

“I will. And unless you haven’t learned something about me by now, there isn’t a damn thing you can do to stop me.”