“I think you know better than—”
“No, I don’t. And it doesn’t seem like I’m telling you anything you don’t already know.” He stepped closer, right into Dom’s space, and before he realized he’d done it, Dom backed up against the railing. The stripper grinned triumphantly. “You really here for answers you’ve already got?”
Dom folded his arms. “You really want me to pass it along that you’re the one who put a couple of bullets into those two? Because that’s still an option if you refuse to help me.”
The stripper’s lips twitched, but so subtly Dom couldn’t read if it was more irritation or if he’d struck a nerve. And then the stripper snorted with laughter. “You really want me to believe you’d go tell your boys that a queer little dancer like me saved your ass when you couldn’t do it yourself?”
Dom clenched his jaw.
“That’s what I thought.” The stripper’s eyes narrowed. “You wops and your obsession with image.” Shaking his head, he clicked his tongue. “Guess you don’t have any cards left, do you?”
Dom turned his head and cleared his throat, so he wouldn’t cough right in the stripper’s face. “Look, I’m just trying to figure—”
“I know your type, Maisano.” That sharky grin made his knees shake. “All business. All efficiency and numbers. You don’t waste your time driving all the way across this shithole town just to ask a stripper a few questions when you already know the answers. Especially not three weeks after the fact.” Closer still, his bare abs almost brushing Dom’s shirt. “So tell me. Why did you come here?”
“Because I need to… I need to know”—what your skin tastes likes, and—“what happened that night.”
“Yeah?” He bared even more teeth and leaned closer, reaching past Dom to rest his hands on the railing on either side of his waist. “That the only reason?”
“Yeah.” Dom swallowed. “It’s the only reason.”
The stripper studied him, and gradually, the triumphant cockiness faded. His features hardened.
“Look, here’s the deal, Maisano.” He stepped in close again, this time getting right up in Dom’s face, their noses almost touching as he snarled, “I’ve told you everything I’m going to tell you, and now you’re going to get the fuck out of my club.”
“For God’s sake, I—”
“You stay the fuck off my turf, I’ll stay the fuck off yours.” There was a menacing, murderous undertone to his Russian-accented voice.
Dom gritted his teeth—this fucker had no idea who he was really tangling with.
The stripper continued, “You and your kind run this town, but you’ve got no business in this club. Get the fuck out of here, and let my customers enjoy their night without having to worry about Mob guys starting shit. You got it?”
And then he was gone, the club door banging shut behind him.
Dom slouched against the railing, the humidity sticking to the goose bumps on the back of his neck.
Well. That was that, wasn’t it?
He swore into the night. There was no point in staying here, then. Maybe he’d come back in a few days. When he knew what to expect and wouldn’t be so flustered and caught off guard. He was not intimidated by a stripper half his size.
The stripper half his size who’d slammed a door that locked from the inside.
Dom wiggled the knob, then swore and stomped down the porch steps into the alley. As he made his way toward the road, an odd sense of déjà vu rushed over him. He looked around. The shoddy buildings, the boarded up windows, the rusty Dumpsters—they weren’t familiar, and yet they were.
He froze. This was where it had happened, wasn’t it? Right out here? But he only remembered that night in painful flashes. Bits and pieces of scenery that didn’t seem to go together now that he saw the big picture.
He shook his head and kept walking. No sense reliving that night again, especially not here. Instead, he returned to his car and got the hell out of there.
As he drove away, though, there was no getting that kid out of his mind. None.
And not just because he was annoyed by the refusal to tip his hand. The fact was, the stripper had him dead to rights. Dom had convinced himself he’d only come here for answers, but what had he really expected? For this kid to have some kind of insider knowledge about the intricacies of the Mafia?
No. That wasn’t why he was there.
It had nothing to do with the night Dom had been roughed up, and everything to do with how he’d felt when the stripper had stepped up into his space.