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"Five Stars! Bella is a strong woman with an exceptional business sense. She is scared of her family and blames herself for Brady's death. I felt that the author created a suspense filled plot along with some heated scenes. I could definitely feel the attraction between Bella and Brady. Those are just a few of the reasons this book is one worth reading." Shirls, Just Erotic Romance Review Newsletter
"...an enjoyable erotic romance, full of conflict, sinister enemies and extremely graphic love scenes. BACK FOR BELLA by Lesley Belle is a nice, hot read for when you don't have much time to spare, but need a little bloom in your cheeks." Courtney Bowden,
Romance Reviews Today
BACK FOR BELLA
By
Lesley Belle
(c) copyright July 2003 Serena Thatcher
Cover art (c) copyright July 2003 Eliza Black
New Concepts Publishing
Lake Park, GA 31636
www.newconceptspublishing.com
Five years ago…
He was getting close--too close. And the lives of innocent people were at stake - his included. He knew when he’d accepted the assignment that it would be dangerous. You didn’t go toe-to-toe with members of the largest drug cartel this side of the border without knowing the antes. And his bet was up, time for Detective Brady “The Stinger” Randall to fold, though he wasn’t the kind of guy who liked to lose. But he hated being set up even more. And by a woman. It was humbling--not to mention humiliating--to have fucked her only to have her fuck him right back. And not in the carnal sense.
Brady figured it was inevitable. When a man lets his libido rule he relinquishes control, his mind gets muddled and his priorities messed up. And the night the drop-dead gorgeous beauty walked into his life it only took one look, one goddamn come-hither look from those emerald eyes that could hook a man like a hit of heroin from a dirty syringe, and he’d been helpless to stop it. The temptation too consuming and, as he just realized, deadly. It was sloppy. It was stupid. He’d been set up, his cover blown, and the sting operation to bring down the infamous Fernando Mason and his sidekick son a.k.a. Andy Stone, had been halted. Now he had to forfeit the game. So he did the only thing he could do. He killed himself.
CHAPTER ONE
Isabella Mason abhorred drugs and forbade them in her club. She wasn’t naïve enough to think that her girls came to work a little fired up with more than adrenaline, but she had a strict policy--no drugs allowed. Not even aspirin was acceptable and she ensured that every girl’s bag and person was thoroughly searched at the beginning and end of every shift. If they were caught they were fired on the spot -- no questions asked. Just tossed out on their firm, sculpted bottoms.
Isabella had a reputation for being somewhat of a tight-ass, but she didn’t care. If her employees wanted to reap the rewards from her exclusive night club and even more exclusive clientele, they would pay homage to her rules. Isabella ran a clean club--and she would keep it that way.
Isabella thanked God every day that she was born a woman. Her curvy body and feminine wiles had served her well over the years along with her savvy business sense that was easily overlooked not only by her family, but by her competitors. You had to capitalize on your strengths, use your attributes to get want you wanted, and that’s exactly what Isabella had done over the years.
She easily spent fourteen hours a day, every day, except Sunday, in her club A Stone’s Throe. It was glitzy, glamorous, and, above all, lucrative. Men and women, alike, sandwiched themselves outside between ruby red velvet ropes, vying for the opportunity to get a peak behind the tinted windows into an erotic fantasy world that would revisit their dreams, and probably bedrooms, for nights afterward. People, Isabella knew, craved escape. They sought out temptation. They wanted to awaken their senses and stimulate their bodies. If that required watching uninhibited female forms bending, squatting, fondling and shaking various body parts on stage, alone or in tandem, then she was more than pleased to take their money and provide the essential service. Because it was a service, more valuable than others Isabella could imagine. She sold sex. Not the act itself, but the idea of it, the most sensual and arousing and uncomplicated aspects of it. It made people happy.
It made her rich.
Isabella wasn’t ashamed or embarrassed by her career choice. Not her style. Why should she be? People had urges, thirsts that needed to be quenched by more than martinis decorated with expensive olives bobbing on plastic swizzles or vintage scotch served in gilded snifters at the bar. It was all above board, completely legal, and absolutely necessary. Her club catered to the curious, the deprived and the sexually frustrated--as long as they paid.
And they paid heftily for the chance to have women flaunt their wares and titillate warped or weary senses.
Discreetly.
The straight-laced, politically correct corpses that entered her club left with renewed vigor and life. Appearances were deceiving, so Isabella never judged. But she never underestimated, either. Behind the conservative business suits and silk gowns lay some of the kinkiest individuals Isabella could ever imagine. You get what you pay for. So they paid and Isabella provided everything from naughty to nice as long as the guests looked but never touched. She ran an exotic night club--not a brothel. Another of Isabella’s strict policies. She employed performers, not prostitutes. The air could reek of sex, the atmosphere oozing with it, but it was an illusion of the senses. She didn’t rent rooms by the hour or allow dark corner escapes. Hands stayed on the linen covered tables, zippers stayed fastened, and the only thing swallowed was liquor.
Taking one last look in the mirror before exiting her dressing room above the club, Isabella wondered fleetingly if she didn’t somehow resemble a modern day Madam with her rouged cheeks and cherry lips. Her porcelain skin a sharp contrast to the pink and red hues garnishing her complexion, one that dissimilated her from her Spanish heritage. Her mother, though Isabella knew very little about her except that she was a whore her father had hidden for nine months and sent away after Isabella was born, must have been fair skinned with green eyes because she barely resembled her father or brother save for the short stature that seemed more of a custom than a gene-pool influence.
Her club was the feather in her cap. No worse than the illegal narcotics they bought and sold - her oblivion to the family enterprise an undeclared requisite - and no better than the whore her mother made her by association. But it worked for Isabella. She was wealthy, independent and unburdened by family ties.
As much as could be expected, anyway.
Her father and brother stayed away for the most part, but Isabella knew that they didn’t run in such different circles. Her father and brother still kept their hands in the pot, kept a watch on her to ensure she didn’t stray too far from the family allegiance. They were powerful men and that meant they needed to keep her close if only to keep her quiet. And when the gun-wielding brutes showed up on her doorstep every month to scour her club and deposit a wad of folded bills in her hand, she merely smiled and batted her eyelashes. She couldn’t throw it back. Her only solace was the club’s name, A Stone’s Throe. A silent indictment of the distaste she had for her paternal lineage and a reminder to them that she still had a bet to make and a chip to gamble with. A taciturn dare that she was still in the game, could still pose a threat, and could cash in at any time. And if she did place a wager, it would be from six feet under.
That was their challenge to her.
So instead of throwing back the money, she opted to throw-up in the bathroom. Then she’d sob in her office, alone, and distribute the money to her employees in the form of a monthly bonus for a job well-done. She was afforded few chances, so Isabella just played the sport and kept her cards close. As much as possible.
“Good evening, Ms. Mason.” The burly man nodded brusquely as he uttered the salutation.
“Hello, George, how are things looking tonight?” Isabella shared a secret code with the head of the club’s security team. He was also a loyal and trusted friend, though he said little. He was a man of action, not words.
Many saw him as a bouncer, a barbarian who intimidated people with his menacing stature and, should he be forced to use it, his street-wise fighting skills that had landed at least two men in the hospital. The first being his father. The second an unruly patron of A Stone’s Throe.
George had little patience for men who hit women, having watched his own mother endure endless years of abuse at the hands of his doped-up, cracked-out, trailer trash father who had apparently treated the family dog with more respect than his wife. So when he’d come home to an unconscious father and a battered mother, unrecognizable through bruises and blood, George had made good on a promise. But the man lived and George agreed to leave it that way so long as he never touched his mother again.
The other man lived, too. His crime only a minor infraction, but slapping one of Isabella’s girls was just not tolerable. And word got around that if you roughed up a lady at Isabella’s club you’d be certain not to do it again.
“Clean,” the man replied stiffly, never taking his eyes off the action unfolding around them.
Isabella knew that meant that the club was drug-free and hassle-free. No cops lurking about, no enforcers coming to pay her off. “Thank you, George. I’ll be at the bar should you need me.”
Isabella was granted another terse nod to signal his acknowledgement before she strolled past him and up to the bar nestled at the far end of the room. It extended the length of the floor with leather covered stools standing sentinel in front. The mahogany wood was always polished and pristine, giving the illusion that one was seated at an exceptionally high and ill-dimensioned formal dining table instead of a bar.
Isabella spared no expense for the comfort of her guests. Chandeliers cast a warm, ambient glow where strobe lighting customarily flickered and spewed colored bleeps of rainbow light. Linen covered pedestal tables replaced sticky, beer smeared ones, and plush carpet was laid where squares of muted linoleum usually rested. Isabella wasn’t matron to a back-alley disco. Hers was a fashionable club that serviced those with discerning tastes and an elitist attitude. Like sugar, her club was a refined, sweet seduction that people arduously denied themselves in public, but devoured in private. A stimulus that got into the bloodstream. Addiction meant repeat customers.
The night was still young and people still mulled around the perimeter of the club. Later, all eyes would be focused on the entertainment at center stage, an L-shaped platform that gave admirers a clear view of the performers who would dance and gyrate for the pleasure of the wealthy voyeurs.
Yes, Isabella mused, she liked having that much power.
Isabella rested a casual elbow on the bar and waited. People came to her or avoided her just as avidly depending on their mood. She’d been told once that she had eyes that mesmerized, cast a spell. So she stood, patiently, to see what magic she could wield this evening.
“Ms. Mason.” A deep, husky voice sounded from behind. No one ever dared call her by her given name in the club. Another one of her rules. She had learned years ago that mixing business with pleasure, dissolving the thin line between professional and personal was deadly.
Gracefully, Isabella turned around and set her sights upon the man. He was … average. No distinguishing characteristics, nothing special. Isabella bored easily lately, and this man bored her with just the mundane sight of him. He was also a “candy customer”--a regular guest who dropped a handsome sum into Isabella’s profit bucket. Money dripped from his limbs--the too-big, gold watch, the designer suit that made his slumping shoulders protrude from their sockets and jut into a perfect T-shape, the perfect white smile blighted only by a shimmer of bullion capped over one eye tooth that matched the timepiece dangling on his wrist. He smelled faintly of peppermint. Isabella’s stomach rolled once.
“Good evening,” Isabella cooed, extending her hand. The man brought the appendage to his lips and kissed it cordially, his eyes never leaving hers.
Isabella smoothly removed her hand and smiled. “Sasha and Tasha will be pleased to see you tonight.” The man had a thing for the two women who did creative things with their identically pierced tongues.
“They are my favorite,” the man confirmed shamelessly. “But you already know that, Ms. Mason.”
Isabella nodded, her smile never faltering. He wanted those tongues for his own personal enjoyment, she knew. Once he’d offered her ten thousand dollars for an hour of their private services. Isabella had refused. She wasn’t a pimp and the girls were barely old enough to be legal, though they’d been forced to mature far beyond their age. They’d been selling their bodies since they were fourteen and Isabella had made them a better offer to get them off the streets. Now any sexual acts they engaged in for payment was limited to their stage exploits with each other.
“You are far too protective, Ms. Mason,” the man scolded, his mouth curving into a conspiratorial smile.
Go to hell, creep. Isabella tittered politely and ran a brightly painted fingertip over his lapel. “I have rules. But you already know that.”
The man snatched her hand and held it. Tight. “I like a woman who knows how to tease me,” he hissed, though his voice was as strained as her fingers clutched in his palm.
Isabella swallowed a yelp. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. He wouldn’t intimidate her. Not on her turf. She slanted him a wry grin instead.
The man released the hand and flexed his fingers, then winked and sauntered away. He would stay. He couldn’t not. He was, in Isabella’s estimation, a well-dressed junkie needing a fix.
Isabella gestured to the bartender and a shot of black, licorice tasting liquid was deposited in front of her. Black sambucca. She tossed it back, licked her lips, and headed back to her office. Not even the burning elixir could cleanse her tonight. Made-up, decked out and outwardly composed. Medicated with a shot of black sin only moderately numbed her but couldn’t even begin to chip away the façade. Ever since that night five years ago, she had felt dirty. Cheap. Empty. She had more scruples than her brother, more compassion than her father, and she never spread her legs for just any man like her mother, but she wasn’t any better. She was cursed.
Pasting an elegant smile on her face, she glided through the club and back up the stairs to her sanctuary. The show could go on without her tonight.
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