“Need a word with you and Jessie.”
“Sure thing.” She opened the door and turned to look over her shoulder. “Hey, Jess, Menace needs to talk to us.”
Seconds later, Jessie came sauntering up behind Mazie. Her dark eyes skirted over me seductively as she purred. “Menace... It’s good to see that you’re back.”
“Mm-hmm.” I wasn’t in the mood for her flirty bullshit, so I got right to the point. “The boys are telling me that you and the girls have encountered a few issues while I was gone.”
“Yeah, I guess you could say that.”
“What exactly has been going on?”
“Well, about a week ago, I noticed an old white Toyota following me home from the club. Mazie and I both noticed it again when we were out doing a little shopping and then again when we went to get our nails done."
“Can you give me a little more description about the Toyota?”
“It was pretty old. The paint was peeling off the hood, and it had tinted windows.”
“Okay, what else has been going on?”
“I’ve been getting these strange phone calls. No one actually said anything. They’d just breathe into the phone. At first, I thought it was just an ex who was trying to screw with me, but then the other girls started getting the same kind of calls.” She shrugged as she continued, “We’ve all blocked the number, but every one of us wound up getting another call from a different number doing the same stupid thing.”
“Anything else?”
Mazie grimaced as she muttered, “I’m pretty sure someone tried to break into my apartment the other night.”
“What makes you think that?”
“I had a bad headache, so I took a couple of Benadryl and a Tylenol and went to bed. The next morning, I woke up to find my front doorknob on the kitchen floor.” Fear marked her face as she continued, “There were all these scratches on the doorframe where someone tried to pry it open, but thankfully, they couldn’t get through the deadbolt.”
“She called the police, but they said there wasn’t anything they could do, so she’s been staying with Brandy and me.”
“When was the last time you thought someone was following you?”
“Not since we told Hawk and Shotgun what was going on.” The worried look faded from her face as Jessie said, “They’ve had a couple of prospects looking out for us, and since then, we haven’t had any issues.”
“Good.” I was pretty sure I already knew the answer when I asked, “You think Gary has anything to do with all this?”
Jessie looked over to Mazie as she muttered, “You need to show him.”
“Show me what?”
“This.” Mazie reached into her back pocket and pulled out her phone. “I got this last night.”
I took her phone and pressed play on the video. It was a recording of her being assaulted by Gary in his office. I couldn’t see the guy’s fucking face, but I could see the horrified look on Mazie’s. The asshole was raping her, and there wasn’t a damn thing she could do to stop him. When I’d seen all I could stand, I gave her the phone back and said, “I’ll take care of it.”
“Does this mean we’re gonna get fired?” Mazie asked, sounding frantic. “We didn’t know he was gonna go all postal about us leaving.”
“No, you aren’t gonna get fired because some douchebag has a grudge. Just keep doing what you’re doing until I can figure this out.”
“Sure thing.” Jessie smiled. “Thanks, Menace.”
I nodded, then headed to my office. When I made it out to the main bar, I spotted Parker—fuck, not Parker—Aubrey. Aubrey. Aubrey. I had to stop thinking that name, or I was liable to say it out loud. Damn, this was not going to be easy.
She was having drinks with Marlowe and the other ol’ ladies. After everything that had happened, it was good to see her talking and laughing. I didn’t want to distract her from having a fun time, so I let her be and continued to my office. As soon as I got to my desk, I turned on my computer and looked up the Pink Pony. Gary Patterson wasn’t only the manager, but also the owner, and looking at his financials, things weren’t going very well for him. Even before the girls had walked out on him, his club was in the red, and things had only gotten worse over the past couple of weeks.
It was easy to see why the guy might’ve held a grudge, but it didn’t exactly prove he was the stalker, so I had to keep digging. I pulled up Stilettos’ parking lot surveillance cameras from around the time Jessie and the other girls started working, and it wasn’t long before I spotted the white Toyota with the peeling paint on the hood. I got the license plate number and used it to identify the owner—Gary fucking Patterson.