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  VICE

  A Novel by

  Nicole Marsh

  Copyright © 2019 by Nicole Marsh. All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or used simply for the purpose of furthering the storyline and do not represent the institutions or places of business in any way. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental or used for fictional purposes.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Epilogue

  Sneak Peek

  My name is Jenna Stone.

  Work is my life.

  And my job is filthy.

  In a good way.

  The most dangerous part of my job, is staying away from handsy Patrons.

  Or at least that’s how it used to be.

  Before a girl is murdered in my Gentlemen’s Club.

  A girl that looks like me… is dressed like me.

  There are no suspects, just a note that says,

  “No one lives that steals what’s mine.”

  I’m not a thief.

  I’ve never stolen in my life.

  But it seems like this murderer doesn’t believe me.

  Now I’m playing house with the world’s most attractive cop.

  Trying to protect my club, my life... and my heart.

  Chapter 1

  Jenna

  I arrive at work early, on a mission to finish some of the papers that have been sitting on my desk untouched for the last week. I push open the large, dark, wooden door leading into the opulent rooms of Vice, my Club specializing in adult fantasy and seduction. Today I will be the paperwork queen, I tell myself, attempting to get pumped for the least enjoyable part of owning my own business.

  Vice is spacious, filled with luxurious leather furniture and deep purple velvet drapes. During operating hours the space is filled with the beats of sultry music. Escorts, the women working the Club, walk the floors wearing various outfits handpicked with the goal of fulfilling fantasies.

  Alcohol and attractive women are a heady combination. Vice was built with the intention of tearing down inhibitions. My Club offers wealthy and influential men, and women, a private place to enjoy beautiful company, and/or provides the opportunity for our Patrons to fulfill even their wildest sexual fantasies.

  Now I sound like a brochure.

  We do not advertise. We run on exclusivity.

  You have to know someone, who IS someone, in order to make it through Vice’s sturdy, wooden door, across the marble-floored lobby, and into the action. You also have to sign a non-disclosure agreement, enter a legally binding membership, and pay a handsome membership fee. Unless you’re brought as a guest of a Patron to preview the club, then you’re only hit with the non-disclosure.

  But, semantics.

  Lost in thought, I walk towards my office, in the back corner of the club. The flash of my reflection, piecing in and out of the mirrors covering the wall behind the Main Bar, catches my eye as I walk. The glimpse of movement startles me, causing me to inhale sharply.

  After a couple of quick breaths, I glance around the room, confirming I’m alone in the club. Laughing at my paranoia, I take a deep breath, lower my hand from my chest and shake my head to clear my thoughts. I quickly stride the remaining distance across the floor to my office.

  In preparation of the hours of desk work ahead, I’m in my ‘get shit done’ clothes. A pair of yoga pants and a tank, with my dark hair piled on top of my head in a sloppy knot. I’m determined to complete this paperwork today, prior to the Club opening at seven o’clock this evening.

  A few hours and a mountain of paperwork later, I add some red lipstick to my pouted lips as a finishing touch to my ensemble. Dressed in a skin tight, black sheath ‘dress’ that ends just under my rounded bottom and five-inch red heels, I’m ready for business.

  Most people are a bit surprised to learn that I’m the owner of Vice.

  Why?

  Well…

  I am a woman.

  I am a young woman (24).

  I am quite petite (5’1”, 120#).

  Prior to becoming a member, the Patrons of Vice tend to assume the owner is an older, racy man with a larger than life personality, looking for kicks during the last few years of his life.

  Honestly. I rarely hold the owner card out for viewing anyways. Mostly, I act in the capacity of a stimulator, flitting between groups of Patrons in the different rooms of the Club. I check in to make sure my girls are treated right, and that my Patrons are happily settled into the room they chose as their entertainment for the night. In some cases, someone may come in pursuing one attraction and find themselves intrigued by another.

  It’s part of my job to read the desires of others and help them to pursue them. My goal is to offer Patrons a night of debauchery, one that they’ll never find a comparison to… Leading them to return to seek out Vice’s pleasures endlessly.

  Small goals for a small woman.

  My ability to read others is part of what encouraged me to open my own business and I believe that it has been a large contributor to my success. I started out in life with less than nothing. I was passed between families, never treated as much more than a means to a paycheck.

  When I was younger, I used to hope that I only had a few more days left to survive whatever terrible family I was with, optimistic that a better one would be next. But that family never came. Instead, I was forced to grow up quickly and often forced to look after myself.

  Learning to read the personalities of your new “family” while you’re in the system can literally be the difference between life and death. And I’ve always wanted to live, so I picked up the skill quickly. By the time I was a teenager, all I wanted was to get out of the system and build a better life for myself. One where I wasn’t forced to tiptoe around the personalities of bitter adults and volatile kids, having to act grateful for the smallest scraps of kindness.

  As soon as I was free, I knew that I was the only one who could take my past, bury it, and blossom into a better future. My time after foster care was spent scrimping and saving, putting as much money as possible towards the dream version of my future life. Living in probably the worst apartment complex in Chicago, installing three of my own deadbolts on the door, and living on furniture I was able to drag home from the street, I started to build my plans.

  I was hired as a bartender before I was old enough to drink, under questionable legality, and watched as the owner of the run down place I worked at failed to turn a profit. Watching him encouraged me to take some business classes online. Any free course I could find online, I enrolled and voraciously devoured the material.

  Not having anyone, to take care of me, or fall back on, helped me to work harder and accomplish more in a shorter time than my peers. I knew that if I quit trying to better myself, I would be out on the street. Holding those thoughts in the back of my mind, I completed the equivalent of a Bachelor’s degree through free online courses in just over a year.

  In that time, I started wearing more revealing clothing and upping my tip-earning game at t
he bar. Following the end of my self-taught education, I scoured job ads and found a bar hiring an assistant manager in the center of the city. I bought my first blazer and pencil skirt, spent an hour on the L, and aced an interview that doubled my salary and gave me my first taste of what it would be like to own my own bar.

  I was, AM, hungry for success. I’ve endured too much to fail. Years of being told I would never make it out of foster care to become anything. Years of being teased at school, for being the smelly weird girl with the dingy clothes. I’ve stored all of the insults and rejection that I’ve experienced in my life to use as motivation. It drives me to do everything in my power to be successful.

  This driving force, forged from my past experiences, has made me into a mogul. When other kids my age were out partying, I was learning the ins and outs of bar life, likely as their server. I spent the beginning of my adult life working my way through various bars, gaining higher salaries and better connections with each move, putting me on the fast-track to success.

  Fast forward four years, and countless hours of hard work later, and I found the building to host my dream business. Within months of making the decision to open my own Gentlemen’s Club, funding was secured, my location finalized, and Vice was undergoing renovations to become the beautiful palace of sin that it is today.

  Opening my own Club was the best revenge that I could serve to the people who mistreated or doubted me in my youth. Their opinions can no longer touch me here. I’ve not only accomplished my goals, but Vice has continued to grow in notoriety and membership, since opening. In two weeks, Vice will be celebrating its one year anniversary and it’s going to be BIG.

  «»«»«»«»

  The sounding of chimes, echoing throughout Vice, snaps me out of my thoughts of the past and I realize that I’ve just been staring into space while sitting behind my desk. My girls, or as our Patrons call them, the Escorts, are at the back door ringing the bell. They need to be let in so they can head to the dressing room. I clean the remaining paperwork off my desk, filing any private Patron information away in my hidden safe, then head to let the girls in to start preparing for the night.

  In order to help keep the illusion and vibe of the Club alive, the girls enter our building from the back. They head straight to the dressing room, two hours prior to opening, where they pick-up their assigned outfits they’re expected to wear for the night. The attire is different for each zone and rotates through different colors every night. The girls arrive early to have plenty of time to prep their outfits and apply their makeup, before it’s time to entertain.

  Unless there’s a Patron request for a specific Escort, the girls typically stay assigned to the same zone. A list is posted by the door in the dressing room, daily. It provides updates on zone changes, after the information has been received. Typically the list is accurate, however based on Patron’s moods or schedules, there can be last minute changes that occur after the girls have already started to prepare for the evening.

  In addition to the Escorts, Vice also has a staff of bartenders, a full security team, and a small kitchen staff for our limited food menu. The staff is well compensated and reliable, all of them were hand-picked by myself.

  After letting the girls in, I walk to the Main Bar, and start to review inventory, looking through the shelves to get a feel for which bottles are doing well, and which aren’t. We have a huge shipment of champagne coming in this week, in preparation for Vice’s one year anniversary, but I’m thinking about creating a few drink specials to clear out some of our less popular liquors.

  While I’m bent down with my head in one of the fridges, I hear a voice calling my name. Glancing up, I see Sira heading into the room through the double doors. I raise my arm above the bar to wave her over before resuming my task.

  She approaches me with a note in her hand. “Hey J, I answered your phone in your office. I heard it ringing when I was down the hall.” She looks a bit sheepish when I glance up at her face, probably about walking into my office and answering my phone. Sira continues, “Trent called and requested Katia for the night.”

  I nod my head, “Thanks, I’ll let her know in a few.” I stand up to accept the note that Sira is holding out to me. I accept the scrap of paper and stuff it into the strap of my dress, “I should probably find a way to keep my phone with me,” I admit with a laugh, looking down at my tiny outfit.

  Sira chuckles with me. She’s also dressed in a teeny cocktail dress with nowhere to store her phone.

  Sira started working for the Club on opening night last year. She’s one of my first hires and one of the few girls that I could see owning her own club one day. Sira is a hard worker, and she’s hungry for success, she’s always willing to help out and goes out of her way to take on more than she’s assigned. Sira works in the Main Bar of the Club, but I know she’s been itching to be moved to a different zone, in hopes of earning more tips and maybe gaining a little more authority.

  Having delivered her message, Sira excuses herself and heads back to the dressing room to finish getting ready. I finish up my inventory before leaving the Main Bar to go find Katia.

  Vice is the product of hundreds of hours of planning and love. Many of those hours went into anticipating the wants and needs of the Patrons that would visit the Club. Even more hours went into creating a venue to fit those needs.

  The Foyer of the Club is spacious enough to allow Patrons to stand inside on the checkered marble floor, or to sit in one of the leather arm chairs lining the walls. Patrons really frequent the foyer for one of two reasons, either to check in for the night, or to wait to apply for a membership. Like the rest of the Club the color scheme of the room is plum, black, and deep brown with wood inlayed walls.

  The Main Bar of the Club is made up of one room with a large rectangular bar in the center. Although it’s an open floor plan, the room is divided into sections by sets of bulky black couches creating U-shapes around the outer edges of the room. Heavy purple drapery adds privacy on three sides of the groups of couches. The Escorts in this zone wear mini cocktail dresses and flit between tables offering companionship and drinks as needed or requested. Our patrons have the options of enjoying the Escorts provided or bringing their own guests and there is a fair mix of both that occurs.

  In the areas behind the Main Bar are four additional zones:

  The next area is our Gambling Room, where high rollers can risk their money. Patron’s place bets against the house at different tables, while our Escorts work the room dressed as traditional Vegas show girls. The room channels Vegas casinos, with drinking, gambling, and a show with the girls strutting around in their over the top outfits.

  Another main area of the bar is the Viewing Room, which is more of a traditional strip club, with scantily clad Escorts dancing for Gentlemen callers, both on and off stage. There are some poles in the center of the room, but much like the front of the Club, the room is set up into sections to offer more privacy for our Patrons.

  No one enjoys running into someone unexpected on a night out, especially with a naked girl dancing on your lap. We try to help circumvent run-ins and provide privacy in all of our rooms.

  Further in the back of the bar, near my office, we have bedrooms, or as we lovingly call them, the Backrooms. Reserved for use by overnight Patrons or overly private Patrons, there are a total of eighteen rooms, equipped with the tools to suite different tastes.

  Intimate Escort and Patron relationships are not expressly encouraged, nor are they required for employment, but relations often occur. The Backrooms were created with this knowledge in mind and contain both fetish items and beds. The rooms serve a dual purpose of offering a safe place for the Escorts to entertain their Patrons and earn additional tips, and occasionally serve as a place where overly inebriated guests can sleep off their drinks.

  The last zone in the bar, the Bottom Floor, is down a set of stairs and reserved for Patrons seeking a bit of pain with their fun. Either giving, receiving, or viewing. This port
ion of the Club is manned by additional security, and requires an additional membership application and fee to be let down the stairs. The Club is exclusive, but zone four is even more exclusive.

  Sometimes I feel in awe of Vice. It still feels so surreal that this place, one that I dreamt of and drafted for almost a year, not only exists, but is about to celebrate its first anniversary of opening.

  After finishing my inventory of the Main Bar, I wander into the dressing room to check on the girls. Most of them are fully dressed, standing around in groups to chat while they wait for the Club to open.

  Our Vegas girls, for the gambling room, catch my eye first. They’re all clustered in the corner, dressed in silver, crystal inlayed swimwear with large feathered tails and head pieces.

  Walking past the feather adorned Escorts, I spot my front zone girls, the ones I’m looking for right now. The girls look beautiful, all of the girls working the Club look stunning, and vibrant in royal blue colored miniature cocktail dresses for the night.

  I take my time walking through the dressing room to the girls, doling out compliments, and asking about everyone’s day, as I make my way towards Katia. Katia leads the Main Bar, she’s my number one employee, as well as my best friend. Well, really one of my only friends.

  I met Katia one late night-early morning during my walk home from a bar, I was working at. I spotted a woman crumpled on the ground in the middle of the road. Glancing around, I saw that there was no one else on the street. Even dressed in warm boots and a full down coat, I was shivering in the cold winter air and the woman lying in the road looked barely dressed. Concerned, I jogged over.

  The woman was curled into herself on the pavement, but it didn’t look like she had been hit by a car, there wasn’t any visible blood on her or on the ground. She was incredibly gaunt and also unbelievably underdressed for the weather in a dirty, torn, pale nightgown. Just from looking at her laying on the ground, I couldn’t tell what was wrong. She was so thin, I was concerned that she had collapsed on the road due to lack of food.