The afternoon sun was already burning low and orange by the time Kelvin pulled up to the address Liam had given him.

He looked through the windshield.

Then he looked at Liam.

Then he looked back through the windshield.

There was a building in front of them, wide and low.

Sitting back from the road behind a small parking lot that was already half full despite the early hour.

The exterior was all black painted brick, clean and deliberate, with a sign above the entrance lit in red neon that hadn’t fully come on yet because the sky wasn’t dark enough to need it.

The letters were simple and the name sat above a red neon outline of a woman’s silhouette that would be unmistakable once the night got going.

A bouncer stood at the door, arms at his sides, watching the parking lot without particularly watching anything specific.

It was a strip club.

Kelvin stared at it for a long moment.

"A strip club," he said. His voice was doing the thing where he was trying to stay unimpressed and not fully getting there.

"Yeah," Liam said.

Kelvin kept looking at the building. "You brought me to a strip club."

"You’ve been trying to get me to come to one of these with you since first year," Liam said. "You said you weren’t going unless I came with you."

Kelvin opened his mouth. Closed it.

"Also," Liam said, "a friend of mine owns it."

Kelvin turned to look at him slowly. "A friend of yours owns a strip club."

"Yeah."

"A friend of yours. Owns this." He pointed at the building.

"Yeah."

Kelvin turned back to the windshield and sat there for a second. "You know what. Cool. Cool cool cool. Totally normal. Just another thing I didn’t know about my best friend." He nodded to himself. "This is fine."

"I brought you here so you’d forgive me," Liam said.

Kelvin kept his face straight. "I don’t know what you’re talking about."

"Kelvin."

"I’m fine. I wasn’t upset about anything."

"You literally said apology not accepted."

"I don’t remember saying that."

Liam looked at him. "We can leave if you want."

Kelvin’s hand moved to the door handle immediately. "I didn’t say that."

He was out of the car before Liam had finished processing the sentence.

---

Up close the building had more to it than it showed from the road.

The black brick was clean and maintained, no peeling paint, no cracked edges, the kind of exterior that got looked after regularly.

Either side of the entrance had a low black planter with dark leafed plants in them, nothing decorative, just enough to frame the door and give the entrance some intention.

The neon sign above was starting to glow as the sky dimmed, the red deepening as the natural light pulled back.

The silhouette in the neon was all curves and suggestion, the leg extended, the arm raised, nothing explicit and everything implied.

The bouncer at the door was broad and unhurried, wearing all black, a small earpiece sitting in his left ear.

He looked at Liam and Kelvin as they came across the lot and then looked away again, which meant someone had already told him they were coming.

The door was heavy and dark and when it opened the sound came out first.

Music. Low and deep and consistent, the kind of baseline that you feel in your chest before your ears fully register it, sitting underneath everything else like the building itself was producing it.

And underneath the music was the murmur of the interior, voices and movement and the ambient noise of a space that knew what it was and had stopped apologizing for it.

They walked in.

The entrance corridor was short and dim, the walls dark, the lighting coming from thin strips along the floor that led the eye forward. Then the corridor opened up and the main room arrived all at once.

It was bigger than it looked from outside.

The ceiling was high enough to feel open, draped with dark fabric that absorbed the light rather than reflecting it, keeping the top of the room shadowed while everything at eye level was lit in deep reds and warm ambers.

The stage ran along the far wall, long and elevated, with a main pole at the center and two more at either end, each one lit from below with a light that made everything around it glow.

The stage was occupied but the real show hadn’t started yet, just movement and music, bodies finding their rhythm in the early part of the evening.

Round tables filled the floor space between the entrance and the stage, each one low with seating around it, the chairs upholstered in dark fabric.

The lighting over each table was warm and isolated, pools of amber that kept each group in their own private atmosphere without cutting them off from the room entirely.

The bar ran along the right wall, long and black topped, the bottles backlit behind it in a way that made the whole thing look like a display case.

Bartenders moved behind it with the practiced efficiency of people who had done this long enough that it had become automatic.

The smell of the place was something between expensive cologne and something sweeter underneath it, not heavy, just present, the way a well run room always has its own specific smell.

Kelvin walked in and stopped two steps past the entrance and just stood there taking it in.

"Okay," he said quietly. "Okay this is nice."

"Yeah," Liam said.

"Like actually nice. This isn’t what I was expecting."

"What were you expecting."

"I don’t know. Maybe free boobs and asses flying everywhere." Kelvin looked around slowly. "This is clean. This is actually a nice place."

A woman appeared from the side of the entrance.

She was wearing all black, a fitted top and tailored trousers, professional but cut to show that she was aware of what environment she was working in.

Her hair was pulled back. She smiled at them with the specific smile of someone who was genuinely good at making people feel like they had been expected.

"Welcome," she said. "This way please."

She led them through the room, navigating between tables with practiced ease, and brought them to a table near the center of the floor, not too close to the stage and not too far, the kind of position that said someone had thought about where to put them.

The table was clear and set, two glasses already sitting on it.

She pulled the chairs slightly and waited.

They sat.

"Someone will be with you shortly," she said, and then she was gone the way people who are good at their jobs disappear, smoothly and without a moment of awkwardness.

Kelvin settled into his chair and looked around the room with the expression of someone who had arrived somewhere they had been looking forward to for a long time and found it exceeded expectations. He leaned back. He looked at the stage. He looked at the bar. He looked at the tables around them.

Then he looked at Liam, who had already pulled out his phone and was typing.

"Are you seriously on your phone again right now," Kelvin said.

"One second."

"We’re in a strip club."

"One second."

Kelvin shook his head and looked back at the stage.

A woman appeared at their table. Young, wearing the club’s standard outfit which was minimal and deliberate, her tray held at her side. She looked between them. "What can I get you?"

Liam looked up from his phone. "We’re good for now. We’re waiting for someone."

The woman looked at him. Then at the room around them. Then back at him. "Sir. This isn’t a bar. This is a—"

"Janelle."

The voice came from behind her.

The woman, Janelle, stopped mid-sentence and turned around.

Camille was walking toward the table.

She was wearing a dress. Short. Deep burgundy. The hem stopped high on her thighs, showing off long, toned legs. The fabric clung to her body. Fitted at the waist. Tight across her hips.

Her ass filled it out completely, the material stretching over the curve of it. Her boobs pressed against the fabric, full and round, straining slightly with each breath.

Her sleek bob framed her face perfectly, sharp and clean, making her cheekbones stand out even more.

Low heels. Simple jewelry. The kind of woman who knew exactly what she was doing and didn’t need to try hard to do it.

Janelle straightened immediately. "Ms. Camille. I didn’t know these were your—"

"They’re my guests," Camille said. Her voice was smooth and unbothered. "You can go."

Janelle nodded and disappeared.

Camille looked at the table. At Kelvin first, who had sat up slightly in his chair and was doing his best to look casual about it. Then at Liam.

Liam had stood up from his chair.

Kelvin followed, pushing his chair back and standing, his hand already coming forward.

Camille looked at Kelvin’s extended hand and smiled at it from where she was standing. "Hi." She said it warmly and left the handshake in the air.

Then she stepped past him and stopped in front of Liam.

She reached up and put both hands on his chest, her palms flat against the fabric of his shirt, and moved them slowly, feeling the outline of him underneath, her eyes coming up to his face with something in them that was entirely unbothered by the fact that they were standing in a room full of people.

"I was surprised when I got your text," she said. Her voice had dropped slightly, not because she was being secretive but because she had decided that was the appropriate register for this particular moment. "What brings you here?"

Liam looked down at her hands on his chest. Then at her face. He tilted his head slightly toward Kelvin. "Him."

Camille looked over her shoulder at Kelvin.

Kelvin gave a small wave and a smile that was working very hard to stay composed.

She looked back at Liam. "That’s all?"

"That’s all."

She held his gaze for a second longer than necessary. Then she smiled, the slow kind, and took her hands off his chest and turned back to the table. "Sit down."

They sat.

Camille remained standing, her weight resting on one hip, looking at Kelvin with a different kind of attention now. Assessing. Deciding something.

"I’m going to arrange something for your friend," she said.

Liam looked at her. "What kind of something."

"Don’t worry about it."

"Camille."

"Liam." She looked at him with an expression that said the subject was closed in the most pleasant possible way. Then she looked at Kelvin. "You’re going to have a good night."

Kelvin looked at Liam.

Liam looked at Camille.

Camille had already turned and was walking back through the room, her heels quiet on the floor, the burgundy blazer catching the amber light as she moved between the tables and disappeared toward the back of the club.

Kelvin watched her go.

Then he turned to Liam and pointed at him across the table.

"You," Kelvin said. "Are completely forgiven."

Liam picked up his glass. "I know."

Kelvin sat back in his chair and looked at the stage and then at the back of the room where Camille had disappeared and then at the stage again.

"Enjoy yourself," he said.

Kelvin was already looking at the stage. "Way ahead of you."

Camille’s office was at the back of the club, past a door that didn’t have a sign on it and didn’t need one.

The room was small but it didn’t feel small. Dark walls, the same deep color scheme as the rest of the building, a desk along one side that was clean and organized in the way that said the person who used it actually worked at it.

A monitor. A few stacked folders.

A pen sitting parallel to the edge like it had been placed there deliberately.

On the other side of the room, against the wall, was a long low daybed, the kind that sat somewhere between a couch and something else, upholstered in dark fabric, two cushions at the back.

Camille closed the door behind them.

The sound of the club dropped immediately. Not gone, just distant, the baseline still present through the walls but muffled enough that the room had its own quiet.

A small speaker on the desk was playing something low and unhurried, barely there, just enough to fill the silence without owning it.