The Tycoon's Stowaway. Stefanie London

cursory look at their website hadn’t given her much: it seemed they did a mix of dance and music, including an open mike night once per week. Not exactly ideal, but she was desperate. So she’d accepted the offer and put her focus back on her auditions, thinking nothing of it.

      Except it didn’t look like the quietly elegant bar on their website. The sign was neon red, for starters, and there were several rough-looking men hanging out at the front, smoking. Chantal bit down on her lip. Everything in her gut told her to turn around and head home—but how could she do that when it was the only gig she’d been able to book in weeks? Make that months.

      Sighing, she straightened her shoulders. Don’t be such a snob. You know the arts industry includes all types. They’re probably not criminals at all.

      But the feeling of dismay grew stronger with each step she took towards the entrance. She hitched her bag higher on her shoulder and fought back the wave of negativity. She had to take this job. Her ex had finally sold the apartment—meaning she had to find a new place to live—and this job included on-site accommodation. It would leave her days free to pursue more auditions, and it was money that she desperately needed right now.

      One of the men hanging out at the front of the bar leered at her as she hurried past, and Chantal wished she’d thrown on a pair of tracksuit pants over her dancing shorts. The sun was setting in the distance but the air was still heavy and warm. She ignored the wolf-whistling and continued on, head held high, into the bar.

      The stench of cheap alcohol hit her first, forcing her stomach to dip and dive. A stage sat in the middle of a room and three men in all-black outfits fiddled with the sound equipment. Chantal looked around, surveying the sorry sight that was to be her home for the next month. The soles of her sneakers sucked with each step along the tattered, faded carpet—as if years of grime had left behind an adhesive layer. Though smoking had long been banned inside bars, a faint whiff of stale cigarette smoke still hung in the air. A small boot-sized hole had broken the plaster of one wall and a cracked light flickered overhead.

      Delightful.

      She approached the bar, mustering a smile as she tried to catch the attention of the older man drying wineglasses and hanging them in a rack above his head. ‘Excuse me, I’m here—’

      ‘Dancers go upstairs,’ he said, without even looking up from his work.

      ‘Thanks,’ she muttered, turning on her heel and making her way towards the stairs at the end of the bar.

      Upstairs can’t possibly be any worse than downstairs. Perhaps the downstairs was for bands only? Maybe the dancers’ section would be a little more… hygienic?

      Chantal trod up the last few steps, trying her utmost to be positive. But upstairs wasn’t any better.

      ‘Oh, crap.’

      The stage in the middle of the room sported a large silver pole. The stage itself was round with seats encircling it; a faded red curtain hung at the back, parted only where the dancers would enter and exit from. It was a bloody strip club!

      ‘Chantal?’

      A voice caught her attention. She contemplated lying for a second, but the recognition on the guy’s face told her he knew exactly who she was.

      ‘Hi.’

      ‘I’ve got your room key, but I don’t have time to show you where it is now.’ He looked her up and down, the heavy lines at the corners of his eyes crinkling slightly. ‘Just head out back and get ready with the other girls.’

      ‘Uh… I think there’s been some kind of mistake. I’m not a stripper.’

      ‘Sure you’re not, darlin’,’ he said with a raspy chuckle. ‘I get it—you’re an artist. Most of the girls say they’re paying their way through university, but whatever floats your boat.’

      ‘I’m serious. I don’t take my clothes off.’ She shook her head, fighting the rising pressure in her chest.

      ‘And we’re not technically a strip club. Think of it more as… burlesque.’ He thrust the room key into her hand. ‘You’ll fit right in.’

      Chantal bit down on her lip. Perhaps it wouldn’t be as bad as she thought.

      But, no matter how hard she tried to convince herself, her gut pleaded with her to leave.

      ‘I really don’t think this is going to work,’ she said, holding the key out to him.

      ‘You really should have thought of that before sending back our contract with your signature on it.’ His eyes hardened, thin lips pressing into a harsh line. ‘But I can have our lawyer settle this, if you still think this isn’t going to work.’

      The thinly veiled threat made Chantal’s heartbeat kick up a notch. There was no way she could afford a lawyer if they decided to take her to court. How could she have made such a colossal mistake?

      Her head pounded, signalling a migraine that would no doubt materialise at some point. What kind of club had a lawyer on call, anyway? The dangerous kind… the kind that has enough work for a lawyer.

      ‘Fine.’ She dropped her hand by her side and forced away the desire to slap the club owner across his smarmy, wrinkled face.

      She was a big girl—she could handle this. Besides, she’d had her fair share of promo girl gigs whilst trying out for dance schools the first time. She’d strutted around in tiny shorts to sell energy drinks and race-car merchandise on more than one occasion. This wouldn’t be so different… would it?

      Sighing, she made her way to the change room where the other dancers were getting ready. She still had that funny, niggling feeling that something wasn’t quite right… and it wasn’t just that she’d somehow landed herself in a strip club.

      She concentrated for a moment, analysing the feeling. It had grown stronger since her audition—an incessant tugging of her senses that wouldn’t abate. She unpacked her make-up and plucked a face wipe from her bag. Smoothing the cloth over her face, she thought back to the director. He’d looked so familiar, and he hadn’t seemed to be able to look her in the eye.

      A memory crashed into her with such force she stopped in her tracks, hand in midair. An old photo, taken a few years before she’d first started dating Derek—that was where she’d seen his face before. He was a friend of her ex-husband’s, and that couldn’t be a coincidence.

      Rage surged through her. Her hands trembling, she sorted through her make-up for foundation. That smarmy, good-for-nothing ex-husband of hers had put her name forward for this skanky bar. He probably found the idea hilarious.

       If I ever come across that spiteful SOB again I’m going to kill him!

      An hour and a half later Chantal prepared to go on stage. She looked at herself in the mirror, hoping to hell that it was the fluorescent lighting which made her look white as a ghost and just as sickly. But the alarming contrast against her dark eye make-up and glossed lips would look great under the stage lighting. She’d seem alluring, mysterious.

      Not that any of the patrons of such a bar would be interested in ‘mysterious’. No, she assumed it was a ‘more is more’ kind of place.

      She sighed, smoothing her hair out of her face and adding a touch of hairspray to the front so it didn’t fall into her eyes. The other dancers seemed friendly, and there were actually two burlesque performers—though they didn’t look as if they danced on the mainstream circuit. When she’d asked if all the dancers stripped down she’d received a wink and an unexpected view of the older lady’s ‘pasties’.

      Well, she wouldn’t be taking off her clothes—though her outfit wasn’t exactly covering much of her body anyway. She looked down at the top which wrapped around her bust and rib cage in thick black strips, and at the matching shorts that barely came down to her thighs. She might as well have been naked