Tough Guy: A Hero Club Novel by Jamie Schmidt (the reading list .TXT) 📗

Grier showed up. The undercover cop and I had an agreement. I’d give him all the intel I had on any drugs moving around this side of town and he’d keep the investigation into my uncle’s death two years ago from gathering dust on a desk.

Uncle Johnny had taken me in when my parents spiraled down into gambling and drugs. He let me sleep in the backroom of his burlesque club when they lost the house. He gave me a job cleaning up the club after school, so I had a place to go. Then the bouncers thought they could use a kid of my size and they trained me. The martial arts lessons paid off and I worked my way through high school minding the door and managing drunks. I should have never left for Europe. Uncle Johnny and his club might still be here if I hadn’t been gallivanting all over world, having one big party.

I had just opened the safe when the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. Expecting a fight, I whirled on the balls of my feet.

Chance leaned drunkenly against the door frame. He held out his hands in front of him. “Easy mate. Whatcha got there?”

Pitching the baggies into the safe, I said, “They’re not for sale.” Locking it, I turned back to Chance, who hadn’t moved.

“Not looking to buy drugs, mate. Looking for more girls.”

I clapped him on the shoulder. “That I can help you with.”

Chapter Three

Jackie Mitchell

Because I was expensing this trip to Lisa’s account, I booked a room at the Wynn on the Las Vegas Strip instead of one of the budget hotels closer to the airport. I considered it compensation for having to turn down the part in the show. Although after visiting her apartment in New York and having her roommates tell me that Lisa took all her stuff and moved out three months ago, I was no longer thinking that Lisa was just flaking out for longer than usual.

She’d actually moved to Vegas. Who did that? Vegas was for playing around, doing daring and stupid things, before returning back to the drudgery of your existence. You didn’t live here. You risked having the shine buffed out of the town. I’d figured she was just on an extended vacation, but she’d given up her Brooklyn pad to go live in the desert.

Alone in my luxury room, I quickly unpacked and then did a few arabesques and pliés because I wasn’t used to having so much room to move. My apartment back in Queens was so tiny that Lisa could touch her fingertips on one wall and her toes on the other. I was slightly shorter, so that was another thing that she did better than me. I wonder what apartments looked like here. Too bad I didn’t have Lisa’s address. She hadn’t shared it with our parents either.

I called her, but it went to voice mail again. “Hey, Lisa. It’s me. I’m in Vegas. I need to see you. Please don’t make me track you down. I’m at the Wynn in room 1492. Give me a call and we can get drinks or something.”

I didn’t have any hopes that she would call or text back. She’d gone incommunicado, and I had to admit that even I was starting to buy into my mother’s paranoia. When she didn’t immediately call me back, I decided I better start my Nancy Drew routine. My first stop was the Spearmint Rhino, a titty bar about five miles off the Strip and Lisa’s last known location. I parked my rental car in a nearby garage and walked to the club.

The Spearmint Rhino was glitzy and neoned up enough to be on the Strip, but I’d bet it saved a ton on rent by not being there. The doorman seemed about to give me grief. I wasn’t dressed to impress. I wore a Calvin Klein wrap dress and sensible-heeled sandals. But after a quick look around, he must have decided that it was early enough in the night to let me in. In another few hours, I’d be waiting on line for a miracle and paying a hefty cover charge—if I even managed to get past the guy.

“Thank you,” I murmured and slipped him a twenty. That seemed to brighten him up a bit. Until I asked about my sister. He just grunted and gestured for me to go inside. I wasn’t sure if that was good news or bad news.

The beer, burgers, and boobies happy hour was still in effect. Not interested in any of those, I sat down at the bar and exchanged a tired smile with the female bartender.

“Are you lost?” she asked.

“I’m not, but my sister is.”

“There’s a lot of that going on around here. Can I get you something?”

I ordered a glass of wine and paid with another twenty. “Keep the change,” I said, and slid my sister’s headshot across the bar. “Do you know Lisa Mitchell?”

She looked surprised. “Yeah, she worked here about a month ago. I hope nothing’s happened to her.”

“Me too. She hasn’t been in touch for a while and my parents are worried. Do you know why she left?”

The bartender frowned in thought. “I can’t say for sure. We didn’t have a lot of shifts together and when we did, we were slammed. I know money was an issue with her. That and she was always criticizing the dancers, saying she could do better. It didn’t make her very popular around here.”

That sounded like Lisa. “Do you think I could talk to the dancers?”

“If you got the money, they’ve got the time.”

I inwardly winced. “Who would you recommend I speak with?”

“If you’ve got a hundred dollars, you can probably get fifteen minutes in the VIP room at this hour.” She leaned over the bar and whispered. “Pay cash if you have it.”

“Thanks.” Great. Just great.

I caught the eye of one of the dancers who had been doing leg exercises like the ones