Havok: A Bad Boy Mafia Romance - Riley Rollins Page 0,1

all I've got to look forward to are old men stuffing dirty bills into my g-string.

Stumbling into the bathroom, my hand searches for the light switch. The walls are dirty, fuzzy almost. I hate this bathroom. Every time I come here to clean myself after a shift, I leave feeling even dirtier than before. The faucet handles are covered in toothpaste grime and soap scum, and the moldy shower curtains constantly stick to my legs in the shower like tendrils.

Sometimes I think of cleaning this bathroom, but I never do. There's no point. It wouldn't change a damn thing.

When I click on the light switch, I see the damage to my face. It's a mess, but it's nothing I haven't been through before. My next shift doesn't start until 10 p.m. tonight. A good eight hours of sleep, a healthy application of foundation, and I'll be fine. Then I'll go in to the club and start the cycle all over again.

But there's one thing I have to look forward to. One thing that carries me through the darkness, and keeps me from giving up.

Vladimir. Or, as they call him at the club, Havok. He works security for the club. That gorgeous, rippling, tattooed hunk of man. Always lurking in the shadows of the club, protecting me and the other dancers, his eyes burning through the darkness like a cat's.

The other bouncers try to grope me, fuck me, buy me with drugs, take advantage of me. The customers treat me even worse, like meat. But not Havok. Not ever. He appears by my side in a flash whenever I need him. Uses his thick, corded muscles and brick body to shield me from any threat. He keeps me safe, always.

But whenever I try to thank him, he avoids my gaze. Slips away back into the darkness. Never tries to get closer to me. Not even a little bit.

I want Havok to rescue me. To claim me as his, and take me away from this life of chaos with Brock. His strength could heal me.

But he hasn't rescued me. And I don't think he ever will. So it doesn't matter that his body is cut from marble, his jaw all hard, sharp, dark lines. It doesn't matter that he affects me in a way that I've never felt before. It doesn't matter how he grounds me, makes me feel safe. It's all a fantasy, and my real life is here in this filthy apartment with Brock.

Still, I just know that if I were Havok's woman, he'd protect me. And he'd do it ferociously.

I feel like I've known him for a lifetime.

2

Havok

I stand in the back of the club, silent and watchful. My arms are crossed, my body hard and alert. Heavy, grinding industrial music blares through the club's P.A. system, loud in the low-ceilinged, neon-lit room. My eyes scan back and forth, and I keep mental tabs on who's here tonight and who's with whom. Situational awareness. That's what keeps you alive in this world.

My real name is Vladimir Vladimirovich Ivanov. Some call me Vlady for short.

Others call me Havok.

By day, I'm a hitman for the West Ark branch of the Russian mafia, the Bratva. By night, I moonlight as a bouncer at Fascinations, the hottest strip club this side of New York City.

I'm not working a second job for the money. I don't need more of that. My targets have made me filthy fucking rich over the years, ever since I came to the United States from Russia to work in West Ark. I don't need the pitiful thirty dollars an hour I take home from this gig.

I'm here for one reason and one reason only.

Connections with the underworld.

To your average Josef, the strip club is just a seedy place to take the boys for a few beers. To get away from the office, away from the wife and kids. But in reality it's much more than that. It's a gathering place for men of the dark. Ambitious men, to whom money and success are everything. The kind of men who stop at nothing to make their dreams come true. Men like me.

This job lets me keep my finger on the pulse of West Ark. Meets me new clients, finds me new Bratva business partners. Lets me keep my enemies close.

I believe they call it "networking."

Because all I've really got left is ruthless ambition. An insatiable hunger for money, for power, for control. I've got no family. No parents. No one