Chapter 16: Front Row

I danced my set to an audience of one.

Gus had cleared the room as soon as the cash hit the bar, so there were forty empty chairs and a man in the middle one.

I kept the mask on and my eyes on the back wall.

Vaughn never moved once.

He didn't clap, and he didn't lean forward.

He watched me from the first note to the last.

When the song ended, I walked off without looking at him.

Gus was waiting in the wings with his arms folded.

"He wants the VIP room," he said. "Fifty thousand, same as before. I told him I'd ask you."

"Ask me what?"

"Whether you want me to throw him out."

I thought about it for one full breath.

"No," I said. "Send him back."

The VIP room was just as I had left it, with the velvet couch and the lamp turned low.

Vaughn stood in the middle of the carpet in his coat and did not sit.

"Same terms as last time," he said. "Mask on, no names, no hands."

"Those were my terms."

"I know. I'm giving them back."

"I don't need them back."

He swallowed. "Then tell me the new ones."

I closed the door behind me and leaned on it.

"I'm not dancing for you tonight."

His face did not change. "All right."

"I won't take your money, either. Gus will refund the row."

"All right."

"You don't get to pay for this."

"I wasn't trying to pay," Vaughn said. "I paid for the room so nobody would see me say this."

"Say what?"

He took off his coat and folded it over the arm of the couch, slowly.

"I read the whole file this afternoon. Every page."

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