Chapter 7

Filthy, wealthy, and horny old men.

Those were the description inside Celeste's mind as she watched them enter Lust and Greed nightclub owned by Kennedy. The name itself spoke a volume to those who were regulars. Only those with invitations could enter the nightclub, and those who weren't invited wouldn't even know where the nightclub was. Kennedy Strauss always made sure his nightclub stayed hidden and secured. That way, he could do his business without getting busted.

Celeste and Leto stood next to their employer as he walked around, greeting his regular clients whose pockets were full of money. Some of them congratulated him for his event, and some whispered the words of business. Kennedy, whose life was always filled with lust and greed, could never stop himself from getting more of what he wanted.

There were two different types of events like this. When a small group of twenty to thirty girls, the event would be called the meeting. The auction would commence when there were more than thirty girls involved. Celeste didn't want to know how Kennedy or his suppliers got those girls. From what she heard, those girls usually came from low-income families. But, not all of them were doing this willingly. Knowing Kennedy, he already got that figured out.

"Check on the girls," Kennedy whispered to Celeste. "Make sure the previous incident didn't repeat itself."

"Yes, sir."

Celeste went to the basement, where the girls were prepared before they were presented to the stage. She spotted the doctor going in and out of each room to indicate he was doing his work. Why would they need a doctor? Well, the doctor wasn't there to check for their health because someone already did it before they were shipped here. The doctor's job was to drug them. That was Kennedy's solution to bend their will. The drug was called 'Happy Drug' was still under experiment by the same doctor whose name was never revealed. Celeste had witnessed the power of the drug itself. Even the most determined and strong-headed person would sire their Master once the drug was administered. The drug was used to trigger a specific part of their brain to make them obey the words of their Master.

Celeste didn't know how Kennedy acquired such a drug, but what she knew, he had a place to mass-produce it. Nobody knew the exact location of the aforementioned place. The doctor was the only one she knew had a connection with the place. That was one of Kennedy's businesses. He would sell the drugs to those willing to pay a high price for them.

Celeste returned to the first floor and saw some of the clients were already getting in action with the female staff of the nightclub. No matter how many times she saw this kind of public display, Celeste could never get used to it. She understood that those men were horny and all but doing sex in a public place that was uncounted for.

"Everything's under control," Celeste said as she returned to her employer's side.

Leto was talking to several guards, indicating the night's main event was about to start. Celeste excused herself to the bar where Dante was sitting on his own instead of focusing on the main event.

"Not entertained?" She asked him before she made an order to the bartender.

"Does the sound of someone moaning entertain you?"

Celeste scanned him from head to toe. His body language was telling her that he wasn't entertaining. Not even a bit. That made her wonder. Usually, the guys would be entertained by those girls. But not Dante. He was different. Even when one of the girls came by his side, he didn't even glance at her.

"You'll learn to deafen your ears to it," Celeste replied at last.

Dante hadn't seen anything uglier just yet. This was just the beginning of Kennedy's test. The vampire businessman wanted to see how far his bodyguards would go when a scene like this was involved. Many of his bodyguards died because they got involved in a fight with the clients about the girls.

"Hmm," that was the only reply from him.

Perhaps, he already got someone waiting for him at home. That could be the reason why he wasn't affected by any of those girls. That thought alone made something stirred inside Celeste just like yesterday. The thought of seeing him with another girl was bothering her to the core for some reason.

"She must be beautiful," Celeste said and looked at him with the corner of her eyes.

"What do you mean?" Dante questioned with a glance at her.

"To keep you uptight like this, she must be beautiful until you couldn't even look at another woman for a split second."

He let out a small chuckle, "Maybe I'm just not interested."

"That's a first."

"You were right about one thing." Dante turned to look at her. "She's indeed beautiful."

Her stomach churned uneasily—not to vomit or have a stomachache. It was just churned at how he mentioned the beauty of a woman who waited for him at home. Celeste looked away as if she tried to regain back her composure. Why did she become this way out of the blue? She had been with many men before, and none of them ever made her feel this way. But Dante—he made her feel every emotion that was new to her.

"Getting acquainted, I see." Leto chirped in. "See any girl you like, Dante?"

"Not interested," Dante replied monotonously.

Leto glanced at Celeste, who shrugged her shoulders to him. It was evident that Dante wasn't interested in anything other than the drink in front of him. Leto used to rile up the guards in the nightclub and watched them fall into their sexual desires. But Dante was a whole new level. No matter how hard Leto tried to rile Dante up, the latter remained neutral.

"I need a smoke," Dante said, getting up from his seat and leaving through the back door.

Leto slumped on his seat, and Celeste could see that this was the first time he failed to rile someone up.

"Do you think he has erectile dysfunctional or something?" Leto asked, feeling dejected. "Look at those girls. They're sexy and everything."

"I thought you wanted to be done by him," Celeste joked, but that came out backfiring to herself. She felt something was bubbling inside of her.

"There's no joke that he's got a hot and sexy body. Even when he was in the ring punching someone, I could see the muscles like…man, I wanted to be devoured by him. It's obvious he's not interested in men. But he didn't even interested in women either."

"He's got a girl at home."

"The same one?"

Celeste shrugged. "Not sure. He confirmed that he got a girl. That's all that I know."

Dante reentered the club and said, "I have to go back to the ring."

"The boss told you not to have any match tonight," Celeste answered.

"He said it's okay."

Celeste glanced at Kennedy and saw him nodding his head to her. She gave a few orders to Leto before leaving with another guard and Dante.

"Why is it so sudden?" Celeste asked Dante, taping his hands as he had no time to get into the changing room.

"It's a cleanup match."

It was a term used by the fighting club. When a guest fighter kept winning his matches in a single night, the club owner would call his cleanup fighter, who had the highest chance to defeat the guest fighter. In this case, the club owner called Dante to clean up the mess. Otherwise, the club would continue to lose money because his fighters kept losing, and the guest fighter won.

As soon as the car parked in front of the fighting club, Dante left the car and walked with Celeste trailing closely behind him. He took off his shirt and threw it to the other club staff waiting for him. He walked to the ring a second the host announced his arrival. His opponent looked at him cockily as if he had already won the match.

With the amount of cheering in the arena, Celeste could see it. Although she saw thousands of blue dots connecting with each other to mimic every movement in the arena, she was able to watch the match that suddenly became a highly anticipated match for the night.

Dante held in his breath, reading his opponent. He had a lot of pent-up anger from Kennedy's club, and he had found a way to vent it all out. His opponent looked like he could take a lot of beating before falling to his knees.

That would work wonders, but there was a 'no killing' rule.

"Is it fun?" Celeste walked into the changing room.

The match gave a predictable result. Dante won it easily. Now, he was sitting in the changing room with a wet towel over his head as he breathed heavily. Maybe that was why Kennedy wanted him. He had zero hesitation in killing, but it almost felt like he was holding back when he was in the ring. Despite having zero hesitation, Dante knew his limit.

"Punching people for money," Celeste added.

Dante stood up and walked to his locker. "It is what it is."