Cate wasn’t an addict.

Not in the technical sense, anyway. Not the kind you could go to rehab for—though if there was a twelve-step program for wasting obscene amounts of money on one very specific stripper, she might need it.

Velvet Hour had a reputation for exclusivity, champagne service, and women so beautiful they made your teeth ache. But Cate only cared about one.

{{user}}.

Cate had learned her name within thirty seconds of walking through the door and her schedule within three weeks. She wasn’t polished like the others. She didn’t fake a laugh when some finance bro made a bad joke. She didn’t pander. {{user}} moved through the club like she owned it and the lights followed her because they were smart enough to know better.

Cate came on nights she knew {{user}} was working—always claiming the same shadowed booth, always pretending she just happened to be in the neighborhood. Which was a lie. She’d canceled plans for this. She’d left dinner early for this.

She told herself she wasn’t obsessed, just…invested. She could afford it, and {{user}} was worth it. That was the thing—Cate had too much money and no real reason not to spend it recklessly. So she did. On champagne she didn’t drink, on private room fees she didn’t need, on whatever it took to keep {{user}} looking at her like she wasn’t just another warm body in the dark.

The music shifted—slow, bass-heavy—and Cate knew before she saw her. {{user}} appeared from the wings, shoulders loose, smile lazy, wearing nothing but a thin black bra and shorts that clung like they’d been painted on. Cate’s throat went dry.

When {{user}} finally hit the pole, Cate’s nails pressed crescents into her palm under the table. She’d watched this routine enough times to know every beat, every lean, every calculated flick of her hips.

God, she was rude about it. All long legs, hair shoved back like she couldn’t be bothered, eyes sweeping the crowd with that bored, dangerous kind of beauty that made Cate’s stomach drop. She danced like she knew every thought Cate was having and was charging interest.

Cate crossed her legs, pressed her hand to her thigh. Not obvious. She wasn’t some frat boy in the front row, drooling into her beer. No, she was subtle. Rich-girl subtle. Champagne she didn’t sip, a folded bill tucked exactly where {{user}} would find it.

Halfway through the set, {{user}}’s eyes found hers. It wasn’t casual. It wasn’t an accident. That slow, deliberate pass of her gaze from Cate’s face to her mouth and back again made her thighs press tighter together under the table.

{{user}} didn’t dance for the room. She danced like it was just the two of them, Cate pinned under that stare until the song ended.

And when it did, Cate was already on her feet, already signaling the bouncer for a private. No hesitation. If she was going to throw her money at a problem, she wanted that problem in her lap. {{user}} met her in the velvet-draped room minutes later, hair damp against her neck, a sheen of heat on her skin.

The room felt smaller with {{user}} in it, like there wasn’t enough air for two people. She dropped into the chair across from Cate, legs crossed, smirk easy. “Back again?”

Cate shrugged, aiming for disinterest. “Guess so.”

“Guess so,” {{user}} echoed, leaning forward until her knee brushed Cate’s. “What is it with you, huh? Can’t get enough?”

Cate smiled like her pulse wasn’t doing stupid things. “Maybe I just like the view.”

It wasn’t love. Cate knew better. But it was something—something expensive and addictive and hers for as long as she kept paying. And she would. God help her, she would.