The club never really gets dark.

Just dim enough to hide things. Neon bleeding through the glass, gold light catching on chrome and skin, bass heavy enough you feel it in your ribs more than you hear it.

This is Night City. Everything runs on credits, chrome, and bad decisions. Corporations own half of it, gangs fight over the rest, and people like you survive somewhere in between.

You know the rhythm of the place by now.

Who pays. Who stares. Who touches too much. Who doesn’t.

Upstairs, the rooms go for more than most people make in a week. Down here, it’s all performance. Conversation, attention, selling the illusion of something real for just long enough that they forget it isn’t.

They don’t call you what you are.

Not here.

Here, you’re a Doll. High-end, curated, trained to read people before they speak, to give them exactly what they came for without ever breaking the illusion. It sounds better than what it is. Costs more too.

And him.

Kade doesn’t blend in, no matter how quiet he is.

He’s already in his usual booth when you step out from the back. Same corner. Same seat. Back to the wall, eyes on everything without looking like it. Drink untouched in front of him.

Netrunner.

The kind people don’t ask questions about if they know what’s good for them. Jobs from fixers, corporate cleanups, hits that don’t make it into the public feed. The kind of work that leaves marks you learn not to comment on.

He comes here like clockwork.

Doesn’t ask for anyone.

Doesn’t have to.

You don’t go to him right away.

You’re not supposed to.

There’s a system. Appearances. Other clients. Other girls. The illusion that this is all the same, all equal.

It isn’t.

You make him wait a little. Just enough.

Then you slip into the booth across from him like it’s nothing.

“You’re late,” he says, already looking at you.

“You came early.”

“Didn’t say I minded.”

You smile a little at that, shifting closer instead of staying across from him. Your knee brushes his under the table. He doesn’t move away.

Never does.

Up close, you can see it. The faint cut along his brow. A darker bruise just under his collar. Fresh.

“You’ve had a night,” you murmur.

“Yeah.”

Your hand comes up without asking, brushing lightly along his jaw. He stills for a second, then leans into it just enough to make it easier for you.

No one else would notice.

But you do.

“You gonna tell me what happened,” you ask, quieter now, leaning in like it’s part of the act.

“Job went loud.”

“They always do with you.”

A faint huff. Almost a laugh.

Your fingers drift down, slow, tracing the edge of his collar where fabric meets skin, where something harder sits just underneath. Augments. Reinforced. Built for the kind of work he does.

Built for surviving.

“You good?” you ask.

He nods once. Then, after a second, “Better now.”

That lands softer than it should.

Someone passes your table. Lingers for half a second too long.

Kade’s eyes flick up.

That’s all it takes.

The guy moves.

You don’t even react. Just shift a little closer, like you belong there. Like this is part of the job.

It is.

But it’s not just that.

“You staying long?” you ask.

“Got time.”

Your hand slides down to his, resting there for a moment before your fingers slip between his. Hidden under the table. Out of sight.

His grip tightens just a little.

“You working after this?” he asks.

“Full night and morning shift.”

“Not anymore.”

You glance at him, raising a brow. “You paying for that?”

He looks at you like that’s not even an option.

“Yeah.”