You're Always You

Chapter Seventeen

David Minett

Oh, this....

This....

Ugh.

There weren't words for how uncomfortable David was being here again, of his own accord, not even having Monica as an excuse. But, now that he knew Lydia was here? Well...he was compelled to keep an eye on her.

She would hate that. Call him a stalker, a creep...and she wouldn't...be wrong, necessarily. Dave knew that.

But damn it that was his wife, and it wasn't easy to just pretend otherwise.

Of course, after talking with Monica that morning, it seemed a little dumb to return immediately to the...strip club. David spent the majority of the day looking into whatever connections he had in the Army, as well as outside of it but thanks to it, in an effort to get Brett released ASAP. That was a much better use of his time during the day. It...didn't move forward very much, but something was better than nothing.

It was when night fell he got up the courage to return.

And walking into that place again....It gave him bad vibes. But, he wasn't here for himself, he was here for Lydie. And that made it easy to ignore the...ahem...ladies that tried to get cash out of him. It would've been easy anyway, because this was not his scene, but the fact that he was looking for someone, the only person he was comfortable seeing in such...scant clothing....

It made things easier, to have a task.

That said, David didn't want to outright confront Lydia. That was just stupid. He was only here to make sure she was okay. Obviously this would be a poor establishment if it didn't do that already for its employees, but uh....

Well, this was run by Dickie King.

So.

This could be the most esteemed strip club in the east coast, and David would feel no more safer just leaving his wife here knowing who was behind it. She'd suffered with Dick enough.

She'd suffered with a lot of dicks, apparently.

Ugh.

As planned, David kept his distance when he finally did catch sight of Lydia, and just...tried to discreetly follow her about, making sure she was okay. However, it was pretty obvious to him, even with the distance, that she was not okay. She wasn't doing her walk, that exaggerated stripper walk, nor was she trying to solicit anybody. She was just...walking around. Keeping up appearances.

And upon closer inspection, half asleep.

Oh, honey....

Dave decided to swoop to her rescue when some asshole was getting touchy-feely, when she clearly was not in a state to be working at the moment. Why she was here like this in the first place bothered David—why was she sleeping here?—but that wasn't important yet.

Achingly reminded of the day they'd first met properly, David couldn't help but use the same line he had on Dick, telling the offender not to be a predator. He had hopes that perhaps being subtle, dropping hints and inside jokes, were stir something in her, but....

Well, the woman was half asleep.

He knew what it looked like, coming here and dropping a bill to take a stripper into a back room, but it was necessary. For one thing, Davie just...wanted her off the floor. Wanted to give her an excuse to take a break. They didn't even have to talk, despite his fib, because he didn't know that there was anything they could talk about.

If all he did was give Lydia an excuse to nap, that was fine.

"Alright," the woman said once they occupied a room. "You got fifteen minutes."