Stripped Bounty by Dorothy F. Shaw

the hall in search of Rosie. Charlie nodded and headed that way. He knew the routine with the girls, knew she was late. As Badger did another scan of the crowd, he moved toward one of the dancers on the floor. Again he found nothing out of the norm.
    Charlie emerged from the hall, shaking his head. The fuck? Something was wrong. Really wrong. Maybe she was sick. Badger clasped the closest dancer not engaged in a table dance by the arm, and asked her to work the cage stage, and then moved down the hall.
    Uncaring who was in what state of dress, Badger walked directly into the dressing room. A couple of the girls gasped and covered their bare breasts. Badger rolled his eyes and turned to Evie. “Hey, where’s Rosie? She sick or something?”
    Evie glanced up from sewing whatever the fabric was in her hands, pink-framed reading glasses perched on the edge of her nose. “Rosie’s onstage, Badger.” She raised the thread and bit it with her teeth.
    “If she was, you wouldn’t be staring at my ugly mug right now, Evie. She ran down the hall after her set and hasn’t come back.” He glanced among the girls in the room and into the small, attached bathroom. “Any of you seen Rosie?”
    “Who?” One of the girls ran a brush through her hair.
    Goddamn stage names. None of the girls really ever knew each other. “Arianna.” He let out an exasperated sigh. “You seen Arianna? About this tall—” Badger raised his hand to show Rosie’s approximate height. “Long, dark hair. Petite tits, pretty much petite everything except for her long legs.”
    “Oh yeah, I saw her.” The girl grabbed a can of hairspray and started fogging up.
    “When?” Tired of this game, Badger stalked to the girl and snagged the can from her hand. “When did you see her?”
    She jerked back from him. “Jesus! What’s your problem?”
    Badger tossed the can down and gripped the girl’s upper arm. “I don’t have a problem. What I do have is a missing girl.” He pulled her closer. “Now, take a second, jiggle some brain cells so they start firing, and tell me when the fuck you saw her last.” The last was said on a growl. Though he hadn’t meant for it to slip out.
    The girl’s eyes got wide before she started glaring. “Take your fucking hands off me.”
    “Badger. Easy now…”
    He glanced over his shoulder to find Evie beside him, her hand resting on his forearm. The look of concern on her face gave him pause, enough to rein his shit in and let go of the ditz he was hell bent on getting an answer from. Badger let out a breath. “I’m cool. All good, Evie. You see Rosie, let her know I’m looking for her, yeah?”
    “Sure, honey.” Evie patted his arm with a meek smile. “Sure.”
    Badger took two steps backward before turning and leaving the room. Where in the fuck was she? He ran back toward the bar. Charlie was still at the entrance to the hall. “She come out?” Charlie shook his head and Badger did a one-eighty and headed for the office. Barging inside, he found it empty. A cold chill zipped up his spine and made the hair on the back of his neck stand on end.
    Badger ripped his keys from his front pocket, unlocked the filing cabinet drawer and pulled out his gun. After holstering it in place on his side, he stalked out the back door of the club. Her POS Toyota was still in the lot. What the fuck? He took two steps forward and listened. After a moment, a faint sound of something scraping on the pavement, off to the right near the Dumpster, caught his attention.
    Badger pulled his gun from its holster and racked the slide. Keeping his steps light, he slowly walked toward the big green trash bin. Moving to the side of it, he pressed his back to the hard metal. He paused long enough to draw in a deep, calming breath, and then pivoted around, arms extended with his gun gripped firmly in his hands. Badger’s eyes went wide at what he found.
    “Oh, fuck! Holy shit, Badger. Don’t shoot.” Rosie shrank farther down into