“Don’t do anything that’s going to embarrass your wife and family, man,” he warned his old neighbor.

“Aw, naw, man, this is business. And have your photographer take a few pictures of me with all you guys so I can show my cousin for more parties.”

“Good idea,” Ivan told him. They gathered everyone together and took more pictures before Julio dashed off to retrieve the two girls he wanted to invite into VIP as his special guests.

“You need anything, Ivan?” another assistant asked. It was the same Filipina from Zee-Dog’s birthday party in October. She had interrupted Ivan while he’d been speaking to Catherine.

Ivan noticed her and asked, “What is your name again?”

“Ashley.”

“Yeah, I haven’t seen you in a while, Ashley. Where have you been?”

Ivan didn’t remember getting her name before, and he hadn’t seen her around in a while. She still looked good, though. And when he studied her glittery, form-fitting dress, he couldn’t find any bra straps or panty lines.

Either she’s not wearing anything under that dress, or she just hooked it up real good, Ivan told himself. Either way, she got my attention tonight.

Ashley looked surprised by his inquiry. “You remember me?”

He said, “Yeah, I remember you. I thought you were one of the best-looking girls at the football party.”

She smiled and said, “Thank you.”

Ivan told her, “Well, I don’t need anything right now, but I’ll let you know later, if that’s all right with you.”

She nodded. “Yeah, that’s okay. Just let me know.”

Ivan studied her eyes for a minute. She was focused on him, regardless of all the activity going on around them inside the room. And she refused to move until he told her to.

Ivan was curious about that. He asked her out of the blue, “Is your boyfriend up in here somewhere?”

Ashley smiled again. “No, I don’t have a boyfriend.”

Ivan told her, “Well, we need to talk about that later on.”

“Only if you promise,” she told him.

Ivan wasn’t expecting that. That told him everything he wanted to know.

He nodded and said, “You make sure I give you my private number before you leave here tonight. You hear me?”

She nodded back to him. “Okay.”

“All right, well, let me get back to things,” he told her.

She held up a hand and said, “Later,” as she faded away.

Ivan watched her disappear into the crowd like a mirage.

Yeah, I’m definitely gonna see what’s up with her tonight, he promised himself. Then he got back to enjoying the VIP crowd. Busta and his squad were chatting things up with plenty of eye candy, and Lucina looked on, seemingly pleased with it all.

“Hey, man, I’m glad you’re into friendships in this promotion game and not just closing people out,” one of their promoter friends commented.