Not at all

Lucas shook his head. "The other day she was practically begging me to turn her into a prostitute."

"Really? Wow." Audrey replied, the surprise plain to read on her face. "Are you sure it's a good idea to do that here?"

"Hey, I'm not the one who told her to advertise!" Lucas countered. "When word gets around, this place will become a lot more popular, and quickly too."

"That's not... I was just trying to make it more interesting!" Audrey said. Her expression turned thoughtful. "It would be good for business, I guess. And Eldwyn doesn't seem to mind. Still..."

"Still...?"

"I don't know... I've wanted to own a bar for as long as I remember, I don't want turn it into a brothel on the very day I finally achieved my dream."

"I understand."

"When I stand behind the bar, and I look around at people having a drink and a laugh, that makes me happy. Exchanging jokes with regular customers, finding ways of increasing revenue, managing staff... I don't want to lose those things."

Lucas shook his head. "But I don't think you have to."

"What do you mean?"

"The whole ground floor is taken up by the bar, right? I mean, along with the rest rooms, back office, and storage. So what's upstairs?"

"Storage is in the basement, actually. Other than that, yeah, pretty much. Heor used to live upstairs with his family. We still have some old furniture there that he never bothered collecting. There's an old bed there that I sometimes sleep on when it's too late to go home. We store some junk in one of the other rooms, but it's mostly just empty. But what does that hav—Oh!"

Her eyes widened as she realized what Lucas was getting at. He grinned. "Exactly: we could have both! Keep the bar as is, and create a more... private setting upstairs. In any case, is managing a bar so different from managing a brothel? The jokes you make with customers would be a little different, sure, but it's still the same kind of business, and you'd still help people to enjoy themselves."

"Men, you mean," she replied, raising an eyebrow skeptically.

He shrugged. "Depends on how we ran it, I guess. I'm sure there's women out there who wouldn't mind paying for a discreet evening with a handsome boy. Or a pretty girl, for that matter."

Audrey got a far-away look in her eyes as she considered it. "The bedrooms wouldn't have to change much, I guess, and we could split the living room in two for an extra room. We'd need a bathing area as well, maybe even two."

"Plus some more girls," Lucas added. "Eldwyn is great, but I think there's a lot of people who wouldn't appreciate finding the girl they just hired had a dick."

"Elves, especially, always so conservative. I think some of the girls working the bar wouldn't mind making some extra money on the side. Not all of them, though..." She mused. "Ah, we could use some kind of cue to tell them apart, maybe a ribbon or something!"

Lucas chuckled at what he had unwittingly unleashed. "You warmed up to the idea quicker than I expected."

"Well, maybe," she admitted, smiling self-consciously. "It's just an idea right now. We'd need to figure out if it's even doable. I mean, we'd need money for the initial investment. We'd also need to put together a thorough plan and figure out a way to make it profitable."

"Not tonight, though. Tonight we celebrate."

She nodded vigorously and demonstratively drained her mug. "Agreed. Percy! One more round on the house!"

More cheers of approval erupted from the now significantly denser crowd.

"I guess you're right, though," she continued as the crowd quieted. "It really is the same kind of business."

He nodded in agreement.

Percy brought them two more mugs. After a sip of the cool Elven ale, Lucas turned back to the men's room door.

"Damn, I haven't been paying attention," he muttered, watching a man return to the bar and another enter the bathroom. "How many is that now?"

"I don't know. He didn't look like he had a pleasant surprise, but there's no way to know," Audrey replied. "We're just going to have to wait for Eldwyn to return and tell us how it went. Or you could go check it out yourself?"

She leaned in closer and softly placed a hand on his thigh. "Wouldn't you like a nice blowjob from your brand new whore?"