That day in that tiny concrete room when I arrived, I thought they'd be bending me over the card table and taking turns; I steeled myself for it. But they didn't - they barely touched me. Instead, they pulled out a syringe.
"Loyalty juice," he said with a grin that never touched his eyes. He called himself Viper, and as I would find out later, he was Theo's second quarry.
"Please," I said, my stomach turning, "I'll do whatever you want, I swear. I won't fight."
"Seems a shame to waste the good stuff on you," he said, ignoring my pleas. One of the men grabbed and held me and extended my arm for Viper. I tried to twist away but it was a useless struggle.
"Go on, keep wriggling about and get your arm torn up," he said, kneading the inside of my elbow and positioning the needle.
I screamed. I held still, afraid to cause myself more pain than necessary, but I screamed as he injected what felt like fire into my vein.
I clutched my arm when the man let me go. “You marked?” he asked.
“Huh?”
He casually backhanded my face. I yelped; but it felt numb almost right away. “Turn her around. Show me her ass.” I held my breath and prepared to scream again, but the will and the fight left me as the drugs began to take effect. They manhandled me, pressing my chest against the cold wall and yanking my pants down , revealing the tattoo on my lower back. “Property of the Dust Bowl Devils,” it read. There was no way they were going to tolerate that.
"Get that shit covered and get her backstage," Viper said with a dismissive wave, his attention already back on the money.
Heroin, I found out, when my escorts finally stopped laughing at my panicked questions long enough to get the word out. That first rush was incredible. I felt like I was floating; like I was wrapped up in a warm and happy dream. The feelings brought me right back in time to when I was young; when I rode with my father in his brand new pickup truck, changing cassette tapes every five minutes to find his favorite songs. They became my favorite songs. Loud, jarring techno music blasted through the club, but I only played the tunes of my childhood in my head.
Four nights of the same. They kept me very high, very drug-addled those first four days. I spent them in a brown haze. I didn’t even feel it when they filled in my tattoo, covering the words and the devil’s face with black ink, leaving nothing but a shapeless blob. I tried to explain to the backstage manager that I was a terrible dancer, but the big-nosed bitch didn't care. "Just flash them some pink and they won't give a shit if you're doing the goddamn chicken dance."
So I slinked and sashayed up and down the stage that jutted out through the middle of the huge, warehouse-like room. There were three poles spaced out in a row, but even my drugged brain knew I'd only hurt myself using them to perform.
I did what I was told. When the managers pushed me at the stage, I danced. When they directed me into private corners with their customers, I went. When they pointed at a cock, I embraced it with my lips and legs. What did it matter? The drug took me somewhere far away inside my head. I didn't feel like myself. I was someone else entirely.
I was heavily supervised by imposing looking men with guns, but they slowly melted away as I succumbed to the call of the needle. The other girls didn't talk to me at all. They didn't seem to communicate with each other very much, either.
Viper visited me in the cold, dim bathroom as I perused my reflection. This was different. Normally he had me brought to him elsewhere in the club.
"On your knees," he said. I sank to the cold tile floor. He loosened his belt. "Open your mouth." I did without protest. He slid his cock between my lips and I moaned. Not for him, but for the hit I knew he would soon deliver.
I extended an arm upwards as I sucked his member deep. He was thick, but not so long that I couldn't take him fully inside my mouth. Just another cock, I told myself, no big deal. No different than any other.
He squeezed my arm above the elbow. Relief washed through me. I can't be hooked yet, it's only been four days. But it would eat the pain and the fear. I would be invincible. Nothing could touch me beneath that cloud.
He paused, though, with the needle poised above my veins. "I know that you're Theo's bitch."
I looked up. I moved to release him so I could speak, but he stepped on my hand with a slam that echoed off the tiled walls. "Don't stop!" I cried out around his shaft but took care not to bite down, no matter how badly I wanted to. My hand throbbed. "I know you're his bitch," he said. "We're going to kill him." I squeezed my eyes shut against the tears, but they squeezed out anyway. Does that mean he's searching for me? "He ought to have stayed home." I bobbed my head and ran my tongue along the underside of his member. Why was he telling me this? Did he come down here to gloat? "It was his fault I was exiled in the first place. Now they send the fucker to kill me? He and your whole club will pay."