Rumour has it they’re self-inflicted, but I’m not so sure on that either.
“Bill and Rosie did this to you? Is that what you’re telling me?”
She sits back down. “Gonna call the cops?”
“Is that what you want?”
“They wouldn’t do shit if you did.”
She’s right about that. My agency called the police out ten times in a twelve-week period when she first landed on our books. Ten tall tales, ten instances of accusations with no substance to back them up. Her account of events changes every five minutes, just as they would today if I pushed her on them.
I fell into the sob-story trap myself on day one, even though my colleagues told me I was being played. I wasn’t the first, and I sure won’t be the last. The girl is difficult, but she’s compelling. Her wildness is addictive.
I breathe through the silence as she examines her grubby nails. I wait patiently until she speaks again.
“Bill wants me.”
“Wants you?”
“He looks at me.”
“Bill wants what’s best for you,” I insist.
“He wants to fuck me. You do, too.” Her eyes bore right through me, and I don’t move. I don’t look away, not because she’s right – which she is – but because playing her game is the last thing she needs from me.
I’ve wanted to fuck her ever since our first session when her pouty little mouth sneered at me and told me I was just another useless cog in the useless fucking system.
I’ve wanted to bend her over my desk and fuck some manners into the snarky little bitch ever since she spread her legs in that very same seat and asked if I was hard for her. Asked if I wanted a go.
Asked if I knew she was wet for me.
Carrie Wells is a beautiful package of trouble, just like I said.
We have CCTV in this room. One false move and I’d be out of the job I’ve dedicated the last fifteen years to.
And I wouldn’t make one false move. Of course I wouldn’t.
Couldn’t.
I’m waiting for it – the stream of obscenities as she loses her shit and tells me I’m disgusting. That I want to smell her. Want to taste her. Want her to rub her tight little pussy in my face.
I wait for her to tell me I’m an asshole and she never wants to see me again, that my help isn’t worth shit.
But today she doesn’t.
It’s the breath she takes. The shaky little rasp of air that sets my nerves on fire.
It’s the way she looks at her boots and not at me.
“They really are gonna throw me out this time,” she whispers. “I said sorry, too. I mean, I’ll be alright, I can take care of myself, find myself someone to bunk with, I just… I like my room there. I feel safe.”
“Apologise again,” I tell her, but she shakes her head. “Tell them how you really feel.”
“No point.”
One false move and she’ll storm away and I know it. One stupid comment and she’ll be out and away from here long before our remaining fifteen minutes is up.
I should ask her the standard questions. Tick the right boxes. I should be professional, just as I have been every other session up until now.
But I can taste it. The tiny little crack in her beautifully plated armour.
“Who really hurts you, Carrie?” I ask her, and those green eyes crash right into mine.
“Who do you think?”
“Tell me,” I insist, willing that just this one time she’ll finally be honest.
She fiddles with her grubby fingernails. “You think I do it to myself. Everyone thinks that.”
My skin prickles. “Do you?”
She shrugs. “I trampled mud across Rosie and Bill’s posh carpet. And I put that hair dye in with Rosie’s washing. I did it on purpose, all of it. Maybe I hurt myself too.”
“Why did you do those things?”
“I wanted them to be angry. I wanted to hurt them.”
“And what about now? Do you still want to hurt them? Do you want to hurt yourself?”
“Maybe.” Another shrug. “No.”
Make or break. I take an audible breath. “This is it, Carrie, last chance saloon. Five months you’ve been coming here, and for what? Tell me how I can help you. Let me help you. Why come here every week if you aren’t going to let me do anything to help?” I sigh. She says nothing. “Just tell me this, what do you want?”
“I want you,” she says, and this time there’s a guarded honesty in her eyes, a burn that matches the one I feel in my gut whenever I look at the wild creature across from me.
There’s no snide smile on her mouth. No arrogant cock of the head. No fidgeting. Nothing.
My mouth is dry as a bone, and my cock is a fucking traitor to everything I stand for. Everything I believe in.