Wild Dirty Secret(92)

Something unsavory roiled in my gut, and I hadn’t even eaten the soup yet. After he left, I forced myself to eat. Two days of not eating and an entire bowl of soup left my stomach distended and sore, but I finished it as a show of obedience. It was a good deal, and one I hadn’t been expecting. I had assumed I wouldn’t be able to help Claire from here, at his mercy, with no leverage at all. Now I had a chance to save her, and all I had to do was the same job I had done for years.

I wasn’t sure if I could. I had resigned myself to death, to rape. But consensual paid sex?

Unbearable.

There was a mirror each prostitute must wear. A man thought he was using me? No, I was using him. His physical impulses, his money. He was the one being manipulated. A woman looked down on me? No, I looked down on her. She spread her legs for free. She was the cheap one. The mirror was a shield, and mine was gone, shattered by a few brief hours of true happiness, of real sex, of realizing that the only person I was tricking was myself.

But I had to do it, for Claire. For myself, because this was the goal I had set, to protect her as no one had done for me.

I watched from the window as Henri and a few other men walked to the black Escalade across the street and took off. The door opened, and I turned, expecting Jade. Instead it was Jenny, from the hotel suite party that day. I sucked in a breath of surprise and relief. “You’re alive.”

She glanced down the hallway and then crept inside. Her step was unsteady, pupils dilated. I wondered if she’d been the one I’d heard through the wall, getting banged. I wondered if she had even felt it, as high as she probably was, though it was for the best if she couldn’t.

“I can’t stay long,” she mumbled. “I have an appointment.”

I held her hand. It was shaking. “What is it?”

“I heard what Henri told you. Don’t believe him.”

A sick feeling turned my stomach. Of course it would be foolhardy to trust someone like Henri, but in this position, I didn’t really have a choice. “Why not?” I managed.

“That’s the same deal he made with me.” She shuddered. “My…my boyfriend stole money from him, too much to pay back. Henri promised he would forget his debts if I agreed to work for him.”

I could guess where this story led. “And?”

“And he shot him, right in front of me. I’ve been hooking for him ever since.”





Chapter Nine





I kept the tomato soup down, but barely. When dinner came, I almost threw up from the smell of grilled chicken alone. Jade relented and took it away. I showered and shaved and put on makeup that came standard with each room. The same garish colors for every girl, the same skimpy clothes. I dressed with a lacy black bra and matching thigh-high stockings, a black silk sheath and high heels. Rituals I had done countless times, but they didn’t steady my mind this time.

They didn’t numb me.

A silver Jaguar parked in the lot across the street, conspicuous in its luxury. Men had streamed in and out all day long for other women. But I suspected this one was for me. If Henri was going to make a deal like that, he must have lined up some heavy hitters. I would be his road back to the top, the star of the show, motherfucking Winnie-the-Pooh.

A man dressed in all black crossed the street with long strides. I waited, imagining him stepping inside the darkened door, paying Jade at the front desk, being escorted up the stairs. I imagined his wife waiting for him at home, wondering why their sex life sucked. Or maybe she was relieved.

Footsteps approached down the hallway.

“This one,” I heard Jade say through the door, and then it opened.

A man. Of course it was a man, but it took me a second to recognize him out of context, as he was wearing a sleek business suit. I barely stopped myself from saying his name.

Major.

Jade must have caught the recognition in my eyes. “You know him?”

I forced myself to shrug. “An old friend.”

At least it felt like a million years ago. I felt older too, or maybe just wiser.

She knew I meant client, but her eyes narrowed. This was my first client since my kidnapping, after all. If I screamed rape, they’d have a hell of a time keeping it quiet. At some point, they couldn’t kill every client who talked shit about them. It was bad for business.

We kept to our roles, though. Major with raw lust in his eyes. Me bored and mildly fearful. We must have been convincing, because Jade nodded and shut the door.

I opened my mouth to speak, but he gave a short shake of his head, then glanced at the door. Jade was listening.

Rising, I went to take his jacket. Before I reached him, he shrugged it off and handed it to me. I took it from him, feeling the weight and shape of a gun wrapped inside.