“I don’t think you could have hurt him, Lola. Not if you cared about him. That’s not you.”
“I didn’t want to hurt him,” I say, my throat raw, my chest tight. “But I did—and the worst part is, I wasn’t even sorry. Even now, I’d do it again in a heartbeat.”
* * *
“Hold still.”
The words are whispered into my ear, hot and faintly wet. I close my eyes. Tears squeeze down onto my cheeks. I’m bent over the bed, inhaling the dank scent of the bare mattress. There are stains I don’t want to contemplate.
Some of them probably came from me.
There’s a hard thrust, and I can’t help but whimper. I clamp my mouth tight and taste blood.
“Do you like that?” comes the breathless voice from behind me. “Does your boyfriend do it like that?”
I shudder at the stabbing pain, holding myself still and closed. I only have to get through this. I only have to survive.
“Hannah?” The voice comes from outside the room—familiar and beloved. No.
He can’t come in here. He can’t see my like this. I try to call out, to tell him not to come inside, but only a croak comes out. I’m too broken to even speak, too lost.
The door opens, and I only have seconds to glimpse the surprise in his eyes. And the rage.
Then he’s flying across the room. There’s no more invasion in my body, no more hands holding me down. Only the smack of flesh on flesh, the grunt of animals locked in battle.
I know this is a fight to the death.
Chapter Nine
I stare at the glass doors that open and close. Of all the places I could imagine Blue living, it’s not here.
I would have thought a run-down apartment building with rent by the week. I would have imagined sour milk and a stack of empty pizza boxes for a coffee table. Not that I think he’s broke. Ivan takes good care of the bouncers, just like he does for the girls. If my money wasn’t getting sucked into dialysis and a gas bill for a forty-year-old house with no insulation, I’d be rolling in the dough too. As it is, there’s a twenty in my pocket that’s going to be cab fare home.
It’s just that Blue seems like the quintessential bachelor—down to work and to fuck.
Not the kind of man who has a doorman who nods to me as I step up to the desk. “Ms. Bowman?”
My heart jumps in my throat, and it doesn’t go back down even when the kind-eyed old man smiles.
I force myself to chill the fuck out. No matter where Blue lives, whether it’s on the streets or a goddamn skyscraper, Blue is just another horny guy. I’ve known so many of them. Too many of them.
“That’s me.”
“Mr. Blue is expecting you.” The man nodded toward the elevators. “You can go on up. Twelfth floor.”
I don’t meet his eyes as I murmur my thanks. I can’t imagine what this man thinks of me, showing up here at night when I’ve never visited before.
Actually, I can imagine. I’ve heard the words flung at me a million times since I was a teenager. Slut. Whore. At least those times I did what I needed to survive. In a way that’s still what I’m doing now.
My red heels click on the smooth tile surface. Gleaming elevator doors reflect a woman in a pretty dress and a cheap jacket. All flash and no substance. It’s a relief when the doors close behind me, locking me in, leaving me alone as the elevator whooshes up. I shut my eyes against the mirrors around me and focus on my breathing.
There’s still time to back out.
I could go downstairs, hide my face and my shame from the kind-eyed doorman, and walk back onto the street where I belong. Blue wouldn’t follow me. He wouldn’t force me.
At least, I think he wouldn’t.
He’d been pretty forceful in that damn locker room.
The truth is that I owe him. He knows it. I know it. The only question is whether I’m going to pay up. Five years ago I was the kind of girl who’d shove him out the door without even a goodbye. Now I’m the girl who returns his wallet when it would be easy to shove it in the garbage and pretend I never saw it. I’m the girl who pays what I owe—I need to know I’m not the girl I was before. I need to know I’m worth anything at all.
The elevator doors slide open with a hushed sound. The quiet of the hallway rings in my ears. Everything is grayscale—the muted walls and the plush carpet. The silver knockers on every door. This place is a kind of bachelor pad, one made for wealthy men.
The kind that don’t need to be working security at a strip club, no matter how much Ivan is paying.
I’m standing there, confused, paralyzed, when a door opens.
“Hannah?”
My heart bangs against my chest. His voice sounds so sweet, so familiar. God.
I can’t take it. I can take his hands on me or his dick inside me, but I can’t take his voice saying my name. I can’t stand him thinking I’m that girl, the one too innocent and too broken, the one who loved him and the one who sent him away.
I turn and run for the elevator, which slides closed, just out of reach. My heel snags on the carpet, and I stumble. I’m falling, flying, the world a blur of gray and silver and tears in my eyes.
Strong hands catch me.
“Watch it,” he says in that same voice he uses to threaten me, to compliment me. They’re the same thing when they come from him. Everything about him warns me away and draws me close. I’m tearing apart just to be near him, breaking under the weight of my fear and desire.
“Let me go,” I whisper.
He doesn’t. His hands tighten on my arms. “Where are you going?”
“Away from here.” Away from you. “This was a mistake.”
“Ah,” he says. Just that, and then he tugs me gently toward him. The heat of his chest is solid against my back, supporting me and holding me in place. “Are you afraid of me, Hannah?”
My teeth clench. “Don’t fucking call me that.”
He pauses as if I’ve surprised him. “Why does it matter, with just you and me here?”
I force myself to take a deep breath. Straightening, I turn to face him. His eyes are curious, his stance wary. And he isn’t wearing any shoes. That’s what strikes me about him. The gray T-shirt snug around his arms, the worn jeans. They’re more casual versions of what he wears at the club every night. But he always has on thick shoes, almost like boots, when he works. Even at the fight, with no shirt on, he had slipped into big, unlaced sneakers before coming into the locker room.
Only now, standing in the hallway of his apartment building, is he standing without shoes. It makes him seem somehow more real—a real man, with real hopes and dreams that I can never be a part of. The future is for some other girl. I’m just the tease he needs to fuck to forget, the bitch he needs to punish. I’m the sentence, and this night, this is a period.
My feet carry me backward. Somehow I manage not to trip. My hands grope the smooth wall and find the button—and press.
His eyes narrow. “Lola?”
I hate that he gets it right this time. That he respects me enough to call me what I want.
But not enough to let me leave.
He steps forward. “You’ve come this far, gorgeous. You’re going to finish this.”
I raise my head. Never mind if my whole body is trembling—I will meet his eyes, those dark pools of lust and resentment, like windows to the past. “And if I say no?”
The windows frost over. “That’s not an option.”
Elevator doors slide open behind me. I glance at the empty mirrored box.
“Don’t,” he says.
I close my eyes. I’m not sure how I found the strength to come here.
I don’t think I have the strength to leave.
He steps toward me slowly, casually. His hand is tight when it fists in my hair. I remember he used to love my hair. He used to stroke it, to play with it, to press the strands between his blunt square-tipped fingers. Now all he wants to do is pull it, use it like a leash to yank my head back. I stare at a chr
ome light fixture. Yellow light clashes with the stinging tears in my eyes, making a kaleidoscope, something pretty in the face of an ugly past, an ugly present.
His voice is low in my ear. “You’re going to walk down that hall and go inside my apartment. Then you’re going to strip. I don’t need to watch. I see you do that any night of the week. What I want is what comes after. You. On the couch. Facedown, ass in the air, ready to take whatever I give you.”
* * *
He said he didn’t need to watch, but I still thought he would. It’s somehow more unnerving to get undressed when I’m standing alone in the living room.
It makes me feel ashamed, which shouldn’t even be possible after what I’ve done at the club. Blue is just gifted like that—gifted at making me feel like shit. I take off my dress with quick, efficient movements and toss it onto a chair in the corner. My heels get kicked off to the floor underneath. My bra and panties come next. Then I’m naked in a room I’ve never been in, my skin pebbling under the cool air from the vent above me.
Blue returns from the kitchen with an amber bottle hanging from his fingers.
Only one bottle. Of course he hasn’t offered me a drink. I’m not here to enjoy myself, and he’s not my host. We aren’t going to pretend this is a date. I haven’t forgotten what this is about, but if I ever do, he’ll remind me with the subtle digs.
He nods to the couch. “Bend over. I want to see what those fuckers don’t get to.”
And the not so subtle digs.
My skin is covered entirely in goose bumps. Even my nipples are stiff and proud, like some cruel parody of arousal. I’m not even wearing my heels anymore, but my legs are wobbly when I cross the small space.
The carpet is softer than anything I’ve ever felt. This is the floor where he walks with those bare feet. This is the floor he might lounge on or do push-ups on. This is the floor he might fuck some other girl on, a girl he actually likes, one he doesn’t order to bend over.
The leather of the couch looks worn—artfully worn, like rich people have. Even in my shame and my nervousness, I have the sense to wonder where he got all that money.
And why he’s corralling drunk assholes at the Grand if he doesn’t have to.
“Now, Lola. Stop stalling.”
His voice sends a shiver down my spine. Cool leather kisses the fronts of my thighs. I bend at the waist, using every ounce of grace, of strength I’ve built up while stripping. He wants to see something those fuckers don’t see, but that’s all I show him—the smooth descent, the blunt display of my ass, as if I were onstage and he were standing two feet away with a twenty in his hand.
It feels like a victory, that small defiance. Like I’ve held something back.
Especially when I hear his breath catch at the sight.
Confidence steadies me as I dig my heels into the soft pile. My hands stroke the buttery leather before settling into place, fingers spread.
The heat from his body touches me first. It breaks through my defenses, invisible and undeniable. A hundred men have touched me, have grabbed me, have ground their dicks against me. And just the whisper of his body, the evidence of his nearness makes my heart pound.
His finger is featherlight against the small of my back. He touches me like I’m delicate, breakable, when we both know I’m anything but. He touches me like he’s tracing the lines of me, drawing the curve of my ass, dipping into the tender space between my legs.
“You’re shaking,” he says as if remarking on the weather. “And you’re wet.”
Of course his words only make me shake harder. They only make me wetter.
He leans down, his forefinger notched to my pussy, barely invading me, casually possessive. His mouth is close to my ear, his whisper low and gruff. “Are you afraid of me?”
“No,” I lie.
Two fingers shove inside me, deep and fast. My body is lubricated, but not enough. I flinch and hop up on my toes. It presses my face into the cushion—and I think that’s exactly what he meant to do.
“Tell me the truth,” he says, the spider to the fly.
I’m already caught in his web. There’s no way out.
My voice is muffled even to my own ears, mouth half-smashed against a leather couch that probably cost more than my car. “Candy says you’re not really going to hurt me. She says you…you just want to fuck me. That you’re not really mad.”
His fingers stroke me deeply, intimately, soothing me after the rough burn of entry. “Five years would be a long time to hold on to a grudge.”
Part of me wants him to agree, to say that all this was some strange seduction, to assure me that I have nothing to fear. But if he told me that, it would be a lie. He may hide his anger well, especially if Candy couldn’t see it. I can see it. I can feel it as he adds a third finger before I’m ready.
I rise up on my toes again, breath held in my chest, cheeks hot with embarrassment. He touches the inside of me as easily as another man might hold my hand. No, this is less intimate than that. This is a man reaching inside his car to twist a knob. This is a man touching something he owns.
“Are you going to hurt me?” I whisper.
There. I’ve asked the question, and I know that if he does answer me, it will be honest. Whatever his answer, I can take it. I’ve felt pain before, felt hate and rage. Even if it seems like it will be different coming from him—sharper and more personal. I’ll survive. If there’s one thing I know I can do, it’s survive.
His hand stills. I imagine him looking directly at me, staring at the pink skin stretched around his fingers. It’s humiliating being this open to him while he’s still dressed. Humiliating with the light on. Humiliating when he takes a swig from his beer bottle with one hand while the other is still pressed inside me.
“And ruin the surprise?” he asks mildly.
My jaw clenches tight. My eyes shut too. “I’ve never been a fan of surprises.”
“No,” he says thoughtfully. “I can’t say that I’m a fan either.”
I cringe knowing he’s thinking of that awful night. It had been one hell of a surprise when I’d accused him of raping me. He would hardly be a fan of them after that.
“So I’ll tell you the answer,” he says, pulling his fingers from me with a wet sound. Those damp fingers press against my back hole in an answer more eloquent than words. “Yes, you’ll probably be hurt tonight.”
I swallow, knowing I shouldn’t feel disappointed. And definitely not scared. I knew what I was getting into when I came here, didn’t I? And if I had clung to some stupid fairy-tale idea of him, something clearly false, at least when it came to me, that was my own damn fault.
He leans forward, resting his arm on my back. I feel like a piece of furniture, like an extension of this sofa, something soft and sturdy for him to rest on.
“And tomorrow night,” he adds. “I took you out of rotation.”
I gasp in shock and indignation. “What the hell?”
“And the next night after that.”
“Are you crazy?”
“Three nights, Lola. I don’t think that’s too much to ask after what you did. I don’t think it’s enough, actually, but I can be lenient.”
I struggle, I fight. I want to be standing when I yell at him for doing this. I want this to be an even playing field, but he’s already resting his weight on my back. I went over the arm of this couch willingly, and now I’m trapped. “You had no right to do that. Just because I agreed—”
“Unless you want me to tell Ivan about those sticky little fingers of yours? He’s lenient with you girls, but I don’t think he would like thinking you’re stealing from the customers. Or from him.”
“I don’t,” I gasp. “I don’t steal from him or from—”
His body moves as if in a shrug. “Who can say? And to be honest, I don’t give a fuck.”
I fight again, but it’s like trying to move a mountain. One that’s resting comfortably, casually on my back. The anger seeps out of me, replaced by
worry, by sadness that we’ve come this far. I turn my forehead into the cushion, hiding and self-soothing. “I can’t go three nights without getting paid,” I say into the leather.
There’s a long pause. “I’ll make up the difference.”
He’ll pay me for sex? God, even when he’s being cruel, he’s kind. “No.”
The thought of it makes my stomach turn over. If this is about a debt, then we need to be square at the end of it. I fucked him over once, and he’s giving it back. It’s supposed to hurt.
“No money,” I say, staring at the blur of light and black leather. “If we do this, we do it on my off days—like today. I work my regular schedule. That’s my deal. Take it or leave it.”
This pause is longer, and I wonder what he’s thinking. Is he going to try to force me to miss work? Is he going to force me to take his money? I think that would be the worst punishment, to be made his whore as well as his plaything.
He strokes a hand over my back like I’m an animal—petting me. “One night a week.”
My skin tingles, and I force myself not to arch into his touch. “How many weeks?”
He doesn’t answer. He just grabs me by the hair and lifts.
Chapter Ten
“This is very important, Hannah. Mrs. Moreno has the pictures of your bruises. We need to know who hurt you.”
I refuse to look up, to meet his eyes. My voice is a whisper. “I told her.”
“We have her statement, but I need to hear it from you.”
After a long beat of silence, I look up into the kind eyes of a judge. He looks sorry for me. Everyone is sorry for me. They just can’t help me. Isn’t that what Blue told me? That they don’t understand what it’s like in the system. They shove us around like dolls in cardboard houses.
I grasp the wood handles of the chair, already slick from my palms. “What will happen to him?”
The judge looks tired. “That depends on a lot of factors.”
“Like what?”
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