by T. L Smith
“Tell me something.”
My feet stop just before the door, and I turn around to face him. He’s watching me intently, his round belly hiding under his button-up shirt. “Do you enjoy it, or is it all fake?”
I give him my only answer; the one I give every client—I wink before I walk out. As I leave the room, I hear a soft laugh behind me.
Outside, the sky is black. It may storm tonight, it may not, I can’t be sure.
So I call my brother, and he doesn’t answer.
Then I call my neighbor, and luckily she does.
“Where is he?”
She’s quiet.
“Merci.” I say her name.
“Fuck,” she responds. “I thought he would be back by now.”
“Where is he?” I ask her again. My hands go to the steering wheel of my shit-ass car while waiting for the answer, and I squeeze tight for a moment before sliding my client’s money into my purse.
“Don’t kill me.”
“Merci,” I repeat, my patience running thin and showing in my tone.
“He’s at Works Bar.” My hands slam on the wheel, hard, then I hang up the phone.
I may die tonight.
2
Chanel
I’m going to throttle him. My hands will wrap tight around his throat as I extinguish the living light from his eyes.
He knows better.
We both do.
Fuck.
I am going to kill him.
Dead as a fucking cockroach beneath my feet.
End of discussion.
I want to pull my hair out with each step I take.
Have I not taught him anything?
Does he not listen to me at all?
Why does he have to be like this?
It’s not hard to follow a simple instruction, ‘stay away from them,’ which, clearly, he ignored.
Dead.
Argh.
This is what I’m left with.
Heels clicking with each step I take into the bar, my eyes scan the area.
I shouldn’t be here.
This place is not the place for me.
But sometimes a girl has to do things that are necessary—things she may not want to do.
This is one of them.
For sure.
“You aren’t meant to be in here, whore.” My head swings in the direction of where that voice came from. The bartender’s eyeing me up and down, pulling his lips together in disgust as he glares at me.
“Fuck you!”
His gaze swoops over me again, and I know what’s got his nose out of joint. A dress with a slit up the side, that if it rode up, you would see everything. Because I’m not wearing underwear.
“Your funeral.” The bartender cackles like a stupid witch, going back to what he was previously doing.
Upon taking a deep breath, I turn away from him.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
This is the last place I want to be.
We all know whose place this is.
Who that person is.
And I’ve warned him, time and time again.
To. Stay. Away.
Yet, I know, I just know he’s here with every fiber of my being. Plus, his little rat of a friend told Merci.
He could have been lying, but I suspect not.
I walk past a few patrons, straight to the back door where it’s forbidden to enter unless you’re invited. I’ve never been invited and don’t ever plan to be.
Who the fuck knows what they do back there?
And the stories I hear? Well, most invitees don’t come out functioning properly afterward—if you are a woman, that is. The men? Well, they have full rights to everything, don’t they?
It’s a man’s fucking world here.
My hands give a slight tremble as I reach for the door, but I shake it off. Now is not the time to grow weak. Right now, I need everything in me to do this.
Every-damn-thing.
Especially if I am dealing with him.
I’ve seen him around, heard the whispers, but have never, thankfully, had to meet him.
Seems my luck just ran out, and I’m about to meet the most fucked-up man there is.
Lucas Rossi.
My chipped blue nails clench the door handle, and when I turn to look over my shoulder, the bartender is eyeing me, waiting to see what I do next.
Will I actually push it open?
Or will I stay on this side, where it’s safe?
Taking a deep breath, I prepare myself to push it open.
I have to.
It’s for him.
I love him.
He’s all I have left. Which is why I’m willingly walking into Hell.
My body is locked tight, and I will myself to turn the fucking handle. Just do it. Do it now!
What could be the worst thing to happen? Oh, yeah, I don’t get to walk out because, that’s it, I’ll be dead.
Fuck this!
Turning the knob quickly, I push the door open with a little more force than needed. I’m immediately met with the aroma of stale cigar smoke in a room that’s dark and dingy. There are only a few scattered lights that shine down on a table in the center. All eyes of the men sitting at that round table, with cards in their hands, look up to face me.
“You brought us a toy,” one of them says.
I ignore the words as my eyes search the room. Looking for him. I have to find him. When I don’t see him, my breath hitches, and I wonder if this was the right move. Then I see my brother walk out of a back room, holding a tray of glasses. His eyes, the same brown as mine, lock on me and he swears.
“You fucking little shit.” My brother’s face pulls tight as my words are aimed right at him, and he shakes his head. Then, seeming to remember where he is, he looks back to the table and continues on with what he was doing—serving drinks. I stand there shocked that he’s proceeding but watch as he sets a drink in front of every man, then bows and backs away when he’s finished.
“You should lose the dress,” a man with a wicked gleam in his eyes comments, his eyes traveling the length of my body before settling on my face. I hold his stare, unmoving. He smirks at my reaction and shakes his head, looking away.
“You should, though. Otherwise…” He doesn’t finish but looks at my brother, who is now standing at the back door, with a tray in hand. I take in the words he just uttered—and those left unsaid—and bite my lip. I’ve done worse, so taking off my dress would seem so simple, but that’s not why I’m here.
“I came for him, and we’re leaving.” I glare at my brother. “Brody.”
He glances down, then places the tray on a table and makes his way over to me.
“Not so fast. His services aren’t finished.” The one who said ‘otherwise’ is the main talker, it seems. He has long hair tied back in a ponytail and a sneer that appears to just sit over his face.
“They are! He’s underage,” I reply, refusing to be intimidated, pulling my stupid brother closer to me by the sleeve of his dress shirt.
“I’m eighteen in like two weeks,” my brother grumbles next to me.
I can’t help the scoff that leaves my mouth. “He’s leaving.” I announce to the room and step back toward the door, my hand gripping my brother’s arm with no respite.
“You open that door, I’ll put a bullet in your brother’s head.”
My hand stills over the knob, and the gruff, irate sound of that voice hits me hard.
I know who it is without having to turn around while everyone else goes deathly silent.
I may have never met Lucas, but everyone on the streets knows who he is. You’d be stupid not to know of him.
While he isn’t the leader of the mafia—his cousin, Keir, is—Lucas is feared down here even more so than Keir. Keir doesn’t usually bother to come to this shitty area where the scum live to play with us. Because, trust me, playing is what he does.
The stories I’ve heard, the marks I’ve seen, we all know better than
to piss where he eats. Yet, here I am, walking straight into his bar, like I have not a care in the world.
While Keir stays in the better part of the city and in his nice houses, Lucas is the exact opposite. He will slum it and not give a fuck.
He’s the only person in this shitty little neighborhood just out of New York who drives a car worth more than any house you’d find here—probably double the price—yet, no one, and I mean no one, would touch it.
We all know our place.
Though, it seems for family, I’ve forgotten mine. I glance at my brother.
“You seem to be under the impression you can walk in here and take what you want.” He pauses. “My things.”
“He’s my brother,” I bite back, and a small hiss leaves someone at my outburst. I can’t see him, since he’s sitting at the end of the table where no light shines directly above him, but I know he can see me. Every inch of me as I stand under the main light near the door.
“I don’t give a fuck if he’s your son.” Brody tenses next to me. He damn well should be uneasy, making me come down here to get his ass. “Now, do as the man said and lose the dress.”
I look over at Brody.
“I’ll do it, if he can go.”
“You’re negotiating with me?” His voice is stern. “Stupid woman.”
I hold my ground. Brody knows what I do to make ends meet, but that doesn’t mean he has to see it.
“If he goes, I’ll do as you want,” I repeat, my tone even and agreeable. I can hear the sound of tapping on wood. Squinting, I see one of his hands is on the table, holding cards, while the finger of the other taps repeatedly. A ring he’s wearing catches my eye as those strong hands continue to tap, tap, tap. I wonder how someone’s hands can be so attractive. Because his certainly are.
“You can go, boy.”
I open the door, yanking Brody through the opening, then lean in so only he can hear me. “Go straight the fuck home and lock yourself in,” I order, shoving him farther and closing the door in his face. The last thing I see is the shock of his gaping mouth, ready to speak, as I slam the door behind him.
When I hear his footsteps moving away, I turn around to accept what’s coming next from the men in this room.
He is standing right in front of me when I do. Dressed in a black button-up shirt with black slacks and combat boots. It seems odd to be wearing a pair of scuffed boots with his experienced suit, but he pulls it off.
It’s not hard, though, if you look like him. When you first come across Lucas Rossi, you think, Shit, that man is attractive. How is that even possible?
The stories about him should make him ugly, hideous, a monster. But he’s young, in his late twenties, maybe early thirties, with tanned skin and slight stubble dusting his jaw. He has a tragus piercing in one ear, silky dark hair that’s perfectly mussed, and wood-colored eyes. Like the bark on a tree that has all variations of brown variegated through them. They are intense, and as they stare at me, it feels like they’re raking through my soul, scratching at it to see what’s underneath.
Well, isn’t he in for a huge surprise because there’s nothing.
I have nothing left.
“You weren’t planning on…” he pauses, licks his lips, and my eyes track each movement, “… running, were you?” He leans forward and grips a piece of my dull brown hair and then drops it. Where his is vibrant, mine hasn’t been washed for days.
I choose to not speak.
“What did you say your name was?” he pries.
Again, I keep my mouth shut. I watch as the muscle in his neck tics at my non-response. He isn’t used to someone not jumping at his every command, and right now I don’t give a shit about what he wants.
“Tsk, tsk, tsk.” He steps back and looks down over my body. “Remove it.”
Instantly, I reach for the hem of my dress, and his eyes track my movements. I slide my hand up my leg, showing my thigh, as I raise the dress higher. After a few blinks, I glance up to see him showing no emotion whatsoever. Then, before I can go any farther, he steps close to me again.
“What do you smell like?” He leans in and, before I have a chance to react, his face is buried in my neck and he’s breathing me in.
What the ever-loving fuck?
I feel the warmth of his chest hovering above mine, as his breath tickles my neck, all while I stand there shocked and still. Then he moves his body even closer, and I feel his erection pressed against me.
And do you want to know the worst part?
I like the feel of his body against mine.
He possesses something no one has ever had over me—power—and he holds it in the palm of his hand, as if it were a toy.
“Vanilla, musk, with something a little… spicy,” he remarks, then pulls back. I watch him lick his lips, his pupils dilated while his eyes roam over me. “My last favorite flavor was cotton candy, but I soon got sick of it.”
“What did you do?” I don’t know why I asked that question, it just slipped from my mouth. His lips twitch, it seems he’s pleased that I asked. And surprised.
“I killed her.” He says those three words as if I asked him what he had for dinner. Then he licks his teeth and nods to my dress.
“Now, remove it. Otherwise, you’ll end up next to her.”
3
Chanel
The stories of Lucas aren’t made up. The man is the worst of the worst. And doing what I do for work, I know this. The girls all know him, or of him. Everyone does.
I reach for my dress again, but he holds up his hand to stop me. Then he looks behind him to everyone at the table. I’d forgotten they were there since the moment his presence took up all the breathing room in front of me.
I hate that my heart rate picks up being near him, but not because I’m frightened.
How fucked-up am I to be thinking of how large his cock might be while I know for a fact he kills the women he fucks.
That should be a big turn off.
Yet, my body betrays me and wants to know what it would be like.
Evil bitch.
I don’t even know why my body is feeling this way to begin with, considering a man has never made me come.
“Leave.”
They do as he says. Chairs scrape instantly, all of them standing in unison and then walking out the back door.
He waits and watches before he turns back to me. “You ruined my night, so you better be making it up to me.”
Again, I say nothing. He moves away and rests on the table’s edge behind him, his legs stretching out and crossing as his gaze now fully roams every part of me.
His eyes show me shades of a forest, the dark earth of the trees. Like deep within the woods, where it’s scary, Lucas is the same. He takes you out there, fucks you, then burns your body when he’s done. Your ashes scattered among the dirt floor, leaving you a worthless memory.
I begin to approach him as I reach for the hem of my dress once again, to which he raises a brow.
“Can’t say I’ve had trash for a long time.”
He did not say that.
Did he?
He just called me trash.
Fuck him, the asshole.
“Can’t say I’ve had fucked-up, asshole maniac either, but look where we are.” His legs uncross and spread before him at my words. “And that’s saying something for a whore,” I spit at him. Lucas sucks in a breath, taking two swift steps up to me. His hand lands on my hip and he grips it hard before it slides it down over my ass.
“Where are your panties, whore?”
I inch closer to his face, so we are almost nose-to-nose. “In my last customer’s pocket.” I smirk. It’s a lie, but he doesn’t have to know that.
“You’ve already finished work for the day, then. That means I can abuse this cunt?” His hand goes to slide around to my bare pussy, but I stop him.
“That’s a no.” With my other hand, I pull my dress up. He looks down between us, and as he does, I lean in and bite his cheek.
>
“Love bites. Can’t say I’ve had those for a while,” he growls in my ear, and that’s exactly where I need his attention to be.
I take a deep breath and do the stupidest thing I could possibly ever do, and that’s really saying something. I pull the knife out of the strap on my leg and bring it to his throat, adjusting my body out of his grasp.
“You can’t afford me,” I tell him. “And I know better than to give it away for free.” I look him up and down, as he’s done to me. “Especially to you.”
A slow and steady smirk touches his lips, and he moves closer to me, the knife pressing into his skin. I watch in horror as he pushes more and more until blood starts seeping slowly from his neck, forming little droplets.
“If you plan to pull a knife on me, you’d better back it up.”
I press harder, feeling it cut deeper.
Do I really plan to kill a member of the mafia? Especially when they all know what I look like.
“You are scum.”
“Coming from a prostitute,” he bites back.
Yes, I may sell myself for money, but there’s a reason why I am this way. One he would never understand.
“Fuck you.”
“Oh, I plan to fuck you. Maybe not today, but mark my words, I’ll be between those legs in no time.” He licks his lips and takes a step back from me, the knife removing from his flesh. I see the blood dripping down his throat into the opening of his shirt, and he makes no move to clean it away. He simply reaches behind him and picks up a cigar, putting it to his lips as he watches me. “If I were you, I’d run before I change my mind.” He clicks his tongue.
I back away until my ass hits the door, then I reach for the handle and turn without a second’s hesitation. As soon as it opens, I’m out. The bartender smiles at me as I run, my feet aching and my heels clicking, but I don’t stop until I’m safely in my car. The stupid thing starts, which I thank the stars for.
As soon as I get to the shitty apartment complex I call home, I take the stairs to the second floor and swing the door open to find my brother sitting in front of the television with a bag of popcorn open, watching a movie.