by Voss, Deja
Chapter Seven
“What the fuck, Tress?” were the first words that came out of my mouth when I pulled into the clubhouse parking lot. “Thought you said she was a good girl. Could’ve had a war on our hands back there.”
“I had no idea, I swear,” she said. “We haven’t exactly been hanging out a lot lately. She never said anything about it. Trust me, Colt’s just about as happy with me as you are right now. Can you just drop it?”
Colt was pacing around the parking lot, peering through the giant chain link fence we had erected around the shop. “I can hear em, just can’t see em,” he said to Breaker. “Too fucking dark.”
Breaker was puffing on a joint, and he offered it to me when I walked over. The sound of saws and hammers were pounding away, even in the dark of night. Half the reason why the clubhouse was where it was was so we didn’t have to worry about neighbors. The land surrounding us was a complete swamp, and putting in the kind of drainage you’d need to make the property even slightly useable would require extremely deep pockets.
I took a hit and nodded in approval. The man definitely had good taste in bud.
“I have no fucking clue, brother,” Breaker said. “Haven’t seen anybody going in or out.”
I felt useless. A few months ago when Colt asked me to get some intel on the new property owners, the agency wasn’t really turning up anything. The land had been leased to a company who bought and flipped properties. Why they decided to situate themselves in our backyard was a question nobody could answer. Now that they were in full swing construction, I wished I still had some sort of connection, some way to find out what their intentions were other than trying to use my phone flashlight to try and see anything at all in the darkness of night.
“I don’t fucking like it,” Colt said, kicking the fence.
“I think you’re being paranoid,” Breaker said with this goofy glare. “So what, they build a house or something back there. Not like we aren’t secure here.”
“What if some old asshole moves back there and starts calling the cops on us. Don’t need that shit.”
“We’ll make it go away,” I said, patting him on the back. “It is what it is. I’ll see what I can do tomorrow.” I knew there was nothing I could do about it tomorrow short of walking my ass over there and finding out myself. I had no more connections. I couldn’t just make a phone call. Colt never brought it up, but the way he just huffed and walked off was all I needed to know he wasn’t impressed with my solution. He was on high alert as usual, and the fact that his old lady nearly set us up for something really bad back at the restaurant wasn’t helping.
“Dammit,” Breaker muttered. “I wanted to talk to you guys about something.”
He looked like a kid who just got rejected by his older brother when he asked him if he could play baseball with him and his friends. That was the funny thing about Breaker. He was tough. Loyal. Intense. But deep down we all kind of looked at him like a kid brother. We all felt like he needed us to look up to.
“What’s wrong, bud?” I asked. I was anxious to get on the road, get back to my house, put this day behind me, but I could tell he was really stressed out.
“I was hoping you guys could help me.” He pulled a felt box out of his jeans pocket. “I wanna propose to Hannah tomorrow when she gets back from her vet tech exam. Not fucking sure how to do it, though. I don’t wanna be cheesy.”
“I wish I could help ya. I don’t think I’m really the right guy to go to for that kind of advice though.” I wished I was in the same position he was right now, to be honest. I’d marry Sage in a heartbeat if I ever got her that close. I couldn’t help but be jealous of him. What did he have that I didn’t? Long hair? Face tattoos?
“Will you just be there?” he asked. “Promise me?”
“I’m happy for ya,” I said, pulling him in for a hug. “Of course.” As much as I wanted to be as far away as possible from his happiness, I wouldn’t let a brother down on such an important day.
I started walking back towards my bike and he called after me. “Is everything alright? I know it’s none of my business, but you’ve been off.”
Christ, it wasn’t just me noticing it. My brothers were picking up on it, too. I was falling apart. What the fuck was I supposed to do? If this was the life I always dreamed of, why was I having so much trouble fitting into the space I created for myself.
There was only one thing I could do to get Sage off my mind once and for all. I needed to double down on Dana. I needed to let her know I was her man and she was my woman, and even though it wasn’t exactly right, it was how things were going to be. I didn’t even bother texting her, just rode my back right back over to her house. We weren’t just going to have fun anymore. I wasn’t playing games.
If I wanted a shot at feeling normal, falling in line like a regular civilian, it was time to do regular civilian shit, even if that meant turning my back on everything I knew. I could make myself love her. I could make myself do anything if I tried hard enough. Being undercover for years gave me those tools.
I just had to figure out how to apply them outside of the safety of the rules set by the agency. For a minute I missed the structure of being told what to do every second of every day. Missed the freedom of not knowing any better than to throw myself into the line of fire. Just another reason why Sage was so much smarter than me.
She knew better than to live in denial. Denial that we were born to be anything but bought and paid for agents. Denial that we could live and love like normal civilians. Denial that pretending was just as good as the real thing.
It was going to have to be, though.
Pretending was something I could do.
I would pretend the rest of my life with Dana if it meant I could shake Sage from my mind.
Chapter Eight
Sage:
It’s insane what people will believe when they want to. Even skeptics turn soft when something they’d always hoped and dreamed for seemingly falls into their lap, which was the only reason why I was currently cruising the backroads of bumblefuck Pennsylvania in a convertible with the president of Femme Fatales Inc.
Kevin was your typical tech start up dude. He was young, cocky, burning through money like there was no tomorrow. He wasn’t attractive by any stretch of the imagination, but you could tell he didn’t care. He was used to being able to buy whatever he wanted in life, and in his mind, he’d just bought one of the most notorious stars in the porn business as his newest business partner.
My open interview was really strange. I didn’t wear Sabine’s traditional masked attire. To the layman I just looked like your average thirty something. The casting directors nearly laughed me out of the room but Kevin still motioned me into his private office. In my best thick German accent, I told them I was ready to make a comeback as all their jaws dropped to the floor. I could see the dollar signs in his eyes when I told him I would be willing to perform on camera without the mask for the right amount of money. A publicity stunt that would surely take their company to the next level. A year of hype, and the world of porn would finally get something they’d been craving for the last twenty years, Sabine unmasked.
I couldn’t help but wonder if he was imagining how much money they’d make from a snuff video of Sabine, but I needed to feign my innocence or else I’d blow my cover. I showed him how flawlessly I could switch from my German to a typical American accent which should’ve been a dead giveaway, but he bought it.
From that day forward, I would be known by day to everyone in the company as just some random investor, some savvy business woman. Lyndsay Smith, plain and simple. We’d leak some Sabine Steele stuff to the general public for the next year, tease it out, build up the subscriber base and get people talking. Hopefully by then I’d have all the information I needed to get this operation shut down. The idea of actually pulling the trigger and making a porn, even if it technically wasn’t me was way outside my comfort zone. Obviously I’d do it for the mission. I just h
oped it wouldn’t get that far.
That and the fact that a year of pretending like I could stomach Kevin was going to present a new set of challenges. I knew I was a potential cash cow, but for some reason he took to me like he wanted me to be his girlfriend or something. I lost count of the amount of times he ‘accidentally’ grazed my knee and the way he’d opened the door of the convertible and helped me in, standing there leering at me
I didn’t know how to break it to him that it was never going to happen. Technically, biologically speaking, I was old enough to be his mother. Technically, it was taking everything in me not to use my krav maga training to keep his fingers from ever ‘accidentally’ touching any of my body parts ever again.
I had to play nice.
So I was. Fortunately between the loud gangster rap blaring from the radio and the sound of traffic whooshing by, there was hardly any space to speak, except at red lights. Where we were now, there weren’t any red lights, just miles and miles of country roads, the smell of fresh air mingled with farm animals but it wasn’t exactly displeasant. I counted cows. I did my best not to fuck with my wire. It wasn’t going to pick up anything good anyway. Not until we got to our final destination.
The newest studio wasn’t even on the map. He told me it was more descreet. Actresses could live there if they wanted to. Celebrities could show up and nobody would bother them. I was getting more of a vibe of ‘nobody could hear you scream,’ the further down the road we drove.
“Almost there, sweetie,” he said, and I could’ve sworn he was blushing. Maybe this was all in haste. This pimple faced brat could barely talk to a woman, let alone run a porn empire. Let alone run a snuff production company. I would be surprised if he still didn’t live in his mother’s basement.
“Only one set of neighbors for fifty acres,” he said, slowing down as we passed what looked like some sort of garbage truck facility. He slowed to nearly a stop. It was surrounded by a chain link fence that went damn near up to the sky, a gate at the entry way guarded by two guys in hoodies who were sucking down cigarettes. I wondered what they were protecting. The only thing I could see was garbage trucks. Was it really that easy to steal one of those? “They really aren’t the type to worry about what we’re up to.”
“You know them?” I asked.
“Not yet. Maybe later we’ll stop by and introduce ourselves.” He continued down the road a little ways to a pathway not much wider than the car and turned in. I didn’t know what to expect. Construction vehicles lined the sides of the pathway. It was noisy as hell, and everywhere I looked there were people in hard hats working. Trees were being cut down, trenches were being dug, and about a quarter mile down the road, I caught sight of the mansion being constructed. You’d think this kid was the son of Hugh Heffner by the sheer enormity of the place. It looked like something you’d see on MTV Cribs back in the 90s. Oversized. Trashy. Fake. Hopefully in less than a year it’d be abandoned and full of feral cats.
“Wow,” I said as he parked in front of the giant mansion. “This had to have taken forever.”
“Babe, when you have the kind of money I do, things happen pretty fast. We haven’t had a chance to get an interior decorator in yet, but maybe you could help.” I’d lived on military bases and in hotels for the last fifteen years of my life. Interior design was the furthest thing from my realm of expertise, but I realized he was trying to impress me. He was trying to make me feel comfortable.
He opened the car door for me once again, and reached for my hand, gazing at me like I was his bride and he was going to carry me across the threshold. I smiled politely and walked toward the front door. “Give me the grand tour.”
The kitchen was gigantic, all the appliances still with their tags and plastic wrappers on them. The marble countertops probably costed more than my entire net worth. There was seating for at least fifteen people, and I imagined sitting in the breakfast nook with my fellow porn stars enjoying my morning coffee. I wondered if they naturally woke up looking pretty and sexy or if they liked to slub around in their bathrobes for a few hours like I did.
The furniture was sparse, but every room had a giant TV hanging on the wall. He made no effort to hide the cameras hanging from the ceiling in every room, which made me feel slightly relieved. On our way up the steps, he showed me a secret door in the wall.
“No cameras in here,” he said. “If you plan on using any party favors, make sure you go in here. The rest of the house aside from the bedrooms and upstairs bathrooms are being filmed 24/7. We’re going to make a killing in subscribers.”
Fucking great. I was moving into this guy’s crappy attempt at emulating the Playboy Mansion and I was going to be on camera nonstop for horn dogs all around the world to see.
“I don’t plan on participating in any of that, just so you know,” I barked in my fake accent. “Sabine only comes around for special occasions. Sabine doesn’t show up anywhere unless she’s making six figures.”
“Understood,” he said. “It will be better for me anyway if I have you undercover here keeping the girls in line anyway. Reporting back to me if they’re doing anything that might get us in trouble.”
I was glad we were on the same page. I didn’t really care for the mask that Sabine had to wear. It was hard to see and harder to breathe, but mostly, it was completely dehumanizing. When that mask was on, I was literally just a body to be ogled.
We walked up the stairs and he showed me to my bedroom.
“This is where you’ll be staying. Of course, if you get lonely, my room is right over there,” he said with a cocky grin, pointing to the door painted red down at the end of the hall. “I have a jacuzzi in there. Alaskan king size bed, too.”
I tried not to throw up in my mouth.
My bedroom was surprisingly really nice. I expected it to be some creepy fuck dungeon, but instead it was the kind of room I’d imagine some fancy old lady living in. The queen sized bed was fitted with a comforter printed in off white calla lilies and the long drapes covering the floor to ceiling windows were the same shade of off white. There was a beautiful vanity set up in the corner, and the hardwood floor was covered in a fuzzy black throw rug that I was sure would feel like heaven in between my toes when I woke up in the morning. I never would’ve picked this decorum for myself, but Sabine probably would’ve.
“This is really nice. Thank you Kevin,” I said. I wheeled my suitcase to the bed. I tossed it up there and started unpacking. I figured he’d get the picture and leave. Kevin wasn’t much for getting the picture, though.
“I kind of assumed you’d dress a little… sexier?” he half asked as I pulled out some blazers and blouses, smoothing them flat.
“I am here to help with the business, Kevin. My ‘sexier’ stuff doesn’t come out unless Sabine does.”
“Even if it’s just you and I hanging out?”
Especially if it’s just you and I hanging out, I wanted to yell.
“I’m very flattered by your attraction to me, Kevin, but I am here on a professional level. I’m sure you’ve worked with plenty of talented women who were very different in their personal life than they were on camera.” I was trying to find a polite way to say ‘not a snowball’s chance in hell’ but I still needed to keep him close. I still needed to maintain some level of charm. I wanted him to let me in on all the deep dark secrets of Femme Fatale Inc. I needed him to trust me. Still, I needed him to keep his grimy hands as far away as possible from me.
He looked like I’d just slapped him in the face.
“Come here,” I said, patting the bed, motioning for him to sit down next to me. His pout turned into a wide smile, and I realized I was dealing with a child in a man’s body. “I’m sorry if I’m cold, Kevin. I take a little while to warm up to new people. I’m sure you understand where I’m coming from.”
It was obvious from his glazed over eyes, he did not. “Look in the closet,” he urged.
I opened the closet door and it looked like a strip club threw up in
there. There was probably not one shred of clothing in the whole damn thing that I could’ve worn out in public without getting an indecent exposure charge. I thumbed through the racks of clothes, laughing my ass off at how impractical this stuff was. Who needed a dress with only the nipples cut out on it?
“Once we start filming, I’m sure we’ll put all this to good use. You have very good taste.” I was straight up lying through my teeth.
“This is your dress code for around the house,” he said. “I’m sorry. I have to put my foot down about some things. If you’re going to be a representative of my business, I expect you to look a certain way.”
I let out a hearty laugh as I grabbed a handful of the skimpy fabric and tossed it over my shoulder. At the end of the day, I had the upper hand here. As much as I wanted to gain his trust, I also had to exercise my power. If he wanted Sabine to make her comeback with his company, he needed to know I wasn’t going to be walked on.
I slid my blouses onto the hangers defiantly, staring him down the entire time. “That’s not how things are going to go around here, Kevin. You put your foot down all you want. I’ll walk. Easy as that. I don’t know how to make this any clearer. I’m not here for your pleasure. I’m not here for you to treat like a whore. I’m here because together we’re going to make a fuck load of money. You don’t think I can take my business elsewhere? Do you know who the fuck you’re dealing with, child?”
It was a calculated risk. I hung up my blazers as he stood there watching in fascination. It was obvious he wasn’t used to hearing people tell him no.
“Fine,” he finally conceded after I hung up the last of my clothes. “But when we’re out in public together, don’t even think about pulling that attitude.”
“Don’t give me a reason to,” I said with a demure smile.
He shook his head and walked to the door. I was tired from a day of traveling. Looking forward to flopping down on that big comfy bed and taking a little nap. Really looking forward to busting out my equipment and making sure this room wasn’t bugged or covered in secret cameras. I had insisted in my contract, but I wouldn’t put it past this slime bag.