by Hadley Knox
“Correction to my earlier statement,” he said with a smile. “You have a really lovely home.”
“Thank you,” I said. “Would you like something to drink?”
“Do you have water?” he asked.
“Sure,” I nodded. I grabbed one from the refrigerator and fixed myself a glass of sweet tea.
“So can I ask you something?” he said as I returned to the table.
“Shoot.”
“You acted like you need the money real bad,” he said. “But looking at your home now, you don’t seem to be hurting in the financial department.”
“Well, my ownership of this home is the reason that I called you,” I said. “I should be honest with you about my reasoning.”
I took a deep breath and told him the story of Frank’s abrupt departure and the impersonal divorce proceedings. I told him about my children, the school that they attended, and the need for them to finish their education there.
“Wow,” he said when she was finished. “There’s more to you than I originally thought.”
“Yes,” was all I could think to say. “I really need to bring in some extra income to keep up with my house payment and related bills.”
“At twenty percent, you should definitely be able to earn a good chunk towards that,” he said.
“So how do we do this?” I asked.
“I was thinking about the details on the way over,” he said. “I’m thinking that we need to get a new cell phone for you that you use exclusively for this business. We get new cards and new ads printed up with that phone number on it. That way they call you and you take care of the scheduling.”
“How will I know when you can work?”
“I guess I could give you my availability in advance and those are the times you are free to book me for,” he said. “I don’t really need much vacation, but I like to have a night or two off once a week.”
So I set up the blocks for appointments on the schedule,” I said, half to myself. “What about travel time.”
“You can figure that into the schedule,” he said. “Just get their addresses. That’s the main reason I need you.”
“Okay,” I said. “This is much simpler than I thought it would be.”
“It really isn’t that bad,” he said. “You seem to have innate organization skills, so I don’t think this will be a problem.”
“So what about payment?”
“I deal in cash only,” Greg said as he took a gulp from the bottled water. “I collect from them before the session. I will pay you your share the next time I see you following the visit. In fact, I could set up a daily visit in the mornings and drop off your portion. You will be able to track the amount I should be collecting from the schedule that way you know that I’m not scamming you.” He grinned at the last statement.
So this was an arrangement that would make it so we were seeing each other every day. I could still feel electricity when he was around me, and now I was going to put myself near him on a very regular basis. I knew that somehow that would spell disaster.
“Okay,” I finally nodded. “So what do you think we can earn with this venture?”
“If I continue make what I’ve been bringing in, then your cut would be about thirty thousand a year. Does that sound okay?”
“That’s great,” I said.
Another thought occurred to me. What if I had multiple men that worked for me? Could business do so well that I could afford to manage the schedules for more than one man? If I could make thirty thousand managing Greg’s business, what if I had could have several other men working for me? Then I could begin to double or triple what I was bringing in?
I thought immediately of Derrick and Ben. Both young men were good looking and in need of money. One of them, I had even had sex with and I could testify that he was indeed worth paying for. How would Greg react to the idea? There was only one way to find out.
“Okay, let me ask you something,” I said. “What do you think about expanding?”
“We just had our first meeting,” he said. “Do you think now is the time to start expanding?”
“We’re just getting off the ground,” I said. “What if I knew a couple of other guys that we could bring in?”
“It’s not a bad idea,” he shrugged. “It would help to make your income greater, but it would mean more work for you.”
“I could handle it,” I said. “But are you afraid that it might cut into your income if you have other escorts that people are calling for.”
“Not really,” Greg smiled. “I have quite an extensive list of regulars that make up a good portion of my sessions. I don’t have too many new customers, but when I do, most of them become regulars.”
I laughed. “So you’re that confident, huh?”
“I have quite a bit of experience,” he said with a wink.
“Whatever,” I waved him off. “I’ll get in contact with a few more guys, and maybe we can set up another meeting. They will be new to the business, so they might need your help a little in the beginning.”
“I won’t mind at all,” he said. “Just let me know.”
“So I guess that’s it,” I said.
“There’s one more order of business that I would like to attend to,” he said.
“What’s that?”
“Come here,” he commanded.
“Greg,” I sighed. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. If we’re going to have a professional relationship, we can’t mix it with sex.”
He started undoing the buckle of his pants without getting up. “Are you saying you don’t want to?”
“Of course I want to.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
“No.”
“What if we do it just one more time?”
He raised his butt off the chair slightly, and slid his jeans down his thighs and past his knees. I got a full view of him sitting there in the chair, completely naked with his body letting me know that he was ready.
How could I resist that? He was so handsome, so irresistible, and he was without pants in my kitchen. I stood up and walked over to him.
At first, he was gentle. He reached both arms around my waist and lifted my shirt. He kissed along my stomach, both hands rubbing my sides, rotating lower and lower until they reached the elastic band of my shorts.
In one fluid motion, he dropped his hands, taking my shorts with them. I giggled softly as I stepped out of the shorts, which had fallen to the ground.
He patted his thighs and I complied by sitting exactly where he indicated.
Chapter Ten
Once Greg left, I could finally get some real work done. I went back to my laptop where I created a few folders to manage revenue, appointments, and return clients when we were able to collect their information. Based on what Greg had said, many of the clients required anonymity, which was something I could definitely sympathize with.
I found a program in which I could create a calendar and I went about setting up a color code system, in hopes that my little plan of including additional people would work. I assigned the color blue to Greg, since that matched his eyes.
I was adept with my word processing and database skills, so none of those tasks took me very long. Once I had finished setting up the calendar, I stood up and walked into the kitchen to prepare some lunch.
My cell phone rang.
My heart stopped for a moment, but then I realized that the mysterious caller had always called the house phone. I assumed it was only a matter of time before the prick had my cell phone too. Part of me didn’t want to answer that phone, much less look at who was calling, but then I decided that I probably should just go ahead. My stalker seemed persistent and ignoring his calls probably wouldn’t do a bit of good.
I didn’t recognize the number and it was an out of town area code. At least the caller didn’t block their number from showing up – that was a good sign.
Picking up my phone, I hit the talk button and greeted the caller
on the other line.
“Lana,” I heard someone say. It took me a moment to realize that it was Jeremy.
“Hey there,” I said, trying my best to make sure my voice was quivering.
“I just wanted to call and see if you wanted to have dinner with me tomorrow night.”
“I would love to,” I said quickly. I needed a little normal in my life right then.
“Great,” he said. “Should I pick you up at around seven?”
“That sounds lovely,” I said.
“Great, I’ll see you then.”
“Okay,” I said. “Have a nice day.”
He didn’t hear that last part, because he had already hung up the phone. I imagined that he was busy and prolonged farewells only consumed too much of his already packed schedule.
Whatever, I said to myself as I set the cell phone on the counter. I wasn’t really a big fan of farewells either. In fact, I hated small talk altogether.
My least favorite expression was the ‘how are you today’. Never, in the history of mankind, had there ever been a more impersonal, worthless expression. The way I saw it, if anyone cared enough to worry about someone’s well-being they would not use that expression. Instead, those words were reserved for those people that the speaker didn’t particularly care about enough.
One of these days, when some acquaintance wasted my time and asked me that question, I was going to unload on them. “My husband left me two years,” I would say. “He then made me sign my divorce papers by myself with no explanation for why our marriage was ending. He left me with an overpriced house, two children to raise, and a job that paid next to nothing. If that wasn’t enough, I was a control freak prude who wouldn’t let a man anywhere near me, but one night I decided to change that and in a span of less than twenty-four hours, I had sex six times with two different people.”
I actually laughed out loud at that. I could just see the other person running in terror. They would have had no idea that their pointless little question would have elicited such tragedy.
The rest of that afternoon, I spent preparing for the impending business venture that I had just signed myself up for.
My first stop was the cell phone store. I decided to go with a different phone carrier altogether to purchase my second phone. All precautions must be observed, I thought to myself as I started filling out the form on the clipboard. The first blank asked for my name. There was no way I was putting “Lana Ford” on that form. I could not risk having this traced back to me, or my children.
The only name I could think of that, still had a slight degree of honesty, was my middle and maiden name. I used those two to construct a whole new name altogether. It would take someone a lot of work to connect “Clare Crane” to me. When I spoke with the cell phone representative, it took a little coaxing to get him to bypass his rules regarding identification. Luckily, my middle name was on my license and he took my word for it on the last name.
After that, I decided that I needed a few new outfits. I couldn’t keep parading around in jeans that fit like I was a grandmother, and shirts that I had owned since the children were babies. After three department stores, and more than a dozen personal fashion shows in front of the changing room mirror, I had finally chosen six complete new outfits. I considered myself shopping savvy, so deals and sales abounded on my receipt, but I still hated to spend the money while I was in crunch time. For every dollar I spent, it put the kids and me just a little closer to living on the streets.
However, I told myself, a new outfit was part of my new business venture. I didn’t have the foggiest clue what was the practical purpose of me looking good, but something told me that I couldn’t let Greg have a pimp that looked like someone’s older aunt who had a lot of cats.
I chuckled, but then I stopped, realizing that I hated the word ‘pimp.’ The visuals that the word brought up didn’t look anything like me, nor did it reflect anything about why or how I was getting into this business. I just couldn’t go around calling myself that, even though the word perfectly described what I was doing.
A new name was required. There wasn’t much to work with, and I wasn’t very familiar with the profession in the first place. The only word I could think of was madam. I only knew about that term from the movies, but from what I had gathered, the title was assigned to a woman who operated a brothel. It didn’t really fit me at the moment, since I didn’t really own and run a brothel, nor did I have enough people working for me to consider myself anything other than a lonely, single woman doing whatever she could to make money.
I decided right then and there, on the way home from buying some new outfits, that I would be called a madam. That’s exactly what I would be. At least in my mind, the term brought some degree of sophistication and professionalism.
What I really needed was some more girl time. With everything that had happened, it was time to tell the girls about my new venture. They would be honest, and at the very least, I could trust them not to blab their mouths about what I was planning. I fired off a quick text with the time and location for our proposed meeting, and quickly got affirmative responses from them that they would be there.
I loved Pearl and Betsy dearly. They could always be counted on to come through, even if all that was needed was a simple dinner and conversation.
By now, the phone had activated, so I called Greg using the new number. He was happy that I had gotten so far in setting up our new business.
Before going home, I stopped at the office supply store and had a thousand business cards printed up for Greg with the new cell phone number on them. I got a few scant looks from the frumpy, middle-aged woman who was handling my work order, but I didn’t really care. I had too much to do to be bothered with her silent judgment.
My new phone rang. My heart started beating fast, wondering if it was already a client. I wasn’t in front of my schedule, so it would be hard to book Greg at the moment.
When I looked down at the caller id, I saw Greg’s number flashing.
“Hey,” I said as I answered the phone.
“Hey there,” he said. “I figured I should start using your super-secret line now that you have it.”
“You can call me on either phone,” I said and immediately regretted it. He was right; it would be best if he just used the new cell number, because even though she had slept with him and liked him a lot, he was still a part of her secret life.
“I just wanted to let you know that I changed the number on my online ads, so you may start getting calls,” he said. “I’ve e-mailed you my available times, so feel free to fill it up.”
“Got it,” I said. “I have decided something that I needed to tell you.”
“Okay,” he said apprehensively.
“It’s not that major of a deal, but I have decided that I don’t like the term pimp. From now I want to be referred to as a madam.”
He didn’t stop laughing for an annoying minute. I stared ahead at the road, holding the phone a short distance from my ear while he finished further embarrassing me.
“What’s wrong with that?” I asked when he finished laughing.
“Nothing’s wrong with it,” he said. “It’s just funny that you’re so uptight that you’ve spent energy worrying about your job title.”
“It’s important.”
“No, what’s important will be the money that we start raking in.”
“I meant to ask you earlier. Do you want to keep your normal hourly rate, or should we increase that.”
“Two hundred dollars an hour is a lot,” Greg said. “Do you think that people will pay more?”
“For what I had last night? Sure.”
“Was it that good?”
“You know it was.”
“What about this morning?”
“Nothing happened this morning.”
“That’s not what I remember.”
“Look Greg,” I said. “That was great, too, but you have to be strong. You and I cannot be anything more th
an friends while we are working together, and I mean it. I enjoyed being with you in that way, but once I start booking your appointments and sending you off to spend nights with other women, there is no way that I will be able to handle dating you.”
“Who said anything about dating?”
“Me,” I said. “I may be discovering this new side of me and all that crap, but that still doesn’t mean I don’t have dreams of finding another man that I can settle down with. I have my kids to focus on and this new business. Worrying about a boyfriend who sleeps with one or two women a night is not something I need on my plate right now.”
He was silent for a moment and I worried that I had jeopardized our business. “You’re right and I’m sorry. I’ll do my best to keep our new relationship professional.”
“Thank you,”
“Any leads on some new men to add to the business?” he asked.
“I’ve got a few in mind, but I want to take that part slow. I just got the calendar set up for you and I don’t even know how that’s going to work, so I want to make sure that I can handle more.”
“Smart move,” he said. “We should probably get together on a regular basis to go over business stuff. I can’t tonight because I put on the calendar that I’m available for clients, but I’m available tomorrow night. Want to get some dinner?”
I almost accepted his offer, but then realized that I had just made plans earlier that morning. “I’m sorry, Greg, but I can’t.”
“Why, you got a hot date?” I could tell by the tone in his voice that he was just kidding. But what he didn’t realize was that he was spot on.
I guess he assumed the answer by my silence.
“So you do?”
“Yes,” I said. “It was a guy I met at work a few days ago before I met you. He wants to take me out to dinner, and he finally called me this morning to schedule.”
“I have to be honest. I’m a little jealous.”
“I can’t control how you feel, Greg, but you have to understand that if we’re going to be platonic friends, I might date other men. Just like I can’t get jealous of you seeing clients.”