Tramp (Hush Book 1)

by Mary Elizabeth

  The last receptionist, Camilla, didn’t last long, I see. Inez has a hard time keeping receptionists in the dark or behind the desk, but I think this may have been record time. Camilla was too timid, too wild-eyed and abashed by the beauty that walks in and out of here all day. I noticed the way she marveled at me anytime I visited the spa. Golden eyes would scan my entire body, and her complexion would deepen. I also saw the way someone like Naomi made her shrink into herself.

  How Camilla reminded Inez of me at all is beyond me.

  “Excuse me,” the new girl calls after me as I walk by. “You can’t just go back there.”

  Knocking twice on Inez’s door, I give the receptionist a look that stops her in her tracks. Determination cowers into trepidation, and she wisely returns to her post behind the desk to answer phones or do whatever-the-fuck it is she does here. That’ll be the last time she tells me what I can and can’t do.

  “My girl, you’re here.” Inez welcomes me with outstretched arms. She comes to me as I’m dropping my purse in a chair, holding my face in her hands. Inez kisses each one of my cheeks. “It’s been too long, Lydia.”

  “It’s been a week,” I remind her.

  “We really should get together more often. Why don’t we eat dinner somewhere? Or you can come to my place and I’ll cook you a meal.” Inez sits in front of me on the edge of her desk. She’s dressed in a navy-blue suit that sets her red hair on fire today.

  Retrieving the envelope with Inez’s cut from my earnings this week, I ignore the dinner invitation like I’ve ignored all invitations for dinner I’ve received lately. The grimy, inky-cotton sent of cash disappears once she takes the envelope and places it behind her on the desk. There’s no need to count it. Inez knows it’s all there.

  “Fine. No dinner then,” Inez says with a shake of her head. She knew when she asked that I’d refuse. “There have been quite a few calls for you this week. You’re booking out six weeks, and I don’t think we should go out farther than that. Can you double up a couple of days a month? Would you mind that? You’re such a popular girl and the only one who works like this.”

  “I’m not doubling my days, Inez,” I say with an air of finality.

  Inez hands me a sheet of thick paper with the names of potential clients listed, complete with a short description of each. There’s a doctor, a pilot, and a few men in finance. A lawyer named Talent Ridge isn’t listed, and I don’t admit to Inez that he’s interested. The disaster that happened at Ridge & Sons hasn’t come up again since I told her coffee with the younger Ridge son went well. I’d like to leave it that way.

  “How many of them check out?” I ask. By this I mean, how many of them qualify to be on my books.

  “All but two. The doctor has terrible credit, and one of the finance managers has been arrested for solicitation of a prostitute. The idiot will never get a chance with any of my girls for being a dirty liar.” Her eyes meet mine. “These arrangements don’t work without honesty.”

  Omitting information about Talent isn’t lying. Everything I’ve told her about my interaction with him is all true—the coffee date was a success and we agreed the night in his office was a mutual misunderstanding. She doesn’t need to know that he kissed me, or that he’s texted me almost every night since then. He’s not paying me, and I’m not sleeping with him. Inez has no place in this equation.

  I’m allowed a personal life.

  Passing the list back, I say, “Put them on my schedule. If they can’t wait, you can fit them with someone else.”

  Inez pinches the bridge of her nose. “Must we continue to have this discussion every week, Lydia? These men want the arrangement only you offer. You make double what my other girls make an hour, but they take home more on a weekly basis because of your refusal to take more than one appointment—”

  “I said no.” Unwavering, I match her frustration and lift my chin in defiance. “These men kiss me, touch me, fuck me six days a week. I get one day off to brace myself for it to happen again for another six days and another six days and another six days. One client a day is all I can stomach, Inez. Twenty-four hours isn’t long enough to recover from more than that. If they can’t wait for me, find another girl to do it.”

  Inez’s defensive posture melts, and her expression softens with compassion. It’s not very often I confide in her my struggle. It’s not very often I admit that I do struggle. My heart turned to stone along my journey from a child watching her mother dance for money to now, but I am human.

  Normalcy isn’t a concept I come face-to-face with on a regular basis, but I felt like a fraud sitting in that coffee shop with Talent. It was harder for me to act like I belonged there than it is for me to stare at a man’s cock and pretend I want it. Fitting in among people my own age to drink coffee took more out of me than letting a stranger inside of my body.

  This life has me fucked-up.

  I’m simply great at hiding it.

  “You’re right,” Inez admits. She presses her lips to the top of my head and walks around her desk. “I shouldn’t push you.”

  “Thank you.” I chew on the words. What a terrible thing to be thankful for.

  “Did you notice we have a new receptionist?” She takes a seat and crosses her legs. I don’t answer, afraid a scream will escape before my response. “Camilla was more aware than I gave her credit for. She caught on in record time, don’t you think?”

  I wait to hear if she fired or hired her.

  “She wants in,” Inez says. She leans her head back against the chair, looking up at the ceiling. “I’m hesitant, and I’ll tell you why. Camilla’s not like us, Lydia. She didn’t grow up without opportunity. You and I made the most out of the lives we were given, but something happened that led her away from a mostly normal upbringing.”

  “What do you know?” I speak, confident that looming hysteria has calmed for now. “Drunk dad? Abusive mother? Did her uncle lead her into a room with candy? Our stories are mostly the same.”

  “All she said is that she doesn’t have anywhere else to go.”

  “Give her a job. She’ll either tough it out or run home where she belongs.”

  “The thing is…”

  Filling my lungs with oxygen, I exhale and ask, “Didn’t you just say you weren’t going to push me, Inez?”

  Holding her hands up in surrender, Inez asks me to hear her out. “Camilla has the potential to be special like you. Be her mentor, Lydia. Teach her how you’ve done it for so long successfully. I’d like her to pick up where you leave off.”

  “At her age, if Camilla needs the birds and the bees talk, she needs a therapist, not a mentor to teach her how to be a whore.”

  Inez scoffs. “I hate it when you talk like that.”

  “Dress it up however you like, Inez, but that’s what we are. Even you. I have no interest in teaching some lost girl how to sell her body. If she comes from a decent home like you claim she does, send her back. That’s the humane thing to do.”

  “Do you think I’m a monster?”

  “Of course not,” I whisper. “I think you’re a queen. You know that.”

  “The girl made it clear she’s not interested in returning home. She’ll do this with or without our guidance, Lydia. We both know what will happen to her on the streets alone—we’ve been there and it’s not pretty. Camilla’s safer under our influence. With your busy schedule and her willingness to learn the ropes, with enough experience she can service clients in the same manner as you do. We can kill two birds with one stone.”

  The decision’s made, so there’s no point in wasting my breath to argue. Displeasure roars from the hardness in my eyes and the set of my straight shoulders. I lock down like window shutters before a hurricane, boarded up and nailed. Inez can stress her point until she’s blue in the face, but I won’t speak another word about Camilla until I’m expected to show her how to sell her virtue.

  “For heaven’s sake, Lydia. I recognize that look on your face.” Inez rolls her eyes and
sits forward in her seat. “Before you completely shut me out, there’s one more thing I need to run by you. Camilla needs a place to stay, and you have an extra bedroom—”

  I take it back. I won’t listen until Inez turns blue, because if I do, chances are I’ll choke the life out of her before she has the opportunity to say another word.

  “Think about it,” she calls out before I walk out. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  Sitting on my bed with my legs crossed, I chew on my thumbnail, awaiting the arrival of my nightly text message from Talent. I’ve checked the status of the phone numerous times to make sure the minutes and text allowance are reupped. How often have I scrolled through his previous messages to make sure I didn’t miss one? Anticipation runs wild while I wait to see what he’ll say next, hoping it’s something good. The realist in me is certain that Talent wouldn’t be caught dead with me and this is just a game to him.

  I go back and forth between throwing the phone to the other side of the bed and keeping it right in front of me to see the message the instant it’s received.

  Dog’s happy to be allowed on the bed, and he sits beside me patiently.

  It arrives like clockwork. I lift the phone and open the message in a single breath, not releasing it until I’ve read it.

  When can I see you again?

  Falling back against my pillows, I stare at the tiny screen until the message blurs and the power save kicks in and the light dims. How long will he continue to send messages without a reply? For the last week, his one-sentence notes have given me something to look forward to while the time with clients gets harder and harder to stomach. This is leading nowhere, but I take joy where I can get it.

  “What do you think, Dog?” I ask my bedmate. “Should I call him?”

  Dog doesn’t give a shit, and I take his disinterest as a good sign. Clearly, if this were a bad decision, he’d save me from danger. That’s what domesticated pets do on TV. Which is the kind of loyalty I expect from Dog until I find his owner.

  I press call on the only number I have left programmed in the phone and listen to it ring once, twice, three times. My heart can’t take the suspense, and I motion to hang up before my bed swallows me whole when I hear his voice.

  “I was going to answer on the first ring, but I couldn’t handle it if I answered and you hung up because you called by mistake. The second ring could still be an accident, but I knew by the third ring this was the real deal.”

  “You are so weird,” I say with a small laugh.

  “Where are you?” Talent asks. His voice is cool and easy like a summer’s breeze. “Let’s go for a drive.”

  “Is that code for sex in your car?” I ask, burying disappointment under strained indifference. Of course, he wants to have sex with me again—that’s literally what I’m here for. I’m used to a more direct invitation.

  He chuckles. “You have so much to learn.”

  Covering my face in the palm of my hand, I ask, “Why do you keep messaging me, Talent? If you want to sleep with me again, all you have to do is ask. We don’t have to keep going in circles. You don’t have to kiss me or send me texts every night.”

  “I like kissing you,” he says. The edge in his tone doesn’t go unnoticed. Worry seeps from a small crack in my heart because I don’t want to scare him away, but I don’t know how to talk to him either. “And I won’t insult you by pretending I don’t want you again, but it’s probably not in the sense you’re used to.”

  “I can do it in every way, Talent. I’m flexible.”

  Falling into character as Cara is second nature; she’s a part of who I am. But the two sides of me don’t coincide like they usually do. I don’t fit into Cara like I did a month ago. She’s tight around my throat, my wrists, my pussy, like experience at how the bright side of society lives has made me a little taller.

  He clears his throat and asks, “Do you want to meet me for a drink? There’s a bar outside the city where we can avoid running into anyone we might know.”

  As someone who lives her entire life out of the public eye, I shouldn’t be offended that Talent doesn’t want to be spotted with me. Not a single person in my life outside of Inez wants to be seen with me in public because I’m a filthy secret best kept behind closed doors. When I was a child, I hid in the dressing room while my mom took her clothes off on stage. As a teenager, truckers and travelers stuck me in the back seat so no one saw the underage girl they picked up between stops. Now as an adult, I don’t leave my apartment because men more powerful than me have too much to lose.

  “Can you send me the address?” I ask.

  “I can pick you up,” Talent offers.

  “Send me the address.” I hang up the phone and jump out of bed.

  I’m setting myself up for disappointment, but if this is leading nowhere, I may as well get a drink out of it.

  An hour later, I arrive at the bar Talent recommended and pay the cab driver. I expected neon wall advertisements and dollar bills stapled to the ceilings. Those are the kind of bars I grew up in … the kind of place you take a slut for a cheap drink.

  The scene I’m welcomed by is better lit and smells remarkably nicer than the bars I’m used to. Instead of cigarettes and sorrow, the scent of oak and spice invites me farther inside. Small, candlelit tables for two line the walls, and an empty stage with a single microphone is set up at the end. The barstools are upholstered with real leather and aren’t torn and sticky. As soon as I take a seat, a server places a cocktail napkin in front of me and asks for my order.

  “May I please have a vanilla old-fashioned?”

  The bartender returns with my drink and the bill. I sip my cocktail and smile when I see the cost. I’m definitely not at the type of bar Cricket partied in. This liquor is even better than the stuff Inez keeps in her office. Thanks to her, I know what a good drink is.

  “How do you keep showing up before I do?” Talent whispers in my ear from behind. He sweeps my hair away from my shoulder and places a small kiss to my exposed neck.

  “Punctuality is a strong suit,” I say. This is only half true. The whole truth is that the thought of walking into a room I’ve never visited unprepared terrifies me.

  Talent runs his hand down my arm, past my wrist, and over my palm to lace our fingers together. “Let’s grab a table in the back before this place fills up.”

  “How’s it going, Mr. Ridge?” the bartender asks. He dries a wine glass with a white towel.

  “Add her drink to my tab, Billy,” Talent replies, leading me away.

  “You don’t have to do that,” I say. “I can pay for my own drink.”

  “Shut the fuck up,” Talent replies, laughing. “You don’t have to be such a hardass with me.”

  Similar to when we were at the coffee shop, our table sits away from the hustle and bustle of the rest of the bar. It’s nearly nine o’clock at night, and ours is only one of three occupied tables. Talent didn’t hide his affection for me in front of the bartender, but he must not want the other six or seven customers to overhear our conversation. Whatever it may be about.

  “I don’t think we’re in danger of losing a table.” I take the seat he pulls out for me.

  “The band doesn’t start for another hour. Give it twenty minutes and there won’t be an empty seat in the house.” Talent sits across from me. He’s overdressed in slacks and a button-up, having loosened his tie. His shoes shine in the yellow-orange light above, and the watch on his wrist costs more than I make in a month. He nods toward my drink. “How is it?”

  “Fantastic,” I say, licking vanilla spice from my top lip.

  Right on cue, our server saunters over and asks for our drink request.

  “A bottle of Dalmore 25 and two glasses, please.” Talent doesn’t take his eyes off me as he orders.

  That twelve-hundred-dollar bottle of whisky puts my sixty-dollar cocktail to shame. My date is here to party and it shows.

  “Are you going to drink that entire bottle alone?” I ask,
sipping from my glass. Dark liquor coats my tongue and burns the back of my throat before warming my stomach. I’ve only drunk half of my old-fashioned and can already feel a steady pulse in my lips. With a morning appointment tomorrow, there’s no way I’m having more than two drinks before I call it a night and head back to my apartment.

  “I’m getting you drunk,” Talent admits. His lips curve into a mischievous smile. “It’ll either slow you down when you try to run away from me again or get you to stick around for a while.”

  Inhibition takes a hike with sobriety, and I don’t hate the idea of Talent chasing me around. I toss back the rest of my drink and shake my head as it goes down and answer honestly. “Can’t. I have to work tomorrow.”

  I didn’t notice that Talent and I gravitated toward each other from across the table until he withdraws, rubbing the back of his neck and looking away. He scoots his chair from the table to put more space between us and it’s a struggle not to grab him by the tie to bring him back. My cheeks blaze from embarrassment or from the hard liquor. Or from a little of both.

  “That upsets you?” I ask. I clink the ice around in my empty glass.

  Dark gray eyes find mine, nearly knocking me down with their severity. “I don’t know what it does to me, Lydia. This is new to me.”

  Heat prickles the palms of my hands, and uncertainty spicier than the bourbon overpowers any expectations I arrived with. The lingering taste of vanilla on my lips turns to silt and pride has me scoping out the nearest exit. Anxiety fastens on to my elbows and knees like bolts and screws, turning tighter and tighter as each second goes by.

  “What are you doing?” Talent asks. He moves his chair back to the table. “I recognize that look on your face. Don’t do that. Don’t leave. We just got here.”

  “You’re the second person today who’s said I have a look,” I say, surprised I had air in my lungs to speak. “I don’t have a look.”

  “The fuck you don’t.” Talent stops when our waitress arrives to deliver our bottle of whisky. She places one glass in front of me and the other in front of Talent. When she retreats, promising to be back to check on us soon, he continues, “The muscles in your jaw tighten and two little creases appear between your eyebrows.”