Tramp (Hush Book 1)

by Mary Elizabeth

  Hey, Talent. Are you up for a relationship with a slut—literally?

  If he agreed and we attempt to function as a normal couple, the implications if someone recognizes me and opens their mouth would be disastrous for us both. Or if we continue to casually fuck, when does that end? When he meets someone he loves? Someone he can live normally with? Lydia two months ago was cold enough to accept an arrangement like that, but I don’t think I have the heart now.

  What about me? Is Talent willing to entertain the idea of sharing his woman with six different men a week?

  How much longer do I have this life in me? I feel it slipping.

  “What do you think?” Camilla beams before me, doing a circle to give me a look at her hair from all sides. She runs her fingers through her ends and says, “I don’t think my hair has ever been this soft before. I can’t believe it’s mine.”

  The blonde highlights around her face deepened the warmth of her God-given hair color, and the tonal contrast is natural passing and stunning. She looks older, stands taller, and she’s well on her way to bring this city to its knees.

  “Looks good,” I say, offering a small smile.

  “Good?” She clicks her tongue, tousling her hair at the root. “Cara, I look more like you and less like me. Who knew a little color could change so much? Check out all this volume I have now.”

  Yael drives us from the hair salon to Hush for the next part of Camilla’s transformation. Inez isn’t in the office today, but her best esthetician is aware of our visit and is ready for us when we arrive. She leads us to a private room and hands Camilla a plush robe and a pair of slippers.

  “Please undress completely and cover yourself in this,” the esthetician requests in a calm manner. The room smells like eucalyptus and is lit in a warm orange glow. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  Camilla waits for the esthetician to excuse herself before she asks, “What’s going on?”

  “Waxing,” I say. I take a seat in the corner.

  She toes her shoes off one at a time. “What? Like, my eyebrows?”

  I nod.

  Pulling her shirt over her head, she mumbles, “I’ve never had my eyebrows waxed before. I wasn’t aware it’s something I need to be naked for. Must be a rich people thing.”

  I fight to keep the grin from my face, choosing to remain indifferent for as long as possible not to tip off the poor girl. She’s never had her brows waxed, and now she’s minutes away from sitting through her first Brazilian.

  To be fair, her brows will be waxed after her puss—

  “Knock, knock.” The esthetician cracks the door open to peek inside. Once she spots Camilla swathed in the robe, she enters entirely. “We met when you were our receptionist, but in case you forgot, I’m Jessica, the senior esthetician here at Hush. Inez has instructed me to take great care of you. As I’m sure Cara will attest to, I’m very gentle and will make this experience as pleasant as possible. Have you had a Brazilian wax before today?”

  Camilla looks past Jessica to me. Hesitantly, she says, “I don’t know what that is. I didn’t work here long enough to get the gist of everything.”

  “That’s totally okay and not uncommon,” Jessica says. “A Brazilian wax is the removal of hair between your upper thighs, all sides of your bikini area, and your backside. We can also remove the hair in front of your pubic bone, leaving you completely bare.”

  Crossing my legs and squeezing my thighs together, I relive the memory of my first intimate waxing session. Inez didn’t warn me about the pain either. Had she, I probably would’ve run from the room and taken my chances on the streets. All these years later, it’s not a pain I’m accustomed to and I don’t ever look forward to my own wax appointments.

  “Bare?” Camilla asks. She swallows hard, closing the robe tightly around her body. “I thought I was here for an eyebrow wax.”

  “Oh, we’ll get there, too. I find it easier to do the Brazilian first since it’s such a large space.” Jessica pats the padded table for Camilla to sit. “I use hard wax, which tends to hurt less than strip wax. After cleansing, we’ll start from the outside areas before moving toward the more sensitive parts. Now, all I need you to do is lie back and part your legs.”

  Pressing her palm to her chest, Camilla admits, “My heart is beating so fast. I’ve never done anything like this in my entire life.”

  Jessica smiles reassuringly. “It’ll be over before you know it, and you’ll be thankful you were brave enough to try it at least once.”

  Anxiety tickles the back of my throat, and the words sneak away before I can stop them. “Don’t do it if you don’t want to.”

  “What about you?” Camilla asks. She sits on the table but doesn’t lie back. “Is this something you do?”

  My voice is not to be trusted, so I nod and clench my teeth to cage any more unsolicited suggestion from leaving my lips. I’m disappointed in how fast my self-control is unraveling, but I’m past the point of reeling it back in undisturbed. The only thing I can do now is keep it from tangling.

  “Let’s do it. I’m sure it’ll be great.”

  I wonder if I should leave the room. Camilla wasn’t shy when undressing, but that doesn’t mean she’s ready for me to see her wide open while Jessica strips the hair from her most intimate places. But she surprises me again and lies back, hitching the robe around her waist. Jessica guides her knees apart and shows her how to position her feet so that she’ll have no issue getting everything with the wax.

  Camilla’s complexion warms, but I’m not sure if she’s shy or nervous. She covers her eyes in the bend of her elbow and bites her bottom lip. But she doesn’t make a single noise when Jessica spreads the wax along her bikini line and pulls it back in one swift motion.

  “How was that, sweetheart?” Jessica asks. She applies pressure to the area she just waxed.

  “I think my anxiety is worse than the pain,” she admits. She uncovers her eyes, shaking nervousness from her hands.

  “It’ll change your life. Being a woman is hard enough without worrying about razor burn.” Jessica pulls Camilla’s skin taut and smears more wax, working efficiently. Camilla’s checked out, doing her best impression of a dead person. “Did you see Inez when you were coming in, Cara?”

  Correcting my posture, I tilt my head in confusion and ask, “I thought she was out of the office today.”

  “She doesn’t normally come in on Sundays, but Naomi showed up and wouldn’t leave until Inez agreed to see her. It wasn’t pretty. You must have just missed her.”

  I check my phone to see if I have a missed call from Inez, but she hasn’t tried to contact me at all. In fact, I haven’t heard from her once today. I’m not delusional enough to assume Inez includes me in all comings and goings at Hush, but a disgruntled ex-employee who tricked me into sleeping with Talent Ridge seems like an issue I should be included in.

  “Did she make a scene?” I ask.

  Jessica rolls her eyes and scoffs, and it dawns on me that she knows. When did Inez tell her?

  “She was relatively calm until Inez showed up, and then she got loud. Inez was able to wrangle her into the office. We turned the music up to muffle out the sounds of their disagreement from clients. Not sure what it was about. We haven’t seen Naomi around here in weeks. If any of the clients noticed anything out of sorts, they didn’t bring it up. I just thought the entire thing was odd. I know Naomi was her personal assistant for a while, but we were under the impression that relationship went sour. Screaming at your ex-boss is no way to get your job back.”

  An hour later, Camilla and I are on our way to the grocery store. My mind whirls, wondering what caused Naomi to confront Inez after all this time. Hush is off-limits and exists for the sole purpose of laundering money for the escort service. Whatever Naomi’s up to, she knew she was crossing a major line causing a scene at the spa.

  Between Camilla’s Brazilian and eyebrow wax, I excused myself and called Inez to get answers. She didn’t pick up, so I
sent her a text. She hasn’t responded. I’m uneasy because it isn’t like her to keep me in the dark.

  “Tell me the truth, Cara. Don’t lie.” Camilla turns to face me. I look up from my phone. “Am I still really red?”

  That’s an understatement. She had her entire face waxed and now she resembles a tomato, but the arch in her eyebrows looks impeccable.

  “Your skin is irritated,” I say truthfully. “It’ll return to normal in a couple of hours. It’s not a big deal.”

  She sinks into her seat, patting her cheeks. “That’s easy for you to say, you still look like a damn goddess. I don’t want to walk around the grocery store looking like this. Everyone’s going to stare.”

  “Let them.”

  “My skin feels so weird,” she continues. “It’s not going to stay like this, right?”

  “You’re going to love it.”

  “Like the Brazilian?”

  “Yes,” I say. “Like the Brazilian.”

  Twice a month, I take a trip to the same grocery store across town. A market recently opened closer to my apartment, but for the sake of routine, I come here because it’s familiar. The items on my list rarely change, and I know my way around so well that I’m in and out in less than an hour.

  So how come I can’t find the fucking salad dressing?

  Sometime during the last two weeks, the powers that be decided to rearrange the entire grocery store and I’m mid-meltdown. The bread aisle is now the international food aisle, and the canned food aisle is now the soda and water aisle. They’ve relocated the alcohol to the other side of the store where the eggs used to be, and I haven’t made it far enough to discover where those are now.

  “We can split up to save time,” Camilla offers, taking pity on me. “Assign me a few items on your list and we’ll knock it out together.”

  “My list coincided with the layout of the store. None of it makes sense now. I have to relearn where everything is to adjust my list for next time. There’s no point in us both running around trying to find the damn Italian dressing.”

  Camilla has the decency to look understanding. “We can ask to speak to the manager.”

  Chuckling, I say, “Okay, Karen.”

  We find ourselves walking up and down every aisle more than once to find the items on the list. The problem with shopping this way is that we end up with a lot more in our cart than I anticipated. Couple that with the fact that we haven’t eaten all day, and we now own the cookie aisle I typically don’t get close to.

  “Do you like Nutella?” Camilla asks. She took it upon herself to cross items off our list as we find them on the shelves. She’s doing a great job of rearranging the order of the list for next time, and I’m grateful for her help.

  “I don’t eat shit like that.”

  “My mom never allowed sugar in the house when I was growing up,” she says with an edge to her tone, and I find myself listening intently. “No juice. No soda. No fun snacks of any kind. So, when I left, the very first thing I did was run to a convenience store to eat a candy bar. It wrecked my stomach, but it didn’t stop me from eating all the junk food I could get my hands on from South Carolina to here. Nutella is my favorite.”

  My image of Camilla’s life before she ended up behind the reception desk at Hush is unclear. But I get the idea that it wasn’t an easy existence and we may have more in common than I assumed.

  “I think I saw it over here,” I say, turning the cart around. “Do you want to get a jar?”

  We circle the cart around to the peanut butter aisle where I saw the hazelnut spread, and my stomach plummets when I see we’re not alone. Caught off guard, I nearly crash our cart into the shelf of strawberry jelly, and Camilla collides into the back of me.

  She smashes her nose into the back of my head and shouts, “Dammit.”

  Talent’s reading the ingredients on a box of brownies like they’re something to be health conscious of, but his eyes lift to mine and hold like magnets when he hears the commotion at the other end of the aisle from him.

  This is why I stick to the fucking list.

  “My nose is bleeding.” Camilla tilts her head back and pinches the bridge of her nose. “Your head is so hard.”

  “Shut up.” I try to turn the cart around, but one of the wheels is stuck straight. I abandon it, deciding it’s a good time to switch to the store close to the apartment. Pushing Camilla forward, I say, “Walk. Hurry the fuck up and walk. We have to go.”

  Blood streams from her nose over her lips. She lifts the hem of her shirt to wipe it away, hesitant to move her feet as I shove her out of the aisle.

  “Lydia,” Talent calls out to me. He walks quickly to close the distance between us. “Lydia, stop.”

  “Dammit, Camilla. It’s just a little blood. Move your fucking feet.” When shoving doesn’t work, I grab her hand and drag her toward the front of the store.

  “Blood makes me faint,” Camilla admits. The soles of her shoes squeak against the tile floor, screeching to a stop. She bends at the waist, holding her hands on her knees to keep upright. “I’m dizzy. I just need a minute. It’ll pass.”

  Talent didn’t return the box of brownies to the shelf. It’s still in his right hand as he approaches us, unsure if he should confront me or offer Camilla a helping hand. She’s a light shade of chalk white and makes red dot art on the floor in her blood.

  “Is she okay?” Talent asks. He motions to her with the brownies. “Should we get help? Does she need a doctor?”

  “No,” I say defensively, stepping between them. “We’re leaving.”

  “I’m dying,” Camilla groans. Her knees shake. “I can taste the blood in my mouth. It’s the worst.”

  Dropping my head back, I close my eyes and count to ten. I can always leave by myself, get into the SUV waiting outside, and order Yael to drive and not to stop until we reach the other side of the world, far away from this agony. Now is as good a time as any to start my life over.

  “Wild, grab a box of tissue for this girl before she passes out.” Talent places his hand on Camilla’s back, and it dawns on me that I should be offering comfort, not him. I’m a shit person.

  Wait.

  Wild? As in Wilder?

  Sure enough, Wilder Ridge, Talent’s older brother, approaches with his hands up in surrender, seemingly as afraid of the blood as Camilla is.

  Because, surely, this situation couldn’t improve at all.

  Wilder is a larger, lighter, stiffer version of Talent. Talent is tall and lean, with dark hair and natural swagger. Wilder Ridge is bulkier, with light brown hair and a straight posture that doesn’t waver under bloody, drippy stress. Sharing the same shaped nose and ears, the color of their eyes is nearly an identical shade of gray, with Talent’s a tinge darker while Wilder’s are sharp and speculative. He absorbs the scene—the bleeding girl, his concerned brother, and the brunette off to the side who doesn’t act like she wants any part in it.

  Wilder runs off for tissue, and I kind of, sort of want to run away, too. It’s not like Camilla would be left alone.

  “Talent, what are you doing here?” I ask, conceding. I push his hand off Camilla and take over, rubbing small circles like Cricket used to do to me when I was ill.

  “Didn’t you hear me calling your name?” he asks.

  “I don’t talk to strangers,” I reply.

  “Ouch.”

  Wilder returns with a pack of tissue and I work quick to get it open. I press a wad of it under Camilla’s nose and guide her upright. Dismissively, I ask whoever, “Can you get someone to clean this mess up?”

  “I think it’s slowing down,” Camilla mumbles under the tissue. She looks around, and her eyes widen when she sees the Ridge brothers. New to the city, even she’s aware of who they are.

  “Why don’t you go to the restroom and wash your hands. I’ll check out and we can go home,” I say.

  Still red from the facial wax, Camilla’s hands are streaked with blood, and her shirt is stained in it. She h
as the decency to look embarrassed in front of two of the most influential people in Grand Haven and quickly scurries off to clean up.

  Talent nods in her direction but doesn’t watch her go. He only has eyes for me, and I melt under his molten stare. The only thing that keeps my chest from caving in is the heavy beat of my heart. I feel it in the palms of my hands, in the bend of my elbows, and in my lips.

  “Is that a friend?” he asks.

  Wilder crosses his arms over his chest, giving nothing away. I slide my eyes to his and dare him to give me a piece of his mind. I’d chew him up and spit him out.

  “Lydia,” Talent says, bringing my attention back to him. “What’s going on?”

  “Excuse me,” I whisper. “I need to get my cart.”

  Wilder moves out of the way, but Talent runs his hand through his head of curly hair and exhales a large breath through his lips. “Can we talk?”

  Pushing past him, I say, “There’s nothing to talk about, Talent. I think we made that abundantly clear the last time we saw each other.”

  He follows me back to the peanut butter aisle. “My brother and I are going to grill some steaks at my place. Come over. Bring the bleeding girl.”

  I laugh out, yanking my cart away from the jelly shelf. “Give me a break. You don’t shop for yourself, and you don’t grill your own food. What the hell are you doing here?”

  Talent captures my elbow and pulls me against his body. I’m assaulted by his scent, his warmth, his power and magic. I close my eyes and inhale the reminder of a life that won’t ever be mine. It takes everything in me not to sink into his touch and fuck the rest.

  “I miss you,” he lowers his lips to my ear and whispers.

  “I miss you,” I admit. It’s a small release of pent-up longing, but it’s still hard to breathe.

  “I’ve tried to stay away, Lydia,” he says. His lips brush against my skin and chills crawl up my spine. “I’ve tried to get you out of my head. But I miss you.”

  Resting my forehead on his chest, I suck up as much of his presence as I can in the few precious seconds we have together, like recharging a battery. When I hear Camilla return and ask Wilder if he knows where I am, I step away from Talent’s embrace and harden myself again. As much as I miss him, it’s still not enough to change what I am and who he is.