by Marata Eros
I shake my head and hope he'll let it drop. I know he won't.
“I... I had an accident... about four years ago.”
“Bullshit.” His black eyes blaze into mine, his hand tightens, and a little whimper breaks the seal of my lips.
“Please.” I breathe through the pain.
His eyes flash to mine before he drops my hand.
It twitches between us. I won't be able to use it for a few minutes.
My eyes meet his.
“I know accidents,” Thorn says slowly. “This isn't no accident.”
I swallow, clearing my throat. “How do you know?” My voice is quiet inside the purring car, my body tense.
Our gazes lock.
“Because.” His hand gently lifts my palm as it spasms between us and runs a finger over the scar at the center. “I know knives.”
Of course he does.
~ 2 ~
I can feel myself begin to thaw toward Thorn as we sit there beside the curb in his purring Porsche.
The silence seems to bind us together as we commune over our differences- our sameness.
He hasn't coerced a confession out of me yet.
The man who forces lap dances on all the new girls and asks no questions. I am so sure I know exactly who he is, what motivates him, only to realize that I'm not the only one who is guarding secrets.
I startle when a street cop comes up to my window and give the glass a sharp tap with his knuckle.
A blue uniform and irritated eyes blare into mine.
Thorn raises his middle finger and pulls away.
I turn. My hand presses against the window as I watch the meter cop take down Thorn's plate number.
“That wasn't smart!” I laugh, whipping around and sinking back against the seat.
He laughs too. “No, it was stupid, but if felt fucking great.”
I nod. I understand great.
I mean, I did.
“Listen, sweet cheeks,” Thorn begins.
I glare at him again, and he chuckles.
“You're so easy to get worked up.”
I think of Mick's hands on my body and I can't deny Thorn's claim. But not for what he thinks.
“Truce?” Thorn asks, his face in profile.
“What does that mean?” I ask. I’m hoping for an alliance, even an uneasy one he seems to offer.
“It means you don't tell Mick I'm doing the merry-go-laps, and I don't tell him you're riding the ponies.”
I get a visual of a carousel filled with wooden horses that have the faces of men I've danced on. I hear the dry click as I swallow.
Another lie.
Another secret.
I concede. “Okay.”
“You can always go back to the poles,” Thorn suggests. His shadowed face turns to mine. “Just be one of Ty's pole girls.”
I stare at him, and he smirks as his eyes travel to the street again.
I say nothing.
“That's what I thought. You need the cash.”
I move my left hand under my right. A nervous habit.
“Why?” Thorn asks, inching closer to First Street.
“Do you have to know?”
I don't want him knowing about my mom.
He laughs. “No.” His face swings to mine as he pulls into my narrow alley and the cobblestones make us bounce as he slows.
“Remember when I told you how you walk?”
I nod, my eyes dropping. How could I forget?
“You said that I was... a... whore.” My voice drops on that last word. I don't deny it. I'm splitting hairs at this point.
“I've gotta be tough, Faren. There's no way to survive this biz without my shit in one sock.”
I wait.
He sighs, raking his hand over his skull cap of black hair. “I said you walk like a whore. I didn't say you were a whore.”
We stare at each other.
I offer my hand, and he takes it. One light pump, and it's done.
“I'm a fucked up dude,” he says. “Just so long as you know it. I'm not soft on the bitches—I can't afford to be. But I don't let any violence or hooking shit go down on my watch.”
My eyes search his. “What about the extras?”
“That's up to the girls.”
He shrugs.
Thorn leans forward, and I press back against the door. “I'm not gonna hurt you.”
Right. A truce is one thing, trust is another. Mine doesn't come easily; Ronnie trained me well.
“No girl is getting the beef stick during laps. If she wants to spread the peanut butter on her time... I'm not policing that.”
I blink, processing his words. “Speaking of...” The raid plays out in every corner of my skull, and I wince from the memory. “those cops...”
Thorn nods, intercepting my thoughts like catching the football from the quarterback. “Yeah, I won't lie. That was close.”
Yeah, it was.
“I don't like lying to Mick,” I say. The first absolute truth I've spoken since this whole mess began.
Thorn exhales in a rush. “Me either.”
“Then why do you do it?”
“Why do you?” he counters.
I can't. I just can't.
Thorn's eyes move to the rearview mirror and widen.
“Fuck me.”
His tone of voice puts me on high alert. “What?” My hand flies to my chest as I turn to see what he does.
Thorn revs the engine. “Get your head down!”
I press my head between my legs as he guns it, shooting out of the alley. I pop my head up as he accelerates headlong into a hole in traffic that's hardly more than a gap.
His wheels screech as he depresses the gas, shifting hard into second and ripping the wheel to the left as he zooms into the two lane opposing traffic load.
I hit the door hard. “Holy shit!” I scream, ducking my head again.
“Yeah!” Thorn hoots, punching the roof. “That rocked balls!”
He decelerates, and I ask meekly, “Can I sit up?”
“Oh yeah, go ahead.”
I lift my head up and wilt against the seat. A leaky sound escapes, and I notice it's my breath. “God, what the hell was that about?”
“Not what—who.”
I look at him as he circles back toward my street. We crawl along in stop-and-go traffic in front of Pike Place Market.
“Mick.”
“No,” I reply in a wheeze.
“Yeah.”
*
Detour
Thorn drives past my turn off, and I say, “Hey, where are we going?”
“You want to explain to Mick what you're doing with me?”
Not really.
He watches my face. “I didn't think so.”
I look at his strong hands, the tat sleeves bleeding up his arms and ask, “So what's the plan?”
“I'll drop you off somewhere else.”
“Where?”
He pulls up at a building and parks.
I see my mom's clinic, and my heart stops.
I whip around to hit him.
“Don't.” Thorn's eyes are hard. “I'm not a complete asshole, but I'm no punching bag either.”
He saw the violence in my eyes that fast. Thorn is brutal around the edges, and the potential for instant physicality surrounds him.
My breathing picks up. “How did you know I was going to hit you?”
“You're nothing but a big tell, Faren.”
My brow cocks.
Thorn laughs. “Y'know, like poker.”
I give him blank face.
“Yeah, okay. Everyone has subtle body signals that give away what they’re gonna do next. Your tells are big.”
Oh. “That's not good,” I admit.
Thorn laughs. “You really wanted to give me the smack down?”
“Yeah.”
Thorn's humor seeps away. “Nobody abuses me. Ever.”
I nod. Got it.
“You knew about my mom.” I fold my
arms as my eyes wither him with a glare.
“Google. I Google every name I hire.”
His eyes glitter in the dome light when I open the passenger door.
Bunce.
“Then you know I can't do that dance with Ron.” I guess Thorn doesn't know him as Ronnie.
Thorn frowns, clearly bewildered. “I know you don't like the laps—I get that. But the dude laid down some serious cash, and you're gonna have to dance that lap. Cops breaking it up or not. He wants a big time raincheck.”
Thorn spreads his hands. “I got a rep, ya feel me?”
I did, but I had been hoping that Thorn’s little compassionate streak might extend to this. I hold up my palm. “He did this to me.”
His eyes widen, and his surprise hums along with the powerful engine underneath the hood.
He strokes the scar with his thumb, my fingers curling inward with every stroke. I want to snatch my hand away from the disconcerting intimacy.
“Yeah?” he asks softly.
I can only nod, my eyes are so full of tears.
Thorn is a silhouette of muscled black, his image wavering through the water of my sadness.
He puts my hand back on my lap and looks into my eyes.
“I'll see what I can do...”
“Thorn... no,” I groan. “I can't... I can't face him- that way.”
Thorn sighs, his head slapping the back of the seat.
“Fuck, I didn't know.”
“It's the fucking mother of all coincidences. But... it's gotta come out of someone's hide.”
My eyes widen. I get one leg out of the car, wanting to escape this conversation so badly the city air feels like a salve.
“Don't freak on me,” he says. “Let me see what I can do. But, Faren?”
I turn.
“Maybe think about going back to poles.”
“Why?” I ask. I only have to do one last lap auction. Then my mom will be debt free, and I'll only have to cover the monthly expenses. A couple poles a week will take care of that.
“Some chicks can't tolerate the laps.”
Some chicks don't need it like I do.
“I don't think Mick will forgive ya for the laps. He might for the poles.”
Thorn's warning me, giving me an out before it's too late.
But I don't need Mick's forgiveness.
There's only one thing I need from him.
That's a secret I've only shared with Kiki; I'm not sharing it with Thorn.
To him, I'm just a desperate girl who’s been dealt a raw hand. No bad pun intended.
I feel a little bubble of hysterical laughter beg to escape.
In his own skewed way, Thorn's trying to help.
“Why are you helping me?”
Thorn's eyes slide away, and I realize I should take his olive branch and run.
“I don't know,” he says, carefully avoiding my eyes. “Mick would want me to.”
“What?” I laugh. “You're doing these shitty lap venues behind his back and you're worrying about...” I lift my shoulders.
“If he knew what you were screwed up in... hell,” Thorn hits the steering wheel of his fancy car and I jump.
“He'd...?” I prompt, my eyes searching his face.
“He'd kill anyone who touched you.”
I think about how tender Mick is with me.
“Mick doesn't do halfway. He's an all the way kinda dude.”
“He can have anyone,” I half-explain.
“No shit.” He jacks his eyebrows up and gives me a look that says he questions my intellect.
“He's got history. Trust me, you don't want to put him in a position where he feels he needs to protect you.”
“Why? Tell me about him,” I say.
Thorn lifts his chin toward the open car door. “It's not my story to tell. And my cup of care is all filled up right now, so why don't you scoot your ass out.”
His eyes are softer, but that hard edge is still there, still sharp.
“Okay.” This is all I’ll get out of him.
For now.
I get out and shut the door.
His red streak of a car screams away from the curb, and the smell of rubber fills my nostrils as I trudge up the stairs to see my mom.
~ 3 ~
The doctor stops me before I enter her room, and my heart drops like a stone in a lake. The ripples and splash are seen and heard only by me.
“What is it?” I ask.
Dizziness assails me, and I remember that I collapsed with Thorn, that I'm damn lucky Matthews hadn't kept me overnight.
I swallow against what feels like a panic attack, and when I open my eyes, I'm calmer. My mother's primary caregiver comes into sharp focus.
“Are you okay, Miss Mitchell?”
Hell no.
“Yes.” My eyes move around him to my mom's door. “Is… my mom okay?”
His face breaks into a smile, and my life changes that fast.
A rare sunny day in overcast Seattle pierces my mom’s room with late afternoon sunlight.
By habit, my eyes trace over the tubes that have kept my mom's meager existence going.
But they're gone.
Tannin Mitchell is breathing unassisted. Her eyes are shut, the withering look is there, but the bloom is back on the rose.
Soft pink unfolds across her cheekbones as if brushed on.
I move closer to her bed and softly stroke her cheek.
Without warning, her eyes pop open, but they're not hers.
“Hello, Faren,” Ronnie Bunce says, his eyes inside my mother's face, latching onto mine like a bird that catches sight of its prey.
I pinwheel backward, screaming as I fall.
Into blackness.
“No!” I scream, clutching damp sheets as I sit straight up in bed.
I'm in between, that place where a nightmare seems truly real, a dream that still clings to me with tenacious fingers.
My eyes search every surface of my room. I come up with nothing out of place. My personal effects mock me from their benign place in my life.
Inanimate, unreal.
I fall back against the bed as my galloping heart slows to a trot. I try to regain the sense of joy I felt when my mom's doctor told me she's woken up, that she lives.
Not in that vegetative existence where she might thrash on a good day, breaking the surface of the unconscious water she drowns in.
On a bad one, Tannin Mitchell appears as if she has already left this world.
I sit up again and stare vacantly into the dim emptiness of my room. The clock fills the silence with its ticking.
I feel something land on my left hand, oozing wetness into the well of my scar.
My tears.
I dread tomorrow. Not my day job.
But the night.
I turn and see the clock reads three thirty. I slide my cell off the nightstand and scroll through my messages.
Two from Mick. My palm dampens against the hard shell of my phone.
A soft flutter like moth's wings ignites inside my stomach.
Mick: Faren, text me.
Mick: Are you okay?
I smile. No, I'm not okay. I put the cell down next to my body and close my eyes.
It's late and I have no right to respond. I've screwed things up six ways to Sunday.
I grab the cell and text him anyway.
Me: I'm okay.
I wait five minutes. I watch the numbers on my digital clock flip over into my uncertain future.
Me: You awake?
I hold the cell in my good hand.
He'll text.
I roll over and settle into the warm nest of my covers, knowing I have to be at the clinic by eight.
I don't feel my eyes close as my hand wraps my cell.
It sits against my chest like the teddy bear I no longer sleep with.
What seems like seconds later, the alarm sounds. It blares its rhythmic discordance like a tortured duck. I slam my hand down on the button, and b
lessed silence ensues.
Thank god.
I sit up, wiping my eyes and feeling like shit.
I rummage through my covers, hunting for my cell phone. I find it buried in my pillowcase. I scroll through texts from work, from Kiki.
No texts from Mick.
My stomach falls to my feet, and heat floods my system.
I think of Thorn evading Mick in my alley yesterday and wonder if it was the last time.
Maybe Mick figures I'm too much of a pain in the ass.
He'd be right.
I get up and stretch.
I pad into the kitchen, make my tea, and head for the bathroom. I crank on the shower.
When steam rises, I jerk off my pajama bottoms and cami and sink into the spray in abject relief. I think of Mick as my hands glide over my body, my slippery fingers touching every bit of me. I linger at all the places I want him to touch.
I crank the faucet to cold, and it jerks me out of my reverie, my desire to climax so I can control myself around Mick.
I hold myself back from pleasure. It's a savage torture of my want versus the experience I must have.
If he gives me a chance to redeem myself, I want to be so primed for the pump that nothing can stop us.
No excuse.
No truth.
Just my need to take Mick.
Before he takes me.
*
I bolt my door and turn, instantly stumbling over something.
Another card. Wrapped in elastic and attached to my mask.
The mask I misplaced! I do a mental facepalm and cringe. How does he know it's mine? My brows come together as I rack my brain. Maybe it's an innocent “find.” One that doesn't warrant a total meltdown of my threadbare control of my emotional fabric.
I bend over, retrieve the mask, remove it from the card, unlock my door, and throw the mask inside without a glance.
Closing my door, I lock it again and turn the card over.
My heart thumps harder.
Came by to see you. Out of town for a few days.
Mick
I run my thumb over the deep, hastily scratched cursive. I feel each indent.
I caress his signature twice.
The rasp of my flesh over his penmanship evokes a sharp pang of lust mixed with longing.