by Laura Day
This is a work of fiction. Any names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons--living or dead--is entirely coincidental.
Mercer copyright @ 2016 by Laura Day. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty One
Chapter Twenty Two
Chapter Twenty Three
Chapter Twenty Four
Chapter Twenty Five
Chapter Twenty Six
Chapter Twenty Seven
Chapter Twenty Eight
Chapter Twenty Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty One
Chapter Thirty Two
Chapter Thirty Three
Chapter Thirty Four
Chapter Thirty Five
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Chapter One
Valencia
The bus was running late. Again. Glancing down at my watch, as I balanced Laila's baby carrier, I counted down the minutes until Ricky would get home from work. It would be roughly one hour until he pulled up and saw that I wasn't home. My frustration and fear grew with each passing moment. I took a deep breath and tried to calm myself down, trying to take the emotion out of it, and just think. More than anything, I needed to keep my cool.
I figured that he'd try calling first, to see where I was, and I prayed that he wouldn't notice yet that my side of the closet was empty and that all of Laila's things were gone too. Best-case scenario - I had an hour, maybe a few minutes more. And then all bets were off. He would come for me.
I needed to be on that bus.
“Come on, come on,” I said, juggling my bags and tapping my foot impatiently.
Laila slept peacefully in the carrier on my chest; unaware of the danger we were in. I wished I could have been as blissfully ignorant as she was. If Ricky found us – I didn't know what would happen, but it wouldn't be good. He probably assumed having a baby together would keep me by his side, trap me and bind me to him. Little did he know, though, that Laila was the reason I'd finally had enough. I couldn't let her witness her mother being beaten, humiliated, and degraded day in and day out. She deserved a better role model.
And I deserved better too.
“Going away for awhile?” An older man asked me, smiling down at Laila.
“You could say that,” I muttered. “If the damn bus would ever get here, that is.”
“It should be here soon.” He frowned, peering up the road. “It should have been here already.”
Tell me something I don’t know.
“How old is she?” he asked, obviously trying to make conversation.
But a conversation was the last thing I wanted. I just wanted to be left alone, and for the bus to arrive, and to get the hell away before Ricky realized I was gone. But I didn't want to be rude to the older man. My stress and fear weren't his fault. He was just trying to be friendly.
“Seven weeks tomorrow,” I said softly.
“She's beautiful. I'm sure you and your husband are very happy.”
I cringed at his words, and couldn't bring myself to answer. Ricky was happy about Laila, but not for the same reasons as me. He was happy because it meant that I was tied to him, forever – he had his hooks in me for the rest of my life. He'd always intended to get me knocked up. It was why he took away my birth control pills. I had to stand there and watch as he flushed them down the toilet, refusing to let me get more.
I never wanted to get pregnant and be tied to him for the rest of my life. But he'd forced himself on me, forced the baby on me, and yet I loved Laila more than life itself. Now, she was the reason I was leaving.
Ironic how that worked out, huh?
I was pretty sure Ricky wasn't going to be laughing at the irony. Oh, hell no, he wasn't going to find it funny whatsoever.
“There it is!” the old man remarked, walking toward the oncoming bus.
I was right behind him, instinctively looking over my shoulder, half afraid I would see Ricky storming toward me, a scowl on his face and his hands balled into fists. Would I always have to live in fear? Would I one day be free of it? I had no idea what I was going to do or where Laila and I would go. All I knew was that we needed to get out of there. I created an opportunity for my baby girl, and me, and I’d taken it. After secretly saving enough cash to make a run for it, I was determined to start a new life – a life where neither of us had to know fear.
What I had wasn't much, but it would get us a hotel room for a few weeks. It would allow us to eat and survive, at least, long enough for me to find a job or apply for Welfare. It wasn't much, but it was something. I had to make do.
I just had to.
Besides my clothes and a few odds and ends I'd managed to stuff into a backpack, I was leaving everything behind. It would be rough, but it was a fresh start. But a fresh start that wouldn’t come if Ricky found me.
I looked down at Laila and resolved once more that I couldn't let him find us.
This bus needed to get moving. The people in front of me needed to walk faster. They needed to find their seats so the bus could leave before Ricky showed up and grabbed me by the hair, dragging me home.
“Do you need some help, miss?”
Shaking my head, I looked for the source of the voice. Were they talking to me? When I looked around, I saw a man smiling at me. He was a younger guy, pimply faced and around college-aged.
What kind of help would he be able to offer me? And then it hit me. He meant my bags. He was offering to help me carry my bags.
“Oh, no thank you,” I said, feeling the heat rise to my cheeks as I turned away.
If Ricky caught me talking to another man, he would – I stopped myself thinking about it. Ricky was gone. Out of my life. Hopefully, forever. Unless, of course, he managed to track me down.
But one step at a time, Val. One step at a time.
I placed my bags on the seat next to me and sighed. I stared out the window – at the terminal down the street from our home. Or rather, what used to be my home.
Now I didn’t have one.
Laila whimpered, and I kissed her forehead. She smelled sweet and soft – a smell I would never grow tired of. She made me happier than anything else in the world, and I had to be strong for her.
Finally, after what seemed like an eternity of my stomach constricting into painful knots, the bus pulled away from the terminal, leaving my old town behind. If everything went as planned, we'd be well outside of Modesto by the time Ricky got home.
I just prayed this bus would take me far enough away so that Laila and I would finally be
safe.
“Where ya headed?” the pimply-faced kid asked as he took a seat across from me.
I was still on edge and still didn’t want to have a conversation with a stranger, but the further we put Modesto in the rear view mirror, the more I relaxed.
“Not sure yet. Maybe Los Angeles? San Diego, if we're lucky,” I told him.
The kid let out a low whistle. “You don't even know where you're headed?”
I shrugged.
“Be careful out there, miss,” he said, leaning back in his seat. “Hopefully, you find whatever it is you're looking for.”
“Me too,” I murmured.
Los Angeles was expensive, but so was San Diego. I knew it was going to be tough to get by in either place. But a big city felt safer to me. I knew it would be easier to get lost in the crowd. Blend in. It would be harder for Ricky to find us. There had to be jobs there too, jobs I could get – even with the little experience I had. Ricky hadn't let me work, which is why my employment history wasn’t great. But there had to be something out there, someone who would hire me.
I had to keep believing that, at least.
The kid winked at me. “I'm heading to Vegas. I'm gonna work in the casinos.”
Vegas. Vegas wasn't a bad option either. I hadn't thought about it before, but maybe the kid was on to something. After all, casino work would be easy to come by.
“Lots of work out there?” I asked him.
“So I'm told,” he said. “Especially for a pretty, young thing like yourself.”
A blush returned to my face. Turning away, I buried it in the sweet skin of my daughter.
The bus would take us to L.A. but after that? Well, my options were limited by my knowledge and imagination.
Maybe leaving California would be better? Make it harder for Ricky to search for us?
I guess I'd just have to decide once I was in L.A., and in the meantime, I would enjoy the ride, and take comfort in watching Modesto fade into the distance.
Chapter Two
Valencia
The smell of stale cigarette smoke saturated everything in the club. My hair would reek from it long after I left the place. It always did. As disgusting as it was, I knew it could be worse. As difficult as it was to believe, I knew there were worse clubs – in seedier parts of town – that had greasier clientele.
The club had three stages, and tonight, I was going to be on the largest one - the one in the center. I had a chance to make a lot of money, as long as my performance went well.
Angel, the girl who'd been on the stage before me, wiped down the pole and bent over to show her ass to the audience in the process. It was a very calculated move. She winked back at me when she was done, her blue eyes shining from across the stage. She walked toward me, tall and slender, her breasts perky and perfect – it was hard not to stare.
“Good luck, Queenie. Tough crowd tonight,” she whispered as she passed.
Being that it was mid-week, the place was emptier than usual. People had real lives and jobs to deal with – real jobs that required them to be there fresh and ready early in the morning. Not everybody had jobs that afforded him or her the time to waste at nightclubs. But there were still enough men in the audience that I felt reasonably confident about bringing home enough money to feed Laila and me – I just had to grab and keep their attention. The hotel, where I’d booked a room, was expecting to be paid tonight too, so maybe Laila would be the only one eating tonight – it wouldn't be the first time – unless I knocked it out of the park.
So much was riding on me making a lot of money tonight, and I couldn't let my baby down. Not again.
With one last glance in the mirror, I straightened my thigh highs and made my skirt short enough to reveal my ass. The skirt was a silky black number with a pink bow on the front – it was all about the tease. My top was basically a bikini top that barely covered my nipples. It too was black with a pink bow nestled between my breasts – a bow I could pull on that would release my bountiful hooters for the world to see.
I had to admit I looked hot. My dark skin had gotten darker while I'd been living in Vegas, and was beautifully tanned. Almost exotic. My hair and eyes were also dark, but the stage lights would illuminate me, making me seem like I was almost glowing out there. The silky powder on my skin made me sparkle like a golden goddess. Like a queen.
Because that's what I was.
“You're up,” the women working the back said, a cigarette dangling from her lips.
Sherry was our stage mom, of sorts. A retired dancer who'd been where we were, and someone who took care of us. She was strict but loving. She protected us as best she could, just like any mom would protect their little girls. Except instead of teaching us the alphabet, Sherry's girls were all strippers and trained in seducing men out of their money.
With a nod, I walked out onto the main stage, my eyes trying to adjust to the lights. However, I knew not to squint because squinting was never attractive – it was one of Sherry's lessons. The rest of the room was dark, and except for the men sitting in the front row, I couldn't see anyone else. It was all shadows and dark silhouettes.
My music started – “Closer” by Nine Inch Nails. Typical, and maybe a little cliché, sure, but it always seemed to get the dollar bills flying toward the stage. Plus, it was a welcome change to the rap and pop music that often reverberated around the club.
I was still learning how to work the pole, so I focused on the crowd instead. One of the regulars – Tyrone – shouted something as he threw a twenty-dollar bill down at the start of my dance. He smiled up at me, but the whites of his eyes were the only things I could make out in the darkness of the club. Twenty bucks wasn't much, but it would get me started. My stilettos clanked against the hard stage as I made my way over to him, bending down and giving him a closer view of my cleavage. With my finger, I lifted up his chin, so he was staring at my eyes not my bust. Teasing him with a wink and a smile, I was asking – without really asking – for more money.
And he obliged.
Tyrone placed another twenty on the stage and smirked. I got down on my knees, facing him with his head still in my hands, and pulled it toward me, burying it into my bust. I knew he liked my boobs – he was a tits man. And I had plenty to offer him. Pulling his head backward, I stared into his eyes again as if he were the only man in the room – that was another little trick that Sherry had taught us.
Giving him my best bedroom eyes, I pulled at the pink bow on my top and slowly removed it, letting the material fall away from my breasts. Perhaps I let my top go too soon, and maybe I should have let the anticipation build a bit more, but it made Tyrone drop another twenty. I climbed down onto his lap and gyrated my hips as if I were a teenage girl in heat. I buried his face between my boobs again as I wiggled over his erection, moving up and down to the beat of the music as he slipped more bills into my skirt.
Men nearby were hooting and hollering, and when I was finished with Tyrone – and pocketed all the cash he left for me – I saw a flurry of money being held in the air around the stage. Men wanted exactly what I'd done for Tyrone, and they were willing to pay for it.
But one man drew my gaze. He was sitting at the far end of the front row, almost in the corner. His eyes were serious and somewhat bleak as he stared at me, watching my every move. There was no money, no smiles, no hooting, and hollering – he was just silently watching. Was he not enjoying the show? Maybe not…but the way he observed me – as if I was the center of the universe – made me think otherwise.
I entertained the other men, who were dropping cash everywhere, and I caught Angel in the audience, glaring at me. She'd been here a while – probably a little bit too long. She was old news. I was the next generation. Even though Angel – her real name was Alexandra – was only in her mid-twenties, she'd lived a hard life, and it showed on her face. Drugs knew how to age a person, and judging by the strained, pinched look to her face, Angel had done her fair share of them.
And there I wa
s, younger, more popular, and making money off the same men she couldn't seduce anymore. I almost felt sorry for her, but I had a baby at home that depended on me. Angel didn't. That was the difference, and it made me work harder. It made me resist the allure of the drugs and the drinking that often came with this lifestyle.
During the second song, almost at the end, I teased the men around the stage with some upskirt shots. And of course, I wasn't wearing any panties. The Ace of Hearts was a fully nude club, and the skirt would be coming off, but not before I gave them a show first. After all, they appreciated the chance to catch a peek of my most intimate parts, especially when they thought they were being sneaky about it. There was something forbidden about it in that they thought they were getting away with something naughty. It drove them crazy – and made them part with their cash.
I chose to drop my skirt altogether in front of the one man still holding out, and still not smiling. He stared up at me, a blank expression on his face. He was a brick of a man – tall and built. He looked rough, but not in the way Angel did. He'd seen things; you could tell by looking at his eyes – as well as at the scar that lined his face. His long, black hair was pulled back, and there were hints of gray at his temples. His leather jacket identified him as a biker with one of the local motorcycle gangs – The Prophets. Not that I knew much about them, but we tended to get a lot of bikers in the club. I'd learned to recognize the good ones from the bad ones pretty fast.