Wanted: An Outlaw Anthology

by Lane Hart

  This new information doesn’t come as a surprise. Of course a woman like that would drive a Lexus. I just hope she doesn’t learn the hard way that people around here don’t see cars like that in this neighborhood.

  “You get your homework done?” I ask, looking for any topic but the uppity social worker.

  Carter rolls his eyes. “Yes, Mom.”

  “Good. Dinner’s in an hour.”

  Before heading to my bedroom, I peek in on Max. He’s sitting cross-legged on the floor, his Legos scattered across the threadbare carpet in front of him, watching cartoons on the television. The kid turns into a zombie as soon as his shows come on.

  Dashing up the stairs, I step into my room and close the door. Digging my phone out of my back pocket, I open the web browser and pray I have enough data left. A quick search through the local job listings comes up empty, the same way it did the other two times I’ve checked it today. The same as the million and three times I’ve checked it the past few weeks.

  Without a thermometer, there’s no way to know what the temperature is inside this house, but it’s cold nonetheless. You can’t see your breath, but it’s cold enough that we’ll all be sleeping in layers tonight.

  I’m out of options, I think to myself as I close down the browser and pull up my contact list. I pull up my best friend’s number and press the green button. My guts churn as I listen to the ringing on the other end and then he answers.

  “Hey, asshole. What’s up?”

  His question is rhetorical. It is every time he asks it. But this time, I have a reason for calling. One I’d sworn to myself I’d never do.

  “Uh,” I say, scrubbing my hand along the back of my neck. “I was wondering if you had any work for me?”

  Zack pauses on the other end, taken aback by my question. “Fuck me, man. You serious?”

  Am I?

  I glance over to the stack of unpaid bills on my dresser. “I’m serious. I need cash and I need it now. What have you got for me?”

  Zack huffs out a laugh. “Oh, homeboy, have I got a gig for you.”

  His statement is music to my ears. So, why do I feel like I’m going to puke?

  Chapter Three

  Georgia

  “Use the other fork, dear,” my mother scolds gently, aiming a phony smile in Benjamin’s direction. “She never did learn which fork goes with which course.”

  Her apology annoys me. She’s right about me now knowing my cutlery, but Benjamin is my fiancé, not some dignitary visiting from a foreign country whom I absolutely must impress. Why does it even matter when it’s just a family dinner of the four of us?

  I pick up my salad fork and spear a piece of lettuce on its tines. “So, Daddy,” I say, hoping to steer the subject in any other direction possible. “Did you get that deal you were working for?”

  “Of course he did,” my mother says with a haughty set to her shoulders. “Your father always get his deal.”

  I glance over at her, fighting the urge to roll my eyes and then look back to my father, who, like me, appears to wish he were anywhere but sitting at this table right now. “Signed the papers just today,” he says. I watch as he reaches for the nearly empty glass of scotch in front of him and drains the remainder of it in one large gulp.

  My parents are a mystery to me. How can two people that are so completely opposite stay married for over twenty-five years? Or even stranger still, how did they get together in the first place?

  My father is a businessman who has made his fortune selling advertising to big media companies. He’s good at what he does, and with the voraciousness in which he throws himself into it, I’d hazard to say he even loves his job. He enjoys the simple things in life and doesn’t throw his wealth around like some of the people I know.

  My mother, on the other hand, is a classic socialite. She is a member of the most exclusive societies, buys only the most expensive clothing, attends every gala and ball she can and is obsessed with perfection in all things. It’s exhausting.

  “Benjamin,” my mother says, turning her scrutinizing gaze away from my father. “Did you get your invite to the gala at the museum?”

  “I did,” he says. “Next Tuesday, right?”

  That gets my attention. “Next Tuesday? I can’t do a Tuesday.”

  Benjamin’s eyes turn to mine, his brows lifted in a surprise.

  “That’s preposterous, dear,” my mother scoffs. “You must go. Benjamin has a duty to his firm to attend, and there will be the expectation that his fiancé is on his arm.”

  I ignore her and speak only to Benjamin. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize, and I already volunteered to run the youth program on Tuesday nights until ten o’clock. There’s nobody else that can do it, and I have to be there.”

  Not a single muscle shifts on his handsome face as Benjamin continues to stare at me. Unease creeps along my spine as I wait for him to say something, but it never comes. Not from him, anyway.

  “Tuesday nights?” my mother cries. “On the South Side? You must be joking. You’ll be mugged!” She shakes her head, her perfectly coiffed hair not moving even a fraction of an inch. “I think you know how much I approve of this job,” she continues.

  “Lillian …” my father warns, but he and I both know his warning is falling on deaf ears.

  “It’s true!” she cries. “A woman of your status should never even set foot on the South Side, let alone work there. You have a black eye, for goodness sake! Why you turned down Yale is beyond me, but I can’t sit by as you endanger yourself on a daily basis without at least letting you know I don’t approve.”

  “You’ve made that perfectly clear, Mother,” I assure her. “And it’s not that bad down there. They need more people to help them improve their community instead of everyone just avoiding it and pretending the issues they face are their own.”

  “They are their own,” Benjamin interjects. “It’s not my issue they have such a high crime rate, or that most of the people down there have drug addictions. I didn’t choose that life for myself.”

  I stare at him, my mouth agape. “Are you serious? You didn’t choose that life? So, you’re telling me you chose to be a rich man’s son and be offered every opportunity in the world to succeed, but if you’d wanted? That wasn’t a choice, Benjamin. That was a lucky break.”

  I watch as his nostrils flare with an anger I’d yet to see from him, but he says nothing more. Instead, he raises his stark white napkin and wipes his mouth before standing. “If you’ll excuse me, Mr. and Mrs. Addington,” he says, his voice a perfect pitch of calm and decorum. “I’ve just remembered I had some work left to do this evening, and I really should be getting to that. Thank you for the lovely dinner.”

  Mother and Daddy both give him a gracious nod and I can feel my mother’s eyes burning holes into me as I stare up at Benjamin in shock.

  “Georgia,” he says in a cool tone, and then he walks out of the room.

  I stare after him toward the empty doorway, words completely escaping me. Benjamin and I have been together for almost a year now, and I had never once seen him behave the way he just did.

  “Really,” Mother mutters, her voice laced with disapproval, but it’s not Benjamin she’s referring to. Her eyes are zeroed in on me. “To argue with a man like that in the company of others. That was uncalled for, Georgia Rose.”

  I flick my gaze toward my father, but it’s useless. He never gets involved in Mother’s quarrels and he avoids offering his opinion whenever possible, even if it means siding with me.

  When I’d chosen to turn down the offer to attend Yale, my mother had nearly had a heart attack. She couldn’t wrap her mind around the fact that I wanted to make a career out of making a difference, instead of grabbing myself some sort of business degree or focusing on finding a rich man to attach myself to.

  But being a social worker is something I’ve wanted to do since I was a child. I knew that it would cause issues with her, but for the first time in my life, I was going to do w
hat I wanted, and that meant standing up to my mother and taking control of my own destiny. Was being a social worker in one of the poorest neighborhoods in the country going to make me rich? No. But I grew up rich, and the proof that money doesn’t buy happiness is sitting right in front of me.

  “Thank you, Mother for a lovely dinner,” I say, placing my napkin across my plate. She gasps in shock, but I ignore it as I turn to my father, and if I’m not mistaken, I see a gleam of pride in his gaze as he nods back at me. “Daddy.”

  And without another word, I too make my exit.

  Tripp

  The hotel is nothing fancy. Just a simple, clean, low-budget hotel, perfect for traveling families and single men on a budget. It’s also, apparently, the perfect place for married women to meet with young men they pay to shower them with the attention they are no longer receiving from their husbands.

  I pull out my phone for the hundredth time and read over the text. Room 219. 8pm.

  A couple of years ago, when Zack had started doing this, I’d thought he was crazy, and I’d sworn to myself that I would never stoop so low as to join him in this little venture of his. But desperate time call for desperate measures, or so they say.

  My stomach knots as I step onto the elevator and press the number two button. As the heavy doors slide closed, I can feel my pulse pounding in my temples.

  According to Zack, the woman I am about to meet is in her late fifties, beautiful but lonely. Her husband works out of town a lot and she is just looking for someone to make her feel beautiful again. Other than that, the only thing I know about her is that her name is Olivia.

  I shudder. I can’t believe it’s come to this. It’s not that I don’t enjoy sex. I’m a twenty-two-year-old man. Of course, I do. But this is different somehow. I’m not picking this woman up at some bar or banging a teacher with a nice ass. I’m about to go into this hotel room, have sex with a total stranger, and get paid for my time. I’ve become a fucking hooker.

  Room 219 is just down the hall from the elevator, and as I lift my hand to knock, it swings open. The woman standing on the other side is wearing a black, super short robe, and I can tell from the see-through material that she isn’t wearing a damn thing underneath. Her brown waves are pulled up into an artfully looking ponytail at the back of her head, and her makeup looks fresh.

  “You must be Tripp,” she says, posing in the open doorway, giving me a sneak peek at what she has on under that robe. “Come on in.”

  As I step into the room and wait as she closes the door, I fight a war within myself, doing my best to accept that I’m not selling my soul. It’s just meaningless sex with a beautiful older woman in exchange for some money to get the gas turned back on in my house. No big deal. Yeah, right.

  As I stand facing the room, a perfectly manicured hand, with impossibly long red fingernails, curls over my shoulder. “My, you are brawny, aren’t you?” she purrs, running her palm along the contours of my arm over my thick fall jacket. “Let’s get this off of you, shall we?”

  I force myself to meet her gaze as she comes around in front of me and pushes the jacket off of my shoulders and down my arms. Her eyes take in my muscled shoulders and wide chest, straining against the material of my shirt. “Would you like a drink?” she asks, her voice husky.

  “No, thanks.” I stare around the room, wondering what to do next. Do I make the first move? Do I follow her lead? I need to make a decision because standing here like a deer caught in the headlights is not getting us anywhere.

  She doesn’t make me wait long. “You’re a very handsome young man, Tripp.” She runs the tips of her fingers down my chest until they stop just above my belt. “Have you done this before?”

  I stare into her eyes and swallow, shaking my head.

  She nods and presses her body up against me. “Good.” She presses a soft kiss to my collarbone. “I like knowing that you’re all mine.” I stand frozen as her mouth trails up my throat and her hands wander down my back until they are cupping my ass, kneading it between her fingers. “We’re going to have a wonderful time,” she whispers.

  I squeeze my eyes closed as her mouth covers mine, reminding myself of how cold it was inside our house this morning. With that thought, I compel myself to move, bringing my arms around her waist and entangling my tongue with hers.

  As she beings to rip off my clothes, I refuse to let my doubts and worries have even a fraction of my thoughts. This is not wrong. This is what I have to do for my family.

  Chapter Four

  Georgia

  Tripp Fletcher had been right. I should have read Hailey’s file before calling him the other day. Today, I had come in to work two hours earlier than was necessary, determine to catch up on the files of each child in my care in the after-school program. What I’d found had been shocking.

  Most of these kids come from broken homes. A surprising number of them had parents in prison and even more of them had a long history with the police themselves. The thickest file of all had been the one for Krista O’Malley.

  Tripp had referred to her as a bully and a thug. She was much worse than that from the looks of things. Since the age of four, Krista had been in and out of foster homes, been in several fights, and been arrested twice for armed robbery. At fourteen.

  Hailey Fletcher on the other hand, was the perfect picture of what a kid should be. Though there were several fights on record between her and Krista, Hailey had always been the victim and rarely came out on top. She had a surprising number of academic awards from her school and was noted as being a helpful contributor to our program. In other words, Hailey was a good kid, living in a world that made it almost impossible for her to be successful.

  At three thirty, the kids from the local elementary and high schools begin to wander in. There are several rooms in the community center where these kids can get help with homework, play sports and even play at one of our three computers. I am the staff member allocated to run the homework room, which just so happens to be where Hailey Fletcher seems to spend most of her time.

  I greet her with a warm smile as she walks into the room; her tattered backpack slung over one shoulder. “Hello,” I say, hoping we can get past the events of the other day.

  Hailey looks at me like I’m from another planet. “Uh … hi.”

  The main part of my job here is to get to know these kids and provide them with a safe place to come when things aren’t going so great in other parts of their lives. I’d failed miserably to do that for Hailey when she’d gotten into that scuffle with Krista and the others. I may have seen a first punch thrown, but I hadn’t stopped to ask how or why it had started. I hadn’t been a safe place for Hailey at all, and she knew it.

  For four years, I’d attended college and various workshops on working with inner-city kids, and the very first day I was working with them on my own, I’d messed up. I’d thought I was prepared for this place, but I’d never once counted on how different the culture around here is from the one I’d been raised in.

  As the afternoon wears on, I wander the large classroom style room, helping kids with math and science. Twice I have to go to my phone and look up the answer. What is this new math they’re teaching now, anyway?

  Hailey never once asks for my help, and she visibly stiffens every time I come within just a few feet of her. I had my work cut out for me to gain this girl’s trust.

  From the window, I watch as a group of teenage boys play game after game of basketball, their voices muffled by the closed windows and their cheeks pink from the crisp afternoon air. One of the boys I recognize as Carter Fletcher, Hailey’s brother.

  I’d read Carter’s file as well. Though not nearly as good a student as his younger sister, he is a smart kid with a bit of an attitude for anyone in a position of authority. He rarely comes into the homework room, and spends most of his forced sentence each afternoon here, playing sports with his friends.

  Just as I’m about to turn away, a group of men approach the boys on the b
asketball court. They’re young–perhaps my own age, and definitely not supposed to be here. I move closer to the window as the two groups converse, trying to decide what it is I should do. I can’t just stand here and watch from the window.

  That’s when I see Carter and another man separate from the crowd. The two go off into the corner, their heads together as they share a private word and the man hands him a brown paper bag, looking around to be sure nobody is watching.

  Carter takes the bag, stuffing it under the front of his shirt and tucking it into the waistband of his pants before putting out his fist and bumping it with the man’s. They part then, the man and his friends wandering back out to the sidewalk, disappearing down the street, while Carter moves to his backpack, glances around, and then shoves the paper bag into his backpack.

  As he lifts his head from his task, his gaze meets mine through the window and the unmistakable look of fear passes across his face for just a moment, before it melts away and he narrows his eyes at me, then goes back to his game. I stand in that window for several moments, watching the boy as he moves gracefully around the basketball court.

  What had I just witnessed? There was no way that exchange had been on the up and up. What business could Carter possibly have with a group of men like that? And what exactly was in that bag?

  As the afternoon draws to an end, and five o’clock draws near, I mull over those questions again and again. I had a duty to do something about what I had just witnessed. But what? Do I talk to Carter directly? The look he’d given me had made it clear that would get me nowhere. Do I call the police? That would just get officers showing up at the Fletcher’s home and possibly ruining everything Tripp had worked so hard to provide for his siblings.

  Finally, as the last of the kids clear out, heading home for the night, I make a decision. Pulling out Hailey’s file once again, I flip it open to Tripp Fletcher’s phone number and pick up the receiver to the phone on my desk.