“Nyjah, you don’t want to date me. Trust me. I’m not dating material.” And the idea of going out on a date makes me want to throw up. Yes, I have sex with men, but for money and the fact that it hollows me inside makes it possible. But actually going on a date with someone, setting myself up for some kind of romantic connection, makes me feel sick. I still haven’t gotten over Layton—not sure that I ever will—so dating isn’t an option.
“I know what you are, Lola—I know what I’m getting into.”
“No you don’t. Trust me.” I squirm uncomfortably in the chair. “If you did, you wouldn’t be talking to me.”
He shakes his head with aggravation. “You always think so lowly of yourself. Is that why you do it? Because you don’t think you deserve better.”
I’m getting irritated, even though I know I shouldn’t be. He only cares about me, but I’m not worthy of his sympathy—worthy of anything. “No, that’s not why I do it. I do it for the same reason everyone else around here does. Because I’m a slut who likes sex.”
He rolls his eyes. “That’s not why everyone does it and you know it.”
“It’s why some do.”
“Yeah, but not you. I saw it in your eyes the day you walked in here. You’re carrying something dark inside you.”
I’m having a hard time breathing. “Nyjah, please drop it. I don’t want to talk about this. I just want to go do my job, which apparently is going to be real easy tonight since he doesn’t list wanting sex.”
“Yeah, but what if he does want sex?” he questions, searching my eyes for God knows what. “What if his weird answers to the questionnaire were simply because he didn’t want to admit what he was expecting?”
“Okay, then I’ll fuck him. Sex is nothing new, Nyjah.”
“Yeah, but you’re distracted today.”
I shrug. “Distracted or not, I can still be a great sex partner.”
He pauses, scratching at the back of his neck. I’m still in a little bit of shock about him asking me out. Yeah, he’s flirted with me a few times, but never acted on it. In a normal world, I’d be flattered, but this isn’t the normal world. This is Lola’s world, offspring of a very powerful, very dangerous drug lord.
“You know, my dad’s looking for help around the office again,” Nyjah says, lowering his hand onto his lap. “I know you said you weren’t interested the last time you offered, but thought maybe you’d changed your mind over the last couple of weeks.”
I tuck a strand of my hair behind my ear. “Do we really have to do this again? I already told you, I can’t take the job and I still feel the same way.”
“Is it because of the money?”
“Partly. But there’s more to it than that, again, something I’ve already told you.”
“Like what?”
I consider what to tell him, consider the real reason, consider what makes me do the things I do without feeling any sense of shame. “Look, can we just leave it at I have some issues and this… job helps me deal with those issues. Without it, I’d just have to think all the time and I don’t want to think.” I sigh. “Women can enjoy sex, you know.”
“That’s not what I’m saying.” He pauses, rubbing his hand over his shortly shaven hair. “And it doesn’t seem like you enjoy it whether you’ll admit it or not.”
“You know, if you really want to pick people’s minds, Nyjah, then you should consider a career in psychology,” I say, getting up from the chair. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a guy to go fuck.”
He shakes his head, getting frustrated. “Fine, Lola. I’ll see you tomorrow.” He goes from friendly to formal in a second flat then gets up from his desk but then pauses, opens a drawer, and retrieves an envelope. He shoves it in my direction and when I take it he cross over to another woman who works here. He never seems to give any of them crap and I wish he’d do the same for me—stop trying to figure me out. And never ask me out again. Besides, if he really knew what was going on in my head, all the things I’ve thought and done, he’d probably run for his life.
I turn to leave, opening the envelope that has my name on it, figuring it’s my paycheck. Well, cash for my work since I won’t do checks. But I realize it’s too thin to be holding cash and by the time I get it open, I’m a confused. But the confusion shifts to sheer panic when I see a piece of paper inside, just like the note that was given to Dannie. It’s the same handwriting too.
Everything you know is a lie.
My gaze snaps up and I quickly scan the room. The women that I work with are loitering around near the bar area and sitting at the tables and some are on the stairway smoking. Nyjah is still chatting with the same woman with frustration in his expression. I hurry over to him, trying to keep myself together, but I sound breathless.
“Where did you get this?” I ask him, holding up the envelope, my hand twitching to go up my dress and to the gun strapped to my thigh. I carry it with me whenever I can for protection and right now it feels like I need protection.
“It was left in the mailbox out front.” His brows knit and he starts to reach for the envelope. “Why? What’s—”
I don’t let him finish. I rush off out of the building and onto the front porch. The Dusky Inn is exactly what it sounds like—an Inn. It’s a old two story-building enclosed by a rickety porch and is hidden out in a neighborhood where most of the houses look about as depressed and outdated as it so it doesn’t stand out. It also has a bright red mailbox out front near the edge of the gate. I always thought it was a little strange, mainly in the sense that it actually looked nice. Marching down to it, I open it up, not sure what I’m looking for but don’t find anything but a flyer for a free carwash. I shut the mailbox and glance around the neighborhood, again not sure what I’m looking for but feeling as though I need to search for an answer as to who the hell is sending the notes.
Nothing appears of the ordinary, though. A few people smoking and drinking on the porch next door. A guy working on his car. The usual drug dealers and prostitutes on the corner of the street. They’re there a lot and I wonder if any of them noticed anything different this morning.
I go over to one of the woman who I’ve chat with a couple of times. Her work name is Luscious and she’s nice enough. She’s always wearing a different color wig—today neon pink, which matches her stilettos.
“Hey Luscious,” I say, ignoring the few other women who give me dirty looks because of where I work. There’s sort of this ongoing fight between the women who work at The Dusky Inn and the street corner girls because the Dusky Inn girls think there more upper class hookers, which doesn’t make sense to me but still makes most of the women who work the corner hate me.
“Hey Lola.” She smiles at me as she struts away from the curb and the crowd, her heels clicking on the sidewalk. “What’s going on with the rich girl?”
“Not rich, remember. And nothing much.” I glance over her shoulder at the people watching us then lower my voice and lean. “I was just wondering if you notice anyone a little… suspicious hanging around here this morning?”
She cocks a brow, propping her hand on her hip. “Honey, have you seen the neighborhood we work in. Everyone is suspicious around here.”
“Yeah, I know… maybe suspicious isn’t the right word.” I pause. “Have you seen anyone maybe watching The Dusky Inn or perhaps put something in the mailbox.”
“You mean like the mailman.”
“No someone else… someone was maybe dressed in a suit.”
She considers what I said, her head tipped to the side. “No, I don’t think so. But let me ask around.” Before I can say anything else, she wanders back to the crowd and starts chatting with everyone. Moments later she saunters back over with a shorter guy with overgrown hair and a goatee.
“Luscious says you’re looking for someone suspicious?” he asks, eyeing me over with want in his eyes.
I nod warily, not liking how he’s looking at me. “Yeah, someone maybe hanging out around The Dusky Inn.”
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He gives me an amused grin. “Yeah, I saw someone staring at the building this morning. Some woman actually I’ve never seen before.”
Woman? Okay, not what I was expecting. I glance around at the houses then back at him. “Can you tell me what he looked like?”
His grin darkens and he tsks me. “Not so fast. First you gotta pay then I’ll give the info.”
I shake my head. “How much?”
“I don’t want your money.” His gaze lingers on my breasts before slowly traveling up to my face.
“Fuck you,” I say, my hand moving for my gun, ready to threaten him, but then I stop when I realize just how stupid of a move that would be.
Luscious slaps the guy on the back of the head. “Don’t me an ass. Just tell her what you told me.”
He glares at her. “Watch it bitch.”
Luscious raises her hand to hit him again, but I quickly pull two twenty’s out of my bra and wave it in his face. “Forty bucks if you just tell me what the woman looked like.” I’m not even sure if it’ll matter, if I’ve never seen the guy before.
He stares at the money for a second then snatches it out of my hands. “Yeah, okay.” He stuffs the money into his pocket. “She looked like you.” He starts to walk off, but I snag him by the arm.
“Don’t be an asshole,” I snap. “I gave you forty bucks now tell me what she looks like.”
He looks back at me, then down at my hand on his arm. “Hands off bitch,” he says.
“Not until you tell me.”
“I already told you she looked like you. Tall. Nice tits and ass. Same eyes and your faces looked pretty the same too. She was a little older maybe, but still hella fine.” He winks at me and makes this disgusting pucker with his lips.
“Oh yeah.” Luscious slams her hand against her forehead. “I saw her too, but I thought she was you. Except she was dressed in all leather which didn’t seem like something you would wear”
Leather? What the hell? “I wasn’t here this morning.”
Luscious shrugs. “Well, I thought it was you. Sure as hell looked like you.”
“Nah, I got up close to her,” the guy says. “She looked older and a little bot different. Bigger breasts too.”
My heart misses a beat in my chest as I stand frozen in time, lips parted, shocked to my very core. “Older like someone who could be my mother?”
“Mother. Older sister. Whatever.” He jerks his arm out of my hold. “We’re done here. I gotta get back to work.”
This time I let him walk off. It doesn’t matter if he stayed or not. I’m completely speechless. Someone that looked like me. Someone like a mother or a sister. Problem is I don’t have a sister. And my mother’s dead.
So who the hell is she?
Chapter 4
Lola
I’m falling apart. Almost two years of suppressing my emotions and now their all manifesting in the form of anxiety. The thing that really sucks is that I only had an hour from when I was at The Dusky Inn until I had to meet my client for the night.
I think about calling my Aunt Glady, seeing if maybe she knows any of my relatives who look like me and perhaps have a leather fetish. There’s a ton I’ve never met before, so who the hell knows. Maybe my father has one of my aunts or cousins out looking for me. Although, I don’t know why the hell he’d have them give me strange notes. It doesn’t make any sense and I really don’t want to get my Aunt Glady involved in this. It’s why I cut ties with her almost two years ago.
So instead I do what I need to do and get cleaned up to go to work, making sure to pack my gun. I pretty much check over my shoulder every five seconds, knowing that someone out there, in the street, in the restaurant—everywhere—there’s probably someone watching me.
Thankfully, I’m a pro at turning myself off when I need to. Despite my rattle nerves, the night goes smoothly. I have dinner with my client Tenner, a tall, larger guy in his early thirties, who smells like cheap cologne and who can’t seem to take his eyes off my cleavage. I make sure to drink a lot of scotch, because scotch makes almost anything okay, including sex with a guy I’m in no way attracted too. Then we go up to the room where it’s clear he wants sex despite what he said to Nyjah so I strip everything off but my boots so my gun will stay hidden.
He’s nervous and it’s my job to make him relaxed so I sit him down on the bed and straddle him. “Relax baby,” I tell him as he grips at my hips. For a moment I wince at his touch, but then smile, pretending that it’s Layton I’m touching. I always picture him when I do this, which is probably fucked up in so many ways but so am I. Sex with Layton had always been good, despite the many complications between us and it’s the one time I can think of him without being bombarded by emotions. Sex has always been sort of a relaxing, calming sort of experience for me, and now it’s become my way of numbing. Like I’ve devoured glass after glass of Whiskey.
“I am relaxed,” Tenner promises, then leans in to kiss me, his eyes closing, his lips puckered.
I put my hand over his mouth and slant back, shaking my head, but keeping my charming smile on. “No kissing on the mouth. Remember.” My rule, not The Dusky Inn’s. It was my one stipulation when I started working there, something that bugged Reagan but Nyjah made it his duty to inform all the clients of this. The no kissing rule had started with something my mother had told me, but honestly, after Layton died, I made a silent promise to myself never to kiss a guy ever. He’d stolen a short kiss that night when we fucked in the bathroom stale and I want that to be the last kiss I ever have.
I lower my hand as his eyes open, and then let my hands wander toward his cock, turning inside everything off until I feel so numb I swear I’ve died. I’ve done it a hundred times and it’s starting to get somewhat alarming how easily I can shut down in the snap of a finger. Sometimes I wonder if one day I won’t be able to turn it back on.
As my hand brushes his harness, Tenner reaches down and grabs my wrist roughly, apparently shaking all of his nerves in a second flat—either that or it was just a facade. “I was told that I could do whatever.”
This isn’t the first time a guy’s gotten a little rough with me and I know the best thing to do is keep everything calm. “Well, whoever told you that was wrong? There are a few things I don’t do. Like kissing.” Why the hell did Nyjah not tell him this?
His fingertips press downward, fingernails biting my skin. “Wrong or not, I want what I was told I would get. I paid good money for you.”
“It’s just a kiss,” I tell him calmly. “No big deal. I have a lot of other talents.” I reach for his cock again, although this time it’s not as easy at the first, my irritation getting to me.
He swats me hand away and suddenly I’m being flipped over onto the bed on my belly. He pushes down on me, pressing my face into the mattress. “It’s just a kiss for now, but the next thing I know you’ll be stealing my wallet and taking off before I even get laid.”
I don’t squirm. Don’t scream. Barely breathe. I’m not afraid. Not yet anyway. “Whoever did that to you didn’t work for Nyjah. We have rules there. Now just tell me what you want.”
He shoves on me harder, his hand on my back, his weight hovering over me and he leans down and breathes in my ear, “I want you to scream.” I feel his weight come down on me, his hand hitting me in the back of the head. It feels like my skull cracks and my ears start to ring.
“Mother fucker,” I curse, blinking my vision back into focus. That went downhill really fast. I try to slam my head back against but he dodges my advances. Fighting against his weight, I wiggle my arm out from under me and lean to the side, reaching down to my boot. I can feel the tip of his hard on pressing against me, one hand grabbing my hair, the other pushing me down and I know that at any moment he’s going to slip inside me. It shouldn’t be different, but it is. It feels twister and makes me feel sick to my stomach so mustering up every ounce of strength I have, I push upward, forcing his weight off me. My hand slides into my boot and as I roll
over I withdraw my gun.
He’s about to lunge at me, but catches sight of the gun and stops in his tracks, kneeling on the edge of the bed near my legs and putting his hands up. “What the hell is this shit? This wasn’t part of the deal.”
Sitting up, I keep the gun aimed at him, hating that my hand is a little unsteady. “What deal?”
His eyes are wide and full of alarm. “My deal with Reagan. He said if I paid an extra five hundred I could get rough with you. He’s done it for me before with another woman.”
Fucking Reagan. His morals have always questionable at best and I’m starting to wonder if maybe this is why Nyjah pushed so hard for me to stop escorting—perhaps he knew this shit was coming. Maybe that’s where the date offer was coming from. Perhaps he knew this is what I’d be facing tonight.