After spent a period of time on the couch, kissing and becoming together again, they took a short ride out to a mall and watched a decent action movie, and then returned home with take-out bags of Chinese food. Sitting on the couch, they toyed with chopsticks, told jokes, and teased each other viciously.

 

The déjà vu experiences were far less assaultive these days. The weirdness of them was eroding away, as well. Each continued to report insights to the other, as they were revealed. It just felt like the fair way to handle it -- to let the other person know, that you knew something new about them, something that was probably very personal.

 

The experiences, as they saw them, felt like exposures of forced intimacy. This was a major challenge for both of them since neither of them had much experience with intimacy and detested being forced to do anything.

 

They were on their third after-dinner beer when Nicole told him, "I want to make something clear, Cole. If you'll have me, I want to leave the show -- when you are ready. I want to move into your house where brown is the tone spiked with blue. I want to water your dying plants, fix you meals, shower with you, sleep with you, and have sex with you. After these last few weeks, the show has nothing to offer me. Nothing. I do, however, want to know what you will do for employment after I quit. Am I leaving you in a spot?"

 

He searched her face as she said these words, and searched her expression now. "No, you won't be leaving me in a spot. I have savings and there are always jobs with the brotherhood. I could probably even acquire a real job. Maybe. Well, probably not without some favors called in since I've only had one real job in my whole life."

 

The visual intimacy she received regarding this job of Cole's was shocking to her. "Shoe sales?" she barked, nearly spilling her beer when she was suddenly submerged into a mall shop scene of young Cole on his knees before a woman, helping her try on shoes. He was pissed, because this was the twelfth pair the woman had tried on -- having no clue how sexually aroused the woman was at the sight of him down there. Nicole could read her. She wondered if the Cole she knew now could read her.

 

"I hated that job," Cole spat to her from his position on the couch.

 

Nicole laughed, her mirth becoming warm in her belly, "You had no idea what was going on, did you?"

 

"What?"

 

"The women!" she pushed, "They were all over you. Hell, you could have charged three dollars for fetching shoes and they would have paid. The woman I saw you with, the twelve shoe woman? Red hair? Large breasts? Probably thirty. She would have paid dearly to have you come home with her. She was about to cum in the store!" she continued to giggle and Cole took a lonely noodle from their pile of Chinese wrappers and tossed it into her hair.

 

"Hey," she complained.

 

"Hey yourself," he chided. "I was fifteen for crying out loud. Between a naked woman and the keys to a bike for an hour, I would have chosen the bike every time counting myself lucky."

 

She rubbed his shoulder and then kissed the side of his neck, "Don't keep me waiting like this, Cole. Do you want me? Could you want me? Is it still something we need to wait for?"

 

"Yes, I want you,” he told her clearly. After some thoughtful moments he said, “I take it, the faster we move you out, the better, right? I mean, once the news is clear…" he offered, never really understanding the politics of her life.

 

"Gabriel, of course, will want to hurt me if I leave him. I don't think he'll physically hurt me. He'll trash my apartment and break all my pretty things, like they mean anything to me now. He'll try to find out who I'm moving on to, so he can threaten and coerce me into coming back. He'll really be pissed if I try to take his clients. That's where the money is, but since I'm not taking anything, he'll likely just throw a fit and seek out some mean, nasty, little revenge for leaving, and that will be it. I'm not his slave for Christ's sake."

 

"Gabriel? That's the first time I've heard that name from you." Cole said, paying close attention to what was on the horizon of their future days.

 

"Gabriel Morelli. He's my pimp, Cole. The man in charge of the stable I'm in. Top of the food chain. My manager, Antonio, deals with finding new clients and keeping my security available. The finances are boring, so I won't lay that out, but Gabriel gets a large cut from my fees."

 

"How much are we talking about, for your fees?" Cole asked, and she heard in his voice risk calculation, not voyeuristic curiosity, so she told him.

 

Cole’s whole being seemed to drop into deep thought, "So, you don't have any agreement? No debt to pay off? No baggage you are leaving unclaimed? Nothing like that?"

 

"No, I don't. A lot of the girls, even the call girls, get hooked up on smack or some other filth in their veins. They wind up owing Gabriel in spite of the money they are pulling down, which, unfortunately, begins to become much less as the smack takes hold.

 

"That shit is powdered death. I've watched beautiful, intelligent, skilled women, transformed into corner smack whores in months because of heroin. I’ve heard, but placed blinders around the possibility of it being true, that Gabriel intentionally gets some women addicted to heroin so that he can break down their wills and control them easier, that he forces them to shoot up."

 

Her insides turned into watery disgust and revulsion at the idea of this really happening. "But you are right to ask," Nicole continued. "If I owed Gabriel anything, this would be a whole different story. I'd have to clear my debt, of course, which is always tricky. There are always residual fees, as he likes to call them. He likes us to owe him, but I don't. I'm clean and clear of any holds, and have money of my own.

 

"The apartment," she explained, "is in a building Gabriel and some partners own. They'll evict me as soon as they can without much concern for things like laws or contracts or leases. So, basically, on Thursday when I don't show up, if you want to do it this week, he'll trash whatever I couldn't take -- which, honestly, Cole, I don't give a shit about. I want some of my clothing, some of my shoes, my jewelry, and the stash I have of just-in-case money, with my laptop. That's it. Quick and dirty."

 

"May I ask how much that stash amounts to?" Cole asked.

 

"Twenty grand in hundreds, fifties, and twenties," she told him without hesitation.

 

He nodded. "Caution would suggest next week and, after my last brush against something that should've gone down easy, I would like to ask that we tip our hats to caution. So, next week, when I arrive at your place to drop you off for the evening, we'll both bag and haul your things to the limo and bring it all over here. Then I'll drop the limo off and ride home.

 

"With a week's notice, I can get Rat and a few of the other guys to help us haul things while keeping an eye on anyone trying to keep an eye on us. You mentioned the building is theirs. I'm guessing security is theirs, as well. I doubt we'll be able to make more than two trips before someone is rolling up to stop you or hassle you."

 

"Trucks would be better, Cole. No one would know I was running to you then," she suggested.

 

He agreed with that, on the belief that the less anyone knew about where she was running, the better.