Chapter 1
ABBY
“No! Get your hands off of my parents,” Bailey screamed.
“I’ll kill you,” my father yelled at the police officer. “I’ll hunt you down and cut your heart out.”
“George, stop threatening him; it’s just going to make it worse. Girls, you take care of yourselves. We’ll be back for you. It’s just a few days. We’ll be back,” my mother sobbed.
“I’ll do whatever the hell I want and this son of a bitch better watch his back,” my father continued.
“I love you, girls. I love you,” our mother said as she was put into the backseat of the police car.
“I’ll die without my mommy,” Samantha cried as she ran toward the police car.
“Mommy … Mommy … Mommy …”
I woke up, sitting bolt upright in bed as the dream settled into my mind. It wasn’t the first time I had dreamed about that horrible day. It had been the moment when my sisters and I lost our parents forever.
No one ever thinks they can survive the loss of their parents. Luckily, most people never have to deal with it. But our parents made some pretty big mistakes, and they paid for them dearly, but so did we.
I remembered that day so vividly, even without dreams it was very clear in my mind. I held onto my sisters Bailey and Samantha as they both cried uncontrollably for our parents. They cried for hours and hours. When the social worker came to get us, I couldn’t take it another minute and finally let the tears quietly roll down my cheeks as well. It wasn’t the first time we had seen them taken away by the police. But it was the first time I had felt so much dread.
Mrs. Lynton was our social worker and on that day, she appeared unusually solemn when she arrived. Her normally optimistic attitude was gone, and I didn’t know why. Later, I would learn that she already knew we weren’t going to get to see our parents again. She had been working with them, and they were on probation. But this arrest was their last chance, and the social worker knew that they were going away for a very long time.
“Girls, we have a foster home for all three of you, this time,” she had said to us. “You won’t be separated.”
You would think that would have made me happy, but the truth was, I didn’t care. My emotions were dulled to the situation, and I couldn’t stand to be anywhere that I felt caged up. The Barristers were actually the nicest foster parents we had ever had in our ten years of back and forth between home and our parents. But it didn’t matter to me. If I couldn’t have my parents, I wanted to be on my own. I was seventeen years old, and there was nothing the Barristers could do to convince me I should stay in Wichita, Kansas another second.
When Mrs. Lynton came about a week after our placement to tell us that our parents would not be able to regain custody, this time, I lost it. I lost my teenage mind. The screaming started as an involuntary reaction to the hurt I felt inside. But then I couldn’t stop myself; I didn’t want to stop myself. When I finally ended up locked in my room, I knew I needed to leave. I had to get away from Bailey and Samantha and give them a chance to be happy. They were only 16 and 13 years old. They were still children, and they deserved to try to be happy.
It’s funny to me that I thought of Bailey and Samantha as children but I thought of myself as an adult. I was only a year older than Bailey and certainly could have used the love and understanding of a caring adult. But my heart was in so much pain, I couldn’t stay in that home another moment longer. I honestly thought I was doing what was best for my sisters. I believed that leaving them there was better than me staying there with them.
I was almost 18 when I ran away, so the state didn’t look for me very hard. They figured I was more trouble than I was worth, and it was probably better that I had left instead of causing a bunch of trouble in the foster home. Kids in foster homes were often getting into fights and causing so much chaos that they had to be placed in special units that were run by the state. I felt like I would have ended up in one of those units if I had stayed there.
Our foster parents were kind, but with each nice comment they made toward me, I felt myself lashing out at them. They couldn’t replace our parents, and no matter how nice they were to us, that would never change. It would never bring our parents back.
In retrospect, I was hurting and scared. I thought I was grown up enough to know better than the adults around me. I didn’t. But I couldn’t take back the past and the decisions I had made were what made me who I was in the end. They made me strong enough to deal with absolutely anything that came at me. I didn’t need someone to take care of me, I could take care of myself.
Leaving my sisters was the hardest thing I’d ever done. But I tried to stay in touch, and now that Samantha had just turned 18, both my sisters were living on their own. Bailey had moved into our old family home when she turned 18 with the help of a local church group, and Samantha had just recently moved in with her. It was perfect for them, but I knew they were having a hard time paying the bills. Plus, they had received some notices about owing back taxes as well. I had to make more money so I could help them.
It had been four years since I arrived in New York City with dreams of acting on Broadway. As I lay in the bed of a man I didn’t know, in an apartment I had never been in before, I certainly wasn’t living the dream that I’d had for myself. But whoever really got their dreams when they wanted them? I didn’t expect things to come easily to me, and I was more than willing to work for the life I wanted.
My life wasn’t horrible, though. George was a guy I had met while out at a club with Isabella. He was kind and seemed rather lonely. We talked and danced and had a great night together. When he invited me back to his place, I knew I would say yes. The nice guys were the best ones to spend time with.
“Good morning beautiful,” George said as his naked body rolled over and he kissed my hand.
He had been naked in the hope that I would want to do more than sleep next to him in the bed. But he obviously didn’t know that I was using him for his warm and comfortable apartment. He was a nice guy, and someday I was sure that he would find a decent girl; it just wasn’t going to be me.
Everything about George repulsed me. His pale skin, the zits on his face, they all made me absolutely sick to my stomach. But coming home with him hadn’t been about having sex or being attracted to the guy. I chose George because he was harmless. He was the kind of guy who probably didn’t bring that many women home with him, and he was the sort of guy who wouldn’t force the issue if I didn’t sleep with him. In my world, nice guys were exactly who I was looking for. Not because I wanted to date them, but because I needed a place to sleep.
“Morning,” I said as I put my actress skills to work and flashed him a brilliant smile.
Men liked it when you smiled in the morning; I had learned that over the years. It was hard to find a man to date in New York City. Most of them were so caught up in their jobs that they didn’t want to take the time to get to know someone. But it wasn’t hard to find a guy to go home with when I needed to; the unattached nature of a one-night stand was easier on a man’s brain.
It typically started as one night. But then I was sweet to them, sweeter than any girlfriend they had ever had before. We laughed, made breakfast together, and I left nonchalantly without a care in the world. But I always got their number and always stayed in touch. For weeks, I would flirt and build them up, in the hopes of finding one I could stand to live with for a little bit.
Sometimes, I came across a man that I liked enough to stay with for a week, and sooner or later I would give in and have sex with him. But typically, I didn’t stay long enough to ever have any real emotions about a guy.
“How are you feeling?” George asked me.
His hand traced up and down my arm as he looked at me with genuine concern. I had pretended to be sick in the middle of our passion the previous evening. It was a ploy to keep me from sleeping with him, and it had worked.
I did have to suffer through his naked, hairy body lying next to me all night long, but that was a small price to pay for a comfortable bed in the middle of winter. I had slept in much worse conditions and was grateful to have made a connection with George.
“I’m still a bit fuzzy,” I said as I smiled at him and held his hand. “Maybe some food would help?”
I was starving, not having eaten much at all in the last couple of days. Only a few scraps of food from the restaurant I worked at and some drinks that George had purchased for me the night before. It wasn’t unusual for me to go without eating, but I never got used to it. When your body was hungry, there wasn’t much else you could do but find some food and give yourself the nourishment you needed.
Mostly, I held his hand to prevent him from trying to slide it anywhere that I didn’t want it to go. But it was a nice touch of intimacy as well. There was a balance of intimacy that was needed to hook a guy, and I wanted that balance not to include sex.
Sure, I sometimes slept with a guy when he was extremely handsome and someone I wanted to date in the long run. But those guys were few and far between. I had expertly come up with a plan of seduction that was working for me and it didn’t involve sex at all, just the promise of sex in the future … when I felt better.
Men were predictable creatures, and if you coddled them and promised them your body, they would almost always give me exactly what I wanted. I wanted to hate my life, but I actually really liked the attention from men. The power that came with seducing them was exhilarating.
“Would it help if I made us some breakfast? Or would you prefer to go out and grab something?” George asked as he got out of bed.
His cock was fully erect, and I tried not to look directly at it as he stood over the bed. He wanted me to see him. He wanted me to see how much his body wanted to be inside of mine, but I didn’t care. I was about to eat breakfast and then leave. I’d put George in my phone book as someone I could call again down the road when I needed an emergency place to stay for the evening.
“Oh, yes. Let’s eat here,” I said as I turned my back to George and got out of bed. “I’m so hungry, I don’t think I will even make it to a restaurant.”
I took an exceptionally long time stretching and pulling my hair into a ponytail hoping that he would finally go put some clothing on before breakfast. But I didn’t say a thing about him exposing himself to me. There was no need to say anything. I wasn’t trying to get George to be someone that he wasn’t. I didn’t really care all that much if he exposed himself to me. All I cared about was the fact of having slept ten solid hours in a nice warm bed.
The situation was unique for him, I was pretty sure. Typically when a guy had convinced a girl to come home with him, there was no doubt that he was going to get lucky. But poor George didn’t know that I had no intention of sleeping with him. I simply wanted to sleep.
As we sat at his dining room table, I took in the rather large New York City apartment that he had. George had said he was a business owner, but I couldn’t remember what he did. His apartment was by far the biggest I had been in for at least the last few months. In New York, that was saying a lot since most apartments were smaller than a typical living room from where I was from.
“Your eyes are amazingly blue and beautiful,” George said, staring at me while we ate our scrambled eggs.
“Thank you.”
“And your hair, it’s like the perfect shade of brown, and so soft,” he said as he reached up and ran his fingers through my hair.
I knew exactly where he was trying to lead things, and I needed to put a stop to it if I wanted to get to work on time. My day job, as a waitress, was essential to meeting high-quality guys, and I couldn’t lose it. The last two real boyfriends in my life I had met while waitressing. I needed to be on time to that job.
“Thanks so much for last night George. You were such a gentleman. Not too many guys are out there like you. I truly appreciate your sweet and genuine caring about my wellbeing.”
“Oh, you’re welcome,” he said, pulling his hand away from my hair. “I always make sure to treat women with the utmost respect.”
It was a classic move; tell a guy he was a gentleman, and he suddenly felt like a giant ass if he started to act less than gentlemanly. I had used it plenty of times. The only problem with my move was that it only worked on men that were generally well behaved. If I misjudged a man and he wasn’t respectable, then things sometimes got a little more difficult.
“Can I call you?” I said with a sweet smile.
“Oh, of course.” He grabbed a pen and started to write down his number. “You call me anytime. I’d love to take you out on a real date.”
“Thank you so much, George. I’ve got to run to work now. I’ll text you,” I moved in to kiss his cheek, but he turned and his lips touched mine.
I gave him a long, hard kiss in the hope that it paid off down the road, and maybe I could make something work with George. His place was plenty big enough to share, and it sounded like he worked a lot. It had been a long time since I had a regular boyfriend, but George seemed like a sweet guy and I definitely was considering him as a possibility.
As I left his apartment, I looked back and wrote down the number, just in case I ever needed to drop by or something. It was December in New York, and there was no way I was ever sleeping in a shelter. George seemed like the kind of guy that would let Isabella and I crash on his couch if we were in desperate need of a place. The nice guys were the best ones to keep around.
“Isabella, answer your damn phone,” I said to her voicemail as I walked toward the subway.
She had left with some jerk from the club, and I was worried sick about her. Isabella never made wise choices in the men she hung around with. Instead of looking at their financials and their ability to be sweet, she looked at their abs. I tried to explain to her that the hot guys were the ones she should stay away from, but she never listened.
Two minutes later, I got a text from her:
“Can’t talk. I’m with the sexy rocker. See you later at Glance; remember we are doing the peep show together tonight.”
“OK,” I replied.
Glance GoGo Club was our fun place. We both worked real jobs during the day and at Glance in the evenings. It was fun, and we got to party and get paid for it. Glance wasn’t a strip club, and both of us were highly against becoming strippers. Glance was a dancing club, and we got paid to dance on stage or in fun scenes. It wasn’t Broadway, but it was something better than my boring waitressing job.
I finished buttoning up my plain white top and tucked it into my tight black skirt. I worked the morning shift at Henderson’s on the Green. It was a restaurant in the lobby of the Ritz-Carlton and located on the south edge of Central Park. The breakfast crowd was my favorite, they tipped the most and there were often families. Rich families were much more generous than rich men alone. It seemed counter-intuitive, but I paid special attention to the wives and the children and always ignored the men. The wives appreciated that and tipped me well for it.
“You’re late Abigail,” my boss said as he wrote a note in his little notebook.
“Yes, I’m sorry Mr. Walden; I will stay late to make it up,” I said with a smile.
“OK. Thank you. Let’s try to be on time tomorrow.”
“Yes, sir.”
Mr. Walden was actually a really decent man. He had a wife and twin girls and worked his ass off at the restaurant. He was firm but fair, and I wanted to keep my job. Mr. Walden was the best boss I had ever had. He never tried anything with his waitresses and was extremely understanding with our outside lives. But his one sticking point was, he wanted us there on time. He couldn’t make the guests happy if he were understaffed, so most girls were eventually fired because they didn’t show up on time enough. I didn’t want to be one of those girls.
“Table two is the Gioacchino family. Be especially attentive to them,” Mr. Walden said.
“Who is he?”
“He’s bad news. Not quite the mob level, but bad news. Just be prompt and smile,” he said, returning to his office.
Mr. Gioacchino was handsome. He was older, maybe early fifties, but he dressed extremely hip. He had tattoos on his arms, with a short buttoned up shirt and loafers. His graying hair was styled long on top and shorter on the sides, and he had a perfectly manicured beard. I had never been one of those girls that chased after older men, but I would have chased after him for sure. Except he was married, and I didn’t go after married men.
“Good morning, can I get you some coffee?” I said, looking right at Mrs. Gioacchino.
I smiled and kept eye contact with her. She was beautiful, at least, ten years younger than her husband. Mrs. Gioacchino was dressed much more conservatively in a suit and had her blonde hair pulled up in a bun.
“I’ll take a black coffee,” Mr. Gioacchino said.
I briefly turned to him and smiled, but then quickly turned back to his wife. Even that quick glance into his eyes had sent an enticing shock through my body. He was even more handsome up close.
“I’m not really sure what I want,” his wife remarked.
“I’d suggest the cappuccino and a grapefruit, you look like you have business to do today, and they will give you energy without the drop later in the morning.”
I smiled, and maintaining my posture, turned toward Mrs. Gioacchino. She was my primary client, and I needed to make her happy. No flirting with her husband. No side glances at him. Only continued eye contact and helpfulness to her.
“Oh, yes darling. Thank you, that sounds delicious.”
“And anything else for you sir,” I said as I looked at my notepad and tried to avoid eye contact.
“I’d like the house special, thank you.”
“That girl is absolutely delicious, Aldo,” I heard Mrs. Gioacchino say as I walked away.
I couldn’t help smiling at her words. It wasn’t very often that other women were kind to me. Even if it was in a weird, flirting sort of way. It was nice to hear kindness from another woman. Most of the women I was around were intimidated by me. They thought I was going to steal their man or that I was some sort of bitch that wouldn’t be nice to them. I was always nice to the women I served at my tables, having learned that they were almost always the real ones in charge.
I wrote his order down on the move and then hurried to the back to give it to the cook. My co-workers stood there and stared at me as I returned to the back room. The look on their faces was ominous.
“You know who that is right?” Rob asked me.
“Yeah, Mr. Gioacchino.”
“Wow, was he scary? Do you think he has a gun with him?”
“What are you talking about Rob?”
“He was charged with eight murders back in 2005. Eight, not seven, not six … eight murders. He did them, but no one could prove it. Now he’s apparently gone legit, but no way I’d ever want to be face to face with the man.”
My blood went cold at the idea I had just served a murderer. He didn’t look like a murderer, but then again, I didn’t really know what one looked like. He certainly looked like a tough guy, and I would bet with him on any fight. Despite his age, he looked to be in excellent shape. But why would a murderer be eating at a fancy restaurant like ours?
“He seems like a normal family man to me,” I said, trying to ignore Rob.
“Yeah, normal like … hey, let me chop your head off …”
I finished serving the Gioacchinos and made a special point to compliment the wife; I wasn’t above flirting with a woman if it would get me a bigger tip. They gave me a hundred dollar tip for their breakfast and seemed rather nice. Except for the whole past murdering thing, Mr. Gioacchino seemed like a good guy.