There was always a moment when I was working where the shame over what my life had become inevitably rushed to the surface. I hated that moment. It was the hardest part of my job… my life. I had become so well trained that my body no longer faked the physical reaction I wished I could hide.
“Come on, Diamond.” James moved against me. His hands were by my head, and I turned my face and closed my eyes so I didn’t have to see him. Not that James was bad to look at. As far as clients went, he was one of the better looking and nicer ones I had.
My hips rocked involuntarily, my body shook, and my arms tightened around his lower back. He released immediately after me.
It was over, and it wasn’t so bad that time. The shame I felt at my inability to control my orgasm surfaced like a small ripple instead of the vast wave that normally hit me. I would not cry in front of James. I would save it for later, if I allowed the emotions to come at all.
We dressed in silence, and once I’d fixed my hair, James turned to me. He pushed his light brown hair back with one hand, his other hand loosely held his black framed glasses at his side.
“Forgive me for asking, but I’ve always been curious,” he spoke slowly, as if he was afraid of hurting me. Ironic, yes?
I raised one eyebrow, waiting for him to finish.
“How did a nice, beautiful girl like you end up as one of Penny’s girls?”
I wanted to say that my mom sold me to pay for her drug habit, but I didn’t. And it was only partly true. The rest was too painful to think about—the life I had before my dad turned on the Nordic Lords. The night before my ex-fiancé, Ryker, killed his dad and took off and out of town without a word to me. One text, dismissing our relationship, was all I got. A relationship where I’d loved him since before I knew what love was. I no longer allowed myself to think about that part of my life.
The truth was… sometimes life gave people lemons, and they made lemonade.
Life gave me a handful of rinds, seeds, and pulp, and I made the most of the crap hand I was dealt.
I shrugged in answer.
“How’d a nice guy like you end up calling for one of Penny’s girls?”
I had never asked a client this question, but James made me wonder. He seemed genuinely nice. He had a preppy haircut and he looked intelligent and handsome with his plastic framed glasses and the fancy suits he always wore when he called on me. He drove from five hours away just for two hours with me.
He blinked once, then twice, debating whether or not to answer.
“My wife had an affair with my best friend and I can’t bring myself to touch her.”
His honesty stunned me. So did the lack of emotion in his voice. “So an eye for an eye sort of thing?” He smiled, but his eyes were sad. I knew that look. It was the same look I saw when I looked at myself in the mirror. “Why don’t you leave her then?”
He was silent for a bit, then turned away as he tucked his tie into his pocket and shrugged on his suit jacket. “I care about my wife and I won’t divorce her. I just… can’t forgive her either.”
I understood how that felt. It felt strange to connect with someone whose life was so different than mine, yet full of similar pain.
“I can find someone else,” he said, turning back to me, “next time.”
I shook my head and smiled. It may have actually been genuine. He was nice and didn’t hurt me. As far as clients went, I could spend time with worse. “It’s okay. You’re not so bad.”
He laughed once. It was deep and rich and full of a lightness that told me even though he was going through a hard time, he had an easy life. I envied him instantly.
“You might not be so good for my ego.” His eyes flickered to me and then to his wallet. He’d already paid one thousand dollars for my two hours. I was a whore, but I didn’t come cheap. He handed me a generous tip with an almost sheepish look on his face. I couldn’t tell if he was ashamed of what he was doing or if it was pity for me.
“So, can I ask what you do after this?”
“Shower.” I regretted the quick response when his already hesitant smile flattened. I could almost see the guilt over what he’d done to me. I didn’t see it on a client’s face very often, and for some reason I didn’t want him to feel so bad. It wasn’t his fault I had the life I did.
He nodded.
I watched James walk down the hallway of the hotel and away from me. He had only come to see me a handful of times, but there was something about him—the lost look in his eyes when he mentioned his wife, the way his shoulders curved inward as he walked away, that told me how defeated he felt. It made me call out his name before he reached the stairwell and disappeared from me. I had a suspicion I wasn’t going to be seeing him again anyway.
“Go home to your wife,” I told him, resting a hip against the doorway, my arms crossed in front of me. I let them fall to my sides. “Figure out how to make it work.”
His lips pursed together like he was thinking of saying something, but he changed his mind. He raised his chin and lifted his hand in a half-hearted wave. “Good-bye, Diamond.”
Diamond.
I blinked away the memories of the dark eyes that used to croon the name into my ears as he made love to me. Stupid me for choosing that as my working name in the first place. It pierced straight to my chest every time. As if my punishment wasn’t bad enough.
“Bye, James,” I returned with an understanding smile before he vanished into the doorway. I watched the empty hallway, unashamed that someone could walk out of their rooms and see me in my satin robe and negligee with my hair looking freshly fucked. Everyone in Jasper Bay knew who I was—knew who I’d become. There was no point in hiding it anymore.
Turning back to the room, I clicked the lock in place before stripping back out of my clothes and stepping into the hotel’s scalding hot water. I always showered before I left, needing to wash the feel of a man’s hands off me immediately.
I replayed the conversation with James in my head as I dried off from the shower and re-dressed in my skinny jeans, silver ballet flats, and a loose-fitted black top that hid my figure. It was the first friendly, and potentially honest, conversation I’d had in almost five years.
I hit the back stairway intent on leaving Penny’s for a night at home with my drugged out mom. I’d watch mindless television, maybe knit a scarf. If I started now, in July, I might have it done by the time winter hit in northern Minnesota. I scoffed at the idea. Screw that. Wine and ice cream seemed like a much better plan.
I was mentally creating a quick grocery list as I walked down the back hallway in Penny’s. It was lined with private rooms where clients could request blowjobs and quickies. The room upstairs where I had been with James were used for the “longer term” requests and the rest were rented out by the week. Reputable men like James were rare finds as far as clients went. Most of the clients and boarders were bikers from the Black Death Motorcycle Clubs other charters passing through town for the week.
Surprisingly, the main room in Penny’s was tastefully decorated. I took in the red couches and the women who sat around and tried to catch attention from the men who perused the room. They smiled, they swayed their hips, and they licked their lips. They took every good thing God had given to women and used it for evil and sinfulness, all while keeping a fake smile of interest plastered on their faces.
We were wicked women. Unforgiveable. It made absolutely no difference that I was forced into this life. It didn’t matter that my mother’s life and safety were held over my head in return for willingly and happily spreading my legs.
I was no different than the women who chose this life.
We all did what we needed to in order to survive.
“Diamond.” The deep, greasy voice rang in my ear and snapped me back to the present. I twisted around and looked at Mills. He was gross. The worst Black Death member when it came to what he wanted physically. He actually preferred it when I acted like I didn’t enjoy it. He was sick. Demented.
And I was his favorite whore.
I tasted vomit deep in my throat, but smiled pleasantly. “Yes, Mills?”
His eyes roamed my body, making me wish I could go back upstairs and take another shower. Thankfully, I was off duty for the next few days. Mills would have to wait.
He finished his slow and slick perusal of my intentionally, well-covered frame and nodded his head toward the door.
“Someone’s looking for a room.”
“And?” I asked, cocking a hand to my hip. “I’m off duty.” The only benefit to being as good as I was at pleasing men was that I had earned the respect of several Black Death members. They let me quit working the main floor two years ago and I started working in their office handling all their accounts… at least the legal ones. Booking rooms for boarders was part of my job description. My other job description was taking appointment only clients, like James. I was, after all, the best whore in northern Minnesota.
“The client’s in a hurry and Hammer’s on a run.” I rolled my eyes. Of course he was. The president of Black Death was almost always on a run of some sort.
“Fine,” I said as I rolled my eyes.
Mills grinned. A full set of yellowed teeth appeared. By the way the light bounced off of them, they looked rotten. Like his soul.
I spun around, needing to get away from Mills, and I was in such a hurry that I quit paying attention to the people in the room until I met another Black Death Member, Slick, standing with his back to me. His leather cut stretched across his back and I knew his arms were crossed over his chest. His feet were firmly planted as he refused to let our visitor walk around him.
And when I finally saw him, I wished Slick would have kicked the man out the door, directly onto his ass.
Ryker. Fiancé.
The vomit taste was back in my throat as I skipped over his face, my brain not allowing me to focus on the man I had wished for years would come back and save me.
Stupid idiot, I scolded myself. He wasn’t that anymore. He had taken off and left me alone to deal with the fallout of my dad turning on his own motorcycle club. The only opportunity to keep my mom alive was aligning with Death. Literally.
My eyes dropped to the floor and I saw his boots. I saw the jeans that fit him perfectly. I saw the wrinkly black t-shirt that stretched across his chest and biceps. I saw the black duffel bag in one hand, and his other hand rolling into a fist and releasing.
“Faith?” I couldn’t keep from looking at him when he said my name. I looked up and saw him blink several times, as if he thought I was an apparition.
His jaw dropped in shock.
I wanted to reach out and slap the shit out of him while at the same time throw myself into his arms and beg him to save me, to take me away from my hell. But it was too late. The Faith he knew was gone forever.
“You work here?”
I cocked my head to the side, trying to understand how he didn’t already know this. Had Daemon never told him what I had become? That thought was followed quickly by what in the hell was Ryker doing here?
The question was answered as it slipped through my mind. Olivia had been shot. Daemon probably called him. Black Death had put me on lockdown since I could be connected to her. It was the one freedom they’d given me weeks ago—allowing me to reconnect with my old friend.
Now, they wouldn’t let me visit her in the hospital or talk to her. Everywhere I went was accompanied by two Black Death members tracking my every move.
I blinked quickly several times as I remembered the night Ryker had promised to fix everything. And then instead of doing that, he had left me; he’d left my life a thousand times more screwed up than it already had been.
I was here, and it was his fault.
My lips curved into a smile. My back straightened. I would not fall back into his trap. He wouldn’t be here long, anyway. I knew he wouldn’t. There was no way in hell Ryker was sticking around town.
“I’m the best they have.” I watched him wince with a sick smile of satisfaction ghosting across my lips. “And you need to leave. Nordic Lords aren’t welcome here anymore.”
“I’m not a part of Nordic Lords.” I watched his hand curl into a fist again. His shoulders were tense and his eyes scanned the room like he was prepared to take out every man in the place. He looked like he wanted to throw me over his shoulder, haul my ass out of there, take me back to his rig off the coast of New Orleans, where I’d heard he was working and living, and never let me leave. My stomach flip-flopped at the thought.
Crap.
I leveled my eyes at him, hoping my expression was close to ambivalence in order to mask the pain searing through me.
“I’m not a part of Nordic Lords,” he repeated more firmly.
I shrugged. Close enough. I was about to tell him that when a warm hand came out and clasped me at the back of my neck. I moved closer to Slick, as if I enjoyed him touching me.
One side of Ryker’s lips twitched as he glared at the man pretending to be my guard. In a sense, I supposed he was, considering they owned my ass.
“You need go to. Like Diamond said, we don’t have a room for you.” Slick stressed the “we”, but we weren’t and never would be a “we”. I didn’t bother to correct him. The less Ryker knew of me, the better.
“It looks like a lot has changed around here.” Ryker still hadn’t taken his eyes off Slick’s hand on me. I wondered if it was jealousy. And then I wondered why I cared anymore. Ryker had been the one to leave me. If he was jealous, it was his own damn fault.
I smiled. It wasn’t genuine, and I saw a flash of rage in his eyes. “That can happen in five years.”
Ryker’s head dropped, and he took a deep breath before drawing his eyes slowly back to mine. He didn’t check me out, not the way most men did, but I still felt his gaze on every inch of my skin. It prickled with interest.
Shit.
“I supposed I shouldn’t be surprised,” he said, his lips twisting into a wicked grin. “You always did seem to prefer Black Death.”
I scowled. What in the hell did that mean?
He left without another word. Slick dropped his hand from my neck when Ryker was gone. I turned to him and glared.
“While that pissing match of yours was fun to watch, next time, do it without your hands on me.” I turned and stalked to the back office without waiting for his response. I wouldn’t get one anyway.