I step around the side of his desk, over to where he is, and pull myself onto it, sitting on the corner, facing him. My dress rides up, the tops of my lacy thigh-highs visible. I hand him the stack of cash, and he takes it, his gaze lingering on my thighs for a moment before he starts counting.
When he finishes, he opens a desk drawer and tosses the cash into it. He says nothing, just takes it. Not long ago, he used to offer promises, words of encouragement, but these days his brand of help is more like extortion, like I’m paying for his silence.
Well, I kind of am, but that’s beside the point here...
His hand finds its way to my knee before running up my thigh, slipping beneath the bottom hem of my dress, his calloused fingertips caressing my skin. He’s handsy, sometimes copping a feel—inspecting the goods, he calls it—but he never tries to take it any further. Some might say he’s a decent human being for it. I say he’s just embarrassingly impotent.
No amount of little blue pills will get that gearshift out of park, if you know what I’m saying.
So I tolerate it... for now... until the day comes when I don’t need this place or his help anymore.
There’s another knock on the door, and George gets up with a sigh, pulling his hand away as he struts to the door, unlocking it and yanking it open.
“Boss,” a quiet male voice says as someone walks in. I look that way, tensing when I see a vaguely familiar guy. Young, with a buzzed head and soft hazel-colored eyes. He was at the bar tonight, the one a few blocks away.
He’d been with that guy, the one with the scar on his face and a lot of money in his wallet, the one drinking cheap rum straight from the bottle.
Oh shit.
I turn away, my back to the guy as he sits behind me, on the other side of the desk, hoping like hell he didn’t notice me tonight. George retakes his seat, his hand right back on my thigh, tracing the lace with his fingertips.
“So?” George says. “How did it go with Scar?”
Scar? Seriously? How cliché can someone be?
The guy clears his throat. “He says he has nothing to do with what’s been happening.”
“Horse shit,” George says. “It’s gotta be him. Who else would have the balls to steal from me?”
Everyone, I think, keeping that to myself, pretending I’m not listening so George won’t kick me out. Hell, I’d steal from him if I didn’t count on his generosity to stay afloat. It wouldn’t exactly be hard. He doesn’t even lock the drawer he tosses his cash into.
“I don’t know,” the guy says, “but he was insistent, even got mad at the insinuation that he was a thief.”
“He is a thief!” George says, raising his voice, his hand stilling on my knee. “He extorts half this fucking city!”
“But he says he didn’t steal from you,” the guy says. “I still presented your offer, though, that you’d be willing to cut him in if he’d knock it off, and he told me, well... he told me to bring you his counter offer, instead.”
“Which is, what? Fifteen percent? Twenty? I’m not going over twenty-five, there’s no way.”
“He doesn’t want your money.”
“What does he want?”
“An apology, I’m guessing.”
“What? Is that what he said?”
“Well, no.” The guy pauses. “He said for you to suck his cock, but I’m pretty sure an apology was the sentiment he was going for.”
My lips twitch as I force back a smile. Oh god, don’t laugh. I seem to be the only one in the room that finds it funny. George’s nostrils flare as he grips my knee, squeezing it.
“He said that?” George asks, his voice a low growl. “For me to suck his cock?”
“Yes,” the guy says. “Said he won’t kill you if you do a good enough job.”
Oh, wow, this just keeps on getting better. I bite my cheek, hard, trying to keep a straight face, but I’m finding that hard at the moment. George’s cheeks glow bright red, his eyes bugging out of their sockets, like those words have him so messed up he’s about to blow a gasket.
George, he isn’t exactly the scariest guy on the planet, but he certainly intimidates a lot of people, with his in-your-face attitude and his fiery temper. Oh, and he’s also got one hell of an inflated ego, like he’s invincible, which I guess compensates for the whole flaccid penis deal. I don’t know. Who do I look like, Dr. Phil?
The point is, George struggles to keep his cool, which is showing at the moment, as his grip on my leg starts to hurt, like he’s about to rip off my kneecap.
“The son of a bitch thinks he can threaten me?” George spats. “He thinks I’m afraid of him, that I’m going to apologize to him? He thinks this is all a joke? That I’m a joke?”
The guy doesn’t answer. Maybe it’s rhetorical, I don’t know. But it’s damn sure got me curious—does he? I know nothing about him, except he carries a lot of cash and he caught onto my game pretty fast.
“I’ll kill him,” George continues, standing up, finally letting go of my leg so he can pace around the small office. “Suck his cock? I’ll cut it off! I’ll cut it off and shove it down his throat, make him choke on it for talking like that! The nerve!”
The guy is still quiet. I turn my head, chancing a peek at him, and see he’s staring at me. Shit. I don’t know who he is. I stay far away from that side of George’s business for good reason. One of his little thug henchmen, I’m guessing.
“Go back to him,” George says. “You go back to that motherfucker, and you give him a message.”
“What kind of message?” the guy asks, finally looking away.
“The kind that comes with a bullet, Ricardo. That kind.”
Ricardo—as his name seems to be—lets out the quietest sigh before saying, “I hear you.”
“Go on.” George waves toward the door as he throws himself back down in his chair. “Get the hell out of here.”
Ricardo leaves without another word, closing the door behind him. I sit here, not moving, waiting for George to calm down. Move too fast and I might spook him; linger too long and he might think I’m eavesdropping.
Well, I mean, I kind of am, but raising his suspicion isn’t my intention. I’m trying to lay low these days, just squeak by under the radar.
George runs his hands down his face in frustration, grumbling under his breath, before his eyes settle on me. “Is there something you need?”
“Nope,” I say, offering him a smile, one he doesn’t return. “Just taking care of business. I’ll get out of your hair now.”
“You do that,” he says.
Shoving off the desk, I tug my dress down, covering myself up before walking out. The music is still going strong, the bass vibrating the floor as I head through the club, navigating the dark hallway to the back door.
A cloud of smoke greets me as I step outside, the kind that makes my eyes burn and my nose twitch. Ricardo lurks there, right outside the door, frantically puffing on a cigarette, lips wrapped around the end of it like a porn star sucking dick. He turns when he hears me, tensing, alarmed, and lets out a stream of smoke my direction.
I wave it away, grimacing. Gross.
“Sorry,” he mutters, puffing on the thing a few more times, back-to-back, before throwing it down and stomping it out, twisting his boot-clad foot on it so feverishly that he tears it to shreds.
Sorry isn’t a word I hear often, especially not from any of the men I encounter in life. I kind of feel bad for the guy. Something’s got him frazzled, and really, who am I to judge someone’s vices?
“It’s okay,” I say. “Rough night?”
“You could say that,” he says, eyeing me warily. “You one of Amello’s girls?”
“You could say that,” I tell him, repeating his words.
He nods. “How much?”
“How much what?”
“How much do you go for? How much to take you in one of those back rooms right now and turn you out for an hour?”
The sympathy I felt just a second ago? Gone. “I’m not one of those girls.”