Selling Out (20 page)

“Gee,” I said. “Do you think he wants to come in here?”

“Occupied,” Luke called over his shoulder.

I started toward the door. “I think we’re done here.”

“Oh no.” He stopped me. “We need to snort a few lines. Then
I’ll probably make you pay me back. On your knees. All that takes a while, so
he’s just going to have to wait.”

The picture he painted was so accurate it chilled me. “It
creeps me out how well you fall into this role.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Would you rather I open every
conversation with the Miranda rights?”

The banging on the door grew louder, stronger. I wondered if
the rusty metal pole of the mop could bend. More likely the door handle would
break off first.

Luke prowled over to the door and rattled the mop in the
door handle. “Hold your fucking horses.” He turned to me. “We should give them
a show.”

“Oh my God, you’re so long,” I said in a loud voice. “And
thin. And with all those bristles on the end.”

“You’re complimenting the mop here?” He strolled back.

I smirked. “He’s the only hard rod in the room, I believe.”

He reached me, standing close, then ducked his head to my
neck. With his hands on my hips, he pushed me onto the ledge of the sink.

“He can’t please you like I can, baby.”

“I don’t know about that.” My legs parted as he closed the
space between us. I stared at the fuzzy exposed pipes above us, wondering
exactly how far this little show would go. “I like a man who cleans up nice.”

His fingers walked up my thigh. “It’s all show. He’s limp
where it counts.”

“And you?” I matched his wandering fingers with my own,
traveling down his lean belly. “How are you?”

“Thorough,” he whispered, and my legs fell open a little
more.

He found the damp string of my thong and slipped past it.
The touch of his fingers on my slick skin was electric, sending waterlogged
sparks through my body. The thought alone was almost enough to bring me to
orgasm. He was touching me. Luke had his hand on my cunt, and what’s more—I
liked it. I was wet for him, not freaking out for him. As his fingers slipped
deeper, I began to rock against him. This was real, the most real sex I’d ever
had, in a dirty bathroom, with the door rattling angrily, while we both
pretended to be different people.

He stilled.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, breathless.

“Be louder,” he whispered.

His words poured cold water over my body. The tender skin
around his fingers ached; the dampness chilled. All this was a show.

I moaned loudly. “Is this right?” I muttered. “Am I doing it
right?”

His hands began to work their magic again, and to my
frustration, I slipped under their spell. My moans grew louder, fake and gaudy,
but beneath the wild cries resonated true pleasure. Underneath the facade of a prostitute
was a woman in heat. My long moans and heated encouragements gave way to
breathy pants.

“Why are you doing this?” Why taint the act with something
real? Why show me what I couldn’t have?

Without answering, he ducked down, matching his mouth to his
fingers. I let out a shout of surprise—one that would surely satisfy a curious
audience. I held myself suspended on shaking arms, a picture of wanton
depravity, spread open on the bathroom sink. He licked my clit while his
fingers fucked me, winding me tighter, dragging me higher, until the air was
too thin to breathe and the drop too high to look down. My hips rocked into his
mouth and waiting fingers, wanting more, seeking his generous tongue and the
sweet friction.

“Let go,” he muttered against me, and the vibrations, right
there, almost pushed me over. Almost, but not quite. I didn’t like to come with
a man. It had happened before, and each time, I had felt dirty.

“Stop thinking.”

“I can’t.” My lips formed the words silently.

“You can do this,” he insisted.

A desperate laugh escaped me. “The magic cock again?”

“My cock isn’t a part of this.”

He paused with his fingers inside me and looked at me, his
green eyes pure and bright and pained.

“This is just about you. Giving you pleasure. Making you
come.”

I had to ask. “Why?”

Not breaking his stare, he pushed his fingers deeper inside
me, searching, searching for a certain spot. I knew where—a little left—but I
wouldn’t help him. I didn’t want this, did I?

“Don’t you think you deserve it?” he asked. “Pleasure.
Orgasms.”

“You know I don’t,” I moaned, bucking against him.

“No,” he said, a little sadly, his fingers still rubbing and
stroking and searching. “You don’t think so. But you’ll let me do this. You’ll
let me lock you in a bathroom and force you, because then it wouldn’t matter if
you deserved it or not. You’d just be doing your job.”

“Ahhh,” I cried out as he found the right spot.

“There?” he asked, the tease.

“No, no,” I begged, because I didn’t deserve it, didn’t want
it, except for the burning desire to have him and keep him and feel this way
forever.

“Just take it,” he murmured. “You’re not responsible for
this.”

He closed his mouth over my clit once more, sucking and
lashing it as his fingers pushed me over. My entire body jerked once in a
futile protest before giving in to the flood of pleasure. Wave after wave
crashed over me, until my vision blurred to a distorted hue and my mouth filled
with water, and then he was kissing me, soothing me, rocking me gently back to
shore. I shuddered against his still hand as the last vestiges of my orgasm
left me.

Like the insistent cawing of seagulls, the rattling on the
door was too distant to disturb my stupor.

“Oh, Luke,” I sighed, resting my forehead against the
softness of his neck.

Tension tightened his body broken only by the tremors that
ran through him.

“Let me touch you,” I said, knowing he wouldn’t. In that
way, he was like me.

“I didn’t mean for this to happen,” he said gruffly.

“Sex in a dirty bathroom is usually a spur-of-the-moment
activity. Or so I assume. I have never done it before.”

“Really?” His voice was wry. “An accomplished sexual maestro
like yourself?”

“Yes, well, usually I have standards about these things.”

“Except with me.” The amusement was gone.

“You’re my new standard,” I said softly. “Anything else
doesn’t compare.”

He pulled back, his features strained. “God, Shelly. The
things you do to me, the things you say. I can’t even lust after you properly.
I want to devour you, swallow you whole. I want to secret you away where no one
can ever take you from me, not even you.”

My breath caught at the jagged edge of longing that grated
his voice. If ever I had imagined us together, there were silk petals on satin
sheets and scented candles in the window. Sweet words and courtly manners were
a safe fantasy. But this feral desire did more than woo me—it thrilled me. A
dark and primal part of me awoke from deep slumber and stretched, its sleek
black body rippling with its urge to claim, to mark, to devour him right back
until we were inseparable. I wanted to drown in the sea of possession, to tie
myself to his weight and throw myself into the water, so that even if I lost my
nerve, we would still be together. “You won’t be satisfied until I’m ruined,
will you?”

His eyes swirled green and black, molten malachite, as he
murmured, “Turnabout is fair play.”

As we left the small bathroom, sauntering past the angry
line of people, I wondered if it was true. Would I be willing to ruin his
career to make him want me? And if he did abandon his principles for me, would
I even want him still?

We handed over a few hundreds to get into the back areas
with large booths and thick tables, probably made for dancing on. Low platforms
skirted the length of the room, studded with poles to the ceiling, but no
strippers graced them. Testosterone filled the room like dust in the desert,
emanating from the lounging men. A few women perched on laps. They were eye
candy as much as the gold chains and flashy watches the men wore.

I recognized about a third of the people, but Luke had been
right. I had glimpsed these people as they interacted with Henri, but these
weren’t my clients. This wasn’t my scene. I kept my eyes downcast. It would
help prevent anyone from recognizing me, plus that was proper submissive
behavior. Luke slung his arm around my neck, a mark of ownership. I could feel
the eyes on us, their heat and judgment. New meat would always be a novelty,
whether it was a feisty virgin escort or a new couple in the scene.

A man waved us over. He wore a similar grunge uniform to
Luke, though a stripped-down version—and he seemed far more intimidating.
Tattoos blanketed his scalp, visible through his cropped hair. A flat look in
his eyes said he was no stranger to death. He introduced himself as Todd and
spoke to Luke, but he kept his eyes on me.

“Haven’t seen you around.”

“We’re new in town,” Luke said coolly. “Just checking things
out.”

“Maybe we don’t need anyone poaching on our turf.”

Todd wasn’t a particularly menacing name, but this guy gave
it a new edge. I imagined a young mother in a hospital, naming her infant Todd,
counting his fingers and toes, raising him with high hopes, and then her
disappointment and fear as he turned into one of the scariest motherfuckers I’d
ever seen. More likely, she’d been a crack whore and this was all he’d ever
been destined for. It didn’t make him any less terrifying. Anyone else would
have been quaking in their boots. Luke’s body was as solid as a tree, his arm
like a noose around my neck. He was just protecting me, just playing a part,
but I got the strangest sense he was holding me back.

“That’s one way of looking at it,” Luke said. “I’m not
looking to take anyone’s piece of the pie. I figure, let’s just make a bigger
pie.”

My eyes must have bugged out of my head. Insulting a guy one
minute in—shit. So much for blending in. What the hell was the exit strategy
again?

Todd laughed. “I like the way you think. Sit down, and tell
me more about it.”

The man at the end of the booth had full sleeves of colorful
tattoos and three visible gold teeth. He glared at us but scooted over to make
room. I went first, ending up pushed tight between Gold Teeth and Luke. Luke
and Todd conversed in vague, barely understandable language about the types of
drugs they sold, about how much volume Luke had supposedly dealt. I wasn’t sure
what this was supposed to get us. Was he working on a drug bust? Although we’d
first have to get in with them to get any information. Meanwhile, Gold Teeth’s
fingers inched up my thigh.

Luke stretched beside me. “What I’m curious about is who the
big players are.”

Todd snorted. He seemed to like Luke’s chutzpah. “Are you
saying I’m not big enough for you?”

“You run a nice pack,” Luke said with a nod to the heavily
armed and heavy-lidded group around us. “But like I said, I like to expand the
pie. That means more than chemical merchandise.” In a swift move, he pulled me
onto his lap, far enough away that the wandering hand slipped from my leg.

Todd eyed me. “She’s a nice piece, but there’s only so many
times a ride can run in a night. Unless you’re hiding a harem in your boots,
you don’t have any business thinking big.”

Luke’s hand skated up my arm, sending goose bumps along my
skin.

“I don’t have any girls with me, no, but I know how to get
them.”

Todd’s arms had been spread out along the back of the bench.
With slow intensity, he leaned forward. The chain bracelets clunked against the
table. “And just how do you do that? You got a clone machine stashed away?
’Cause I’d sure as hell take one of those to order.”

He nodded toward me on the last, and a shudder ran through
me. I could have sworn he saw it, and a ghost of a smile graced his face.

“I used to run a program,” Luke said. “We’d target a certain
kind of girl. There are certain criteria you can use to figure out the good
ones. Then you train them.”

An uneasy look crossed Todd’s face before he bolstered
himself. “If you were so successful, then why’d you move here?”

“Things got too hot,” Luke said easily. “Only so many girls
can go missing before people start poking around. That’s bad for everyone. Cops
are not discriminating, if you know what I mean. It can be a mess. But this
place would be fresh.”

The other woman at the table seemed to snap out of her coked
stupor. “There was that girl who went missing. She was on the news.”

Luke snorted. “In a city this size? That probably happens
every hour.”

“No, it was right here in this club,” she insisted. “We saw
them—”

“Shut up, Lee,” Todd snapped. “Go clean yourself up.”

She sulked off to the corner, toward the same single-stall
bathroom Luke and I had used earlier.

Luke pushed me off him and smacked my bottom. “Good idea.
You need to use the little girl’s room too.”

Wow, he had this whole degrading-women routine down pat.
Inside the bathroom, I found the woman with her face pushed under the faucet.
She blew her nose repeatedly, splattering water onto the peeling mirror and
cracked tiles. I tried to ignore the fact that my ass had been where her hands
now rested. This place seemed a whole lot seedier without Luke.

“Are you okay?” I asked her.

“Can’t get it out,” she muttered, wiping her face on the
sleeve of her shirt. Her brown-black hair was pulled back into cornrows, her
lips a deep-stained red. She wore a black sleeveless T-shirt, revealing arms
that were thin but well-defined with muscle.

“Yeah.” I tried to sound sympathetic. “I know how that goes.
Listen, about that girl who was taken—”

“Fuck, what are you doing here?” she cried.

I gestured lamely at the door. “My boyfriend told me to come
here.”