by Ada Scott
Always tired. Always struggling. Always worried.
“What am I gonna do?” I ask my reflection, shaking my head sadly. A part of me is screaming to run as fast as my legs will carry me. Just carry my high heels as I run away from my problems. Or grab the phone and ask Granny to come pick me up. A wave of shame and sadness rushes over me as I imagine her demanding to know what happened to me, why I’m not away at school like I said I would be, why I’m dressed like a high-priced escort, why I’m calling her in the middle of the night to rescue me from my bad decisions.
But is it really that bad of a decision?
I mean, when it comes down to it, I know I have good intentions here. I wouldn’t be doing this—any of this—if I wasn’t dead set on raising the money I need to pay for Grandpa’s surgery. I’m not offering up my body, my innocence, for sale just because I want money to buy a yacht or a new house or whatever. I’m only here because I love my grandparents so dearly that I’m willing to do whatever it takes to help them, to try and pay them back for their kindness and compassion toward me. They raised me. They took me in when they were supposed to be enjoying the best time of their lives, free from any major commitments or responsibilities. They didn’t even hesitate to adopt me and care for me like I was their own child, sacrificing their dreams of traveling the world to spend their time and money on another kid.
They did whatever it took to help me when I needed them. What kind of granddaughter would I be if I didn’t do the same for them?
I grit my teeth and look away from my reflection, too frustrated to face myself. I pull the fluffy bathrobe down from its hook on the back of the bathroom door and slip into it, tying the belt in a loose knot as I crawl into bed. I can feel the prickling sting of tears in my eyes and I wipe angrily at them, further smearing my eye makeup.
“Fuck,” I groan, looking at the black streak on the heel of my hand. Lately it feels like I just can’t do anything right. I try to make good choices, but I always fall into trouble. The job at the club didn’t work out. I’m already regretting lying to my grandparents about why I’m not away at school. And now this whole Innocence For Sale thing is getting out of hand.
It’s not Caleb’s fault, though. He may be a little rough around the edges, a little hard to read at times, and he may be neck-deep in the kind of danger I’ve only vicariously experienced through watching mafia movies, but he’s not a bad guy. That much I can tell already. He’s tough, but he’s got a softness to him underneath that jagged exterior.
I could feel it in the way he touched me. In the way he carried me, without a second thought, away from danger. It was instinct for him. There was no hesitation in his actions. If it had come down to it, I know he would’ve protected me before himself, and I’m basically a stranger to him.
I close my eyes and lean back into the pillows, reliving the thrill of his hands on my body, his deep voice guiding me as I pleasured him with my mouth. I’ve never done that before. And it wasn’t as terrifying or difficult as I always expected it to be. In fact, nothing with Caleb ever feels forced or scary. Nerve-wracking, maybe. Thrilling, certainly. But he doesn’t scare me. He makes me feel safer somehow.
Still, he’s a dangerous man. The world he lives in is a scary one, and there’s no telling whether I’ll be caught in the crossfire with him. If he’s dealing with art forgeries and high stakes operations then he’s definitely living life on the edge. He knows how to walk that edge without falling, but I’m new to this. I’m not used to being this high up, towering ten stories above my old life, my old ways.
What if I fall?
Would Caleb be able to catch me?
Either way, one thing is for certain: if I give up now, if I leave before the week runs out, before Caleb can take my virginity, I’ll forfeit everything. That money I need to save my grandfather’s life will be snatched away from me in an instant. My one last hope, my last resort, vanishing before my eyes. I would have to return empty-handed to the endless, expensive hospital visits. Back to walking in on my grandmother staring teary-eyed at the stack of unpaid medical bills on the dining table. Back to waiting for the inevitable.
I heave a sigh. No. I can’t give up yet. Dangerous or not, this can’t be over yet. I have to stick it out and get that money. My family—my whole life—depends on it.
And besides, despite the shark-infested waters that seem to surround Caleb, I know he won’t let me drown. He won’t let the sharks get me. He’ll keep me safe as long as I stay by his side and fulfill my contract.
The clock reads two in the morning, and I finally strip off the fluffy bathrobe and snuggle in under the sheets to wait for Caleb to return. I know he’s probably expecting to come back to an empty hotel room, but I’m going to prove him wrong. I’m going to show him how determined I am to see this through until the end. I’m not going to run away from this opportunity.
I’m not going to run away from Caleb. And when I really think hard about it… I don’t think I could even if I wanted to. I’m like an addict, craving his touch. I’ve had the smallest taste of what he has to show me, what he can teach me, and I need more. Desperately.
About an hour later, when I’m just beginning to doze off, I’m awakened by the click of the door opening. I freeze, holding one eye open to watch Caleb enter the room quietly, his footsteps barely making any sound as he crosses the room. He stops suddenly, his eyes falling on me curled up in the bed. I can tell he’s surprised to see me still here. It almost makes me smile. I hope that he’ll come over and get in bed with me. I want to feel his warm, hard body against mine. But instead, to my dismay, he walks into the other room and I hear him unfold the pull-out couch.
My heart sinks as I consider the possibility of spending the whole night in another room from him, cold and alone in this massive king-sized bed.
I don’t want that. And to be honest, I don’t think Caleb does either.
So I silently slip out of bed and tiptoe into the living room, hesitating for just a moment before sliding down under the blanket beside Caleb. He’s as still and impassive as a statue at first, but then to my relief he pulls me close to him, my back pressed against his powerful chest. He curls around me, his arms embracing me as I feel his warm breath on the back of my neck, making me shudder with pleasure.
Safe and content in his arms, I fall asleep quickly, and don’t wake up until the bright morning light filters in through the window to our side. I yawn and stretch, wiggling around to face Caleb. His beautiful blue eyes open to greet me and I gaze into them for a long moment, soaking in the warmth and comfort of being so close to him. He reaches up to caress my face, his thumb sliding over my bottom lip. I give it a soft kiss.
“You’re still here,” he murmurs.
“I couldn’t possibly leave you,” I answer, with complete honesty.
“I thought maybe I was just having a very good, very realistic dream,” Caleb says, a hint of a smile on his lips.
“What happened in your dream?” I ask.
He moves forward to kiss me softly at first, then harder when I moan into his mouth. His hands slide down my face, my neck, to cup my breasts. I roll my hips toward him and feel his cock brush against my thigh. I reach down under the blanket to run my palm along the underside of his shaft and he groans.
He breaks the kiss and gets up to push the blanket off of us, straddling me as he leans down to kiss me again while his hands massage my breasts. He kisses his way down my neck and chest to flick his tongue over my nipple, then pull it into his mouth. A spiral of bliss ripples through my body and I close my eyes, sighing. He takes both my wrists in his hands and pins them down on either side of me as he moves downward, kissing my stomach. He gently kisses my thighs, hovering over my mound as he looks up at me, those blue eyes bright and shining in the dawn’s light.
I can scarcely breathe, not wanting to do anything to spoil the moment or make him hesitate any longer. I need him to keep going, to keep touching me.
“Please,” I whisper, my vo
ice trembling ever so slightly.
Caleb
The scent of her is heady and full of need, and that simple word in the air, “Please,” is just as sweet as she’s going to taste. I grip her thighs and run my cheek—slightly rough and stubbly—against her inner thigh, and she draws in a quick breath.
As I open my mouth to let my tongue run along her slit, there’s a knock at the door.
Jane jumps, stifling a yelp, looking with wide eyes at the door. I freeze. There’s a storm of anger brewing in my heart. Who would dare hold me back from the woman who wants my attention? But I keep that in my chest as I sit up silently and look between the door and Jane. She looks just as surprised as me.
Silently, I mouth, “Room service?”
She makes a confused shrug in return, shaking her pretty head. She must not have ordered anything, and I sure as hell know I didn’t. With a stony face, I look back at the door and stand up, gesturing for her to follow me.
She looks scared now, but she obeys, crawling naked to the edge of the bed, where I help her set her feet down silently and stand up. I run a reassuring hand through her hair and give her a quick peck on the forehead.
No matter what’s on the other side of that door, Jane’s naked. I didn’t fail to notice that when she slipped into bed with me last night, and I could put two and two together. She’d been waiting for me naked in the master bed.
Maybe if I’d caught on sooner, we’d have been in a position to not get interrupted.
Regardless, nobody else needs to see her like this, and I’m not taking any chances. I point to the en suite bathroom and give Jane a meaningful look.
She hesitates a moment, but my gaze is firm, and she nods before padding over as quietly as she can, grabbing a bathrobe from the floor as she goes.
I’m dressed in a set of boxers and my undershirt. I wasn’t expecting her to crawl in bed with me last night, so I didn’t think it would be appropriate to strip down more. Saves me the need to get dressed now, at least.
If it’s hotel staff, they’ll take the underwear as a hint to come back later.
The knock comes again, and on my way to the door, I stoop down by my jacket and pull out something I hoped I wouldn’t have to think about using: my gun. Out of my jacket pocket, I take the little round silencer and screw it on with my eyes at the door. I hold it low, out of sight, and cast a quick glance over my shoulder to make sure Jane is hidden.
I see her standing in the doorway, just about to close it, her eyes on my gun.
My heart sinks. The wide-eyed look on her face as she stares at my weapon is just another reminder that she shouldn’t be caught up in this life I’ve got chasing me around.
I give her a stern look, and she replies with a soft nod, pushing the door closed just enough that she can’t be seen.
With that, I move to the door and hold the gun out of sight as I take a breath and pull the handle open enough to let me look outside, groggy and disheveled as I am.
Standing before me is a short, stocky man with shaggy brown hair, a beard, rings under his eyes, and a simple uniform belonging to the hotel. “What?” I grunt.
“Room service,” he says simply in the voice of someone used to customer service. He’s standing with one hand on a little cart. I have to admit, he’d be convincing under most circumstances at this hour of the morning.
But last night, I made a quick round of the hotel to glance at the staff. All the men had clean-cut, short hair and shaven faces. My guess is that the manager makes them stay cleaned up, and this guy doesn’t fit the bill.
“Oh. Forgot about that,” I say, scratching my head as if nursing a hangover headache. “Come on in, I guess.”
If I’ve learned anything over the years, it’s that you need to hedge your bets in every situation and be absolutely sure before taking any big course of action. There’s still a chance this guy is the real deal and just has the wrong room number, in which case, we’re about to enjoy someone else’s breakfast.
The bearded man steps inside while I hold the gun out of sight, and when I close the door behind him, he answers my question for me.
His hand swings around to grab me by the throat, and I catch him by the wrist in the same motion that I bring the gun forward.
To my surprise, he’s quick, and he brings his knee up sharply to push my gun to the side just as I’m about to fire. The muffled shot hits the couch, and he lunges forward before I can recover.
He headbutts me just under my ribs and drives me forward while I’m off guard. The food cart comes crashing down with us as we go to the ground, and out of the corner of my eye, I see a flash of silver—he was hiding a knife in the tray.
“Fucker!” he grunts as we hit the ground, and I have to forget about trying to get a shot in while we wrestle at close quarters. I can’t let him get an opening on me. I may be built like a brick house, but one good stab with that knife this close is all my attacker needs.
I won’t give him the chance.
But with that knife in play, I have to let go of either my gun or his wrist, and the choice is easy. I release his arm and use the free hand to land a blow on his jaw, which dazes him enough that I can push him back and get on top of him. This time, I go for that knife, but he’s too quick with it. He slashes at my forearm, and I redirect my blow just enough that he misses any vital arteries, and the cut just slices through the skin on the side of my forearm.
I lean in, dropping my weight on him, and he grunts.
“Who sent you?” I growl. He replies by throwing his free hand up to my face and trying to claw at my eyes. I tear my face away and pull back. People underestimate how easy it is to gouge someone’s eyes out in a fight.
But the moment I do, he takes the chance to lunge at my gun-arm, wrapping his arms around it to try to wrench it from me. I have about two seconds before he positions his knife the right way to cut it away if he has to.
I respond by wrapping my free arm around his neck and pulling back as hard as I can. I hear bones popping as he grunts a stifled scream, and he starts thrusting his elbow back into me as hard as he can.
He won’t let go of my gun, though, because he knows that as soon as we’re not in close quarters anymore, it’s all over for him.
A flailing opponent is something I’m trained for, but he starts flashing that knife around like a madman at the same time. I manage to get my arm under his to get him under control, but as soon as I do, he shifts his weight under me to keep me from being able to haul him around, using my own weight against me.
So I bring us both down to the ground again with a heavy thud.
He writhes under my grip and tries for the gun again. This time, I have to roll away with him to keep him from getting a grip on my arm, but as I do, he manages to squirrel his way on top of me.
His eyes are crazed, and once on top of me, he works a knee on my gun arm and tries to bring his knife down from overhead. I catch his wrist just inches away from my face, the gleam of his knife in focus before his own bloodthirsty eyes.
“I’m working for people,” he says through clenched teeth, “who are paying a lot of money for your head, asshole!”
We’re deadlocked on the ground, and I know it’s only a matter of time before he figures out how to wrench his arm free of my grip and bring that knife down again. I have to be fast and move us over the next time he brings the knife up in a split-second to—
CRACK.
The porcelain toilet tank cover smacks the back of his head. I watch my attacker’s eyes go glassy, and the next moment, his grip goes slack, along with the rest of his body. He slumps to the floor beside me, unconscious.
Behind him, I see Jane, standing there with her improvised weapon, her face white as a ghost.
A grin spreads across my face. There’s a moment of silence that I finally break.
“Nice swing, baby.”
Something like a muted squeak escapes her lips, and I roll forward to sit up. Immediately, I go to work on the attacker. I ta
ke the knife from his hands, then pull out the spare sheets in the room to start binding and gagging him right there on the floor.
It would be easy to end him, of course, but I don’t want to shed blood if I don’t have to. Besides, I don’t want Jane to see that kind of violence. That part of her innocence isn’t what I paid for.
And as I work, I glance over at Jane to see she’s still frozen in the same position, stunned about what she’s done.
Jane
“Is he… is he…dead?” I mutter, my voice barely audible through the shaking. It feels like I’m the one knocked out cold, like all the wind has been pushed out of my lungs. I can’t breathe. I can’t believe it—I’ve just assaulted a man. A human being. With a porcelain toilet lid.
The guy is propped up in a chair Caleb dragged over to the center of the room, his head slumped onto his chest and his limbs completely limp. He looks like a giant ragdoll or a scarecrow sitting in his underwear since Caleb stripped his uniform off. Something flimsy and…not alive.
Caleb, who is busy binding the guy’s hands and feet, looks up at me with one eyebrow raised. There’s an air of almost amusement in his voice when he comments, “Jane. Do you think I’d be gagging him if he was dead?”
“I-I don’t know,” I manage to squeak out, my eyes still wide and staring at the guy’s bruised and bloody head. Caleb stands up and walks over to me, gently setting his hands on my shoulders, urging me to meet his gaze.
“Jane, think about this for a second, okay? If he was dead, he wouldn’t be able to make any noise, right?” I nod slowly. “So the fact that I have to put a gag in his mouth should assure you that this prick is absolutely alive. Don’t get me wrong, you did give him one hell of a whack—great job on that, by the way—but you didn’t kill the guy. He’s just knocked out. He’ll be…some degree of okay when he wakes back up. And he will wake back up. Which is why we need to move quickly.”
