AVERY (The Corbin Brothers Book 2)

by Lexie Ray

  “Save your sympathies for the bedroom,” Mike said. “I’m going to fuck you until I think we’re even.”

  “If that’s what you feel like you need to do,” I purred. Maybe all he did need was a good lay. Many of my customers were like that, coming in here to blow off some steam — or to have someone blow it off for them. “I’ll get Mama and she’ll give you the best price. We’ll make this happen right now.”

  “Yes, we will,” Mike said. He lunged at me and tore at my shirt, popping buttons off of it as I scrambled back to get out of his reach. Everyone around us gasped at this new development of violence.

  “Please stop,” I said. This situation was reminding me too much of Tito. I wasn’t going to be able to play it cool for much longer. “Let me go get Mama so we can go upstairs.”

  “Upstairs?” Mike echoed. “No. I’m going to have you right here and now. If it doesn’t bring my wife back, I’ll try again. Still nothing? Again. And again.”

  I didn’t like the crazed tone in his voice. It told me that I was in danger. How could I get away?

  I stood up and tried to dart away. I was well aware that everyone knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I had lost control of the situation. Now all I cared about was escape. I didn’t give a shit who knew about it.

  With stunning quickness, Mike punched me on the jaw, sending me to the floor. I saw stars as I tried to crawl away, people shouting all around. My vision cleared just as Mike fell on top of me, his weight making me feel like I was suffocating. He grabbed at my breasts with bruising force, pushing my legs apart with his knees.

  It was Tito all over again, this time with an audience, even though I’d promised myself it would never happen again.

  “Get off me, motherfucker!” I screamed, punching him in the face. “Get the fuck off me!”

  He bit one of my breasts before the two bouncers at the door could pull him off me. Mama was right there behind them, her eyes blazing with a cold fire I’d seen once before — the night my old roommate Jazz was attacked. I felt chilled to the bone even though I knew she was there to help me.

  “Get out,” Mama hissed, her teeth gritted as she glared at Mike. “You’re blacklisted.”

  “I never want to come back anyway!” he shouted as the bouncers hauled him away. “Fuck this place and all you whores! You took everything from me! Everything!”

  The nightclub had fallen into a hush, even the pianist stopping his playing. Mama turned to the stage and swirled her finger in a circle, indicating he should be playing right now. The music started back up, but I had a feeling that he wouldn’t be hired again. Mama was like that — anyone who contributed to a problem she cut loose.

  “Meet me in my office,” she muttered before pasting on her smile. I took a deep breath and gathered my ruined shirt around myself, going quickly so I wouldn’t become even more of a spectacle.

  As I left, I heard Mama schmoozing with the customers. “Please let me buy you all a round of drinks because you had to see that nasty little incident,” she was saying. “Oh, just a lovers’ quarrel. Jealousy’s a hell of a thing. No, totally under control.”

  I winced as I went. The punch Mike had landed on my jaw had jarred me, all right, and the place where he’d bit me was tender, a nasty, mouth-shaped bruise already making itself known. What was even worse was that we were losing money on the incident with Mama buying drinks to smooth feathers. She was treating this as an investment she had to make. Invest now, keep them coming later.

  When I got to the office, I had a little cry, allowing myself just a few minutes of tears. The situation with Mike had been scary — downright terrifying. It had been just like Tito, when I hadn’t been able to defend myself. I dabbed at my eyes and blew my nose. Not much harm done, I told myself, looking in the mirror. I could borrow needle and thread from one of the girls and sew some buttons right back on my uniform. The buttons were the only damage to the shirt, which was lucky.

  I examined my jaw, which was swelling up. I cursed Mike, but figured it could’ve been worse. I’d seen kids back in the old neighborhood knocked out cold with similar punches.

  My makeup was running, I realized, wiping the eyeliner off with another tissue. I tucked some of the strands of my hair back into some semblance of order and reapplied my red lipstick out of habit. I put on more every spare moment I got.

  There were two beads of blood on my breast, I noticed, on the bite mark. They made me feel sick, like I’d been attacked by an animal. Taking a shuddering breath, I cleaned the blood up and found the first aid kit Mama always kept in here. The antiseptic burned the tiny cuts on the blackening bruise, but it gave me comfort that I was getting any germs out. I could even go to the nearby clinic and get it looked at tomorrow, I told myself, for even more peace of mind. Yes, that’s what I would do.

  I jumped as the door burst open.

  “Cocoa, what the hell was that?” Mama demanded. “I’m dropping about four-hundred bucks on alcohol right now to smooth over that incident. That’s the worst thing that’s ever happened on the floor! What did that motherfucker want?”

  I tried not to cringe in the face of Mama’s withering anger. She wanted the best for the nightclub, I knew, and this incident wasn’t best for it.

  “He was a repeat customer,” I said. “But I caught him taking pictures on his phone up in the room last time.”

  Mama inhaled sharply. “There are to be no photos,” she hissed.

  “And that’s what I said,” I told her. “So when he went to the bathroom afterwards, I deleted everything from his phone.”

  “Smart girl,” Mama congratulated me. “Now tell me why his sloppy ass was back here, making trouble.”

  I hesitated, knowing I’d likely face Mama’s full wrath, my fault or no.

  “The photos were also stored on this thing called the cloud,” I said. “Meaning I didn’t delete them totally. Just from his phone.”

  Mama covered her eyes, silent, so I pressed forward.

  “He said his wife saw them and divorced him. She took everything, and he was back to try to regain what he’d lost. He was going to fuck me right there in front of everyone.”

  Mama still wasn’t looking at me, still wasn’t talking.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, my voice breaking. “I was trying to control the situation, but when he got on top of me, I lost it. I — I’ve been raped before.”

  I hated saying that word, but it was said. I had to tell Mama the whole situation. I don’t know how much more control I could’ve exerted after Mike had punched me onto the floor, but I had lost my shit when he’d climbed on top of me.

  “This is very bad, Cocoa,” Mama said. “Very bad.”

  “I didn’t ask for this,” I said, shaking my head. “I know it’s very bad. But I didn’t ask for this. I did everything I could think of to keep control of the situation, but he made a scene every time I tried to leave to get you.”

  Mama shook her head. “You didn’t think of everything,” she said. “You should have hauled his ass upstairs and dealt with him up there, away from the eyes of everyone trying to enjoy their night in my club.”

  “Dealt with him?” I asked, dumbfounded. “It would’ve been worse if he’d lost his shit upstairs like he lost it on the nightclub floor. Did you even see this?”

  I pulled my shirt apart and pointed at the mouth mark on my breast. Despite the antiseptic, it was bleeding again, the iron-red liquid coating my skin like some kind of vicious war paint.

  Mama stared at the wound, shaking her head. There was a knock on the door.

  “Come in!” Mama barked, back to all business.

  The door pushed open. It was Blue. “The cops are here, Mama,” she said, her face ashen. “They’re asking to talk to you.”

  “Motherfuckers,” Mama growled. She eyed me balefully. “Blue, take Cocoa upstairs and out of sight. I’ll distract the cops. She’s not to be seen.”

  “Okay, Mama,” Blue said.

  I knew this was bad. Mama’s
tenuous agreement with the cops was that she could operate happily as long as she stayed off the radar. That was the deal with the higher ups that we often serviced ourselves. But when street-level patrolmen came calling, it attracted too much attention. The media would perk up when they heard something like this on a scanner. The nightclub — Mama and all the girls included — could find themselves in the center of a huge firestorm if the wrong details came out. She would have to pull all of the strings she grasped in her hand to get out of this, likely padding pockets along the way.

  This incident was going to cost the club, but the price wasn’t clear yet. I regretted it a lot, but I hated that Mama was blaming me for it. I had done everything to avoid the scene that had taken place, and I disagreed with Mama’s view that I should’ve “dealt” with Mike out of the sight of other customers. What did she want me to do? Let him rape me?

  “That’s it,” Blue said. “Their backs are turned. Let’s go, baby.”

  We left the office, skirting along the wall as Mama laughed and patted a patrolman’s arm. Both of us dashed up the stairs, me grunting at a pain in my ribs. Had Mike bruised or broken one of them when he fell on top of me? Another thing to get checked out at the clinic tomorrow, I decided. They never asked questions, particularly in this neighborhood.

  “Are you okay?” Blue asked once we got to the hallway. Her eyebrows were knitted together in concern.

  “I’m fine,” I said, laughing. “I’ll just go to my room and wait till this all blows over. You can go on back downstairs. Make some money.”

  That was always our rallying cry: “Make some money.”

  Blue walked me to my room anyway, taking the key from my quaking hand to open the door.

  “Thanks, Blue,” I said. I started to walk in the dark room, the only light coming from the orange street lamp that did a poor job of illuminating the alley.

  “Cocoa, wait.” I turned, and she enveloped me in a hug, crushing me to her chest. I didn’t care that it hurt my ribs and the bite on my breast. I clung onto Blue like she was a life preserver floating in the middle of a stormy sea.

  “Everything’s going to be okay,” she said. “I know it is.”

  “It is,” I agreed. “It’ll be fine.”

  Reluctantly, I pulled away, smiling for Blue’s benefit.

  “Now, get back down there and make some money,” I urged.

  “I’ll be back up to check on you,” she promised.

  “Don’t bother,” I laughed, shaking my head. “I’m not going anywhere. You’re going to be busy, anyway.”

  As soon as Blue left, the full magnitude of the situation hit me. Mama was furious with me; the cops were here, asking questions, and there were photos proving that prostitution was taking place in the nightclub. The situation was very bad, indeed.

  I took my uniform off and pulled on my kimono. The silky fabric of the robe soothed me a little bit. I turned the television on just for some background noise and tried to relax, tried to forget about how Mike had made me feel, tried to forget about the old fear of not being in control. I curled up in bed with a magazine in an attempt to distract myself. Maybe I’d fall asleep. The nothingness of my dreamless slumber would be a welcome break from everything that had happened.

  A knock on my door sent me to my feet again. I opened it and was surprised to see Mama. She rarely left the floor of the nightclub while it was opening, looking to impart a personal experience to each and every customer.

  “Is everything okay?” I asked, almost dreading the answer.

  “It will be,” Mama said. “I have some pigs to grease, but that’s par for the course.”

  “I’m sorry about everything,” I said, feeling the tears threatening to fall. “I never wanted this.”

  “Neither did I,” Mama said, her face devoid of emotion. “You’re my best and most senior girl, Cocoa, and the situation I find us in is inexcusable.”

  “I don’t understand,” I said, feeling confused. “None of this was on purpose. This just happened. I had no control over it.”

  “That’s a sad fact,” Mama said. “The cops were here and described you pretty accurately. Whichever customer called this in got a good gander at you and could probably pick you out of a police lineup. We have photos of you again, engaging in prostitution on my premises. Now, what would you do if you were me? What would you have to do?”

  I knew the answer even as I shook my head no. “You can’t,” I said. “I don’t have anywhere to go. I can’t go back to my old neighborhood. It’s bad there. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. You have to give me another chance.”

  I hated myself for begging, but there wasn’t any other choice. Mama was about to turn me out onto the streets.

  She shook her head, her emotionless mask still in place. “I’d give you another chance if you dropped a tray of dinners on the nightclub floor,” she said. “Hell, I’d give you another chance if you were bad in bed. But your very presence here now is damning. All the media has to do is get a hold of those photos — who’s to say they don’t already have them? Then they put two and two together: the photos, the police responding to a call of male on female violence here at this club.”

  Mama shook her head, the thought of it the only thing that was making her tear up.

  “With the connections I have, with the people that come in here, I’d get thrown under the bus, along with all the girls,” she said. “I can’t have you here anymore. It’s too big of a risk. I can’t take it. Leave for the sake of the nightclub — for the sake of the other girls. Hardly any of them have a place to go, just like you.”

  Angry, desperate tears were rolling down my face. “You want me to pack up my shit and just leave now, in the middle of the night, like Jazz did?” I demanded. “That how you do your girls, Mama, sending them out on the streets all bloodied up from your business?”

  I was fishing for anything, anything to break that businesswoman’s façade, to make her experience any kind of human emotion that wasn’t linked to her greed, but it fell well short. I wondered if there was anything in the world that could make Mama human anymore.

  “You can leave in the morning,” she said. “First thing. You can pack up and say your goodbyes to everyone after their shift ends. You’ll stay up here, of course. You’re through working.”

  I set my jaw even though it hurt to do so. “And what about my money?” I asked, turning to a topic I knew Mama would better grasp. “I’ll be needing all of it.”

  She shook her head. “I’m putting the bulk of it toward damage control,” she said. “You’ve cost me hundreds of dollars tonight just having to buy people booze. Now I’m going to have to pay off the NYPD again, maybe even the DA’s office. Those fuckers are expensive.”

  “I have worked here for years,” I said, my voice as sharp as knives. “I know for a fact that you’ll have money of mine leftover, even if you do have to make all those payments.”

  “Maybe a couple hundred,” Mama said.

  I laughed without a trace of humor. “More like a couple thousand.”

  “Who do you think is doing the books here, girl?” she spat. “I know how much money you have now, after you repay the damage you’ve done to this nightclub, and it is not in the thousands.”

  “It is in the thousands,” I said, lifting my chin. “And it will be if you want me to leave quietly. Otherwise, you’re guaranteed a shit show. Bring on the tabloids.”

  It was Mama’s turn to laugh. “Oh, my Cocoa,” she said, shaking her head. “You’re a snake biting into my heel the moment I try to walk away.”

  “I learned from the best,” I said.

  “I’ll have Blue bring up two grand for you after the shift,” Mama said, turning her back to me and walking out into the hallway. “You’re dead to me, girl. I never want to hear from you again, no matter what kind of trouble you find yourself in. And if you show up here at the nightclub, that dead part will become a reality.”

  I bristled at Mama’s threats, kno
wing full well she had the connections and money to make them viable. But I didn’t say a word as she walked down the hallway and down the stairs, knowing she was probably busy stitching together a smile she could wear for the rest of the night.

  Getting the money was a twisted little victory, but I still felt the rest of the loss. I was losing a home, a job, and friends all at the same time. I would be thrust into the world tomorrow morning without hope of finding a place to live or way to earn a living.

  It was hard to fight off the feeling of hopelessness.

  Taking a deep breath, I set my shoulders before retrieving my rolling suitcase from the space it had occupied underneath the bed ever since I started living in the boarding house. I’d never had any use for it until now.