Dasha’s legs trembled as she turned, bent over, and grabbed her ankles, completely exposing the part of her womanhood that she now despised.
The pulsing beat of the song ended and Dasha’s whole body felt like she was bleeding from every pore. She could almost feel blood coating her skin.
She straightened, completely nude, soon to be forced into acts that sickened her even more. As she walked toward the three stairs that led down from the stage, she swayed her hips like the madame had taught her. Why couldn’t she ignore the men who continued to whistle at her and shout horrible things?
“I’d like a piece of that.”
“I’ll fuck her right here. Just spread your pussy, baby.”
Dasha held her hand to her belly as if that could settle the sickness inside.
Why couldn’t she leave her body and visit someplace in her mind like Yulia did? Where did Yulia go when she traveled outside her body with her mind?
Dasha glanced over her shoulder and saw her pretty friend whose brown eyes looked blank, empty. Yulia followed Dasha off the stage, but was the girl even aware of her own movements?
When Dasha stepped onto the floor, which was sticky beneath her heels from spilled alcohol, steel fingers grabbed her upper arm and jerked her sideways. Dasha let out a small cry as she tripped and fell against the handler, who forced her to her feet again while almost dragging her across the room to the madame who scheduled all of the girls’ appointments.
“I’m going to let you have it good if you don’t pick it up during the show,” Eddie said close to her ear, his breath hot and foul with beer. Dasha flinched. “I think I’ll have to teach you a lesson anyway. How much depends on how you behave the rest of the night.” He stroked her hair away from her ear. “Maybe you screw up so much because you like what I do to you, slut.”
The man’s touch and his words made the ratsnakes in her belly squirm and push their way into her chest. He was one of the men who forced himself on her, sometimes in front of other men or the girls. Sometimes in front of everyone. And sometimes alone where he would hurt her in ways that no one would see. Make her scream and cry and beg.
Which was worse?
Dasha tried to pretend Eddie was nothing but a stranger she had never seen before as he took her to the madame. Block him out like Yulia does. Force him out of your thoughts.
They were almost to the madame, who was speaking with the horrid man who had waved the handful of American dollars. Madame Cherie was a beautiful but sharp-tongued woman who constantly trained the girls to dance and please men. It seemed strange, though, that she never treated the girls like wares for sale. Sometimes Dasha thought the madame might not know that none of the girls had chosen to be whores.
Was that possible?
One of Dasha’s stilettos skidded when she stepped into a puddle of spilled alcohol and she almost fell, but Eddie had a tight hold on her. She cringed and flinched as, at the same time her handler steadied her, a man bumped into her. The man tugged her bare nipple and another man slapped her naked backside hard enough that she knew there would be a mark.
Because of threats against their families and friends, none of the girls ever said anything aloud about being taken from their homes, their country. Nothing about the fact that they did not choose to be whores with ten, or even more, men a night. Could the madame not know because a word was never spoken about it? Always the cruel handlers were close.
Yet couldn’t the madame see from the girls’ expressions, their lack of pleasure in their task, that they did not belong in this place?
Sometimes Dasha thought she saw something in the madame’s eyes. As if she suspected something was not right. Dasha prayed that Madame Cherie would learn the truth and find a way out for them all and for all of their families and friends to remain safe.
It was the only hope Dasha had.
CHAPTER THREE
I would sell my soul
“It’s so good to have every one of my ducklings around me.” Mama gave a broad smile like she always did when the seven of us joined her and Daddy around the family supper table.
She reached over and squeezed Willow’s hand. “And my newest girl.” Mama looked around at the bunch of us. “Who can kick all of your arses at basketball.”
We laughed. It was true. Willow was five-eleven and had been such a good point guard at NYU that the WNBA had even tried to recruit her out of college. Instead she’d gone on to get her doctorate in education and married my formerly bachelor-for-life oldest brother, Zane.
Zane smiled and squeezed Willow’s hand and winked at her. The grin she gave him was naughty, and I almost grinned myself.
“Is anyone up to the challenge of a little three-on-three?” Willow asked with a wicked smile.
Noise around the table broke out with the guys insisting this time they were going to beat her, Zane, and me. Picture five-four me next to five-eleven Willow and my over-six-foot-tall brothers. I could still kick major ass, though. I was quick and hard to block and had a mean layup. My younger sister, Rori, was shaking her head. She never joined us—might break a nail.
Zane also worked for RED, only no one in our family or any of our friends could know. Their lives would be in danger because of our line of work, and neither of us was willing to take that chance. Family and friends thought Zane was still Secret Service.
They also believed that after my time in Army Special Forces, I went on to work for an interpreter service. I speak nine languages, so no one has ever had a problem believing that.
The people around me—even at RED—never knew I’d been an assassin in the past, and they never would.
The exceptions were Karen Oxford and Nick Donovan. Nick had drawn every bit of my horrible history out of me. Over strawberry crêpes one morning during our last op I told him everything. Well, almost everything. Donovan must have put something into those crêpes to make me talk so much—other than making them orgasmically good.
Yet even after I’d let it all hang out, he still wouldn’t tell me much about his own past.
It was starting to piss me off.
I turned my focus back to my family.
“You sure went all-out for supper, Mama.” I sighed with my hand on my full belly and slumped in my seat where I sat between my brothers Zane and Evan.
Nettle soup, roast stuffed loin of lamb, celery with cream, and cauliflower in cheese sauce for dinner. Yum. Mama made the best Irish dishes in Boston.
I grinned at Mama and caught what I thought was a hint of wistfulness in her gaze. That one look made my thoughts pause before Troy spoke.
“Mama likes to spoil the Marine,” Troy said with a snort as he gestured with his fork to Ryan, back from his latest tour with the Marines. Ryan was Special Forces and built like a tank.
Ryan didn’t have any kind of witty comeback like he normally did. Instead he concentrated on his food. He was putting away as much of Mama’s good cooking as he could shove into the gut of his huge six-two frame.
“Someone’s in a bad mood,” Evan said as he pointed at Ryan with his butter knife. Evan, Troy, and Sean laughed. I frowned.
Daddy leaned back and stretched his arms before clasping his fingers behind his head as his green eyes met Mama’s. “That’s my Molly,” he said. “Perfect supper as usual.”
“You just want your sweets, Keegan.” They smiled at each other, and as always love was there—except something was different.
My supper started to sour in my stomach. What was wrong? It must have had to do with Ryan, since he was acting even more strange. Not to mention he was back from his last tour so soon. He’d only been gone around seven months.
Mama stood, her large bosoms stretching the fabric of her flower-print dress. “I’ll need two of you to help me carry out the dessert.”
“I’m there!” Sean pushed back his chair.
Troy beat the rest of us, too. “On your tail, kid,” he said as the pair headed to the kitchen with Mama.
I glanced at Ryan, wh
o was decimating a perfectly good piece of cauliflower. It almost looked like mashed potatoes. His jaw was tight as he pressed the tines of his fork into the cauliflower. Whatever it was had to be serious for him to act this way. It was going to drive me nuts if I didn’t find out what it was. Soon.
Mama, Sean, and Troy emerged from the kitchen each carrying a plate with our desserts. “Porter cake,” she said with a cheery smile. “Made with Guinness, of course.”
“Porter cake’s the best.” Sean thought every dessert Mama made was the best. He plopped himself down in his seat and set the cake he’d been carrying directly in front of him on the table.
Evan reached across the table and snatched the cake plate that had been in front of Sean. “You’re not hogging the whole thing, brat,” Evan said.
“Hey.” Sean scowled. “Give it back.”
Evan cut himself an enormous piece. “When I get mine, kid.”
I shook my head. Over the summer my twelve-year-old brother, Sean, had suddenly gone from a kid to a gangly almost-teenager on the cusp of “the dark side” as Daddy liked to say.
It wasn’t long at all before the three cakes had been devoured. Mostly by my five brothers, even though Willow and I had healthy appetites, too. Rori just picked at hers as usual.
When we were finished, Daddy insisted on a round of single-malt Irish whiskey. That was different. He usually only brought out the whiskey on Christmas and on New Year’s Day.
Daddy finished pouring us each a glass two fingers high with whiskey. Even for Rori who tried to protest that she didn’t want any.
When he’d made his way around the table, Daddy set the bottle down. It clunked on the plaid tablecloth that covered the aged maple wood table. He raised his own glass. “Here’s to the Steele family, together in body, soul, and heart.”
Everyone looked as puzzled as I felt but murmured back, “To the Steele family,” before we followed Daddy and slammed back the contents of our glasses.
I drank mine in one swallow and felt the harsh burn of whiskey hit my throat. Having been a sniper in the Army’s Special Forces, surrounded by males, I’d learned how to drink my whiskey without choking. The alcohol rushed to my stomach harsh and hot.
Rori and Sean both coughed. Daddy had even given my twelve-year-old brother a small shot? Definitely something was up.
My heart started to drop as Daddy set his empty glass on the table as hard as a judge hitting his mallet to bring the court to order. Everyone at the table went quiet as Daddy moved to Mama’s chair and he gripped the high spindles that rose to either side of her.
Ice crawled over my skin and in the silence I glanced at each member of my family, all with an expression of confusion, concern, maybe even fear. Ryan didn’t look up. He just stared into his empty whiskey glass.
Daddy cleared his throat, and I looked at him. I took in his face, rough with whiskers, and the skin around his eyes lined with age. His skin was tan and weathered from a life of hard labor as a mason, and his hair gray, streaked with white, but his eyes were still as glass green as my own.
I clenched my hand around my whiskey glass and brought my gaze to Mama’s. Her throat worked, and my body grew colder still as I realized she was trying to put up a brave display so that we would all be okay with whatever news they had. Her cheeks that normally had a rose hue seemed pale. Was she thinner? She was. Mama had always been robust, slightly plump from her cheeks to her ankles. Why hadn’t I noticed earlier?
Daddy cleared his throat again. His Boston Irish brogue was strong as he spoke. “I guess there’s no beatin’ around the bush. I can tell from your faces you have your suspicions that we’ve not-so-good news to tell.”
Everyone else remained silent. I was so cold my teeth started to chatter.
“Molly . . .” He paused and patted Mama’s arm with one hand while gripping her opposite shoulder tight with his other hand. “Your mama has breast cancer.”
Pressure squeezed my head as if all the air in the room pressed against it while stealing my breath at the same time. Muffled silence. My blood throbbing in my ears. Heart in my throat.
Mama, breast cancer? I started to shake. No. God, no.
“Come now.” Mama’s words and her own light Irish accented words barely made it through my nearly deaf ears. She gave us her normal no-nonsense look, as if she was pushing away any emotion that might be inside her right now. “No sense in you all looking like it’s the end of the world.”
“Mama!” Rori flung herself from her chair to our mother. Her sobs were loud as she wrapped her arms around Mama’s neck and cried against her large bosoms.
I stared at those bosoms as voices started reverberating in my muffled head. She had cancer. There. Strange thoughts went through my mind as I sat in my chair. Her thick gray hair might be gone soon. Her breasts, too.
What if the cancer had progressed farther? What if—
I squeezed my fists on the checkered tablecloth. A strangled sound tried to come from my throat but didn’t make it out.
Everyone but Ryan and I had gone to Mama to hug her. Daddy must have told Ryan about the cancer to bring him home, to be with us when he told the rest of the family the gut-wrenching news.
My big, hulking brothers didn’t bother to hide the tears that trickled down their cheeks. I caught a glimpse of Rori’s blotched red face and swollen eyes.
And still I sat.
My skin numb. My face numb. My eyes as dry and painful to blink as my dry throat hurt to swallow.
Daddy gripped the spindles on the back of Mama’s chair, and his fingers were bloodless. He bent his head, his chin touching his chest, his eyes closed.
“Everything’s going to be fine.” Mama’s voice wavered yet at the same time sounded strong and determined. She shooed everyone away. “Go on now. Sit down.”
Rori was the last to release Mama and force herself away, tears slipping down her blotchy face.
Still I sat.
I couldn’t move. My muscles didn’t want to work. Didn’t want to obey me as I told myself I should go to my mother. Hug her. And let loose the tears that burned behind my eyes. Tears backed up from countless years of being unable to cry. Even now at the most important time of all.
Shame burned my cheeks as my brothers and sister returned to their chairs and sat. Mama met my gaze and smiled, like she knew what emotions were building inside me that wanted to spew like a volcano, my body shaking me with the force of it all. Her eyes said it was okay. Everything would be okay.
It wasn’t okay.
Mama turned her gaze to Daddy as she looked up at him and patted one of his hands gripping the chair spindle. When he raised his head he was tight-lipped, his normally tanned face pale and drawn.
Daddy started to talk, but nothing came out. He cleared his throat then managed to speak. “The biopsy report showed the cancer is invasive.” The sound his throat made when he tried to clear it again was strangled.
Mama patted his hand and she said what he couldn’t. “The doctors started me on chemotherapy last week.” She spoke easily, as if this were a simple thing. “The cancer is far enough along that the docs need to shrink it before they perform surgery.”
Her words didn’t seem real. None of what she and Daddy said felt real.
Ryan finally took his gaze from his plate and focused on our mother. His voice was rough, serious. “You’re too goddamned tough to let it win, Mama.” He looked around the table. “She’s going to beat it. She raised us, didn’t she?”
“Do not take the Lord’s name in vain, child,” she said, as she always did if we strayed over that line.
She then moved her gaze to each of us, and there was strength and determination in her eyes as she spoke. “Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God goes with you; He will never leave you nor forsake you.”
“Deuteronomy thirty-one, six,” I found myself saying in a whisper, the words coming to my mind automatically from my Irish Catholic upb
ringing. I had long ago turned away from the faith I had grown up with. But at that moment I found myself praying that there really was a God and that Mama’s faith in Him would eradicate every bit of cancer from her body.
I finally found that I had the ability to move my body. The chair legs scraped against the wood floor as I pushed my chair back. The ache in my legs was as if my muscles still wanted to refuse me, but I made it to Mama. The wood was hard beneath my knees as I knelt beside her chair and wrapped my arms around her waist. I pressed my cheek against her bosom and squeezed my eyes tight.
“I love you, Mama,” I said as I breathed in her scent, which reminded me of love and home and precious memories. “I love you.”
Her lips were soft against my head as she pressed her lips to my hair. “I know you do, child. Everything is going to be fine.”
I wanted to believe her, but I said nothing and just pressed myself closer to her and held her tight, as if that would anchor her to earth forever.
CHAPTER FOUR
Nick
Nick Donovan clenched his hand around his cell phone before he shoved it into the clip on his belt. He braced his forearm against the wall beside the window of the third-floor Manhattan apartment and stared at the Elite Gentleman’s Club through the gap in the dingy but thick gauze curtains. He, Steele, and Kerrison had gone over the Elite’s building schematics before they left so they knew the layout well.
The phone conversation he’d just had with Lexi played over in his mind. It wasn’t like her to let the smallest amount of personal pain into her voice. At one time she’d shared some of her dark past with him. In that moment he’d known that what she’d been through had hardened her to the point where she thought showing any kind of emotional weakness was a flaw.
Like his own past had hardened him. A past he couldn’t let die. Or wouldn’t.
In the background, Jensen and Weiss argued about the best surveillance tactics to use as they kept an eye on the Elite Gentleman’s Club on East Sixtieth Street, between First and Second Avenues.
Cheyenne McCray - [Lexi Steele 02] Page 4
