Running On Empty: Crows MC

by Bloom, Cassandra

  “How much was the dress?” I asked, frantic and not wanting to waste any more time.

  She blinked at my question. “Huh?”

  “The dress,” I repeated, nodding towards it. “The dress, the necklace… hell, you pay to have your hair done, too? What’d it all cost?”

  “Not that there’s a damn thing you could do about it,” she quipped, “but it was nearly two-and-a-half grand.”

  That actually sounded about right. Giving the entire getup another once-over, I would have figured about the same, especially since the Crow Gang had been making a business out of trying to put out the same stuff at about a quarter of that.

  Nodding, I said, “Fine! Then I’ll buy both of them off of you. Now—”

  “Buy them?” she scoffed and shook her head, “Did you not hear me? I just said that this stuff cost two-thousand, five-hundred dollars!”

  I gave her a cold, solid look. “And I just said that I’m buying it from you,” I repeated in the same “DO YOU HEAR THE WORDS COMING OUT OF MY MOUTH”-tone. I was already reaching for my wallet when I asked, “And how much do you think you’d make off these old perverts?”

  She watched me retrieve my wallet and considered how things were going. Looking up at her, I could see the gears turning in her head as she began to calculate and then inflate.

  Definitely not a stupid whore, I thought.

  “Another two-grand. Easy,” she said, face cold and tone solid.

  I actually smiled at that. Then, nodding, I said, “Okay. Let’s pretend that’s even remotely true. That means that for four-point-five thousand bucks I can get you to go along with this? So what if I offer you a solid five-thousand dollars to do me this favor? That enough to get you to help me out and, in exchange, get you out of here for the night?”

  “Assuming you got it,” she said, still sounding disbelieving. “And assuming you’re not expecting me to suck your dick or do anything else once we’re out.”

  “If anybody’s earning oral for all this,” I said, starting to pry open my wallet, “it ain’t me.”

  My breath caught and my heart sank into my ass. After a rushed count on the bills waiting for me there, I would’ve been being generous if I said there was even two-thousand dollars staring back at me in mixed, large bills.

  “Fuck…” I grumbled.

  “Knew you didn’t have it,” she taunted.

  “Not on me, no,” I confessed, pulling out the wad of bills just the same. Seeing the stack of hundreds and fifties in my fist, her eyes widened and she began to stammer. “Go on! Take it!” I urged her, managing to stuff the bills into her waiting grasp and reaching back into my wallet. My fingers danced across the row of credit cards, searching out the ever-coveted gold sheen. Retrieving this, I held this out to her, as well. “Here,” I said, adding the credit card to the pot. “Once we’re out of here I can hit up an ATM and get you the rest. If you think I’m shitting you or if I try to bail out, then you’ve still got all that cash and a means to indulge yourself while thoroughly fucking my credit. That work out?”

  “Buddy,” she said, moving to cram the bundle into her purse and throwing herself on my shoulder and making like we’d been old lovers all along, “you’ve got yourself an escort outta here. Oh, and by the way, you’re buying me a burger, too. The food here sucks!”

  I couldn’t help but chuckle at that. “You’re telling me,” I said, feeling a sort of bitter-sweet relief at the sight of peoples’ gazes averting from us as we went, not wanting to look at the drunk busboy or his liquor-covered hooker as they shambled for the exit.

  I hated the idea of bailing on my mission to take out T-Built, but, judging from the direction the night was taking, I felt confident that I’d just chosen life in a life-or-death situation. This fact, however, would be spared when I recounted the night’s events with Danny.

  Chapter 10

  ~Mia~

  I followed the man outside, still trying to decide which shocked me more: how he had treated me or the fact that, despite his god-awful suit—which MUST have been purchased, like, only several hours earlier—he appeared to be loaded. Though the money was a sizable surprise, I finally decided that I’d “met” plenty of men with money, but I’d never met a man who actually treated me like a person; who didn’t just treat me like a whore. I’d been rolling on a pretty big bluff when I told him I would out him to the room, and I’d been certain that, like any other man who didn’t like it when I didn’t act like a “good li’l dog,” I was thoroughly convinced he’d just hit me, steal away whatever bit of power I thought I had, and probably leave me stinging with a threat if I dared to open my mouth again. Instead he’d looked at me like I did have power—power that a simple slap or some mean words could steal away.

  Though I’d be damned to admit it to him, he’d actually made me believe that I was a person again.

  And then, moreover, he had actually, genuinely apologized to me! Apologized! To me: a whore! If I weren’t still so skeptical about the whole thing, I might’ve actually puffed up my chest and walked out of there with a display of confidence.

  I didn’t—for all I knew T-Built might see and make a note to beat that habit right on out of me—but just to feel like I could was… well, it was wonderful.

  Not that I’d tell this guy any of that.

  Not that he…

  Well, maybe I’d at least thank him. He deserved that…

  Unless this was all a trick.

  Maybe I’d wait to see where all this led first.

  We continued on, me hanging off him in that “Where we gonna go to fuck now, baby?”-way that just screamed “HOOKER” to anyone looking. True to the guy’s predictions, people either didn’t look—not caring—or went to great lengths to look away if they caught sight of us passing through.

  “Just a sleazy, overdressed whore and a drunk busboy, folks! Heading off to rail me in the backseat of his Chrysler and then cry about how his dad never hugged him.”

  And then, just like that, we were out and already a half-block from the awful place. I felt a wave of relief grow inside me the further away we got. I glanced over at the man again, studying his features. Aside from the heinous suit, I couldn’t bring myself to find fault in him. He had his brushed straight back and styled—or something that he probably considered “styled” in the same way he likely thought that his suit worked for him—in a way that practically screamed “I DON’T KNOW HOW TO BE FANCY; PLEASE THINK I’M FANCY” at me. Considering its length and using Candy’s patented “hooker vision,” I could picture how that hair should look: falling naturally past his shoulder. I almost envied him for likely never having to do much with hair like that; he probably didn’t have to do a damn thing to it to walk out of his place each day looking good. His dark, foresty-green eyes took little darting glances around, and I realized that he was still pretty nervous despite putting nearly two blocks away from the Carrion Crew’s fundraiser. I frowned at this, wondering why that could be.

  Unless, of course, he was somebody who would be recognizable.

  I thought on that a moment, my curiosity swelling that much more.

  That would explain a lot…

  I looked up again, sensing a shift in his pace as he slowed. The anxiety was gone from him. The jitters were gone from him. I stared, blinking. Everything twitchy about him—and just a second earlier he’d been all-but bathed in twitchiness—was just… just gone!

  Sneering down at himself, he moved to pull off the suit jacket, yanked off the tie, and unbuttoned the collared shirt before yanking it with no small sense of victory from his dress pants. He turned away from me—less out of disgust and more out of need—and knelt beside a motorcycle that somebody had parked on the side of the road. I was about to say that it was a strange place for somebody to leave such a nice bike, but, as he began using one of its mirrors to un-“style” his hair I realized that it must have been his.

  He’d parked his motorcycle three blocks away from the party he was crashing? I th
ought to myself, blinking at the gorgeous paintjob; finding it somehow familiar. Christ! He must be somebody recognizable to the Crew if he thought even his ride would be recognized by someone!

  “Who the hell are you?” I blurted out, stunned by the picturesque man that rose to his feet after he’d finished (fixing) messing up his hair

  Damn, I hated being right about something like this.

  “An idiot,” he confessed, shaking his head. He grumbled something about someone named Danny, let out a long, loud sigh that actually seemed to knock his head back until he was basically growling up at the sky, and then, finally, he looked back at me. “Now,” he started, sounding like the sigh had taken about eighty pounds of stress of his shoulders, “I believe I owe you some more money. And a cheeseburger. Christ, a cheeseburger sounds so fucking good right about now.”

  I blushed at that—it really did sound good—and then caught myself looking at the motorcycle. Then I glanced down at the dress I was wearing. Then I remembered that I wasn’t wearing any underwear.

  There was no way I’d be able to ride with him without flashing the entire town. Assuming that we didn’t wind up getting the cops called on us, I still had enough dignity to not want to go around showing myself off to everyone and anyone out and about tonight.

  “I can’t ride on that,” I said.

  “What? Why not?” he demanded, suddenly looking me over as though the reason might be written there. “It’s not about the dress, right? I already said that I’m paying for—”

  “I’m…” I blurted the word, interrupting him, but trailed off, embarrassed. “I’m not wearing panties,” I finally confessed in a whisper.

  I blushed, not liking how embarrassed I was at admitting that. While I wasn’t exactly proud of the lifestyle I’d be thrown into, I’d thought I had developed a harder skin in regards to all of this. I silently cursed T-Built on his stupid underwear rules. If it wasn’t for him, this wouldn’t have been an issue in the first place.

  The man looked back at me for a moment, considering what I’d just said. I was certain he’d try to catch a peek, demand that I show him, or, worse yet, decide to go ahead and check on his own. It wasn’t like that hadn’t already happened to me that night. Instead, starting to nod, he gave a sorrowful look back at the motorcycle—his face seeming almost apologetic—and then said, “Can you walk in those shoes?”

  Caught off guard by his reaction—realizing that he wasn’t going to take advantage of my situation or change his mind about paying me and just ditch me there—it took me a moment to say, “I walk in worse for hours every night.”

  “Fair enough,” he said, rolling his eyes like he’d just asked a stupid question. Then, retrieving his discarded dress coat, he held it out to me. “Here.”

  I stared at it. “‘Here,’ what?” I asked, thinking he was expecting me to hold his jacket.

  He opened it up, holding it at the wrist of each sleeve, and held it in front of me. “You can tie it around your waist,” he said, shrugging awkwardly as he continued to hold it in front of him. “It’s not going to fix the problem, but it will at least help keep everything hidden while we walk.”

  I blushed at that, cursing my instincts for thinking the worst when, as it turned out, he was actually trying to help. Offering a smile for thanks, I nodded, took it, and, at the last minute, decided to slip into it instead. It was too big, and it hung almost low enough to cover my thighs. I was instantly surrounded in the man’s scent, and my body betrayed me and swooned momentarily.

  The man watched, considered the overall effect, and shrugged. “Looks better on you than me, I guess,” he resigned. Then, nodding down an adjacent street, he said, “There’s a Denny’s down in that direction. Would a burger from there work?”

  I blushed, staring at him. “You’re really going to walk with me to buy me dinner?” I asked, stunned. “Even with your motorcycle right there?”

  He glanced back at the motorcycle. Then he looked back at me, looking confused by my question. “Why wouldn’t I?” he said. “You said you can’t ride on it and I promised you a burger.”

  In my mind, those words seemed to make no sense. In my mind, none of this made any sense. I was a prostitute—he knew this—but he was taking steps to keep his word and accommodate my needs.

  “Isn’t it… I don’t know, an inconvenience?” I asked, wondering if I could prompt him to suddenly realize how foolish it was to be putting this much work into dealing with just a whore.

  He shrugged again. “Considering the fact that you’re the one without underwear I imagine it’s a bigger inconvenience to you.”

  I nearly collapsed at that. Now he was considering my feelings in all of this?

  Was I being punked?

  “So…” he drawled, obviously in no way prompted to bail on me or his promise, “Burger from Denny’s is okay then?”

  I blushed and smiled, finally accepting that my luck had changed—even if just for the night—and I nodded. “That sounds wonderful,” I said.

  He laughed and nodded, gesturing for me to follow. As we walked down the street, I was surprised at how comfortable I felt while walking next to this man. As we continued to walk in silence, I decided if I was about to have dinner with him, I should at least know his name. Turning to look at him, I was surprised to find that he’d been staring at me.

  “What?” I demanded, “You changing your mind about asking for sex?”

  The words, a product of my paranoid skepticism, were out of my mouth before I even had a chance to consider an alternative.

  Damn, but this life had broken me!

  “No, no. Nothing like that. Sorry,” he said, his voice hurried like a teen getting caught staring at porn. He took in a breath and shrugged. “You’re different. That’s all,” he said.

  “Different?” I repeated, still feeling bad for snapping at him but also still feeling paranoid.

  He nodded. “Yeah. Like… like I don’t know too many hookers who use words like ‘foregoing.’ And that’s not even to say that they aren’t smart—I’ve known a lot of really bright hookers, actually—but the way they talk is usually pretty…” he trailed off.

  “Monosyllabic?” I offered.

  He looked up at that, startled. “I… I was going to say ‘trashy,’ actually, but that works better, I suppose. Only proves my point that much more, but—hey!—I won’t complain about that.”

  I actually laughed at that. “Well, thank you… I guess,” I said, feeling proud of myself for committing to my decision to say the words to him earlier. Then, realizing that he was likely owed some context for those words, I said, “For everything, I mean. Not just, you know, saying I’m different. Getting me out of there, paying for my dress…” I blushed again, “And for walking with me to get a burger. Not a lot of guys would do something like that.”

  “Well that’s bullshit,” he said, catching me off guard. “Guys walk with girls all the time for burgers. It’s, like, the most American thing I can think of, actually.”

  I couldn’t bring myself to tell him that wasn’t what I’d meant. Instead, I said, “Since we are about to have dinner together, can I at least know your name.”

  He considered this for a moment, that nervous look coming back to the surface of his expression. “You work for the Carrion Crew, right?” he asked.

  I bit my lip at the mention of my work and I nodded.

  Looking a little more worried, he asked, “You loyal to them?”

  I frowned, wondering if this was some kind of test that T-Built had set up. “What do you mean?” I dodged, hoping to get a better idea of what it was he was asking before potentially putting my neck beneath the executioner’s axe.

  “Like…” he trailed off and looked away, thinking. He stuffed his hands in the pockets of his pants and he hummed a stretched note to himself before finally stopping. “Like, what would you do if tomorrow there was no Carrion Crew? Would you mourn for them, worry for yourself, or—”

  “I’d hawk
the fattest, ugliest loogie I could on top of my boss’ grave,” I spat out, surprising even myself. Then, even more surprised by how good it felt to say it, I added, “And, if I’m not crossing a line in saying so, I’d take a piss on top of it, too.”

  He laughed at that, seeming entertained by my reaction, and nodded. “You are a fun one,” he said, “I’ll give you that.” Then, obviously feeling confident in saying it, he said, “Jace. My name is Jace. Short for ‘Jason,’ sure, but most just call me ‘Jace.’ What about you?”

  “Mia,” I said, regarding him with more curiosity. “Why all the cloak-and-dagger questions just to know your name?”

  “Let’s just say that your employers would be very happy to have me dead,” he answered as we crossed the street and started across the Denny’s parking lot. “And I wanted to make sure you wouldn’t be eagerly rushing off to call them and tell them you were with me.”

  Hearing this, I stared at him for a long moment. We reached the entrance, and I quickly moved to open the door and let myself in, holding it open behind me for him as I did. My mind raced, suddenly worried that I might have put myself in danger by leaving with this man. The hostess did a double-take as we came in, caught herself in mid-sneer at our obviously disheveled appearances, and worked to bring herself back into the realm of professionalism.

  Jeez! I thought, What’s it say when even a Denny’s thinks you look like a whore?

  Having regained herself, the hostess beamed a crooked smile with even more crooked teeth, confirmed that, yes, there were two of us, and then saddled us an unusually long distance across rows and rows of open tables and a bunch of others occupied by gawking faces who paused their conversations and their meals to watch us pass. Jace took no notice of this as we followed, seeming confident enough not to care, and I did my best to follow his example. Finally, reaching a lonely table at the other end of the restaurant, we were seated. I slid into the booth, working to keep my slip of a dress from revealing too much at the same time. Two menus plopped down in front of us, and I vacantly heard a hum of words as what I could only imagine was an assurance that our server would be right with us was uttered moments before she saddled back to the front of the restaurant.