The only thing that spoils the ‘old world’ air about my office is the computer perched atop the desk. It’s a necessary evil; otherwise, I’d do without it.
The remainder of the room is more relaxed. One wall is just a huge bookcase. Loaded down with old and new titles, some of the spines have yet to be broken in.
Most of the newer additions were written by Mona’s gay one-night stand. Ever since she told us about him, I’ve been dying of curiosity. Who was it that said writers imbue themselves into their work? I don’t know, but I believe it to be true.
Two days ago, I had Anna, my assistant, go out and buy his backlist. I don’t do electronic books. I prefer the solid weight of a tome in my hands, the smell of the paper as it bristles under my touch. In many ways, I’m a traditionalist. Don’t let the fact I’m a madam convince you otherwise!
A large cream daybed, queen size, packed with huge down-pillows and soft, cashmere throws to snuggle under sits in another corner. Opposite, there’s a sixty-inch plasma screen. And that is where my attention is grasped as though the screen’s contents are magnetic and my eyes can do nothing else but answer that magnetized pull.
Had I not been issued a threat the other day, I wouldn’t have thought anything of it.
The burning building on the screen shouldn’t have grabbed my attention. Sad as it is, these things happen and in a cramped city like this one, the statistics aren’t pretty.
So what is it that makes this building special?
Because it is.
I stare at the crumbling walls, half of the entire building caught in the flames and made derelict. And then, it clicks.
I’ve been there.
Two hours ago.
It’s Mona’s place.
A hard fist grapples my stomach and my guts feel as though a grenade has just detonated inside of me.
I don’t know how long it took to reach this state, but the knowledge that a call from work was the only thing to save Mona, Eddie and myself from the conflagration has sweat beading my brow.
My eyes burn with the ferocity of the flames; something that my television duplicates to a nauseating clarity. The more I stare, the sicker I feel. It’s definitely Mona’s place. I’m not wrong. No amount of wishful thinking will let me lie to myself. I recognize the crappy façade, the even crappier neighborhood. Had Mona not been such a pain in the ass stickler, so proud and self-reliant, I’d have forced her out of that area. Helped her to move in somewhere decent. But stubborn doesn’t describe my friend.
I can only thank God for that call. Whoever the inconsiderate bastard was, contacting a cleaner for a commission at nine-ten PM in the evening, they have my gratitude.
This is a message. The thought whispers through my brain and I mutter, “This is the message from the Russians, isn’t it?”
My fingers curl in on themselves, the sharp points of my nails dig down into soft flesh. But the slight pain is good. It eases my internal agony.
I turn towards Anna, every part of me beseeching her to tell me I’m wrong, that this is just a horrific accident. But the grim twist to her mouth speaks louder than words.
“What did they say?”
Anna’s voice is a whisper. “Burn, baby, burn.”
A cry escapes me and I shove my fist against my lips to stem it. It’s inconceivable that such annihilation could be captioned in such a blasé way.
And there you have the reason why I will not sell to the fucking mafia. Lives, people, they’re expendable. Nothing more than a business commodity that can be used and abused and when the entity is no longer a viable product, then it can be easily discarded.
They don’t care that I’ve built up relationships with these women, my staff. They don’t give a shit about my girls.
Me? I care. I know these women’s children. I know Jessie has a grandmother dying of cancer in a hospice. I know Parvati has family back in India, who have no idea what she does for a living and if they did, they’d disown her in an instant. But they rely upon every cent she sends back to them.
Do the Russians know all that?
No and they don’t care either way.
It’s hard to breathe. I feel light-headed, glassy-eyed. Guilt passes through my blood with the velocity of white water rapids.
It’s amazing to think twenty-five minutes ago, arousal was swirling through me. Followed swiftly by the sense of loss, of being lost. Now, I just feel frightened. I hate admitting to such a weakness, but it’s there too.
Mona and Edwina are more than friends to me. They’re more than sisters! If Mona has been targeted, then Eddie will be next.
But I can’t sell to the mob. I can’t.
Neither can I disband this operation, because if I do, the girls will have lost their income. I’d hope they have the foresight to create nest eggs, but it’s a futile wish.
Eloise has her college tuition to pay for and Britney can’t let two months pass without changing her cellphone.
The weight of the world settles on my shoulders as I stagger over to the daybed. As I sit, the feathers part to cushion my weight in a welcoming embrace. However, through it all, after Anna’s confirmation, my attention has returned to the fire.
Footsteps alert me to my PA’s presence. As she sits down, her weight atop the cushion jostles me a little and she brings an arm around my shoulders to comfort me further. She squeezes and the scent of her flowery perfume, subtle yet strangely powerful—an oxymoron, I know— fills my nostrils. I lift a hand and clasp my fingers in hers, holding tightly like a child holding a teddy bear after awakening from a nightmare.
Anna has been with me since the beginning. A friend, a colleague and an advisor. Too old to be on the game, but one who has the experience that I didn’t have at the start, she’s been a fountain of wisdom. Without her, this operation wouldn’t have been so successful.
She’s more than just a PA. She’s my right hand woman.
“What do I do, Anna?” I hate that my lips are quivering; emotion making them tremble. Making me shiver and shake in her hold.
Nausea returns at the ceaseless burning of Mona and her neighbors’ homes. The flames lick the sky. Arching upwards to caress the stars. Wind has them flickering in fury and the furious flow of water from the firefighters’ hoses can’t seem to keep up with the inner rage of the conflagration. And it’s all because of me. This destruction rests on my soul, because I will not sell to the mob. I won’t give them what they want and like spoilt brats, they’ve decided to play mean.
It’s a ridiculous time to feel this way, but I’m so tired. I feel as though it’s a million years since I last slept. A part of me wishes this were just a bad dream. That I could wake up after eight hours on this daybed, stretch and feel relief that it was all just a nightmare. That Mona’s building was as crappy as ever, falling to pieces but not because of a fire, simply because it was never maintained and that the mob weren’t scratching at my door, wanting a piece of the tasty pie that is my business.
But this is reality.
Hard reality.
“Tell me, Anna? What do I do?”
Her sigh is heartfelt. She shares my pain and horror at the destruction these men are willing to commit in order to get their hands on Papillon. She feels for me.
“You can’t sell to them. You’ve been too good to the girls, Mona. They’re used to you and the way you work. As soon as they come in, they’ll change the structure of the business and the girls will become expendable.”
“But if I close the doors, they’ll just go elsewhere. Maybe somewhere that won’t look after them the way I do.”
“Yeah, but that’s their choice. They decide where they’ll be going and a few of them will probably give it up anyway. If you close the doors, they have a choice about their future. As soon as the mob gets involved, their lives are endangered.”
She tightens her hand about mine. “This place you’ve created, Marina, it’s a haven for women like us. It’s unbeatable. What you charge, the rates and the cli
entele you’ve enabled the girls to have, they can go private. It’s only because you’re so fair, and they love you, that they haven’t already. This place is glued together by you. You’re what keeps us all here. Without you, they’ll go their own way.
“It’s sad, but sadness is preferable to being shepherded off to the Russian mob.”
“But won’t they just come after us if we close down?”
“Undoubtedly. But we can hide. They can’t tout the clients, because they don’t know who they are. They might have an idea, but I think that’s why the mob wants in anyway. You have some A-class clients, Marina. State secrets, with the right woman… pillow talk has caused many a downfall for a lot of businessmen and politicians. And why not make it treason?” She sighs. “I don’t think you have a choice, honey.”
“And the girls won’t mind?”
“Of course, they will! They’ll miss you. Just like I will. But safety is always the priority.”
The idea of giving up four years of my life is an abomination. So is conceding defeat. But with the evidence before me, of what these guys are capable of, I know Anna is right.
“When do I close the doors?”
“Tonight. When the last customer goes, that has to be it. The last time. We’ll have to leave.”
“I can’t leave. I have a mortgage on this place.”
“Yeah, but you can’t stay. What if they decide to torch this place too? Then you’ll die. At least if you’re out of here and they do set fire to this place, you have insurance. You can afford for that to happen. You can’t afford to put your life in danger. You’ve got to get out of town. We all do. We need to expect retaliation, Marina.”
I want to refuse and completely reject Anna’s words, but I know I can’t. It seems incredible that this is the end. I look around the place I’ve called home for nearly half a decade and my heart shrivels a little at the idea of having to leave.
I’ve been happy here. It’s an unorthodox situation, an even weirder business to have established, but it has suited me. And I’ve enjoyed it. It’s been surprisingly fruitful and I’ve been useful, too.
Jenna was the first prostitute I’d ever met. And I mean ever. In Mona’s building of all places, the one currently being eaten alive by starving flames.
I met her after a visit to Mona’s. Jenna had been beaten up pretty badly. Her eyes swollen, puffy and bruised. Her lips bleeding, her nose a raw wound. She’d walked with a gait that said her ribs had been fractured or broken. Her arms wrapped around herself as though that could stop the agony. I’ve fallen off a horse way too many times to count and I’ve hobbled around just like Jenna had that day.
Mona had just moved in and I’d been helping her unpack as well as trying to convince her she couldn’t live in the dump of a building she’d rented. But after her divorce, that shack had been all she could afford and she wouldn’t accept money from either Eddie or myself.
We didn’t know it, because the crappy furniture had come with the rental, so I’d stood outside the elevator waiting for it to arrive, when Jenna had stumbled past me on her way to the stairs.
Her voice had been filled with pain as she’d whispered, “The elevator’s always broken. You have to take the stairs.”
I’d been taken aback at the extent of her injuries. She’d been battered. I’d never seen such wounds. And back at my family’s ranch, I’d seen guys chewed up by bulls! The ferocity of the attack the woman had endured beggared belief. I wanted to say something, do something, but what could I have done? Save gawk at her?
I’d made my way to the stairs, my step almost three times faster than hers and passed two floors, when I’d heard a cry. It had been a weak mewl and I might not have heard of it, but I had and I’d known it to be her. I’d run back up the stairs, hoping to be of help, thinking she’d hurt herself again.
New York isn’t a place where neighborly aid is frequently offered. But I’m not from New York, I’m Montana born and bred. Help thy neighbor is a way of life, not something you pick and choose to dole out.
I’d made my way back to her and found a man, standing over her, his leg arched back at an odd angle and I’d known he’d been on the brink of kicking her in the gut.
My arrival had shocked him and he’d been standing there, like a dumbass, as though he’d been frozen to the spot. I’d used his hesitation against him.
Jerking my arm back, I’d shot the edge of my wrist upwards and broken his nose.
Blood had gushed out. His screams had filled the landing. Literally gurgling with blood, he’d spat some of the liquid at me as he’d snapped, “You bitch!”
I’d come at him again, with the same move and this time, the pain of it had him tilting backwards and slamming into the floor. Luckily, a foot or so away from Jenna’s trembling body.
“Is this your boyfriend?” I’d asked, bending down to help her up.
It had taken all of my strength to get her back on her feet. Any time she’d placed pressure on her bones; her eyes had grown dazed as though she was on the edge of consciousness. It had seemed as though she were mere inches away from fainting.
By the time I’d gotten her standing, she’d managed to grit out, “Yes. He’s my boyfriend. And yes, he’s the reason I’m like this. T-thank you for coming to help me.”
We’d made it down the six flights of stairs to the ground floor without any incidents and without another word spoken between us until I’d led her outside and asked her if she wanted to go to a doctor’s clinic. To which she’d shaken her head and mumbled, “I can’t afford it.”
I’d refused to take notice, knowing that she needed medical attention. After forcing her into a cab, I’d directed the driver to take us to the nearest clinic. I’d sat with her for hours in a smelly waiting room filled with bawling babies, red in the face from the fury of whatever was wrong with them. Their bedraggled and exhausted mothers bouncing them on their knees, as they hoped it would stop the endless tears. Some of the patients had sat slumped in their seats as they slept off their ‘drunk’. Others had stood, jittery, shaking, waiting for their next fix.
The receptionist had looked at Jenna as though she were a turd and spying that, I’d wondered if she was more than just a battered girlfriend and I’d asked her if her boyfriend was also her pimp. I could have minded my own business, probably should have done, but the question had burnt a hole in my tongue and I’d needed to know.
The humiliation on her face as she’d nodded would never leave me. Somehow, that had made it all the easier to hand over my credit card for charging the treatment. After the six hour wait for her to be patched up properly, I’d helped her back to my place.
Helping thy neighbor might have been bred into me over childhood but it had never crossed my mind that I could have placed myself in danger by inviting her into my home.
She might have been a thief or a junkie, willing to do anything to get her next dose of whatever drug she used to numb the pain of her reality.
But I’d had faith in her and she hadn’t let me down. She’d repaid my kindness by doing nothing to prove that I was unwise to trust her.
Slowly, we’d become friends and roommates, when my old one had moved out. I’d managed to cover the rent, just and Jenna, during her convalescence, had taken to caring for the apartment. She’d cooked, cleaned, and looked after me. When she’d managed to get herself back on her feet and needed to start earning money again, knowing what that meant, I’d told her I’d do what I could to help her and that she could keep on living with me.
Neither of us imagined it would mean establishing a brothel of my own in the flat that had been my home ever since I’d moved from Montana to the Big Apple.
Even now, I don’t know how it all started. It just did. Without much planning, everything came into being.
Suddenly, I became a halfway house for girls who’d been beaten by their pimps. Gradually, my staff had been complete. All of them grateful for what I’d done for them, because I’d paid their medical bil
ls without complaint even though it had put me in debt.
Eventually, when they’d returned to their pimps, the meagre earnings they’d managed to save, came to me to pay for their medical care. Not one of them had let me down.
The turning point had been when Lou, somebody who’d come to me with a broken collarbone the first time, had come to me again, but with a punctured lung that had been minutes away from killing her.
Somehow, she’d managed to stagger to my place. I don’t know how she did it. It had been a medical marvel, but she’d thought of me as her safety, as a haven and she’d used her last ounce of strength to get to me.
At that point, I knew I had to do something and I guess that’s why I’ve become what I’ve become.
I feel no shame in it. I’m proud of the lives I’ve managed to save.
People will probably judge me for my choices. They might say I should have encouraged them to take a different path, to get out of this line of work and I have done. Just not in a direct way.
You can’t change someone, unless they want to be changed. And when I met these women, selling their bodies for a wage was the only thing they knew how to do.
Asking or pleading with them to stop would have seemed like an alien prospect, when it was all they felt they were capable of.
As with Eloise, over the years, I’ve encouraged them to take classes. To take part in adult education and help them get the basics they need to take the steps out of this way of life.
I’ve accommodated classes and exams and study time. Done what I can to ensure they have something else to support them, taught them they don’t have to just lie on their backs because that was all they were capable of before.
A Bitch In Time (Marina: Part One: Naughty Nookie Series) Page 3
