Begging for Bad Boys

by Willow Winters

  The guard fires at me as he crouches behind the desk. He misses with my movement, but I don’t. I hit his ankle beneath the desk, which causes him to fall forward. His head’s my next target.

  My hesitation has nearly cost me everything tonight, but I’m in fighting mode. Headshots are what I’m after. That’s what I was trained for. Marines aren’t police; we’re not trained to disable. We’re trained to kill and get the job done.

  And if ever there was a more righteous cause than this, I don’t know of it.

  Another thug comes running out of a side door and I pop one in his skull before he can even see me on the floor.

  I pause, listen. The screams fade. The running of feet heading away recede. I don’t hear anymore coming. That must be it.

  Of all the people I killed — enemy soldiers, terrorists — this balding prick has it coming the most I figure. He didn’t do this because he believes in anything. He enslaved and brutalized women not for a cause, but because he’s a greedy prick. Because he can.

  So I make my move into the office. The pudgy little bald man has a gun, but he doesn’t know how to use it. I do.

  I end him and think not another thing about it. He’s not worth it. I go to his pockets and quickly find a set of keys. I take them into my gloved hands, and swiftly move to one of the chained up women. I put my gun back against my spine, safety on, and show her I mean no harm before I quickly unlock her.

  I hand her the keys and she heads to the next woman with trembling hands. They’re taking care of each other. Even though she could run, she spends the precious time unlocking each of the other women, and that helps heal my heart a little from what I’ve just seen.

  I head out. I gotta go before the cops get here.

  I don’t feel bad for what I did. None of these guys had the slightest shred of decency if they were willing to stand by and watch this shit happen. I only regret not killing those fuckers I first saw, and putting my life in danger for no reason.

  Part of me asks: what am I becoming?

  Nothing worse than what I already was, I tell myself.

  Chapter 7

  Alice

  I was pretty shaken up by the events at the club, Tom — the bouncer — told me that he had my back, that he wasn’t gonna tell some thugs where I or anyone was. And I believe he meant it, but it’s hard to know what a man will do when put to the knife.

  Tom and I have been friends ever since we moved to a new club together. I think we both needed a change, though he was always so stoic, and I never asked why he wanted out of the last club. For me, it was that memories of Viktor never stopped coming and after a while, I had to move on. After I took a leave of absence for my pregnancy, I wanted a new start.

  I wanted a place that wouldn’t constantly remind me of how hard and fast my feelings for Viktor had started, and how much my heart ached when he didn’t show up. It had taken my business attitude about work and destroyed it.

  So I trust that Tom is telling the truth. We’ve been through a lot together already. But eventually, those men are going to find out where John is.

  If it were just me, I might not let it get to me so much. I’d stick my chin out and put on a tough act, but there’s Cierra to worry about now. Motherhood changes the whole equation for me, I’ve learned.

  This club is a bit more upper class, with a wealthier client base. It even helped my earnings a bit to move, to be the new girl at a different club. But that wanes fast, and it inevitably comes down to your hustle.

  Stripping is a sales job at its core, all about your hustle. The most beautiful women on the planet can go into a strip club with all the confidence in the world, but if they don’t have the hustle and the personality, they’ll walk away with very little money. You learn fast that the most piggish, superficial men have more standards than even they think and don’t part with money without some style and skill behind your game.

  But now I’m wondering if maybe I shouldn’t move again. Go to a new club, disappear. Maybe that would help protect me from those thugs.

  I’m spending tonight in hiding, texting various clients and letting them know I’m only available by special request, but when my eyes glance up from my phone, I see a face I never thought I’d see again.

  Viktor’s.

  After all these years… it nearly floors me. Quite literally, as I almost topple over on my stilettos in shock. He’s like a ghost of the past. A walking apparition. He’s still just as handsome, though he’s a bit older now and more rugged.

  I never thought I’d see him again. I’d thought of hiring a detective a few times to track him down, to let him know he has a little girl. But if he didn’t care enough to stick around, I didn’t want to rope him back in. And besides, I had so little to go on. All I knew that was concrete was his first name and the knowledge he grew up in some little coastal town in Maine.

  I didn’t think it’d be enough for even a seasoned investigator.

  But after five years, I find myself staring in shock.

  He’s dressed up nicely, in a suit. It looks too warm for a Vegas tourist; none of them ever tolerate a full suit for long. My own intuition tells me he’s been in the area for a while. More so because he’s not here on a visit, that much is clear. He’s marching back towards the office to speak with the manager, like a man on a mission.

  Curiosity gets the better of me, and I peer after him, watch him slip in back. One of the bouncers I don’t know the name of tries to shut the door on Viktor, but he doesn’t let them. He keeps it open, and though I can’t hear the words that transpire between them I can tell he’s being threatening.

  It’s unreal. Sure, it’s not the screaming match with the thugs, but it’s clear that Viktor is putting the fear of god into them.

  I watch as the manager throws up his hands, seems to curse, but ultimately hands over several stacks of bills, stuffing it into a black satchel that Viktor has.

  Is he with some local gang? My heart sinks…What has happened to him in these past five years? What type of man has he become?

  But I’m so wrapped up in the moment, in the pang I feel in my heart, that I’m too slow to move out of sight when he turns to leave and he catches sight of me.

  My heart jumps into my throat and I want to bolt.

  But it’s too late. Our eyes lock.

  It feels like the moment drags on forever, but it must be no more than a heartbeat before I tear myself away and try to head off. I can’t face him. I can’t hear why he abandoned me. All these years, I’ve come up with stories I told myself when I couldn’t sleep. That he enlisted for a second tour; that he left. That he got a great job offer and couldn’t wait. That he’s off somewhere living a happy life without me.

  Or that I was just a dumb stripper who gave him a free night of fun and he bragged about it to all his buddies before forgetting I existed.

  I can’t face the potential that the last story was right. The shame and embarrassment of falling in love with someone who doesn’t even think of you is too much.

  “Alice! Alice!” he calls as I try to head away, but the crowd is thick and I know it’s futile. More than that, some anger boils up in me, from him having taken off long ago without showing up for our date.

  “Stop letting everyone know my real name,” I turn and mutter to him in irritation.

  He freezes right before me, looking me over like I was a ghost.

  “Sorry,” he says right away, running a hand back over his sleek wheat-blonde hair. “I just… I didn’t know if you heard me.”

  It’s all happening too fast, and I don’t have time to sort through the whirlwind of emotions that’s brewing in my heart. I never thought I’d see him again, and I’d long ago given up on finding him. Yet here he is, walking back into my club, and looking at me like...

  Like what? Like he’s surprised. Happy, even. But then, I guess he should be. Maybe he thinks this’ll be round two, enough time passed between us that a second one-night-stand might be in order.


  And who knows what extortion racket he’s involved with now. I knew military guys had a tough time transitioning back into the civilian population, but I didn’t take him to be the guy caught up in that crap.

  “It’s Aphrodite,” I remind him, and part of me wants to storm away, never hearing his excuses for why he didn’t show up. I don’t want him to charm me again, and I know if he smiles at me, my heart is going to leap out of my chest with joy.

  I didn’t think love at first sight was supposed to last through heartbreak. How can I still feel so strongly for a man I only spent a few hours with? Tears are threatening my eyes, but I can’t allow them to spill. I can’t show him how much I missed him.

  How much I still miss him.

  “Aphrodite,” he repeats after me, like that name is precious to him too. He wets his lips, “Look, I—” he looks like he’s about to offer me some excuses, but thinks better of it. Maybe it’s the look on my face, or maybe it’s just that he’s smarter than the average man and knows better than to try, but he drops it. “I’ve thought about you a lot,” he says instead.

  “That’s nice,” I say, and it breaks my heart to be so cold to him. This isn’t how I wanted it to go. I dreamed of seeing him again, of hearing his voice and feeling his touch. In the dark of the night, it was always him my mind went back to.

  I pictured running into him on the street, seeing him light up and tell me how wrong he was to abandon me. Some romantic version of love that doesn’t exist.

  And now he’s here, back in my life like a fantasy come to life, and I don’t even know where to begin, so I glance down at his bag. “I guess you got what you came here for, huh?”

  Viktor had strut in here looking fierce and intimidating, but when I said that, he looks down at the satchel full of money and seems full of shame. It was the most complete reversal I’d ever seen in a man in such a short amount of time.

  “I guess so,” he says, sounding a little defeated. “I… I didn’t want us to meet like this again. I mean… I never thought I could find you again. I checked the club over and over, and you weren’t there. Not that I thought it’s likely you’d still be around. I thought you might have gone back home in LA,” he says.

  “Things changed pretty fast after that night,” I say with a shrug, letting him read into that what he would.

  “They did,” he says with an air of resignation. “Look, I know you don’t owe me anything… and I have a lot of explaining to do, but…” he rubs at his lightly stubbled jaw. “Let me take you dinner and try to make things right. A proper date,” he offers, that confidence and charm I knew long ago eroded away, replaced by his apologetic demeanor.

  It was such a change. Five years ago, he acted like the world was at his feet. He was happy and excited, ready to start anew. Now he was jaded, beaten down by reality, and that crushed me.

  But then, I was beaten down by reality too. Raising my baby girl — his child — on my own had taken a toll. I replaced my dreams with hers, and funded them with a career I thought I’d only be in for a couple of years.

  I glance around at the club, trying to buy time. I don’t know what a date with him with look like. Not anymore.

  “I’m not available at night,” I respond honestly. “Or... days.” That part was true too. Cierra wouldn’t be in school until next year, and she doesn’t have a regular sitter, especially now that the school year was back in session.

  My rejection saddens him; I can see it even though he hides it well, and it hurts my heart. But he gives me a nod.

  “Of course,” he says respectfully. Whatever he’s become since my one-night stand with him, he still honors my wishes. “I wish I hadn’t screwed things up for us. But I just want you to know that I regret daily that I did,” he says. “Good luck Alice. I hope life gives you nothing but roses,” he says as he turns and walks on out of my life again.

  I can already feel the tears running down my cheeks, and I angrily swat them away. I draw in my lower lip and pray my mascara doesn’t run.

  But my heart is breaking as I let him walk away. I’ve just thrown away my only chance at true love. At the one man who could make my home a family.

  The only man I’ve ever really loved.

  Chapter 8

  Viktor

  I blew my chance with Alice long ago. That’s the truth of it. No matter how right it might’ve been to lay a beat down on that piece of shit rapist, it cost me my chance with the only woman that really ever had my heart.

  I try to tell myself that it was a one night fling, that it likely would’ve gone nowhere anyhow. But I don’t believe it, not in my heart.

  She was still just as beautiful, but she looked a bit wiser now. More confident in that invisible way. I wanted her just as badly seeing her again as I did that first night, but so much has changed. I shouldn’t have wanted to bring her back into my life now anyways. What kind of life could I offer a woman like that?

  Instead I try to focus on my job. Mark is here, pointing out the building.

  “Look, there’s a guy that owes us a ton of money,” he says to me.

  “No shit. They all do, that’s why you send me,” I tell him. I know the job enough by now to know that almost every time, that’s the reason I’m sent out. Some piece of shit low-level criminal owes them money. It’s not as satisfying as the first job he sent me on, to bust up that slave trading piece of shit Zheng, but I don’t feel bad about busting in the face of a guy who robs grocers and liquor stores either.

  “No no, you see, the problem this time is that he doesn’t just owe us. Normally we only lend to a guy if we know we’re his only creditors, but this time it turns out he secretly owed a bunch to some other folks too. Including some Chinese mobsters. You know the ones, same type who ran that place you busted up on your first night,” Mark explains to me.

  “Yeah, hard to forget,” I tell him. And it is. Not because I feel bad; nobody I shot or beat down didn’t have it coming.

  But because it was the start of my new criminal life. And the start of finally making some serious money. Enough to live like a real man who might be going somewhere someday. If I can keep it up for a few more years, I might even be able to get rid of my prison record and find some honest work.

  “So we need you to track him down and collect before they do. He owes us a lot here, bud,” he stresses to me needlessly. “If they get to him first, they’ll wring him dry and we’ll not get a penny, ya dig?”

  “Yeah I got it,” I tell him a bit more impatiently than I intend. I don’t like what Mark does — what we do — but I shouldn’t take it out on him. He’s had a hard life from beginning to now. What he does — what we do, I remind myself again — isn’t right, but I am in no place to judge. “I’m on it, so it’s as good as done,” I assure him.

  “That’s the Vik I know,” he says to me with a broad grin and a slap on my shoulder. And with that, I’m off.

  It’s not a ritzy high-end place my trail leads me to, however. It’s not even a house. It’s a pretty simple, working class apartment complex. Nice and safe, but not expensive. It’s not what I expect when tracking down a deadbeat criminal bum, but since it’s his last known whereabouts, I’ll take it.

  When I get there though, I notice something out of place. There’s one expensive black mustang, parked haphazardly in the lot. Like some rich prick who doesn’t care about his vehicle getting damaged by another driver — not likely in this neighborhood — or someone in a real hurry.

  Either way, this hints I’m on the right track.

  I climb the outdoor stairs towards the apartment on the second floor, taking my gun in hand just in case. My time in the marines and doing this job have taught me many things and one point where they cross over is this: I don't take chances. And I can’t afford pity for my enemies. Pity gets me killed in both worlds; or at least in civilian life, it puts me back in prison.

  My target’s apartment door is open, as in wide open. I approach with caution, pulling my gun out of my jacket
entirely. But then I hear something that causes me to throw all caution to the wind.

  “Don’t touch my daughter!” a woman cries. But I recognize that voice. I recognize it all too well.

  It’s Alice.

  Chapter 9

  Alice

  I grab my stiletto heel that was lying beside the closet, and I charge at the man nearest me. I don’t have a thought, not a single fear going through my mind. It’s all adrenaline. The second that man touched my daughter, I was seeing red. My stiletto heel nailed his shoulder, and his grip slackened on Cierra.

  “Go to your room!” I tell her, as I strike for him again, the high heel aimed this time for his face. There’s so much fury behind my actions, and I’m sure they didn’t expect it from me. I’m still in my pink pajamas, my hair pulled back in a loose bun, and mascara rings still under my eyes from all the crying I’d done this morning before Cierra woke up.

  But all my heartbreak is forgotten, and the only thing on my mind is protecting her.

  These two guys are big though, and I’m not sure even a mother’s fury could overpower one of them, let alone both. I attack the guy before me all the same; it doesn’t matter that I might lose, that I might die, I just need to beat this guy down and then worry about the rest later. My daughter depends on it.

  “You fucking whore!” he cries at me, punching me with the weight of an anvil, but I just keep attacking. I stab the heel of my stiletto into his shoulder and he cries out, the heel lodged in his flesh as he reels back. I don’t give in, and I claw at his eyes, push him back.

  I’ve done so much for my girl. I gave up my dreams of owning and running a little bookstore and coffee shop, I’ve danced every night of the week for as long as I could handle it to pay for her future. I’ll fight these guys down, I’ll do it. I’ll make it happen. And I dig my thumbs into this man’s eyes, my nails breaking but the jagged pieces digging in all the same and making him scream out.