Escape (Part Two)

by Reed, Zelda

  The Dirty Kitty smelled of perfume and sweat, the air, hot and thick and filled with smoke from various fog machines. Three stages were set up on either side of the room, all of them in the center of a single round booth. The men sat a good foot away from one another, watching the dancers with open mouths, dollars outstretched in their hands. A few of them turned to look at us as Evie led me to the bar, her hips swaying in time to the music blaring over the speaker system.

  The women on stage were gorgeous. Slim and toned, with flawless skin and curves in all the right places. They spun around the pole with ease, dropping to their knees and crawling to the edge of the stage, shouldering mountains of sex appeal.

  Evie slid on the dark purple stool at the bar as I craned my neck to get a better view of the room.

  “I don’t see him,” I said, leaning in close so she could hear me.

  She waved the bartender over. “Of course you don’t. He wouldn’t be on the main floor.”

  The back room. I hadn’t thought of that.

  I climbed on the stool as Evie ordered two fruity drinks, sliding her credit card across the bar. “You really like him, don’t you?”

  My eyes widened. “He’s my boss. I just want to make sure he’s okay.”

  She grinned. “No. It’s more than that.”

  My face flushed. In the low, pink and purple lighting of the club, I hoped Evie didn’t notice, but the way her grin spread across her mouth, I could tell she did.

  Was it really more than that? Or was I so wired by my sex drive, I was confusing love with lust.

  The bartender, a busty blonde, passed us our drinks before she tilted her head to the side and said to me, “You look a lot like somebody I know.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, sticking my straw in my mouth. “I’m not from around here.”

  She stared for a minute longer, eyes squinting in the light before she grabbed Evie’s card.

  “I wonder if that was her way of hitting on you,” Evie said, casually.

  I smiled. “I don’t think so.”

  The song changed and the lights grew dimmer, the pink fading to deep purple and blue lights. Evie and I turned around on our stools, backs to the bar as we watched the dancers grow bolder, their tops slipping off of their shoulders. Two of them shimmied their hips, their bottoms sliding off and into the crowd.

  What really happened in the back rooms of strip clubs? Was Chace lounging in a personal booth, a stripper sliding around on his lap as he gripped the back of the couch to keep himself from grabbing her hips? Or could he deal out enough cash to have her on her knees, his cock in her mouth as he gripped the back of her hair? Were there cameras recording his every move, two sweaty security guards, watching and waiting from a back room? Or were the back rooms immune from surveillance?

  I didn’t have to wonder long. Across the room Chace stumbled through a pair of thick purple curtains, a stripper following close behind. She rested her hand on his shoulder, smiling and dropping a kiss on his cheek as she wiggled her hips, her G-string filled with Chace’s cash.

  His jacket was thrown over his arm, his t-shirt and pants wrinkled, his hair all over his head. He was drunk and sloppy, but in the low light of the club, I’d never seen anything sexier.

  He wiped an arm across his brow before he looked up and spotted us. Evie waved, her fingers wiggling, and I quickly looked away.

  Shit. I shouldn’t have come here.

  Chace stormed over to us, his narrowed eyes whipping from my face to Evie’s. “What the fuck are you doing here?” he asked, loud enough to catch the attention of the bartender.

  “I was thinking, my job’s pretty boring and I’m looking for a little more excitement in my life,” Evie said, “So I thought I might pick up an application.”

  Chace snorted. “That’s just what dad would’ve wanted. A whore for a daughter.”

  Evie’s smile was promptly wiped away. Her hand wrapped around her sweating glass as she narrowed her eyes and said, “What the fuck did you say?”

  “We’re here to take you home,” I said, throwing Evie a cautious glance.

  “To New York?” Chace asked. “You going to drive me back to New York?”

  “No,” I said. “We’re taking you back to your mom’s.”

  He spit out a humorless laugh. “Were you not listening? She doesn’t want me there.”

  “She doesn’t want you there because you’re a prick,” Evie said.

  Chace grinned at her. “Always have been, always will be.”

  Evie downed her drink. She slammed it on the bar before hopping from the stool and staring up at her brother. “I don’t even know why I came along to find you,” she said. “But I’ll be outside.”

  I thought about the men gathered around the building and Evie, sitting alone in her car, while they all leered. The bouncer opened the door and she stormed out, his eyes on her ass the entire time.

  Chace leaned against the bar and waved the bartender over. “Can I get another Jack and Coke?”

  The bartender shook her head. “Sorry sweetheart. I’m gonna have to cut you off.”

  Chace’s jaw tightened. “Why?”

  “Because you’re drunk as fuck sweetheart,” the bartender said. “I know it, Mindy knows it, this girl over here knows it,” she motioned towards me.

  “Mindy,” Chace said, tasting the name on his tongue. “I bet that’s not even her real name.” He looked at me. “Do you think a stripper would be honest enough to tell me her real name?”

  I rolled my eyes and wrapped my hand around his arm. “Chace, let’s go.”

  He pulled away from me. “Why don’t we ask her?” He glanced around the room, “Mindy!” he shouted.

  The stripper who followed him out the back room bounced over. Dressed in a short purple wig, glittering pasties covering her nipples, her breasts bounced up and down as she moved. The closer she came the more I saw the resemblance between the two of us. We had the same eye shape, though hers were blue, a similar nose (mine was longer), and the same square shaped face with a wide but soft jaw.

  She could’ve been my sister. She could’ve been my twin.

  “Mindy, I’m just dying to know something,” Chace said.

  “Anything,” she said with a smile.

  “Is Mindy you’re real name?”

  She laughed. “Of course it isn’t.”

  “And what is it?” Chace asked.

  She looked at him slyly, pulling her hands in front her like an innocent school girl. “You know I can’t you tell that.”

  Chace smiled. “That’s alright sweetheart.” From his pocket he pulled a twenty dollar bill. “I just wanted your honesty.”

  “I apologized,” I said once Mindy was away, gritting my teeth as he stepped closer to me.

  Chace laughed. “Actually, you never did.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You never fucking apologized.”

  I sat up a little straighter. “I didn’t?”

  His grin slowly fell from his face. “No. You didn’t. But I wouldn’t expect anything less from someone as selfish as you.”

  I grabbed his arm again, my fingers pressing into his muscle. He didn’t pull away.

  “If I was selfish I wouldn’t be here, trying to take you home.”

  He looked at me. “You’re wasting your goddamn time, I’m not going back there.”

  “You have to.”

  He snatched his arm away. “I don’t have to do shit. But you, you need to get the fuck out of here.”

  “Why?”

  Chace smirked. “Because you’re fired.”

  My chest tightened. A white hot fear rushed beneath my skin as Chace stared at me, his fists clenched atop the bar. His eyes were wet with a drunken haze.

  He didn’t mean it, did he? And if he did, would he remember it in the morning?

  “Come on,” I said, standing. “Let’s go.”

  “I’m not go
ing anywhere.”

  Chace turned away from me and I gripped his shoulder but he pulled away. His movement wasn’t rough but it caught me by surprise, one foot stepping back before my heel caught on the barstool and I fell to the floor. Chace whipped his head around, eyebrows knitting in concern as the bartender rushed over to me.

  “Oh my god, are you okay?” she screamed.

  “Alice,” Chace said, bending at the knees. “Shit, are you --”

  The bouncer stormed over. With one hand tight around Chace’s arm, he pulled him away from me.

  “I’m okay,” I said, pushing myself to my feet. “Leave him alone.”

  The bouncer ignored me. He pulled Chace across the club’s floor, Chace stumbling beside him, before he tossed him out.

  I caught a glimpse of the way his feet slipped against the concrete, the bouncer propelling his body forward, Chace’s shoulders, then back curving towards the ground. Mid-air he drunkenly spun around, eyes to the sky before his skull slammed against the street.

  I rushed out the club. The men loitering outside of the building laughed at Chace, passed out on the ground, his arms spread at his sides, his toes pointing upward.

  “Oh my god,” Evie said, rushing out of the car. The ghost of tears covered her cheeks as she bent down beside Chace’s body. She lightly slapped his cheek. “He’s not waking up!”

  “He hit his head,” I said, kneeling next to him. “He’s probably knocked out cold.”

  Gently, I lifted his head from the ground, feeling around for an open wound, for any sign of blood. Thankfully, there was nothing.

  “Should we take him to the hospital?” I asked.

  “He’s fine!” One of the men shouted. “I’ve seen that happen to plenty of guys who can’t hold their liquor!”

  They all laughed.

  Evie ran a hand through Chace’s hair. “Let’s just get him home.”

  We clumsily carried Chace to Evie’s car, his unconscious body upright beneath me, as we drove back to the estate. The pair of us were quiet, Evie’s hands tightening around the wheel, my own folded in my lap.

  I was sitting in Chace’s lap but there were no sexual thoughts running through my mind. I was terrified and nervous. If something was wrong with Chace I would never forgive myself.

  Tyler helped us carry him to his bedroom, unphased by his brother’s current state.

  “I see guys like this at the bar all the time,” he said. “He’ll be a little sore in the morning, but he’ll fine.”

  Evie and I removed his shoes, socks, and watch.

  She stared down at his shorts before, “You can take those off. I’m gonna tell my mom what happened.”

  The second she was out of the room I removed Chace’s belt, then his shorts, leaving him in his briefs before I covered him with his sheet. I neatly folded his soiled clothes, setting them in the bottom of his hamper. I returned his watch and belt to their rightful place in his suitcase.

  Bonnie was silent when she leaned against the threshold of Chace’s bedroom, one hand over her mouth as she shook her head.

  “He’s okay, right?” she asked me. “He’s just very drunk?”

  Evie must’ve omitted the part where he was thrown out the bar and hit his head.

  “Yeah,” I said with a smile. “He’ll be fine in the morning.”

  Bonnie nodded. She stayed for a few seconds, eyes lingering on her son before she turned and walked down the hall.

  I planned to sleep in my room but I couldn’t leave Chace alone. What if he woke up in the middle of the night, confused as to how he got from the bar to his bed? What if he started to vomit while lying on his back and choked to death?

  I slipped off my shoes, my shorts, and my blouse. Dressed in my underwear and bra I crawled beneath the covers and took the other side of the bed. I all but melted into the mattress, softer than mine, from years of wear, but miles better than the bed I had at home.

  I watched Chace’s chest rise and fall, the only movement aside from his eyes fluttering behind his closed lids.

  He could yell at me for being in his bed in the morning. For now, I turned to the desk lamp and turned off the light, engulfing us both in darkness.

  Eight

  I woke up to Chace vomiting in his en suite bathroom. The door was closed but I could hear him emptying the contents of his stomach in the toilet, his knees sliding against the cool tile as his hands braced the bowl.

  Without a doubt he saw me laying in his bed, the sheet pulled up to my chest, my hair splayed across the pillow. I bet he narrowed his eyes, the thought of pushing me out the bed crossing his mind before the foggy memory of my fall in the club, lit up in his frontal lobe.

  Last night I decided I would play one last game with Chace. I called it: I don’t remember what happened, do you? When he stepped out the bathroom I planned to hop out of bed and put on my clothes. I would smile at him and say, “Are you alright?” When his memory was too foggy for recall and he asked me for the details I would say, “I don’t remember what happened, do you?” He wouldn’t and I would leave with another lie hanging between us. But at least I would still have my job.

  The toilet flushed and I sat up in bed, knowing Chace would be out in any minute. He rinsed out his mouth before the sound of him brushing his teeth leaked through bottom crack in the bathroom door. I folded my hands in my lap, straightened my shoulders and smoothed down my hair.

  I had no plan b, nothing in my back pocket in case our eyes met across the room and he said, “I thought I fired you.” Nothing but the inevitable break down that would follow: the tightening of my stomach, the swimming of my head, the cold sweat breaking out against my back, the shameless pleading, and maybe tears.

  The water stopped.

  “Shit,” Chace said.

  His feet rushed across the bathroom floor before he dropped to his knees and vomited again.

  A knot built in my stomach, pulling me from my bed and onto my feet. As if on auto-pilot I stepped inside my shorts and tugged my blouse over my head. Shoes in hand, I opened Chace’s bedroom door, careful not to make a sound, as I stepped in the hall and closed it behind me.

  I couldn’t do it. Not then. Not yet.

  ***

  Evie and I had breakfast on the back porch, the pair of us sharing a giant bowl of fruit. She smiled when I told her Chace was awake, her fingers picking the leaves off a strawberry as she said, “Good for him.”

  That morning there was something dim about her. Her smile lasted a few seconds where it normally stretched into minutes and she barely looked up from her plate. I could feel her pushing back from the table when the back kitchen door opened and Bonnie rushed outside.

  “Goddammit,” she said, tablet in hand. She dropped the thin electronic in front of Evie. “Have you seen this?”

  Evie popped a strawberry in her mouth. Her eyes skimmed the screen, finger pushing upward before she looked at her mother and said, “Shit.”

  “You’re damn right,” Bonnie said, taking a seat next to me. She plucked a handful of fruit from the bowl.

  “What’s going on?” I asked.

  Evie cleared her throat, reading: “Yesterday, a source had the misfortune of spending the afternoon with Martin Evans and his maladjusted family. Martin (63), comatose since last Thursday, was spoken for by his…” Evie furrowed her eyebrows, “I’m going to skip this part, Mom, it’s really rude.”

  Bonnie waved her hand dismissively.

  “What’s most interesting is Chace Evans did not arrive at the estate alone. While my source was unable to get a name, his new girlfriend, a petite brunette, remained by his side and chased after him following his lively fight with his mother. It would be fair to assume that Chace’s new girlfriend is the woman he used to cheat on actress, Jennifer Mitchel; the same woman who is pulling him away from his unborn child.”

  A knot formed in the base of my throat. Evie slid the tablet across the picnic table.

 
“I wish I could say there wasn’t a picture of you, but.”

  At the bottom of the article there was a candid photo of me, Chace and Bonnie, standing in the hallway. Chace and Bonnie were positioned in the distance, Bonnie leaning forward and invading Chace’s space, Chace’s jaw tight as his arms crossed over his chest. I was standing in the foreground, the photo capturing my profile as I anxiously watched the two of them, my bottom lip worried between my teeth.

  “Shit.”

  “That’s what I said,” said Bonnie. She pulled a packet of cigarettes from her pocket and lit one up, inhaling a long drag.

  “Megra wouldn’t do this,” Evie said.

  I scrolled up the page. The article was written by a “T.D.” on the popular gossip blog, The Shakers & Movers (S&M for short). It was posted an hour ago and already had fifty comments.

  “Of course she wouldn’t,” Bonnie said, blowing smoke. “She has integrity, but can you say the same for those kids she works with?” Her crew, the cameramen and makeup artist. “They probably sold that load of bullshit for thousands of dollars.” Bonnie spit out a laugh. “Playing with people’s lives just to pay the rent.”

  “No one’s going to believe it,” Evie said, pulling the tablet away from me.

  “That won’t stop Chace from being pissed off,” I said.

  Bonnie looked at me. “Is he awake?”

  I nodded. “Has been since five. Although I’m not sure he’s in any state to be social. He’s been throwing up all morning.”

  “Serves him right,” said Bonnie. She piled a plate full of fruit. “But just in case, could you bring this upstairs for him?”

  I swallowed the bundle of nerves that settled inside of my throat, the lot of them exploding in my chest and spreading to the tips of fingers.

  “Yeah, sure.”

  ***

  Chace hated seeing his name in the press. Even when they were talking about his books, he refused to read their reviews or profile pieces, opting to remain ignorant of how the public viewed him.