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He was nothing like the man who’d pinched my cheeks and called me little girl.
In the same heartbeat it had taken for me to turn from dirty to desperate, he’d turned from filthy sex god to cold hard businessman.
Maybe they were one and the same to him.
“That’s really the earliest position you have available?” I asked him, trying my best to follow his lead.
“Do I look like the kind of guy who skirts that close to last-minute vacancies?” he asked back, and my heart dropped to my stomach.
Phoebe needed the money. Soon.
She needed the money before she got her legs broken in some back alley somewhere.
Or worse.
I wondered if the wedge of dirty notes in my cleavage would be enough to hold them off for a while.
“What’s with the eagerness?” the beautiful man asked, but I shrugged it off.
My troubles were mine and always had been.
“Just like to face things head on,” I lied.
He didn’t believe me. His expression said it all, even in shadow.
I didn’t meet his eyes as he fished a blank business card from his pocket. He handed it over with a pen.
“I’ll need your telephone number.”
I scribbled it down in a flash.
“You may need to call a few times,” I admitted. “I sometimes struggle… with the bill.”
“You’re telling me your phone may not be functional?” he challenged, and I hated the nod of my head.
I hated his frustrated sigh even worse.
“I’ve just given you a grand in cash and you’re telling me your phone may not be functional when I call you because you might not have paid the bill?”
I didn’t have any words. None that I dared speak without spilling too much of my situation.
The silence was so awkward my cheeks burned.
“Jesus wept,” he hissed eventually and reached deeper into his jacket.
I tried to protest as he handed me another wad of notes. My fingers clashed with his as he aimed for my cleavage all over again, mouth flapping mute as I struggled to refuse his generosity.
He acknowledged my protests with nothing more than a swat of his hand before shoving the notes alongside the others in my cleavage.
I felt like nothing and everything all at once. A cheap stripper playing a circus show.
An actual pang of sickness twisted up from my gut.
“Your phone will be connected when I call,” he said, and I managed a nod. “In the interim, you will keep yourself well fed and healthy. No sex, no risks, no ridiculous party nights around campus. You will keep your body cared for and your appearance precisely as it was on your application form. No unwelcome surprises.”
There were tears in my eyes as I nodded again. I daren’t speak a word for fear of breaking down.
He lit up a cigarette. I watched his mouth.
“Bedtime for dirty little girls,” he said, and gestured to the steps.
I didn’t need telling twice.
I made it to the top of the steps before the tears came falling, and was long back in my room with the banknotes under my pillow before I was anywhere close to realising I’d left my cardigan behind.Chapter TwelveBrandonWith her torn scrap of knickers in my inside pocket and her cardigan draped over my arm, I felt possessed by something almost human.
Almost.
Humanity was something I’d been aiming to avoid my entire adult life. I’d been doing exceptionally well at it, but the task wasn’t exactly a tough one.
It was easy to see the soul of humanity lacking in the vile little corners of my world. It was even easier to see it lacking in the people who lined my pockets with their filthy money for their filthy deeds.
But tonight was different. She was different.
She was no saint, clearly. No sweet Virgin Mary bestowing her pure intentions on the universe. But still, that didn’t matter. It was impossible not to see the soul behind those big doe eyes. Those sad doe eyes.
Her desperation was all real, and her vulnerability with it.
That amount of authenticity was impossible to fake behind a mask of innocence.
I was hungry for a taste.
Ravenous for a bite.
I’d make a meal out of her very soul and spit out the bones before I was done with her.
The road back to the country house was a long one. I’d selected a venue away from the beaten track, a sprawling manor with sprawling grounds to match, far away from prying eyes and nosey locals. I could have cabbed it easily enough from the beachfront, but I didn’t. I smoked as I walked, appreciating the moon and the country air for once in this backwater seaside shit hole.
I ignored the constant buzz of messages in my pocket, choosing silence over the inevitably imbecilic questions from Eric back at base.
There was no doubt Annabel would be waiting impatiently in the back wings, her sorry little cunt pining my absence even if her mouth wouldn’t admit as much. There was also no doubt the world of webcam would be twitching for my return, waiting for the unfolding of more pretty girl torture to keep their dicks spurting.
