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“Yes,” I managed to tell him. “It’s worth it.”
“Really? It’s worth doing whatever I want, is it? How about worth giving your body to anyone I put in front of you? You have no idea what’s lined up on the road ahead, little girl.”
I guess that’s when I flinched.
I guess that’s when he noticed my physical reaction before I’d had the chance to speak a word.
“You do know that’s what’s coming, right?” he prodded. “You being a slut to whichever cuntish piece of shit I put in front of you for the next sixty days? This isn’t the time to be surprised, sweetheart.”
“I know that’s coming,” I said. “I’ll take anything you tell me to, I’m just…”
“Just what?” he pushed. “Worried the pay day won’t match the pain?”
I shook my head at that. “No. I’m not worried the pay day won’t match anything. The pay day is very generous.”
“Then just what?”
It was his eyes, digging. His stance so strong, even though he seemed so raw.
My inner tension snapped. Broke free and uncoiled. I stared up at the ceiling, lost in the moment of giving up to whatever was coming.
I couldn’t stop the zany humour. The zany fear of confessing anything of my feelings to a man who claimed to have none.
“Nothing to concern yourself with, sir,” I said, but I wasn’t mocking him. I wasn’t mocking a thing but my own crazy emotions.
He sat himself down on the edge of the bed, eyes still digging hard.
“I hope your sister realises how lucky she is to have you on her side,” he said in a sombre tone, and it hurt.
“I only hope she realises I’m trying my best for her,” I told him. “I hope she realises that wherever she is in the shit out there my heart is right with hers.”
“I just hope she’s fucking grateful for what you’re doing.”
“Does it matter?” I said. “I’d still be doing it if she wasn’t.”
He raised an eyebrow. “If she wasn’t thankful? Why the hell would you put yourself through the wringer for someone who didn’t have a basic scrap of gratitude?”
“Love,” I told him, beyond caring that we were likely going to enter another round of crosshairs on the same churning argument. “Love doesn’t have conditions. Not when it’s real.”
He pulled a cigarette from his pocket. “Love isn’t ever real. It may seem like it is, but it’s a pitiful illusion.”
“It is real,” I insisted. “Love is real, and so is gratitude. So is compassion and selflessness and humility. All of them are real. They are worth everything.”
“Doing well for you in this shit hole of a life you’ve been living, are they? Saving your skin from the dregs of crap, are they?”
Another pang of hurt bloomed in my chest. “No, they aren’t saving my skin from the shit hole of life,” I said. “That’s you. You’re the one saving my skin from the shit hole of life right now. Sometimes the biggest saviours come in the strangest suits of armour.”
His laugh was hollow. “I’m not a saviour.”
“I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you. My sister’s probably out there running from the same alleyway assholes who would have fucked me over that night, but she wouldn’t have a hope of ever making it through this shit in a million years if you hadn’t offered me this opportunity.”
“An opportunity to put yourself through hell for sixty straight days? To lose control of every scrap of yourself for a cash lump sum? Such a saviour I am.”
The words came tumbling out before I could stop them. “It’s not hell. This isn’t hell…”
“Try shifting that battered fucking body of yours out of bed this afternoon and tell me again it’s not hell.”
I shook my head. “That isn’t it. It’s about more than that,” I said, but my voice trailed off.
His laugh was cold. “You’re enjoying it, are you? Like being here, do you? Like being the sweet little dolly jumping at my words, my touch, my every fucking demand? Think you’d hang around a heartbeat longer if I transferred that juicy sum of cash to your bank account right here and now? Sure you would. Yes, quite the fucking paradise here.”
I should have shrugged it off. Told him he was right. Told him this was a job, like any other job, just with a bigger salary. Should have told him he was right, that he was just a man offering me money for doing what I was told and nothing more.
But I couldn’t.
I couldn’t say a thing.
I felt the burn of my cheeks as I pulled my gaze away from his.
“Well, indeed, Stockholm syndrome,” he said. “It always happens. Although this is somewhat quicker than most girls in my company.”
“It can’t be. You aren’t a kidnapper,” I mumbled.
“I may as well be, sweetheart. You’d do well to remember it.”
