We're sitting in the back room of an Albanian compound. It's three in the morning. The guards are either sleeping or busy with the girls. This is the safest time for me to eat, to be left alone.
She gives me a small smile. "Hey, sorry about your dad. Another girl told me," she says.
I shrug. "I don't really care. He's the reason I'm here. If giving up his daughter didn't stop his gambling, it was only a matter of time before he was killed. I don't think about him much."
Sabrina nods. "Yeah. I don't think about my parents either. Maybe my mom sometimes. She killed herself a year before I left home. My dad was a piece of shit. I wasn't sticking around to be his excuse. Sometimes I think I should have though. Maybe I'd have ended up better, but probably not by much."
"Do you regret leaving?" I ask, because I have a lot of regrets.
She looks down. "I make the best of it, I'm sure. My life isn't great, and no one's ever gonna tell me, 'Gosh, I wish I had your life. You just get to sit around, fuck, and try to have kids. Lucky you.' But I don't know," she says and finishes her peas. "There's a few good men who come around. I kind of latch onto them."
"Latch onto them?" I ask.
"Yeah, like maybe they aren't the nice guy from those stupid romantic comedies. Shit, maybe they're not even good guys, per se, but they're better than most in my life. They give me a little extra money without letting anyone know. Bring me things. A book. A candy bar. Something to make me feel like a person, not just a body, ya know?"
I shake my head from side to side. "I wish. I don't get anything like that."
Sabrina's eyes are sunken, but they soften when she looks at me. She's only twenty-three, but looks much older. Her body has been used up, wrung out by men and failed pregnancies and whatever else the Albanians want from her.
"Well, one day you will, Lyra. Probably when you least expect it, and probably from a person you'd never want anything from. But be open to it. Girls like us, the best we get are the leftovers. The psycho men who have their brief moment of chivalry. Take it. It's nice to feel seen more than an object from time to time, even if it's fleeting and not perfect."
"Something to think about," I say, standing.
"Better than spiraling," she says with a laugh.
I force a smile. "Let me go see about some more food."
A harsh ring of a phone cuts through my memory and yanks me back into the present.
I jump, sending my fork clattering to the floor. The peas scatter across the linoleum.
It takes me a moment to realize it's not my regular phone. It's the sleek black one Declan gave me three nights ago. The one I'm supposed to always answer.
I stare at it, considering not answering, but then I remember his warning. And the money. Four times my regular pay.
I pick it up on the fourth ring.
"Hello?"
"You took your sweet time." Declan's voice is sharp, irritated.
"I was eating."
"I'm texting you an address," he says. "Be there in one hour."
He hangs up.
No hello. No please.
Asshole.
I throw my nearly full TV dinner in the trash and grab my medical bag. I've spent the past few days staring at that black phone, wondering when it would ring. Now I almost wish it hadn't.
The address Declan texted me is in one of the wealthiest parts of Boston. I didn't think underground fights happened there, but I guess money and violence go hand in hand no matter the zip code.
The car is cold on my skin as I drive through traffic. The heater stopped working—well, I'm not sure when. It didn't work when I bought it.
My beat-up Corolla is incredibly out of place when I reach the address. I slow down, certain I've made a mistake.
