The fact that Blaze can maneuver this so easily has me looking at him in a different light, but I guess this is the world he’d been born into.
It wouldn’t have been difficult for him to introduce me slowly, I realize as my stomach sinks. The things I’ve done on his behalf haven’t exactly been kind, and if he’d been careful to keep the facade about me being his bodyguard up, I might’ve been lulled into this.
As it is, I know I’d have looked the other way.
I’ll have to look the other way now, too.
“Of course,” Pam says. “Right this way.” She leads us down the hall to another door, and I note the number.
107. There have to be at least three floors.
I wonder how many of these rooms are occupied by women who shouldn’t be anywhere close to this place.
We go through two other rooms, neither of them holding Samantha, and Pam starts to get visibly impatient.
“Don’t you have a roster or something?” Blaze demands. “So I can look at the girls first without having to traipse about the whole hotel? Or call them all out into one room so I can inspect them all at once, I don’t know.”
Pam grits her teeth. “I do have a catalogue, but since you didn’t know which type of girl you wanted, I thought in-person visits would be more expedient.”
“In other words, you hoped I’d just settle for the first slut you showed me.” Blaze makes an annoyed sound.
“Hey! It doesn’t count as slutty if you aren’t doing it willingly,” Pandora remarks. “I’ma slut. These women are not.”
She’d been quiet for a while, so I’d almost forgotten that she was still listening in.
I want to tell her that Blaze is only saying what he has to, but I can’t help but wonder if this is what he believes.
Does it matter?
I’d follow Blaze into hell itself even if it was, wouldn’t I?
“No! I wasn’t thinking…” Pam shakes her head. “Fine. This way, sir.”
She leads us back the way we came, into a small room that is clearly an office.
Pam takes one of the tablets sitting out on the coffee table and taps on it, then hands it to Blaze. “Here. You can use the filters to sort. Age, ethnicity, hair color…”
“Thanks.” Blaze takes the tablet and sits down on the couch, tapping away. “Wow, we’ve got more girls than I thought.”
My stomach lurches.
“Yes. We’ve been expanding operations. There’s been growing demand.” Pamela smiles at Blaze. “Your father has brought in a lot of good leads.”
I can’t believe I ever thought he stuck to legitimate sex work. I should’ve known better. Why hadn’t I?
It’s hard to play stoic, but I remind myself that I’m here as a bodyguard. Staff. I don’t have opinions on what’s going on. All I care about is making sure that Blaze is safe, and that’s a role I can fall into because it’s familiar.
“Hmm. She looks okay. Who’s she?” Blaze taps on a picture, and a full profile shows up.
The girl is labeled as ‘Sarah,’ but I immediately recognize her.
Samantha. Pandora’s roommate. She doesn’t look as haughty in this photo as in the one picture Pandora had shown us. The makeup is completely different, and her hair is styled similarly to the first woman we’d seen.
Her eyes are red in the photo.
How long has she been here now? A month? I wonder if she still cries or if she’s learned to put on some sort of front.
Blaze’s finger traces over a number underneath the photo. The room number.
