“I’m doing this for your own good, Crew. Tryin’ to toughen you up, turn you into a respectable man that’ll make your mama proud.”
“I think that one over there needs a bit of help, too. He seems the unruly type, just like you. How ’bout we teach him a few of the lessons you’ve learned?”
“Tobias needs me just like you do. Did ya know his dad walked out on him too?” He made atsksound with his tongue. It was as quiet as the crickets that were chirpin’ outside. So why did it make me jump like a bomb had just gone off? “Young boys need someone to step up to the plate in their life. Show ’em what’s right ’n wrong. That’s what I do for you, ain’t it?”
I nodded, ’cus yeah, he was always right. He was helpin’ me since I ain’t got no one else around to do it for me. I knew my temper was causin’problems, and I knew I coulda been better for Mom. It was just hard to be perfect all the time.
He said it’s ’cus I ain’t tryin’ hard enough. Bein’ good should be easy, he said. It’s all right, the lessons will make me better. And if he says Tobi needs ’em too, I believe him.
Sharp, ugly pains stabbed me in the stomach as I desperately hung on to the bile threatening to rise. One of his favorite sayings played on an echo, repeating endlessly as I staggered against the wall behind me.
“Punishment teaches a lesson, kid. Bruises just remind ya of the lesson you learnt.”
My head hit the wall, cold, hard, and painful. I wanted to open my eyes. See where I ended up. I couldn’t, though. Not with Tobi’s face, all sad and scared, haunting me from when we were kids. Not with his face from just a few hours ago, all sad and anxious as he helped me remember.
I could feel eyes on me. I’d gotten good at understanding that feeling—the one where the hair on the back of my neck starts to stand, and shit starts crawling up my arms. Awareness that something dangerous is lurking just around the corner, waiting to pounce on me.
Snow crunches and slushes beneath the boots of someone else’s footsteps. I heard it parting ways for them. Closer and closer until it stopped right in front of me. Only then did I slowly start to open my eyes. I glanced to the left and then to the right.
For some fucked-up reason, my feet had taken me to the same spot Price had picked me up the first time. I was in the middle of a few other sex workers, most of them huddled inside their meager jackets for warmth. A nauseating spark of sadness hit me for a moment. I could go home right now, lie down in my warm bed, and drift to sleep. They most likely didn’t have that option.
A man stood in front of me, wearing a long trench coat that hung just above his ankles. I looked everywhere except his eyes, looking up and down his body to see if I recognized him. Most of the clients I met with, I never saw their faces for long. It was easier to pick apart their bodies the same way they did mine.
“Hey, cutie. Seen you around a few times. How much?”
I plastered on my best bitch-face, scowling at him. “I don’t do that shit. Fuck off.” I puffed out my chest the most I could, hoping to look largerthan I was. This, I could do. Pretend I was someone different, someone stronger than I was.
The man growled at me. An angry, heaving growl that misted with the snow falling around us. “The fuck you mean you don’t do that shit? My buddy was one of your regulars.”
I huffed in his direction, putting a foot to the left to try and get away. “Well, he was wrong. I’m not in the business anymore. Now, if you’ll excuse me—” I tried to move away. I really did. But it all happened so fast. A cliché I hated hearing but now understood.
Until then, I had never been face-to-face with anything close to an angry tiger. A large, predatory, wild beast with nothing but blood on its mind. The closest I’d gotten was the rare bobcat growing up. They’d stalk along the woods on the path I had to take to my favorite creek.
I’d never forget the distinct sound of a bobcat’s scream echoing through the trees. It was a haunting sound, especially at night. City folks spread rumors or made-up stories about skin walkers who lived in the woods. When a bobcat screamed, it froze you. Forced you to stop and wonder if someone was being murdered, if you should call the police, or if you should run for your fucking life.
A hungry tiger’s predatory stare gave you no room to ponder. It killed you on the spot, marking you as its targeted prey.
The tiger’s eyes were dark, and his nose wrinkled in disgust. I could see it: the hunger, the desire, the lust warring with each other just below the surface. His claws fixed on my neck, the sharp edges dangerously close to piercing through my skin and drawing blood.
I was frozen and helpless. My back pushed further into the wall behind me, one of his arms crushing my ribs to keep me in place. The tiger roared in my face, his breath and saliva burning the hairs in my nostrils. I shut my eyes, squeezing them tight to try and make it all stop. To make the tiger run away and disappear, forgetting its prey was ever here.
When I opened them, there was no tiger. In its place was something much worse.
It was a man.
A man who wanted. A man who needed. And he wasn’t going to stop until I gave it to him.
At least a tiger would stop after tearing me apart.
The man in the trench coat squeezed his hands around my neck tightly, forcing the blood vessels to constrict. I gasped, desperate for any sliver of air I could get. Ice prickled at the back of my neck, subtly reminding me it was time. I’d be deprived of oxygen until I was pure. Until I was a glacier, wading in the Arctic, breaking apart with nothing else to give.
He spat in my face. “Answer me! What do you mean you’re not in it anymore?”
How the fuck did he expect me to say anything with his hands around my throat? “I’m not. Quit—” I choked and wheezed, flailing my arms helplessly. “Quit months ago.” I wrapped my hands around his, trying to pull them off. I wasn’t strong enough. I couldn’t pry his hands off me.
“That’s fucking rich. Once a whore, always a whore.” He pulled me forward, only to slam me back against the wall again. “My buddy says you like it rough. Is this rough enough?”
Pain. White-hot pain seared across the back of my head, forcing me to blink multiple times. The grip on my neck lessened enough to take a few gasping breaths. I pushed at the man, screaming at the top of my lungs.
