Selling Out (14 page)

“Fuck.” His word rang out in the darkness, with apology,
with frustration, and not a drop of hope.

“I don’t owe you anything,” I said.

“No, you’ve been very careful to ensure that.”

“So why’d you turn the light off?”

“You know why. For the same reason you came here.”

Arrogant man, but he wasn’t wrong. His air touched me first,
the rush of movement against my body, his breath a caress on my lips. Then
warmth to soothe me, his lips soft, body hard. His kiss tender, cock rigid
against my belly. I allowed him inside, just barely, a taste of submission. I
softened my hips, offered a gentle roll upward, a hint of arousal. For good
measure, I slipped my hand behind his neck, stroking him, well practiced.

“Stop,” he muttered against my lips.

I pulled back. Every man was different, a unique sum of a
thousand different variables, and my body nothing more than a machine designed
to solve them.

When in doubt, return to what worked. I opened my mouth
another degree, and he took full advantage, sweeping his tongue against mine.
His hand touched the back of my neck in a mirror image of my gesture, except
instead of a caress, he tilted my head back, deepened the kiss. He put me at a
disadvantage.
Yes, I want that too.

His other hand fumbled briefly at my jeans before slipping
them down to my thighs. I felt helpless, blinded by the dark, pinned to the
wall by his body and my clothing. Even my hearing was altered, flooded by my
harsh breaths and his. Any number of men had held full control over my body
before now, but this was Luke, and how quickly he had done it, how easily he
had rendered me willing and my consent irrelevant. I moaned my approval.

“You’re doing it again,” he muttered.

“Doing what?”

“What you think I want.”

“How do you know it’s not what I want too?”

He paused. “Is it?”

I didn’t know. A soft, almost inaudible sob escaped. How sad
was that? Sex was my profession, but I didn’t understand my own desires.

“Shit,” he said.

He pulled away, and I was sure it was over. Just like in his
apartment, he didn’t want me anymore. But in seconds he returned, fierce,
pulling at my clothes, tugging them down and away.

“Tell me to stop.” Harsh. Guttural.

“No, no.” Against the wall, I spread my arms like some sort
of sacrifice, letting his hands and his curses crash over me. “Don’t stop.”

His hands parted my thighs. “You’re going to come for me,
unless you stop me.”

I’ll make him want me
.
Both of us so determined. He would fuck me, and I would come, and then where
would we be? Right here. No future, just sex. Broad fingers opened me for his
tongue, pumped inside. I pushed back, halfway there.

I discovered that he swore during sex. I clenched every
time, and God help me, he noticed, using it to bring me closer. “So fucking
wet,” he muttered. “This can’t be fake. You didn’t lube yourself up before
coming to see me, did you?”

That gave me pause, but then his finger reached a spot
inside me, and I cried out.

“Shh.” He stood up, though his fingers stayed inside me,
pressing right there, pushing and pulsing and oh Jesus, right there. His hand
covered my mouth, muffling my cries and catching a pool of tears on my cheeks.

“Let go, let go,” he muttered against my ear, and I didn’t
understand. I had come. What more did he want? He explained with his hands,
massaging my clit through the aftershocks until suddenly lights burst behind my
eyes, and I came again weakly against his palm.

It wasn’t the first time a man had made me come. Some
clients knew their way around a woman’s body, demanding a real orgasm.

Limp, I waited for him to push me to my knees, to bend me
over the table in the corner, anything. He didn’t move except for the bellow of
his chest, in-out, in-out, and the occasional twitch of his cock at my hip.

“How do you want me?” I asked, my voice husky.

“I don’t.”

“Nice words.” I slid against his hard length. “But your body
calls you a liar.”

“I want you to come with me.”

“What, you think I can’t come from anal?” I taunted. “Want
me to put on a teddy bear costume? I assure you, if it turns you on, I can do
it. If you can think of it, I’ve probably already done it. Or is that what
bothers you? Do you want someone pure, a little innocent for the pristine cop?”

“Jesus. For a girl who’s seen everything, you can be really
blind sometimes.”

“So let me see.” I found the thick bulge in the dark. One
stroke, and he sucked in a breath. Two, and he jerked against me, his body hot,
burning. I had him to hold, to touch, to finally see what it would be like, if
he could be different from a hundred other men. Already I felt more than flesh,
heard more than low animal sounds from him. Already I wanted this, and that
made it new.

A knock came at the door; then Chase hissed, “Time’s up.”

Luke froze, his body taut with arousal and indecision.

“Let me finish you,” I whispered.

He pulled my hand away, groaning. “We can’t. You can’t be
caught. I couldn’t protect you here.”

I let my head fall back against the wall, clearing my head,
finding my footing. “No? Well, we can make our last stand here. The
star-crossed lovers have to die together, you know. That’s how the story goes.”

“Is that what we are?” he murmured.

“The hooker and the cop,” I said. “We’re from opposing
families. Fated to tragedy.”

Apparently done waiting, Chase opened the door, blinding us
both. I leaned against the wall, unembarrassed by my breathless state, and felt
Luke’s hands straighten my shirt. He buttoned my jeans. I had been undressed by
many men, but it was a novel experience to be dressed by one. Everything with
him felt that way. I looked up. A wash of orange light fell over Luke’s face,
revealing his small, knowing smile.

“What?” I asked.

“We have more in common than you think.” His green eyes met
mine, crinkled at the corners. “So we might just be spared a double suicide.
We’ll call that plan B.”

More in common? Unlikely. Before I could say so, he pulled
out his phone. He’d donned his professionalism before I had even managed to pull
my panties up.

“Let me take you somewhere safe,” he said. “Or at least meet
up with me later.”

At his very first words,
let
me
, my body tautened, leaned forward as if to follow him.
Yes, anything, take me
. Like the Pied Piper,
he could lead me into the sea. Already I was enthralled, tethered to him by an
invisible string of yearning. I waded through the shark-infested waters of
headquarters, going deeper and deeper just to hear his voice.

I couldn’t breathe, the dust or the tension filling my
lungs. “No.”

“You still don’t trust me.” It wasn’t a question.

My head tilted back, letting me draw in air from the
surface. “Don’t take it personally. I don’t trust men. Or really, people.”

“So what do you like, dogs?”

A smile played at my lips. “Too needy.”

“Cats?”

“I’m allergic.”

“Of course you are.” He flashed a small enigmatic smile. “I
ought to drag you out of here myself.”

I tensed.

“But since you don’t trust me, you’d probably make a scene.
Then we’d both be screwed.” His lips flattened. “Which is why you felt safe
enough to show up here. You pretend you don’t trust me, but you come here,
wriggle under my thumb, knowing I could trap you so easily.”

“Now,” Chase whispered. “She needs to go now.”

“What is that, some kind of psychobabble? I trust you, but I
don’t want to trust you?”

“You said it, not me.” A glint entered his eyes. “I’d tell
you to make up your mind, but I’m starting to think it doesn’t matter. One of
these days, I’m going to take you. And then I’m going to keep you.”

In a blur of black-suited coat and sandy-brown hair, he
disappeared from the room as quickly as he’d come. I stared after him, a little
shell-shocked. I had expected him to push me for sex.
Do the right thing, Shelly. Trust me, Shelly. Be a good girl so I can
fuck you without feeling like an abuser, Shelly.

But what did he mean by keeping me? Like some sort of
concubine. Crazy.

I straightened my jeans and smoothed my hair. Hadn’t I worn
a cap? I glanced around but didn’t find it. Dim light pooled through the open
door, revealing a dusty concrete floor and rows of brown boxes. Well, this
worked too. I would take a different exit from the one in front, in case anyone
tried to track me through security footage later. They wouldn’t, but paranoia
was the constant churn that kept me above water.

In the main inventory room, Chase glared at me. I wondered
if there had been any real urgency or if he’d just wanted me to stop sucking
face with his favorite detective. It didn’t matter. I’d accomplished what I
came here to do.

“I know what you did in there,” he said.

“Oh really, was it the pornographic sounds we made or the
fact that I’m half-dressed that gave it away?”

“I told you,” he accused. “I told you not to touch him.”

“No, you told me not to hurt him. And he doesn’t swing that
way, so it really wasn’t likely.”

“Don’t act naive, like you don’t know what effect you have
on men.”

“Of course I know what effect I have,” I said lightly. “It’s
big and hard and hurts every time.”

He shut up then, pursing his lips lest I forget he was
pissed. Once I had straightened my clothes, I gave him a kiss on the cheek.
Never leave a man angry; it only gave them more time to stew.

His expression eased. “Shelly, I don’t like you two
together.”

“Get in line. After me. Then him.”

“You say that. Excuse me if I don’t believe you while you’re
all flushed from making out with him like teenagers.”

“Teenagers?” I glanced at the back room. “Is that who you
bring back there?”

He snorted. “Such charm. I don’t know why I like you.”

“Ah, but you do like me. That’s part of what makes me
mysterious. Men like mysteries,” I said sagely.

He waved me toward the exit. “Yeah, I’m sure it has nothing
to do with the fact that you’re beautiful and way too smart to be doing the job
you do.”

“Stop. I’ll blush.”

“Get lost, squirt. And don’t get into any trouble on your
way out.”

“Actually I was thinking I might start a fire. Maybe you
should pull the alarm, just in case.”

He groaned. “You’re killing me.”

“We’ll call it even, then. No more visits, cross my heart.”

He shook his head. “Fine. I’ll do it. But you better be
serious about that. If I see you back here, I’ll turn you in myself.”

In the hallway, I followed the flow until I found an empty
broom closet. One benefit to these old historical buildings was that security
was never quite up to modern standards. They could install all the fancy
systems and safeguards, but the floor plan was designed with comfortable nooks
instead of open spaces.

I pulled out the little plastic badge that allowed Luke to
come and go into secure areas of the building—and to log into the network. It
was a dirty trick, using sex against him like that, so of course I’d had to. I
hoped he wouldn’t be too mad.

Right on cue, a loud clanging fell from the ceiling, shaking
the walls. The footsteps sounded like thunder down the hallway as everyone
slipped outside. When it quieted, I returned to the storeroom. It was empty,
since of course Chase had evacuated with everyone. Such a good boy.

I got on his computer and found the files I needed.

Stephan Laurent had been wanted in connection with multiple
homicides. All young girls, all prostitutes. Full immunity. Murder probably
wasn’t beyond him, but what was the point? Young girls weren’t any good to him
dead. Besides, if he was guilty, that didn’t explain the immunity. He needed to
turn on someone. And ah, here. Known associations: Henri Denikin. The answer
had been sitting in the corner, just waiting for me to turn and see it. My
descent into prostitution hadn’t been random at all. I put my hand to my mouth
to keep the bile in. My eyes fell shut, and I took a few deep breaths of musty
air to clear my head. I needed to focus. I needed to get the hell out of here.

I tossed the little badge on the floor in the storeroom
where Luke could find it and maybe even think it was an accident, that he’d
dropped it. It had slipped from its clip while we’d kissed, and the fire alarm
had been a coincidence. Sure, he’d believe that, just like I believed my
father’s criminal connections meant nothing.

Jade had known. I remembered the look in her eyes.

In elementary school, my class had gone on a field trip to
the zoo. Not the Brookfield Zoo, but a wild animal sanctuary out by Lake
Michigan. We’d huddled outside the chain-link fence while the tour guide gave
us a speech about rehabilitation. Inside, the tiger prowled the far corner,
watching us warily. The woman told us he was more afraid of us than we were of
him, and I believed her, but I didn’t see why that should make me feel better.
The air vibrated with thinly leashed violence. The tiger’s eyes were filled
with malevolence, and through them, I hated myself for being a part of his
captivity.

We left uneventfully, but the next week there was an
“accident” with one of the trainers, and the tiger was put down. Murder, my
ten-year-old mind had thought. They had caged the animal and then killed it
when it didn’t obey. No one else seemed fazed by the news. Our venerable
teacher trilled a laugh and thanked God we hadn’t been there that day.

Bitch.

The next day, Allie left the tiger refrigerator magnet she’d
bought from the gift shop on my desk. It was a white tiger, not orange, and the
plastic represented the commercial value of his life, like a cheapened version
of a rhinoceros horn, but I still fell in love with Allie that day. I twined
between her legs like a stray cat, and she let me stay because she knew I had
nowhere else to go. I would still be there, bringing her dead rodents, the only
gifts I knew how to make, except for Colin. He was like me, operating on an
animal frequency, and he had claimed her.