Forever (11 page)

“They wanted somebody on their arm to pull the eye while they worked the tables or did their deals in the rooms. I went out on countless calls for a few years. I made lots of bad choices in men when I wasn’t working, some who used me for sex, lived off me, smacked me around when their lives weren’t going well. Those I lost in a hurry. Not much different than the way I was treated in foster care. But I took the emotional shit they slung my way to heart, for some stupid reason. I’ve learned I don’t have to take that anymore.” Was there a warning to be detected in that last statement? Dean replayed it in his head and decided to take it at face value.

“You ever go to the cops about the domestic violence?”

“No. For all the obvious reasons. Women like me don’t get a lot of sympathy from the men in blue.”

He shoved his fingers into her wealth of hair and dragged her head back, forcing her to meet his eyes. “Don’t. Don’t demean yourself. Ever. Or sell yourself short. I won’t allow it.”

Staring back assessingly, she finally nodded. “Do my best, babe. Old habits and all.”

Settling back against his shoulder as he sifted through the strands of her hair, she continued, swirling the straw in the glass of water. “I went out on one last call, although I didn’t know it was a last call at the time. Rich kid from
… another state, asked for a big blonde. He dragged me from casino to casino, lost a ton of cash, tried a whole lot of fondling to establish his man-about-town status. I avoided most of it without making him look bad, and when it got time to shut it down, and we were back at his hotel, he asked me to stay the night. I refused and he let it go. Just like that. Disarmed me, really, because I sensed he was pure asshole.

“He sucked back a couple more drinks, said he’d walk me to a cab. But he was unsteady on his feet, seemed really drunk
, so I took him up to his room. Thought I’d just dump him on the bed and leave, you know? I’m not stupid. I enlisted the help of one of the guys who scan for people using the elevators without cards and we went up together. But once we got to the room, just opened the door, the security guy’s radio went and he had to go.”

Dean tried to control the tremors of rage permeating his control. Amy looked up at him and ran her fingers across his cheek, easing the tightening there, soothing his jaw. She was still tense, but it seemed to dissipate as she reached out to him, violet eyes soft.

“It’s done, babe. But you wanted to know. Do you still want to hear it all? I mean, you already know the worst of it.”

He nodded, turning his head to press a kiss on the palm of her hand, a gesture he had never made in his living memory. “I want to know, even as I don’t.”

After a moment, she continued, leaning away slightly as if to avoid the heat he could feel emanating from his gut. “I let my guard down for an instant, and rich boy took advantage. He dragged me inside and as they say, the rest is history. The maid found me in the morning and called 911. I nearly bought it, but laparoscopic surgery removed my spleen, the ribs didn’t puncture my lungs, and the rest healed. It took time for the bones to knit, but they did, although the jaw was the worst of it. And the visits to the dentist. Stay away from me with needles. Sandra was one of my nurses and she saved my head, most importantly. We’re now best friends.”

Sandra, as he’d already figured out, was going to be the wild card in what appeared to be a
dating
relationship. But he couldn’t let that distract him now. He wanted more information about rich boy and hoped Amy would let something slip. “How did you get him charged?”

“The cops did. I was out of it. But it was his room, registered in his name, the security guy
verified I wasn’t interested in staying—that man felt so bad. He wrote a deposition and that counted for a lot. Rich boy’s DNA was everywhere and when they caught up with him—his flight hadn’t even left—his knuckles were still covered in my blood. Daddy swooped in and paid me off.”

“So
he
didn’t pay.”

Amy gave him a startled glance, leaning into him again, this time absorbing his angst with her whole body. “I don’t think a night in lockup was much fun for such a pretty boy, and a trial wasn’t something I wanted, believe me. It might have gone against me. I took the money and ran.
Like the John Cougar song, but it was for the best.”

“And you don’t want payback?” The word sounded venomous even in his own ears.

“Dean. I don’t want him to hurt other women, if that’s what you mean. It tortures me, that he thinks he got away with it, but there’s no real impetus by the courts to prosecute rich men. Not when the victim isn’t pure and innocent. Not when the woman asked for it, working in a risky profession. And don’t get all pissy. You know how escorts are perceived.”

Rich boy wouldn’t be hurting any other women. He wouldn’t be able to lift his hands high enough. There were some things worse than death and Dean knew a fair number of them. He quit pressing her. Being powerless
and defenseless was a foreign feeling for him, one he’d left behind when he was about ten. But Amy’s experience was fresh, and she was still at risk, by virtue of her gender.

“Your turn.” Dean heard the expectation in her voice and went for broke.

“I have legitimate business interests. I also run street protection and illegal gambling. I launder money.”

Her body tensed and she drew away slightly, then sat up to put an arms’ length between them, scooting along on the fake leather seat. Her violet eyes were enormous, teeth tugging at her bottom lip. “Holy shit.”

He waited.

And Amy processed. “Do you pimp women? Sell drugs?”

“No. Never will.”

“Do you, uh
… hurt people?”

“Only the competition, and then in self
-defense.” He wasn’t going to tell her what he was capable of and who he really was. At least not yet and maybe never. It could get him killed.

“Is anyone going to hurt me to get to you?”

Fuck. He should have thought of it, as she had good reason to ask, was still feeling vulnerable, and probably always would in some regard. He’d just heard her describe her life on the arm of scumbags in a volatile city. “We’ve never had an issue with any of my crew’s women being used that way, sweetheart. But I’ve never had a woman, so can’t promise you.”

“It scares me, Dean. I was on the fringe of shit in Vegas
, for sure. I could have been worked over before, or put down. But I moved here to get away from all that.”

“Let’s find our way, Amy. We have a time frame
, anyhow.”

“Time frame?”

“Until, if, you’re on your period. That dictates how fast this relationship moves. You carrying my kid changes things.” And he’d used the R word. So fucked. Still, it didn’t feel too bad.

“You romantic man.” Amy’s tone wasn’t close to matching her words and she shoved further away from him.

He couldn’t help but laugh, reaching out to pull her close, ignoring how stiff with umbrage she was. “I have limited experience, sweetheart, but give me points for trying. Okay?”

Softening, she agreed. “But it’s gonna be a trial. We’re two damaged people, babe. There’ll be a lot of insanity ahead. And I don’t want to have to be watching my back.”

“I’ll have someone on you when I’m not around.”

“Uh, uh. No. I’ll feel like some wiseguy’s piece.”

He waited. If she couldn’t accept the additional risk of being with him then they should probably end this now. The panicked sense of dread boiling up from his belly, the disparate sense of outright refusal to even consider that practical response took him by surprise. He cast around in his head for something to make it work.

“You could move in with me, have a safe place to live and work, if you’re concerned.” Holy shit. Fuck. When he lost his head, or thought with his smaller head, or whatever part was now dictating to him, he fucking lost it to the max. But he’d never had a woman before
, past the casual night or two, and he’d never fucked without a condom before. Life was spiralling out of control, and it was a curiously thrilling sensation. Just not one he was familiar with.

Amy curled away from him again and set her mouth in a gesture he wondered if he’d be seeing a fair number of times—if she accepted his offer. It spoke volumes to him; a mixture of surprise, caution and amusement, laced with a little fear. Her words confirmed his increasing ability to read her.

“You
are
spontaneous, babe. I wouldn’t have thought it, but first forgetting protection and now making such a cozy suggestion?” The fear surfaced, outweighing the other emotions. Her eyes shone a purple midnight-blue. She might want something more than casual sex, but it scared her, too.

Shrugging, he explained, finding the words as he spoke. “You could still keep your place, kind of a safety net, if you want. Be with me, have it known, and be safe. Until we figure things out.”

Unprepared for her response, he found himself wondering what planet he woke up on that morning.

“Still stacking the deck, Dean. There’s always a qualifier with you. When I get my period. Live together until and
if
we figure things out. I’m no expert on relationships, but you’ve already set us up to fail. You see an ending. I don’t know why you hold women in such low regard, but I’m not interested in being the poster girl for failure. I’ve got work to do. Take me home or I’ll get a cab.” She slid away, across the bench seat and got to her feet, making her way to the exit.

Thinking fast, once again overcome with that unfamiliar panic, Dean scrawled his name across the check and followed her. He stared down the men looking at her as she passed, varying degrees of interest and lust on their faces. The women looked disdainful or aloof, studiously ignoring Amy or their lips curling, clearly envious. He decided he wasn’t letting her go. And when he made a decision he went with it—unless something significant proved him wrong.

Already outside and yanking on the passenger door handle, she turned to give him an imperious stare, violet eyes unreadable, but her features were taut. He remoted the locks open and moved to help her inside. Shaking him off, she was buckled in and leaning back against the leather seat, eyes closed, when he got in behind the wheel. He cranked the key and drove out of the lot, letting the silence build. In his experience, however limited on the emotional front, women broke it first. No surprise, Amy didn’t. Fuck. He put his foot down and drove to his home.

“We’re here.” He wondered if she might be sleeping, or if she’d dissociated. It didn’t matter to him. She could be angry, maybe even hurt, but she was comfortable enough to relax her guard around him.

Looking around, she blinked. “Where?”

“My place. C’mon in and we’ll talk some more.”

“I have work to do.”

Dean gritted his teeth and went around to her door. “Amy. Get out of the goddamn truck.”

“Bossy pants.”

Relieved at being teased, he yanked her out and kissed her, delighted when she kissed him back. “I’m going to fuck up regularly, sweetheart. Be glad I figured it out.”

“That’s like number four, babe. Okay, we’ll talk and then I
have
to get my work done. No contest.”

Dean urged her up the stairs to his condo, mentally sorting through the ways he’d screwed up that day. Or was she counting from that kiss in the hall? Four? Four?

****

“So that’s my life story. In a nutshell.” He was sweating, and had to get up a couple of times to get a beer to keep his mouth lubricated. He’d told her pretty much everything, from his birth, to his whore of a mother, the struggle to get out of Dodge and make something of himself, to his return to running the business. He skimmed over his college degree and didn’t share his ultimate secret, although he thought it might seal the deal between them in a good way. But he couldn’t make himself share that and didn’t care to examine all the reasons
, beyond basic survival. He told himself it was too big a risk to share so soon. So instead, he promised himself he’d set a fluid deadline. A time to tell her if they happened to be established as a couple, some time down the road.

Amy hadn’t interrupted very often, other than to ask about sibs and other family. Seemed they were both alone in the world. The other sounds she made weren’t out of pity, but of understanding and acceptance, acknowledging his confession. Something he hadn’t even done in Catholic school. Confession. It felt good, whether for his soul or not remained to be seen.

“Wow. Ever wonder how we’re here and not buried somewhere? Or in jail?” Her face was solemn, those remarkable eyes petal soft.

He shrugged. “I don’t think about it much. Like you said, it’s past. I move forward. What?” Amy’s tiny snort made him look.

“You move forward like I do. Influenced and sometimes burdened by the past.” She laughed, a pure musical sound. “Listen to us. Probably the most I’ve talked to anybody about this shit aside from Sandra. You?”

“I took some courses in the military, psychology stuff. I figured some things out. But I don’t talk about it. And I’m done talking about it.”

Amy stretched from her curled-up position on his couch, taking up little space for such a tall woman with definite curves. His eyes tracked the movement of her breasts and traced a line up to her mouth, tilted deliciously in a smile.