Raven's Revenge (The Pleasure Pros #2) (16 page)

Raven

I had always been
amazed by how Carter had held a grudge against me for so long.
 
However, as I watched him struggling in
his chair, hurling out accusations and threats in spite of the ball gag, I
realized that he was no ordinary man.
 
He was either psychotic or deeply delusional.
 
The fact that he was still fighting was
angering Suzanne to the point where she was actually starting to lose it.

“You sit there and
shut up!” she yelled right in his face.
 
“Or I’m going to hit you right in the balls with this cattle prod.”
 
She pressed it up against him.

His face grew
stern and he glared directly at her.
 
“You wouldn’t dare,” he muttered against the gag.

“Oh, really?” She
instantly released the trigger.

Again, there was
an audible gasp throughout the room as it literally jolted Carter straight up
in the chair.
 
“Jesus!
 
Who turned it on high?” She laughed,
handing it back to me.
 

That last jolt
really took the steam out of Carter.
 
He sat there drooling on his ball gag and mumbling while Suzanne began
to tell her story.

“Some of you might
be wondering what’s going on here tonight,” she started out.
 
“You came here in anticipation of
sticking your dick into this beautiful young woman.
 
Well, Raven wasn’t here by her own free
will.
 
So I couldn’t let that
happen.”

“Thank you.” I
smiled.
 
We really were on the same
side after all.

“Tonight is the
changing of the guard around here.
 
Carter has crossed over the line so many times that he doesn’t even
realize there are lines anymore,” she began her rant.
 
“He took a perfectly legal business and
began kidnapping some of our best girls and selling them to wealthy
international businessmen.”
 
Her
eyes scanned the room. “Some of you were in on that.
 
You might want to get your affairs in
order.”

As she continued
to speak, several gentlemen slowly made their way toward the exit.
 
There’s
nothing like a little self-incrimination
.
 
I glanced over at J.O. who was busy
taking notes.

“Many of you might
think I’m being a little too hard on him.
 
After all, he is my father, right?” she continued, fighting back
tears.
 
“Well, this so called
‘father,’ abused me as a young child.”
 
She then began to tell a story that no one in the room was prepared to
hear.
 

“Abuse can take
many forms.
 
For my mother, it was
psychological abuse. For me, it was sexual.
 
It ended one day when my mother came
home early and caught him.
 
I’m
going to spare you the details as to how old I was and what exactly he did to
me.
 
Just know that my mother was
beside herself with shock and grief.” Suzanne stopped for a moment to collect
herself
while the rest of us stood by in silence.

“What did he do?”
she asked pointing at Carter.
 
“He
drugged her and called the police.
 
He told them that she had been experiencing psychological problems and
had tried to commit suicide.
 
He
told me that if I ever told anyone what had actually happened, he would kill
her.
 
It was very traumatic to say
the least.”
 
She paused once again
to collect herself.
 
Carter just sat
in silence.

“The next thing I
knew, I was sent away to boarding school and my mom was committed to a
psychiatric ward.
 
I couldn’t for
the life of me understand how that could’ve possibly happened.
 
Why was she locked away when he was the
criminal?
 
I only saw her a few
times after that and tried my best to avoid Carter.” She paused once again and
took a deep breath.
 
“My mom died
two weeks before my high school graduation.
 
He had finally gotten rid of the only
witness for good.”

“You have no
proof!” Carter managed to say, clenching the ball gag in his teeth.

You could have
heard a pin drop as Suzanne motioned to J.O. and said, “Bring me the
ledger.”
 
She opened it up to the
first page she had bookmarked.
 
“July 13
^th
, 2002 there is a payment to Dr. Fredrick Andrews
for $25,000.
 
He was the
psychiatrist who declared that she suffered from severe schizophrenia and was a
danger to herself as well as others.”

Carter sat there
in silence, hanging his head.
 
He finally
found out where his ledger of criminal activity had gone.

She quickly
flipped to another page that was bookmarked.
 
“Here are two $25,000 payments made to
an orderly who worked at the health care facility where she stayed.
 
Coincidentally, one payment was made
three days before her death and the other was the day after,” she said as
everyone in the room began to stir.
 
“That’s only the beginning, folks,” she said, handing the book back to
J.O.

“Suzanne was kind
enough to highlight all of the payoffs that you have made over the years, as
well as noting the corresponding crime,” J.O. said, showing him a page of the
book.

“Where did you get
that book?” he hissed with fire in his eyes.

“Abe gave it to me
the day before he died,” she told him with a smile.
 
“Abe covered your ass for years, but
unlike you, he had a conscience.”
 
Carter just groaned and shook his head in disbelief.

“I’ll give you
something to groan about,” she said, grabbing the cattle prod and releasing one
more jolt, which must have hit him in the bladder.
 
We all stood there in stunned silence as
a stream of urine ran across the chair and onto the floor.

“All right, get
him up and get his pants on,” J.O. instructed Blade and Renegade.
 
He then read Carter his rights as the
cameras continued to roll.

Gunner

Once Carter had
been taken into custody and the guests had filtered out of the building, Raven
and I went to find Suzanne.
 
We
found her sobbing violently in her office.

“I’m so sorry,”
Raven told her as we both crouched down on either side of her.

“I just wish I
could’ve saved my mom,” she sobbed.

“You were just a
kid,” I assured her.
 
“There’s
nothing you could’ve done at the time.”

“I’ve thought
about this day for years.
 
I’ve
always thought that I would feel better after he got what he deserved.
 
But now I feel completely empty.”
 
She laid her head on her desk.

“You’ve been
fueled by revenge,” Raven told her.
 
“It will take a little time to find a new mission in life, but you
will.”

“This time it will
be a much healthier mission,” I added.
 
“Revenge has a way of eating away at you over time.”

“You’ve got that
right.
 
Who would’ve guessed that a
twenty-six year old could be so bitter.
”
She smiled.

“Are you sure
you’re ok?” I asked, thinking about all that she had been going through.

“I’ll be fine,”
she said with a subtle grin.
 
“I’ve
had nearly thirteen years of therapy.
 
I just need to let it go now and get on with life.”

“What are you
going to do?” Raven asked her.

“Well, technically
this was your ninth show, so you still have one more to go,” she said, popping
back into business mode.

“You’re right.”
Raven smiled.
 
“The next show is
going to be a little different, though.”

“No, gangbang?” I
asked sarcastically, knowing her answer.

“We can.
 
In this show, you are going to be
my
bitch.
 
So if you want it to be a gangbang, I
guess that’s up to you.”
 
She smiled
and slapped me on the chest.

“That’s a great
idea,” Suzanne chimed in before I had a chance to say a word.
 
“I’m going to send out a note to the
members right now.
 
Next Friday
evening will be part two of
Raven’s
Revenge
.
 
They will love it!”

“Hey, I’ve already
paid my dues.
 
Why the fuck would I
agree to this?”

“Do you ever want
us to get past referring to each other as Raven and Gunner?” she asked without
a hint of humor.

“Yes.” I slipped
my arms around her.

“Then, you will do
this,” she replied, pushing back against my chest.

“No cattle prod!”
I demanded, after seeing what they had done to Carter.

“Ha!
 
You wish buddy.
 
By the way, are you more afraid of water
or electricity?” She laughed, giving me a cocky smile.

She’s come a long way
, I thought as I watched her give
Suzanne a high-five and they both laughed at my expense.
 
Suzanne looked down and smiled, then
turned her iPad toward us.
 
We had a ninety-nine percent approval rating
for tonight’s show.
 
I wonder how
many of them thought that it was all an act.

Most of those
attending in person had left the show in somber silence.
 
They all knew that it was the end of the
boys’ club, and that everything would be different going forward.
 
Some of them would be invited back in
the future, while others would be receiving a call from the Marshall’s office.
 
They
are all wealthy and have high profile attorneys on retainer, so I’m sure that
most of them will walk away unscathed
.

As for me, I’m going to let Raven have
her revenge.
 
After that, the only
name I ever want to use off camera is Jillian.
 
Raven is gorgeous and a true fighter,
but I’m in love with Jillian.
 
I
want something real with her.

Raven

When my phone
buzzed first thing Sunday morning, I assumed that it was either Amber or
Gunner.
 
I fished it out of my purse
only to see a picture of my mother.
 
It’s way too early for her.
 
Tossing it onto the nightstand, I
crashed face-first back onto my pillow.
 
I knew that it was going to buzz again because she always left a
voicemail.
 
I also knew that she was
the queen of ambiguous messages, so even if I did listen to it, I still
wouldn’t know what she actually wanted.
 
That was her way of getting me to call her back.

Screw it.
 
I decided to skip a few steps and called her right back.

“Darling, I hope
that I didn’t wake you,” she said upon answering.

“No, I always get
up a seven forty-five on Sundays.
 
Especially when Hannah is at her dad’s house,” I replied with
a healthy
dose sarcasm.

“I’m sorry, dear,
but I’ve been worrying about you all night.”
 
She actually sounded sincere for once.

“Why?”
 

“The guy you are
dating… does he
go
by the nickname ‘Gunner’?”

Oh, holly hell!
 
I shot straight up in bed.
 
“Dalton?
 
Who told you that?”

“Well, Toots and I
ate at the Level Seven Café last night,” she explained.
 
“When I told her that you lived just down
the street, she thought we should stop in and surprise you.”

“Okay…”

“Well, obviously
you weren’t home, but a nice young man named Tom let us in,” she went on.
 
“I wanted to leave a note on your door.”

“You couldn’t just
send me a text?”
 
This is too weird.

 
“I suppose, but since Tom let us in, I
thought leaving a note would be more personal.”

“I never saw a
note when I got home.”

“Yeah, I
know.
 
I got so flustered after
talking to Tom that I totally forgot all about it,” she confessed.

That’s just great.
 
I knew I should’ve killed Tom when I had
him by the throat.
 
“What did Tom say?”
 
I tried to speak as calmly as possible.

“I asked him if he
had met Dalton and he went off talking about Gunner and Raven, saying that I
should ask you about the two of them,” she told me.
 
“Then when Toots told him that we had
been to the Level Seven, he said that we should ask you about Level Nine.
  
Is that a new place?”

“No.
 
Do you want to go for breakfast?” I
asked, needing some time to think.

“Sure.
 
Where do you want to meet?”

“Our usual
place.
 
See you in an hour.”
 
With that, I immediately got off the
phone, not wanting to say anything more until I had taken a shower and
collected my thoughts.
 
It was way
too early for this.
 
I really need a cup of coffee.
 
Actually, I should probably have a
couple shots of tequila as well.

~~~

“You know it makes
me nervous when you don’t give me a straight answer,” Mom muttered as we
settled into our normal booth.

“I know, but some things
are better discussed in person.”
 
This was one of them.

While in the
shower, I had made up an entire story about Raven being a temporary roommate
and explaining that Tom had mistakenly linked the two of us.
 
However, if she wasn’t satisfied with my
explanation, she would start typing Gunner and Raven into her iPad and then I
would have no control over what she found.
 
She probably wouldn’t have recognized me right away, but she would’ve
instantly recognized my voice.
 
I
did the only thing I could think of doing, I told her the truth.
 
What’s
the worst that can happen?
 
It’s not
like we are on the best of terms anyway.

“The good news is
that Hannah won’t have to spend every other weekend at Perry’s house anymore.”
I started out on a positive note.

“That’s
great!
 
How did you pull that one
off?”

“I stumbled
headfirst into a great opportunity and made a pile of cash,” I replied, shaking
my head in amazement.
 
“It honestly
came out of nowhere.”

“Well, I hope it’s
something legal.” Mom snickered.

“They tell me it
is,” I replied, returning her smirk.

“Okay, Jillian
Marie, what have you been up to?”
 
The clock suddenly turned back to my high school days.
 
I hadn’t heard her use my middle name in
well over a decade.

“Do you know who
this is?” I asked, showing her a picture of Raven on my phone.

“No.
 
I can’t say that she looks familiar.”

“That’s Raven.”

“The one that Tom
was talking about?”

“Yes, that’s the
one.”

“Wow, she’s
beautiful,” Mom, added, grabbing my phone to take a closer look.

“Flip to the next
picture,” I told her.
 
“That’s Raven
with Gunner.”

After looking at
the picture for a moment, she lifted her eyes to mine.
 
“He looks a little like that Dalton guy,
only with less clothes on.”

“Gunner and Raven
have been working together on an amazingly successful live sex show.
 
Together, they have made well over half
of a million dollars in the past five weeks.”

“Wow, that’s a lot
of money,” she replied, trying to wrap her head around the situation.
 
“I still don’t get how you…”

“I’m Raven,” I
whispered, placing my hand over hers.

“That’s you?” She
once again pulled the phone up to her face to examine it through her
bifocals.
 
“I never would’ve…”

“I know. It’s a
makeup artist named Jasmine.
 
She’s
amazing.”

“You’ve been doing
porn?” she whispered.
 
Her eyes nearly popping out of her head.

“It’s a long
story, Mom.
 
I kind of got tricked
into it,” I started to explain.
 
“I
had no idea that he was recording the first session.
 
By the time I found out, it was too
late.”

“Did you sign a
model release?”

“I did, but I
didn’t really know what I was signing.
 
He called it a liability waiver.
 
It was so dark in there.”

“Oh my God!” she
exclaimed as it finally started to sink in.
 
“I never would’ve dreamt this in a
million years!”

“
Shh
!
 
I’m sorry
if I’ve disappointed you, but I didn’t want you to find out from anyone else.”

She just sat there
for a moment with a strange look on her face.
 
I could tell that she was processing
everything that I had told her, but she also seemed to be debating on whether
or not she wanted to say something to me.

“Go ahead and say
it,” I finally told her.

“What?”

“Whatever is on
your
mind.
 
Just say it.” I folded my arms and sat back in the booth.

“First of all, I instantly
had the impression that Dalton was a gigolo.
 
No one is that chiseled in his thirties
unless he is getting paid for it one way or another.”

“I’ll let him know
you said that.” I laughed.
 
She
still had the funniest look on her face.

I knew there was
something else on her mind, so I just sat there and waited.

“Do you know how
your father and I met?” she finally asked with a more serious expression.

“Yeah, you met at
a night club on the night he came back from the war, and he always said that it
was love at first sight.”

“It was love at
first sight, alright.
 
I was in a
G-string with my legs wrapped around a pole,” she confessed.
 
“Your father had literally just gotten
off the boat from Vietnam.
 
He
hadn’t even stopped home to change out of his uniform.”

“You were a
stripper?” My mind had just been officially blown.

“I came out here
with dreams of being a star,” she said, looking down at the table.
 
“When things didn’t work out, I did what
I had to do.”
 
She shrugged her
shoulders.

“How long did you
do that?”

“Not long.”
 
A smile broke across her face.
 
“Your father came back every night that
I worked until he finally got up the nerve to ask me out.”

“And the two of
you started dating?”

“Yes, and that’s
when I started working at your grandfather’s jewelry store.”

“Wow!”
 
Part of me was amazed that Mom had
shared that story, but I think she wanted me to know that we weren’t as
different as I had always thought.
 
My older sister had always been considered the slutty one, so maybe
that’s why she had favored her.
 
Once she found out that I wasn’t above it all, she actually seemed more
accepting of me.
 
I had always
thought that I was a better person than my sister.
 
Maybe I had acted that way toward Mom as
well.

“What are you going
to do now?” she asked as we finished our breakfast.

“We’ve got one
more live show left, then I’m not sure what will happen next.”

“I think you and
Dalton should take that money and open your own real estate office,” she
suggested.
 
“I hear the market is
improving.”

“That’s one
option.”

“You could call it
Gunner & Raven Realty and use that picture of the two of you.” She
snickered.
 
“In this town, no one
would think twice about buying real estate from porn stars.”

“Please, don’t
refer to me as a porn star,” I pleaded.
 
“And for god sake, don’t tell Toots or anyone else.
 
I don’t want this to get around.”

“Well then I don’t
know why you told me.
 
You know that
I never have been able to keep a secret,” she huffed.

“You need to keep
this one.”
 
Please don’t make me regret this.

~~~

After things had
gone so well with my mother, I contemplated having a similar conversation with
Evelyn.
 
Luckily, by the time she
showed up with Hannah, I had come to my senses.
 
Instead, I informed her that due to the
recovering real estate market, I would no longer need Perry’s assistance with
child support.

“So you are
completely relinquishing his responsibilities?” An untrusting scowl crossed her
face.

“I’m saying that
for now, he no longer has to pay child support, so Hannah will be staying here
on weekends,” I clarified.
 
“You can
come visit her anytime, though.”

“Oh, okay.
 
Perry will be pleased to hear that I’m
sure.” A sad smile crossed her face as she looked over at Hannah who had
already made herself comfortable in front of the TV.
 
“I’m going to miss seeing her.”