Trust in Me (9 page)

I wriggled back to life, sure that I needed to get off him, to thank him profusely for what he’d done, probably with my mouth. But his hands clamped down on my thighs, holding me there, and with soft, small licks, he built me up all over again.

Again and again, he made me come. I was adrift in pleasure, tossed by its waves and drowning down, down, but unable to care. Something tugged me back though, a shudder in the body beneath me, an urgent sound interspersed with the moans of arousal. I glanced back to see him gripping his cock. Not the fist of bringing himself off, but a harsh, tight thing that turned his knuckles white. He was holding his orgasm at bay in a way that had to be painful, just so that I could keep doing this. So that this could be about me and not his pleasure. He knew exactly what I needed. He knew everything.

I yanked myself off of him. His face was lined with pain, a sight that filled me with guilt and sympathy…and some pleasure. Maybe some of Carlos’s sadism had rubbed off on me, because in that moment it felt just a little bit good that he’d been willing to go through that for me.

But I had no interest in prolonging his torture. I rolled a condom on his straining cock and straddled him. I rode him in the way that he would enjoy the most and come the fastest. It was working, too. He looked fair to bursting, with veins bulging in his forehead and almost a snarl on his face.

But he stopped me. “No, no, baby. Let me show you.”

With his hands on my hips, he moved me differently. He didn’t go as deep or get fucked as well. But the angle—God, the angle. It hit something inside me, something I barely knew I had. Once, twice, I rolled my hips just to hit it again even as my eyes rolled to the back of my head. I felt the wetness spilling down over his cock, my breasts bouncing in time with my movements, but all I could think of was
again
and
more
and
oh God.

I came and started up all over again. I could tell he was trying to stay still, trying to let me lead, but he bucked beneath my anyway. Just as I came again, clenching around him, he yanked me down with a roar, holding my body suspended in the air as he pummeled me from below as he came.

I fell down onto him as he released me.

“I love you,” he said into my neck. “I love you, Mia.”

The words struck right at my heart, turning my body cold. It was exactly what I’d asked of him, but I hated it. He was better at faking this than I would have thought. Better than I was even. I’d gotten lost in the moment, thought it was real. Until he said those words, words I knew could never be true, and it all came crashing back to me.

I couldn’t believe I’d made him fuck me like that. Was he disgusted by me? He should be.

I had no cause to ever complain about my lot as a whore, even in my head. Because the fact was that as soon as I’d wanted someone and had the means to force him, I’d done it. I made Tyler use his body to get what he needed just like Carlos made me use mine.

Jerkily, I pulled off the bed and grabbed my clothes. I relished each stab of pain from the fabric as it snagged on my open wounds, knowing I deserved even worse.

“What is it?” His chest was still heaving, and his eyes were still bleary and sated as he looked at me.

I shook my head. It wasn’t his fault. I wanted to tell him that, explain that it was me that had screwed him over, that he shouldn’t feel any shame about what happened, but my mouth wouldn’t form the words. And he’d done it for me. Even if I forced him into it, he’d pleased me and I wanted him to know how much it meant to me, at least.

“Thank you,” I finally choked out. “Thank you for doing this.”

Then I fled the room.

Chapter Nine

All men liked blowjobs, but Carlos had a special affinity to them, particularly the choking, gagging kind. That’s what I was doing with my head between Carlos’s legs when Tyler walked in. My leaking eyes had surely made my mascara run, and the entire bottom half of my face was covered with saliva and pre-cum. Even without a mirror, I was disgusted with myself. I was almost grateful for the thick cock in my mouth, shielding the ugly sight of my face as it did.

Tyler cleared his throat. “I need to have a word with you.”

Thank you for doing this,
I mocked myself ruthlessly with the words I’d spoken to Tyler last night. So polite. We could write an etiquette column for the gangbanger set.

“Yes, come in,” Carlos said impatiently. “Ignore her.”

God, if only Tyler
could
ignore me. I wouldn’t be offended. I’d be grateful. But I was pretty sure it was impossible. Not only because of the loud, messy blowjob, made worse by Carlos’s hand ramming my mouth onto him, harder and deeper, but because of the slutty get-up I’d worn to entice Carlos into using me. The draping top, just a wisp of fabric, showed off the scars on my back. Carlos liked to see them.

From the corner of my eye, I saw Tyler perch on a nearby chair, as awkward as a choir boy watching his first porno. He’d give himself away like that. No bona fide human trafficker had a problem watching a slut get roughed up. He might as well flash his FBI badge. We were both losing our ability to fake it, which was the only thing keeping an undercover agent and a whore alive.

I needed to distract Carlos before he made Tyler for a cop.

I sucked in deep, far back into my throat where I couldn’t breathe, not even through my nose. My lips kissed the base of his cock, my face smashed into his stomach. Then I swallowed, gratified by the low masculine groan that reverberated through the air and through his cock. Gratified because it gave Tyler a chance to compose himself.

Unfortunately, he didn’t take the hint.

“I want to go over the schematics one last time before tomorrow’s run,” Tyler said. “Let’s take it into the office.”

God
damn
, I knew what he was doing. Exactly what I was doing. He was trying to distract Carlos to give me a break. But hell, I didn’t need a break from this. This was all I was good for. This was all I could offer Tyler, the services of a slut.

“Sure,” Carlos said, as if he was finishing up a card game or something instead of shoving his dick into a throat. “Hold on.”

He pushed me down deep again and held me there. My body instinctively jerked and flailed in a futile attempt to get free, even though I told it not to. If I managed to get free, it would only result in more pain for me. So thank goodness Carlos was strong enough to hold me down. Thank goodness for that.

“Stop,” Tyler barked.

Carlos froze. His thigh muscles tensed, his fingers tightened in my hair, holding me still, but it wasn’t the moment of climax, it was an unnatural stillness. An animal sensing danger.

“What did you say to me?” Carlos asked.

“We don’t have time for this,” Tyler said. I could tell he was trying to calm down, trying to play it cool, but he was failing fast. “That’s all. We need to go.”

Carlos was no fool. He pulled my head off his dick and held it there, suspended by my hair, like he was some kind of conquering Visigoth regarding the detached head of his vanquished enemy with pride and scorn. Except, of course, that my head was still attached to my body. But I was no less conquered, no less damaged than if my body were broken in two.

The shame that had nipped at my heels my entire life overtook me completely, flattened me, as I was humiliated in front of the man that I…loved. I’d loved him ever since he’d thought a gangly little girl in dirty clothes was worth standing up for, even if it hadn’t worked.

“I don’t think you’re upset about the security schematics,” Carlos said pleasantly. “We went over them last night, and nothing has changed. I think you want me to stop shoving my dick down her throat. Now why would that be?”

Tyler said nothing, but the tension swirled around us, threatening to drag me under. It was a tangible thing: Tyler’s impotent rage, his misdirected fury, weighty and thick.

Carlos’s sharp tone sliced through the air. “Do you like her?” He shook my head with a flick of his wrist. “Do you like my whore?”

“You know I do,” Tyler said. “I offered you a fair price.”

I thought with despair that Tyler
did
like me. Maybe it wasn’t just that he was a good guy. Maybe it wasn’t that he felt guilt over back then or now. Maybe he genuinely thought I was a regular person, worthy of his possession.

Carlos let go, and I fell to the floor like a worthless sack of flour, the dust rising around me in protest. “Take her if you want,” he said. “But if you leave, don’t come back. You won’t participate in the drop. You forfeit your cut.”

Freedom.

For a second, just a second, I allowed myself to revel in the possibility. Tyler and me, together. Happiness, a family. Life flashed before my eyes, one I’d never live. A fantasy.

The offer was a trick.

No way would Carlos let me go. I’d known that ever since the first time he shot down one of his men in front of me.

I’d been new here, barely off the streets for six weeks. As embarrassing as it was to acknowledge, I’d even developed a romantic attachment to Carlos. Well, maybe it wasn’t so ridiculous. He was very intelligent and attractive enough, if you couldn’t see the monster underneath. And he was my knight in shining armor. The age difference between us didn’t matter to me. Maybe I did have daddy issues.

He’d fucked me on his bed—this was before he got too rough. Maybe he thought that I’d run then, even with nowhere to go. And I might have, without those delusional romantic feelings.

One of his men walked in on us. I saw him first and made a surprised squeak. Carlos looked over, his hard cock still inside me, grabbed the gun from the drawer in the bedside table and shot him dead. Then he went back to fucking me with fervor.

I started crying, but that only excited him more. He finished and then called in Leo to clean up the mess. A dead body. Very little blood. The smell of piss. I’d never forget any of it. I found out later that the guy had been skimming off the top. Only a fool would steal from Carlos. The man had already been dead when Carlos shot him, that’s how inevitable his death was.

Still, I thought that he’d done it in front of me on purpose. It signaled a change in our relationship. We were no longer a starry-eyed girl and her savior—he owned me. He showed me exactly what he’d do if I ever left, if I ever betrayed him. So I had no illusions that he’d let me leave now, even if he said I could.

Probably Tyler knew too much to let loose, either. If he tried to get me out of here now, we’d both be dead before we hit the parking lot. I looked up at Tyler, trying to warn him, begging him to hold back. His eyes were haunted, filled with rage and guilt and disgust and all manner of dark things. But he obeyed, staying still.

Carlos stood, giving the impression of a dog crouching over his bone. “That is what I thought. Just because I shared her with you, don’t forget who she belongs to.”

He ripped apart the flimsy silk fabric of my shirt and pulled the knife from his shirt pocket. The metal touched my skin, cold and merciless. Carlos wasn’t even looking at me. He was looking at Tyler as he carved a curved line across my stomach. The blade curved back around, snaking into the letter C. For Carlos, maybe, or cunt. Or cold, because my body started to shiver. The thoughts faded like smoke into the ether as my body’s responses took over. The pain seared through me, imprinted itself on my mind and in my heart. An inside hurt to match the thick scar this would leave.

Carlos didn’t like to do permanent damage. He liked a clean slate to work with when he beat me. This was another message that I wouldn’t be around for long.

My body convulsed, desperate for a safety that my mind knew would never come. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t hope for the moment the pain would ease. The room refocused, veiled in a red sheen of agony. Tyler’s stony silence pulsated in the room. He did it for me.

“I don’t know why you’re shitting bricks,” Carlos said. “You’re the one who told me about her.”

I blinked through the miasma of misery to make sense of his words. What had Tyler told Carlos about me? Tyler didn’t know anything about me, except maybe about where I grew up. Though in reality, Carlos probably had a better understanding of what had gone on behind closed doors than Tyler, because that’s the kind of understanding guy he was.

Wait. Tyler also knew I was working as an informant. It made sense now, too much sense. Carlos had been exceptionally brutal. I knew why. I was dispensable. A traitor. Like the guy who’d stolen from him, I was already dead.

A mournful wail blanketed us, that universal sound of an animal in pain. It made my hair stand on end. It made my throat burn as it left me. It wasn’t that I was dead or dying. It was because Tyler had ratted me out. His bowed head screamed his guilt.

“Oh, yes,” Carlos said. “I know what you are. What you did. Did you really think I wouldn’t find out? Did you think you could fuck with me?”

“No,” I whispered, and then realized it was true. I always knew he’d win this game. He was too good at it. It was all he could do, really. Like an idiot savant, except instead of playing piano or counting cards, his genius was fucking with people. But I’d hoped to be able to free those women, at least, before he found me out.

Now their only hope was Tyler, except I didn’t know whose side he was on anymore. Why had he betrayed me? But that’s how fucked up I was, that I had expected anything different.

“Don’t play innocent now. Tell her,” Carlos said with a ringmaster’s sweep of his arm.

“Fuck, Mia,” he said. Or I was pretty sure he said that. It also sounded like
fuck me
. They meant the same thing though.
Oops. My bad. Sorry about the whole torture/death thing.

“Just…why?” I said, the tears in my eyes twisting his face like a funhouse mirror.

“Well, Tyler, tell her what she wants to hear,” Carlos said.

He mumbled something. An apology maybe. It didn’t matter.

I struggled to sit up. I had this urge to storm from the room in a huff. Probably it was the blood loss making me have visions, but I imagined this scene where I was a normal woman. “You came home late and didn’t even call,” I’d say and then go putter around in the kitchen until we could kiss and make up. But this was nothing like that, and besides, I couldn’t really move, so I ended up flopping heavily onto the concrete.