Better When It Hurts (Stripped 2)

“So I’ll tell you the answer,” he says, pulling his fingers from me with a wet sound. Those damp fingers press against my back hole in an answer more eloquent than words. “Yes, you’ll probably be hurt tonight.”

I swallow, knowing I shouldn’t feel disappointed. And definitely not scared. I knew what I was getting into when I came here, didn’t I? And if I had clung to some stupid fairy-tale idea of him, something clearly false, at least when it came to me, that was my own damn fault.

He leans forward, resting his arm on my back. I feel like a piece of furniture, like an extension of this sofa, something soft and sturdy for him to rest on.

“And tomorrow night,” he adds. “I took you out of rotation.”

I gasp in shock and indignation. “What the hell?”

“And the next night after that.”

“Are you crazy?”

“Three nights, Lola. I don’t think that’s too much to ask after what you did. I don’t think it’s enough, actually, but I can be lenient.”

I struggle, I fight. I want to be standing when I yell at him for doing this. I want this to be an even playing field, but he’s already resting his weight on my back. I went over the arm of this couch willingly, and now I’m trapped. “You had no right to do that. Just because I agreed—”

“Unless you want me to tell Ivan about those sticky little fingers of yours? He’s lenient with you girls, but I don’t think he would like thinking you’re stealing from the customers. Or from him.”

“I don’t,” I gasp. “I don’t steal from him or from—”

His body moves as if in a shrug. “Who can say? And to be honest, I don’t give a fuck.”

I fight again, but it’s like trying to move a mountain. One that’s resting comfortably, casually on my back. The anger seeps out of me, replaced by worry, by sadness that we’ve come this far. I turn my forehead into the cushion, hiding and self-soothing. “I can’t go three nights without getting paid,” I say into the leather.

There’s a long pause. “I’ll make up the difference.”

He’ll pay me for sex? God, even when he’s being cruel, he’s kind. “No.”

The thought of it makes my stomach turn over. If this is about a debt, then we need to be square at th

e end of it. I fucked him over once, and he’s giving it back. It’s supposed to hurt.

“No money,” I say, staring at the blur of light and black leather. “If we do this, we do it on my off days—like today. I work my regular schedule. That’s my deal. Take it or leave it.”

This pause is longer, and I wonder what he’s thinking. Is he going to try to force me to miss work? Is he going to force me to take his money? I think that would be the worst punishment, to be made his whore as well as his plaything.

He strokes a hand over my back like I’m an animal—petting me. “One night a week.”

My skin tingles, and I force myself not to arch into his touch. “How many weeks?”

He doesn’t answer. He just grabs me by the hair and lifts.

Chapter Ten

“This is very important, Hannah. Mrs. Moreno has the pictures of your bruises. We need to know who hurt you.”

I refuse to look up, to meet his eyes. My voice is a whisper. “I told her.”

“We have her statement, but I need to hear it from you.”

After a long beat of silence, I look up into the kind eyes of a judge. He looks sorry for me. Everyone is sorry for me. They just can’t help me. Isn’t that what Blue told me? That they don’t understand what it’s like in the system. They shove us around like dolls in cardboard houses.

I grasp the wood handles of the chair, already slick from my palms. “What will happen to him?”

The judge looks tired. “That depends on a lot of factors.”

“Like what?”