Taming Cross (Love Inc 2)

The third time, a hot weekend in May, he wanted to touch me. After that, he always touched me, but he never asked for anything except blow jobs.

Soon I was going to dinners with him. He started introducing me as his mistress. I was living there, with Tess, and I wasn't an escort. I was a blow job queen. He named me Missy King, and that's who I was on Tess's roster.

Months passed, and I was making more money than Sean had with his pot. And I was saving every penny of it. Once I got a hundred thousand dollars, I wanted to move to California, to San Francisco, and start a new life.

I didn’t get there, obviously.

Drake’s Las Vegas body guard started dropping by to see me sometimes. His name was Jim Gunn, and I always thought he was a creeper. He used to stare at me like he wanted to eat me for dinner. But the first time, he told me Drake wanted him to take me out to dinner, to see how I was doing. It had been three weeks since the governor was able to make it my way, so I took Jim at his word. He was on Drake’s payroll, after all.

After that, Jim took me out to dinner once a week, every week, always asking me personal questions and questions about my past. So the governor could “do damage control” if anyone ever found out he was seeing me. I hated going out with Jim, but I did what I was paid to do. Not once did Drake ever mention my outings with Jim, and it wasn’t my job to mention things to Drake.

One week in August, just after Drake had been in town for a ‘celebrity’ poker tournament, I starting hearing things about this porn star named Priscilla Heat. How she wanted Drake. How she thought I wasn’t worth his money. Just a few days later, the rumor started that I was cheating on the governor with Jim Gunn.

Drake never asked me about it. He came to Vegas one more time, and we went to a fancy casino restaurant with some of his friends. He went home on a Sunday, but on Monday, Jim Gunn called and told me he’d decided to stay. He wanted me to meet him at his penthouse at the Wynn.

Jim picked me up at six sharp in a big, black SUV I’d never seen before, but I didn’t question it. When I got into the back seat, Priscilla Heat was there, and then I started freaking out. The two of them wanted me to quit seeing the governor. Priscilla told me he was hers, and I needed to go back to Georgia. I wondered how she knew I came from Georgia, but then I remembered: I’d told Jim.

“Are you guys working together?”

Priscilla laughed, and they explained how I was going to call Drake and ask him for more money.

“He already knows your plan, my dear.” Priscilla grinned. “How you’re actually an undercover reporter. How you’ll tell everyone about what a lying, cheating bastard he is if he doesn’t pay your price.”

I was so young and stupid, it took me a minute to understand: This was blackmail. We were on the highway, then, and when Jim Gunn turned around from the driver’s seat, he held up a pistol.

“I think you want to do what we’re asking, darlin’. We’ve got some fun things in store for you.”

I was so young. So stupid.

I never even had a chance.

Hopelessness washes over me now, as I think of walking out of here to meet Jesus.

Maybe I should run. Maybe running would be better than walking into yet another trap.

Instead, I pack my bags in the attic—where no one will find them for a while; so they will assume I ran away—and when the sun comes up, I'm prepared to face my last day of freedom.

I go to breakfast. Eat my rice and beans as if it's not the last time I'll ever spoon them out of these metal bowls. The hardest thing, I think, is Sister Mary Carolina. She pulls me into a hug after my first appointment and whispers in my ear, “No worries. God will take care of you.”

It's all I can do to hold back tears.

I'm sitting in a tiny office, filling out paperwork to order more menthol back cream for a little boy named Fernando, when I say the only prayer I will ever say for my own fate.

Whatever happens, please help me to bear it. Please don't let any of the children get hurt—or anyone at all. Please don't let the Sisters see me walking out tonight.

That's the last thing that I pray before the door swings open, and Sister Mary Carolina tells me that I have a visitor.