His eyes darkened suddenly. She’d got a scare last night, and he hadn’t minced his words in laying it on the line for her just exactly what she was doing, but did that mean she was going to mend her ways? Or did she still think that she could get away with it? Getting men to pay for her company and nothing more?
And what if they didn’t like her saying no to them…? What if next time she wasn’t able to get out and get away? A man like Cosmo Dimistris wouldn’t have any qualms about helping himself, and there were plenty of slimeballs in the world with the same views about women! She’d got lucky last night because Cosmo had simply helped himself to one of the other, more willing girls at the party. But another time she might not be so lucky. Another time she might find herself in serious danger…
Beneath his breath, an expletive formed. Damn the girl! Damn her!
Abruptly, he straightened in his seat. He got to his feet.
‘Gentlemen, my apologies. Please conclude without me.’ He nodded at his team, then turned and walked out of the room.
He needed to make a phone call.
‘I’ll just go and check if we have that in your size, madam,’ Sophie said, keeping her voice rigorously polite, even though the woman she was serving had not thought it necessary to speak to her with even the minimum of courtesy. But difficult and demanding customers were something Sophie had had to learn how to handle, however obnoxious they were. Or however tired or dispirited she was.
Or desperate.
Because desperate was what she was. Eating like acid into her brain, the words of the letter kept going round and round in her head…
Unless the fees are paid in full…
She wanted to laugh hysterically. Scream. Dig her nails into her palms until they drew blood. Fighting down her panic, she found the shoe box and hefted it down. Then, surreptitiously looking around her, because the shop manageress was draconian about personal calls for staff, she slipped her mobile out of her pocket and checked for messages.
Yes! There was one! Fumblingly, she clicked it open and read, and as she did so her stomach plunged in a churning mix of emotions. It was another booking from the agency. The escort agency.
That’s what it is—to me! I won’t let it be anything else, I won’t! It’s just an escort agency…
She felt a spurt of anger. Nikos had mocked her for calling it an introduction service—but that was exactly what it called itself, she argued defensively. Its upmarket website proclaimed ‘elite introductions for elite businessmen seeking elite companions’. She’d taken that at face value—but was she being pathetically naïve, blinding herself deliberately to what was beneath the respectable veneer? Well, it wouldn’t be the first time she’d been fooled by a respectable-sounding organisation…
The familiar flush of shame and bitterness flared through her. Dear God, where did naïvety end and criminal stupidity begin?
The hollow inside her hardened, and she lifted her chin. Tough. Tough. No point whatsoever in repining the past and the appalling, criminally stupid mistakes she’d made! Because it was too late—she’d made them. And now she had to take the consequences. And the consequences were that she had no choice—no choice but to do what she was doing now.
Whatever it takes, however sordid the job, I have to do it. I have to make whatever money I can, however I can—I just have to.
And if that meant doing what was loathsome to her, if that meant reading this text message from the agency and being grateful—dear God, grateful!—for the fact that she was being booked again for tonight, then that was what she had to be. Inside her head, a nugget of fear reared its head. What if the man she was to meet tonight was just the same as Cosmo Dimistris? What if he thought he was booking a lot more than a companion for the evening? With an effort that cost her, she forced down the fear, the incipient panic. Well, she would just have to deal with it if it happened. Just as she’d had to deal with everything that had happened since her world had fallen apart…
‘Your customer’s getting shirty—better hurry up.’
The voice of one of the other sales assistants roused Sophie from her troubled thoughts. Hastily, she grabbed the requisite shoe box and hurried out. She could feel her stomach rumble, but ignored it. She never ate lunch any more, it was a waste of money. Every penny she could save went to a far, far better cause than herself. She never spent money on anything other than the barest minimum. She ate as little as possible, as cheaply as possible, endured a freezing cold bedsit to avoid heating costs, walked everywhere she possibly could.
As for clothes—apart from the repellent outfit she’d had to buy for her escort work, which she’d got in a charity shop anyway, she’d bought nothing for longer than she could remember.
For a moment—brief, poignant—a memory flashed in her head, vivid and piercing.
The evening dress I wore to the Covent Garden gala that first, magical night with Nikos! That beautiful, beautiful dress…
Her mouth thinned. Well, that was gone—along with every other designer dress she’d owned.
Along with everything else. Including the life she had once lived.
She swallowed. Sentiment was pointless. Worse than pointless. Unaffordable.
‘You took your time!’ The petulant tones of her customer penetrated.
‘I’m so sorry…’
Forcing an apologetic smile to her lips
, Sophie got on with her job.