“Didn’t they tell you?” I say. “I bite.” And I click my teeth. I’d bitten two men before they got the idea and started warning clients. “Your loss.”
The man gives me an ugly grin and reaches behind him. He pulls a gun out, cocks the hammer, and holds it to my temple.
My breath hisses out of my lungs in terror.
He’s not supposed to have a gun in here. He’s not supposed to have a gun, and I’m not supposed to get damaged by the customers. Of course, it’s a bit too late for anyone to argue.
“You scared now?” he asks. “Eat my dick. No bite. I paid good money.” And he pushes the gun against my temple, harder. His hand twists in my hair and drags my face downward.
I still want to live. The tears I hate pool in my eyes and stream down my cheeks. “Please don’t kill me.”
His smile grows broader, and he directs my face toward his condom-sheathed dick again.
I don’t fight.
• • •
After he is gone, I vomit the contents of my stomach into my piss bucket and curl up on my mattress, staring at the wall and crying. I always cry after they leave. It’s my release. I try to think of zombie movies—I never got past D earlier—but my mind is in shock at the moment. The gun flashes through my mind, and I swallow hard, thinking of the click of the hammer.
Swallowing reminds me of his taste, the mix of sweat and latex that seems burned in the back of my mind, and I lunge for my bucket again.
Someone comes to the door a few minutes after I finish puking for a second time. A knock and then the door cracks open. “Regan?”
It is one of the workers here. Alma. She’s nice to me. I sit upright, pushing my hair out of my face. “Hi.”
She looks around anxiously, then smooths her gray maid’s uniform. She wears it every day, and it, along with her nervous demeanor, tells me that she only works here in a cleaning capacity. “Senhor Gomes sent me. He says you will see a very special friend of his after you clean up.”
“Oh goody,” I say in a flat voice. I know what that means. It’s the man that I see even in my nightmares.
I don’t know his name, but I first saw him in Russia. I’d been at the brothel for a few weeks and was still working on tuning out my “clients” when I’d met Mr. Freeze.
Mr. Freeze was different.
At first, I was excited to see him when he came in the room. He looked American and, better yet, spoke with a nasally accent I attributed to New England. If he was American, he was here to save me, right? The fact that he was pale, ice-blond, and remote-seeming didn’t bug me. Nor did the fact that he was wearing such an expensive suit and was followed by a rather frightening bodyguard with a massive form and hooded eyes. I didn’t care who he was hanging around with as long as he got me out of here.
He’d entered my room, a flicker of interest in his eyes as he regarded me from my place huddled in the corner. “Stand up so I can look at you.”
My heart had sunk all over again. Those weren’t the words of a man who was here to save me.
So I’d ignored him. Scared or not, I wasn’t performing tricks for any man.
It had been a mistake. The bruiser had immediately charged forward, grabbing me by my hair and hauling me to my feet. I’d screamed, but no one came running to see what was wrong. No one cared what happened to me when Freeze had me.
I soon learned that no one approached Mr. Freeze. Everyone was terrified of him.
He dragged on plastic surgical gloves and then proceeded to examine me like a racehorse. As his bodyguard held me upright, his hand moved down my legs, checked my thighs, my pussy, my ribs, and my breasts. And then he made me open my mouth. To my surprise, he pulled out a flashlight and examined my teeth.
“Are these your real teeth?” he asked me. “Do you brush twice a day? And shower?”
“Fuck off.”
He slapped my face and grabbed my chin, careless of the blood dribbling from my split lip. “Answer me.”
I didn’t answer. I tried to bite him instead.
He slapped me again, and this time it left me reeling. “Answer me. Do they shave you or have you had laser treatments?” He lifted my arm and examined my armpit, then bent to study my pubic hair again. “Natural blonde. That’s good.”
It was like I wasn’t a real person to him. I was a doll he was checking out to purchase. Or a car. “You want to kick my tires before you take my ass around the block?”