a Good Samaritan,” I assured him, opening the door and walking out.
In the hall, I took a deep breath, snapped my head from side to side to get the crick out of my neck, and then let my head fall back on my shoulders. I had a twenty-five-minute drive home with nothing to show for my night. For the billionth time, I told myself I should have stayed home.
I was surprised, as I turned to walk down the hall toward the elevator, when the blond man’s door opened.
He was staring silently at me, and I would have kept going, but there was something about his face, his expression, how sort of trusting it was; it had changed in the last few moments and was now something else entirely.
“Is he all right?” I asked, because maybe that was it. Maybe this was what fear or worry looked like on him.
“I believe so.”
“You believe?”
“I closed the door. He’s snoring.”
I waited, but I had no idea why.
He cleared his throat and then wet his lips.
“Okay, then,” I said slowly, studying him but not moving, admiring his long gold lashes as well as his furrowed brows. He was considering something.
“May I ask a question?”
I should have said no, but again, his expression, something I couldn’t put my finger on, a pull that usually never happened, stopped me. Normally people made sense right away. Like I could read them, what they wanted or needed. But either he didn’t know himself, or he was confused. Impossible to tell which, and that was new. “G’head,” I found myself saying.
“You’re a hustler, right?” he asked quickly. “You sit around in the bar and wait for people to come up and talk to you.”
“Are you a cop?” I asked, because how else would he know that? I had on a suit so I’d blend in, and my hair, mustache, and beard were all short, trimmed and neat.
“No,” he assured me. “But I saw you earlier, and then you were still there when I had to run down to the business center.”
I nodded. He had noticed me, and then kept track of me. Interesting.
“So, are you?”
“Maybe I just wanted to pick somebody up.”
“Did you?” He seemed interested in the answer, and I couldn’t help but notice how the T-shirt he was wearing clung to the muscles in his chest and abdomen.
I shrugged.
“Just be honest. I’m not trying to jam you up or anything.”
“Jam me up?” I repeated, scowling now. “How old are you?”
“Thirty-two,” he answered automatically, like it was good manners or something, and studied my face. “But that’s what you do, correct? You sit around in some bar, talk to men. And women too, I assume.”
I shook my head.
“Okay, so just men, and then you what, ask them if they want to have a good time?”
“You watch way too many movies.”
He grunted. “That’s probably true but…that’s how it’s done, though, yes? You do, in fact, sell your body for money?”
“On occasion,” I answered, feeling even more unbalanced than I had carrying his drunk-ass friend up the elevator. Why was I still standing there?
He took a breath. “And was that what you thought Doug wanted?”
Ah, the drunk’s name was Doug. “Yeah.”
“He didn’t, though.”
“No, he didn’t,” I agreed, trying to figure the man out.
“Doug only wanted someone new to tell the Tim story to.”
I nodded. “Tim’s been gone a long time, has he?”
“Doug and I just met, but from what I’ve gathered, around nine months?”
Taking a step forward, I put my hand on the doorframe. “So you and Doug met here on business?”
“Yes,” he said hoarsely, his gaze dragging over me slowly, mapping every inch, until all that blue was back on my face.
“And is your boyfriend at home waiting on you, or gone like Tim?”
“There’s no one”––his voice cracked––“waiting at home.”
“And it’s been a bit?” I asked softly, slipping inside the room.
“It has,” he confessed, closing the door with a click before turning to lean his back against it, never breaking eye contact with me.
I meant to say, “It’s five hundred upfront.” It was what I’d charged back when I was doing it regularly, and it was a familiar script. I normally gave people a quick rundown of my fees and then the rules, like no kissing, no swallowing, and how I was gone the second we were done. I did not stay and cuddle. That was not a service I offered.
I really should have explained everything so he was prepared, but his breath caught like he was nervous, and