Page 20 of Sin of Love
And she says, “Don’t think that because he’s blind where you’re concerned, I am, too. I see right through this weak little victim routine.”
Without the daily funnel treatment, my throat has healed. My voice is strong, my gaze unflinching.
“I wonder what Julep would say if he knew how you’ve been treating me.”
Face twisted in rage, she surges toward me with fists clenched, but jerks to a stop several feet away. Held only by her sense of self-preservation.
“You’ll never get out of here alive,” she hisses.
“I know.” I smile. “But neither will you.”
“You fucking bitch. You were a piece of shit boss and a piece of shit friend. I can’t wait to see you in a body bag.”
Ouch.
I tilt my head, eyeing her simple attire of black pants and T-shirt. “Since you brought it up—now that your cushy assignment of working for me in L.A. is over, how long do you think it’ll be?”
She scowls. “What?”
“How long until Julep remembers he can sell you? You’re still young. Good skin. Tight body. You know as well as I do that it’s only a matter of time.”
She scoffs. “I don’t do that anymore. I’m valuable in other ways. I’ve earned my spot here—unlike you.”
I turn away so she doesn’t see my flinch. Because her words echo in my memory, eerily close to ones that left my own mouth.
Once upon a time, I came close to being her.
“We are nothing to him, Maggie, Margaret, whoever you are… We’re nothing in his world but commodities to be worked until we outlive our usefulness. Do you think old whores retire to the countryside with a fat pension? Nope. We’re shot and buried in an unmarked grave.”
I face her, meeting her gaze. “Tick tock. Time’s running out.”
She scoffs and turns for the door. “I always knew there was something mentally off about you.”
I almost laugh—I’ve merely recycled words Julep said often to me—but frown instead as something horrible occurs to me.
“You’ve been working for Julep, what, five or six years?” I don’t wait for an answer. “Have you met his brother?”
She glances back, looking genuinely confused. “What? He’s an only child.”
I shake my head. “Never mind.”
With a final glare, she exits my cell and slams the heavy door, then takes extra special care to make sure I hear her locking me inside.
Once her footsteps fade, my bravado crumbles and I sink onto my cot, shaking. I don’t cry—not because I don’t want to, but because the opiates in my blood dull that link between mind and body.
So while my mind screams in terror and weeps in sorrow, my body stares vacantly at a wall.
* * *
DAY 27
I’m weakening. She knows it.
Julep knows, too.
I feelhis triumph every time I accept a gift.
I hate them.
