Page 1 of The Kingpin's Call Girl

Chapter One

EDIE

New York breeds plenty of predators in designer suits, but the men in this hotel bar are something else entirely. They’re sleek. Hard. Dangerous.

Steel and diamonds instead of flesh and bone.

And worlds away from the college boys I’m used to being around.

Even their hands seem bigger and rougher.More. When guys come up to the bar, I try not to focus too hard on their hands or think about them touching me.

Bender promised me it wouldn’t go that far, but I’m not stupid. I’m not in the safe, regular world anymore. This is a luxury hotel run by the Albanian mob, heavy with old money, dripping with chandeliers, a place that is so far beyond the orbit of my life, I might as well be on Mars.

It’s 10:07 p.m. on a Saturday night...10:08 p.m. on a Saturday night.

I need to stop looking down at my phone; I really, really do.

I’m trying desperately not to drink all of my gin and tonic in one gulp, but it’s hard because I’m hyper-conscious of my dress,which is fire-engine red. The back goes down to my butt crack, and don’t get me started on the plunging front.

I feel exposed to every eye in the room. I guess that’s the point.

Is this how my sister felt?

FeelsI correct myself. How my sisterfeels.

Because I know she’s not dead—she can’t be. She can’t get to a phone, that’s all. Or maybe she’s on some kind of whirlwind trip where she’s partying so hard she lost track of what day it is. What week it is.

I close my eyes and say a little prayer that that’s what happened.

There’s a thin plastic rain poncho rolled up in my purse. This will be over in three hours and twelve minutes, and then I’ll put the poncho over my dress and walk out of here and give my report to Bender. I’ll go home and scrub off my makeup and wear pajama pants for the next ten years.

A notification flashes across my phone, a faint beacon from my other life—myreallife. My roomie, Odetta, likes a post of mine.

It feels like a world ago.

I take a breath. I’ve stood here too long.

It’s okay to stay mysterious,Bender said,but as soon as you get centered, take a fucking breath, turn around, and smile at him.

Thehimin this case is “Iron Jaw” Dardan, a low-level mobster and member of the Ghost Hound Clan. Bender told me that Albanians call themselves clans instead of mobs or gangs or mafia families.

In addition to having a thing for women in sexy red dresses, Iron Jaw Dardan has cold eyes and a belly like a beachball, and he’s old enough to be my father.

You don’t have to fuck him; you just have to sit with his group and listen to their conversation.

I’m supposed to remember names, places, and dates. Easy enough for a history major.

I take another sip, letting the alcohol burn. Bender gave methirty dollars to spend, and it barely covered this drink, plus a tip. It seems like an outrageous waste, considering I had to sell my dining hall punch card just to buy books.

Just get the invitation to sit,I remind myself. Sit and listen. Bender has promised to drop the charges against me and help me find my sister if I complete this one simple assignment.

He gave me a picture of a woman who has a major 1970s hairdo the stylist called a “Farrah Fawcett” to bring to the beauty salon. Apparently, Bender has been studying the tastes of this guy named Dardan, the one most likely to bring me to the table.

I rip a tiny corner off the napkin and then another and another. I can name all eighty-three Roman emperors and every pope from Saint Peter to the Reformation, but fooling a bunch of hardened criminals? I don’t see how I can pull that one off.

I take another sip and try to channel my anger instead of my fear. Criminals are just stupid brutes who can’t get ahead the right way, so they take the wrong path, that’s all.

For a second I imagine my sister, Mary, laughing at me for that kind of explanation. Mary is obsessed with criminals. It’s how she got sucked into the life she’s leading now. Growing up, Mary was always the one who cared for me and protected me, especially after Dad left. I didn’t realize until way too late that she needed me to protect her.

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