Page 31 of The Kingpin's Call Girl

I let the uncomfortable silence expand beyond what normal people can tolerate, daring him to say Sara’s name. I know that’s what he’s thinking.

It’s not like you to get hooked up with someone since Sara.

Not like you to care about who you fuck since Sara.

Not like you to differentiate one pussy from the next since what you did to Sara.

But he stays quiet. He concentrates on his ring, turning it on his finger.

The ring is a family heirloom that he managed to keep through our mercenary years, from bloody battles in sweltering alleyways to snowy hellscapes. I’m supposed to take it off him if he dies. He’s supposed to take my St. Michael medallion.

He twists it again. Old rings like his usually contain family relics or clan relics—hair or bone or bits of burial shroud from The First, a mafia king who lived four centuries ago. Orton will never say what’s in it. More superstitions.

The pseudo-uncomfortable silence stretches on. Orton can tolerate as much discomfort as I can.

“Right, okay,” Orton finally says.

I grab my coat. I’ll be the judge of what’s like me or not.

Chapter Ten

EDIE

I sneak into the suite I share with Odetta, clutching my rain poncho around me.

Odetta’s sleeping—no surprise there, being that it’s four in the morning on a Tuesday. In a few hours, normal students will be getting up and going to Butler Library to study, grabbing coffee and pastries at the Hungarian Pastry Shop, or hitting the fitness center for an early workout.

And here I am, just getting in.

Quietly as I can, I pull off the plastic rain poncho and strip off the ruined red dress, shoving it into the bottom of my dirty clothes bag like evidence from a crime scene. I stuff my clutch full of money under my pillow and take a shower that does nothing to wash away the electricity of Luka’s touch still pulsing through me.

My body still vibrates with his fingers, his mouth, the intoxicating weight of him pressing me down.

I towel dry my hair, throw on a faded sweatshirt, and sit cross-legged on my bed. With trembling fingers, I pull out the money and count it under the glow of my desk lamp.

Thirty thousand.

My mind spins with what to do with it—lodging, classes,credit card, food. My debt has been spiraling out of control, but with this huge windfall, things can turn around.

It seems illegal to have this much cash. Only criminals would have this much.

But Iama criminal—a criminal on a leash, and the other end is held by Luka Zogaj.

I google him, trying to get his history, or just any kind of information. There’s nothing much but names and addresses of a lot of Zogajes. There is, however, a Zogaj family associated with the Albanian mafia clan known as the Ghost Hound Clan in a list on Wikipedia.

Ghost Hound Clan. What the fuck.

I peer over at Odetta, still sleeping. Whatever happens, I have to keep her safe from all of this.

I divide the money into four small stacks. I wish I had some sort of a professional hiding place like in the movies—a dresser drawer with a false back or a puzzle box or something. I settle for stuffing it all into a sock and shoving it into the back of my underwear drawer.

What if he finds out I’m a college student? Will that look strange? Or maybe not. College is expensive.

I don’t want the ice cream I promised myself anymore, so I try to sleep, but I’m too jacked.

I tiptoe to the bathroom, fill a glass of water, and stare down at 113th Street. Nine stories below, blue Columbia banners flap from the row of streetlamps illuminating empty streets, parked cars, and shuttered shops. It’s always bright here in Manhattan, unlike back home in the suburbs of Hartford, where night was actually night.

This is my fourth year here and my third rooming with Odetta. Odetta’s in the history department, too—early Roman Empire—but she wants to do law.

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