Page 2 of Games We Play
“No strippers.” The man motioned for Leah to follow him. “Don’t worry, ladies, we’ll have her back within the hour.”
“The hour! Wow! What did I pay for?” Melissa subsequently ordered another drink. She promised, as Leah wandered off with the sunglassed man, that it would be her final one of the night. Somehow, Leah didn’t believe her.
“What’s this about?” That was the first thing Leah asked when she entered the quieter back hallways of the club. A bouncer nodded in acknowledgment, but said nothing when Leah and her escort walked by.
He snorted. “Like you don’t know.”
“I really don’t.”
The man stopped. Leah bumped into him, but she was the only one reacting to the sudden collision.
“I don’t like coy games,” he said. “I want people to do their jobs and get on with life. I don’t ask questions.”
It was only then that Leah truly felt the strangeness of the situation. Was this a birthday surprise? Or a case of mistaken identity?
Or worse?Holy shit, wasn’t there that huge human trafficking scandal last year?Where did it originate? Nightclubs like this one? Was Leah about to be whisked to the back of a truck, never to be heard from again? She heard so many horror stories about the I5 corridor!
“What’s that look for?” The man opened a door at the end of the hall and waited for Leah to go in. “You girls get stranger by the day.”
Leah expected him to come into the room with her. Instead, he closed it behind her.
“H… hey!” She was sobered up now. “What’s this about?”
“Would you wait? Jesus.”
Leah backed away from the door. The room… was it another VIP room? An office? Storage area? Because all she saw was a small table and a chair on the other side. Hardly comfortable, let alone for entertaining someone.
She pulled out her phone and texted her friends about it, but nobody replied. They were too busy partying.
Guess I might as well sit down and wait.She had her personal safety app up and ready to go should someone come barging in, intent on hurting her.
This was either going to be the best birthday ever… or the worst.
***
Sloan stared through the two-way mirror, sucking in her cheeks and considering calling the whole thing off.
“Way to go off script,” she muttered. The woman in front of her wasn’t the one she hired. She barely looked like the girl from the Portland escort agency.Last time I ever use them again. Talk about catfishing me.This was the problem with not meeting the women she hired before she hit the city’s pavement. Sometimes she got a completely different person than the one she supposedly hired – because this was not the first time this had happened.
The woman she met was supposedly named Mandy.Not her real name, and I don’t care.“Mandy” was shown in a strapless pink dress and sporting bouncy brown curls that played with her deep and generous cleavage. This woman in the other room wore a pink strapless dress and had brown hair, but she wasnot“tiny in all ways but up top,” as her online profile described her. Sloan had barely paid attention to it when she waved her finger over the first picture that somewhat pleased her. Now she wished she had.
Not that the woman was displeasing to look at – she simply wasn’t Sloan’stype.She liked her women ready to hit the runway as soon as they were done getting their bikini waxes. “Mandy” over there looked like she hadn’t showered in a day.This fucking city.God, did Sloan hate Portland. Worst town for doing business in, yet here she was, attempting to blow off some steam after a stressful week by doing what she loved most.
“Everything good, boss?”
She turned to her temporary bodyguard. “I suppose,” Sloan said with a sigh. “I’ll let you know when I’m ready to leave. Leave us be until then.”
“Sure thing.” He spared her one last look before ambling down the hallway. Sloan knew he would only be a shout away. That was a bodyguard’s job, after all. Shadow, but never be seen.
I should go back to my hotel room.Treat herself to some sexting with her favorite girl in LA.Why did she have to go and get married?Sloan would have personally flown the woman up to Portland to spend the night with her. Instead, the most she was allowed anymore was sexting and phone sex. Droll.
She checked the state of her hair in the mirror. If she was going to do this, she might as well look good. No sense sending this woman back to her agency with tales of a slovenly billionaire whose wig couldn’t sit straight on her head.
Sloan was blond tonight. She always liked meeting new women while blond. They remembered her better that way. Well, that and she was one of the only female clients they worked with. And she tipped well.Verywell.
She might as well get this over with. Who knew? It might be the best dalliance she ever experienced in the rose city.Doubt it. Then again, the bar is so low…
The woman looked up from her phone when Sloan entered the room. Their eyes met, briefly, before Sloan tossed her coat and bag onto the end of the table and turned around long enough to close the curtains over the two-way mirror. She liked to keep her roleplaying private, if she couldn’t use her hotel room. Sometimes it was more fun to meet a woman in a nondescript location and conclude their business there.
