Total pages in book: 95
Estimated words: 89090 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 445(@200wpm)___ 356(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 89090 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 445(@200wpm)___ 356(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
There is a heap of room to maneuver past Vasily, but since I’d rather ruin his night, I shoulder-barge him before inconspicuously slipping my hand into his pocket to remove his wallet without permission.
Good luck paying for a prostitute without money, fuckface.
As Vasily grumbles a cuss word under his breath, I head down the packed street while removing the cash from his wallet. He has only a couple hundred, but the peddlers begging for food outside restaurants that charge an arm and a leg for half a plate of food gleam with joy when I hand it to them.
It’ll feed them for a month.
Once I’ve distributed the bills hiding Polina’s picture nestled between them, I place her photograph in my pocket, then dump Vas’s wallet in a trash can. I don’t hide it under a day’s worth of trash. If someone stumbles onto it while searching through the rubbish for food, they’ve earned the right to use his credit cards.
As I enter Spanks, I’m spotted by an overexuberant blond. He greets me with a head flick before demanding me to his side with a furled finger. His nail polish sparkles in the mood lighting above his head.
“First time?” he asks when I join him by the bar.
“Supposedly not...”—I dig out the bank statement that shows my account is in arrears—“according to this.”
“Oh no.” He snatches up the paper. I have no clue how his nails don’t hack it to pieces. “Did the missus find out? We do have a discreet method. It should have been offered. Oh, look…” He drags a nail under the three-thousand-dollar charge. “You used it. We don’t sell timeshares.”
I’m completely fucking lost, so I blurt out, “I’ve never been here before, so I don’t give a fuck how well you hide it. The charge is wrong.”
“It can’t be.”
“It is.” His eyes snap to mine. Now that I have his attention, I ask, “Do I look like a guy who needs to pay?”
“Well…” He adjusts the collar on my shirt, then pats my chest like Polina did Vasily only minutes ago. “No. But there must be an explanation. Did you loan your phone to a friend?”
“No.” I’d need to have friends to be able to loan them stuff. The people in my apartment every night aren’t there for friendships. They’re to drown out the silence slowly killing me. “Do you have surveillance? It will prove I didn’t make that transaction.”
“Yeah, but I can’t give you access to that. Not unless I want my nuts cut out with a blunt knife instead of a surgeon’s scalpel.”
Once again, I am totally fucking lost, but before I can announce it, the bell above the door chimes, and the blond’s face lights up like a Christmas tree.
When I crank my neck back, interested to see who has captured his attention, my jaw tics. Vasily is standing in the doorway of Spanks. His expression is busted until he misconstrues my visit. Then he looks downright smug.
He moseys in like he owns the place as the guy at the bar asks, “The usual?”
I wait in anticipation for his hunt for his wallet to come up empty but am left disappointed when he pulls out his sleek black cell phone. It is identical to the one that burned a hole in my bank balance last week. One swipe of it over a modified tablet the blond is holding out gains him instant access to Spanks.
“Head straight to your room. Make yourself comfortable until Tatiana arrives. She’s finishing her set.”
Vasily jerks up his chin in response to the blond’s offer before he barges past me in the same manner I used on him in the street.
I grin when I realize how weak his hit is. For a man with wide shoulders and a bucketload of arrogance, his shove is the equivalent of a mosquito landing on my arm.
Spotting our exchange, the blond waits until Vasily is out of earshot before asking, “Bad blood?”
“More like stale.”
He eyes me curiously. “What was the date of your transaction again?” He finds the answer himself by dropping his eyes to the sheet of paper in my hand. As he twists his red-painted lips, he strays them in the direction Vasily just went. “Same time every week. His order never alters.” While pretending he’s spinning to speak to the bartender, he twists the tablet’s screen my way. It shows Vasily’s bill. It is the exact amount I was charged last week.
Once he’s certain I’ve gotten the point, he focuses his attention back to me. “So what will it be? A hundred-dollar bar credit or a private dance”—he air quotes his last word—“with one of our performers?”
This is fucking shit to admit, but I can’t even charge ten dollars to my card. It is overdrawn, and I only have a handful of bills in my wallet.