“Got fifty-seven girls,” he stated immediately.

Oh God. God!

“And drugs?” I was still whispering, but it was around a clogged throat and sounded croaky.

His head jerked and he asked, “What?”

I lost it and my voice pitched high and loud when I snapped, “Do you sell drugs?”

“Fuck no,” he shot back.

I started breathing heavily.

Knight watched me do it.

Then I turned my head and looked to the window.

“Came home bleeding out the ass, from her pussy. Not sometimes, often.” I heard him say and my startled gaze cut back to him. He kept talking and I knew it was about his mother. “Face busted up, lip torn open, eyes swollen shut. I cleaned that shit up. I was six.”

Oh.

My.

God.

My body locked and Knight kept at me.

“Johns did that shit to her but not only them. Her man did too. Her pimp. He got rough and his rough was ugly. And he availed himself often. Only thing could get him to go limp was a four year old in the room. He forgot and didn’t lock the door or lock me in my room, I walked in and I did it as often as I could. Learned to pick my own lock and hers so I could get to her. See him on her. Get him to stop raping her. Be her shield. Pickin’ locks. At four.”

All my innards had seized and squeezed and the pain was excruciating.

“Knight –” I wheezed.

“I told you my life was shit Anya and it fuckin’ was. Hers was worse. Her man, worst kinda human being there is. Kept his girls in blow, in smack, in crack, anything to keep them hooked to him. That’s all he gave them and that was no fuckin’ gift. No protection. He took his cut and it was a big one, babe. He got off usin’ their bodies. He put them on the street, worked them hard. But they turned a bad trick, he didn’t do shit. Johns learn. They know. They get a bitch they can’t play with like they like ‘cause their man pays them a visit, they move on. So they knew which women to pick up. And my mother was one of them.”

I pressed my lips together and rolled them.

Knight continued.

“I had no control. My first fuckin’ memory in this life is walkin’ into my Mom’s bedroom seein’ her in bed bleeding from every orifice. Her slitted, swollen eyes came to me, she smiled a smile she had to force through pain, stupid and hopin’ she was foolin’ me, unable to move a muscle except her mouth and she whispered, “Sweetie.” Blocked out the rest. Know, after that, not once but a lot of fuckin’ times, I found that, I cleaned her up. She was so jacked, by the time I’m fuckin’ six, she’s lettin’ me.”

I swallowed the pain and hurt I felt for him, and it stuck in my gullet because it was a lot, and he kept talking.

“I had no control. None. I was a fuckin’ kid. I could do what I could do and that was all I could do. She was good to me, Anya, she loved me. Not just because I was her shield but because I was her boy. Only good thing she ever did, she told me, was make me. She thought the sun rose and set in me and she still does. But I remembered that, as good as Carl gave it to her and me, I never fuckin’ forgot that feeling of being out-of-control, livin’ shit someone forced on me, and I became a man who never has to feel that shit again.”

“Okay, honey,” I whispered but Knight wasn’t finished explaining.

“Nair is an asshole. And yeah, I took his stable and I still got it. And I’m gonna keep it, Anya. He had a girl, she worked the drags,” he moved to the chest at the wall and ran a finger down the carved, female torso, “she made that for me. Fuck, unbelievable what she could create outta a chunk of wood. An artist. A hooker. A junkie. She was Nair’s. She led me to him. He thought I was a shit-for-brains racer hooked on speed. Thought he could play me. She OD’ed. All that talent,” he jerked a finger at the torso, “vanished. The beauty she could bring into the world, lost. I let him think he could play me and I got in it to look after his girls. He was not like my mother’s man but he wasn’t about protection. He was about pussy. Usin’ it to get rich. Usin’ it to get off. Made his girls service him, one, two, twenty. And I am not joking. Twenty bitches crawlin’ all over him. Insane. Made ‘em oil up and wrestle on his fuckin’ bed so he could watch and jack off. He did not keep them clean. And it was hit or miss, depending on how lazy he was feelin’, whether he’d send someone out to deliver a message, one of his girls got worked over. I spent a lotta time coverin’ a lotta asses which pissed him off. He wanted me not lookin’ after his pussy but bein’ the face of this club. We clashed. I made moves. Got him out. Then rebuilt and grew his empire, such as it was. Girls that weren’t clean, I got them clean. Girls who didn’t wanna be in the life, I let them go. He had forty-two girls. I have more because they come to me. And they don’t got track marks or habits, I take them on. I take their backs. They take clients they wanna fuck, Rhashan and Kathleen make arrangements, they do what they want, only what they want and a man tries for more, we make certain he knows we’re not down with that and that message is delivered crystal clear. That is our reputation, I made it that way so that shit does not happen often and my girls go out safe.”

“Rhashan?” I whispered.

“Yeah and if you’re worried about your girl, don’t be. She knows. He knows I don’t like attention and asked me if he could tell her. Your girl Viv, she is far from stupid so I agreed. He told her. She grew up in the ‘hood. So did he. They both get it.”

“She didn’t tell me.”

“She did, you or anyone, his ass would be out. And that came from me.”

I felt a tremble glide through me as I asked, “So you were going to keep this from me?”

“Fuck yeah.”

My voice was high and tight when I pushed, “Why?”

“Christ, Anya, ‘cause of the way you are right now lookin’ at me,” he bit out. “I just told you how I grew up. Carl made that good for Mom and me. But I raced. You would not believe the skank pussy at races. I got even a hint of sweet, if I broke down, let them in, told them that shit about me, that sweet got sour. But not one of them, not one, Anya, was your kind of sweet. Never in my life did I expect I’d taste your kind of sweet so, yeah, fuck yeah, I was going to keep this from you to guarantee I’d keep your sweet.”

“I thought you weren’t hiding anything from me.”

“I didn’t. I didn’t lie. I didn’t adjust the man I am. I just didn’t share.”

“That’s the same thing.”

“You feel that way, nothin’ I can do.”

I held his eyes.

Then I whispered, “He said you ran drugs through the club.”

“Well, he fuckin’ lied. But, cards on the table, babe, the Russians got this territory. I made that deal so I could control that shit. It’s a fuckin’ club, my boys could have eyes in the backs of their heads and not see all the deals that went down. Four years ago, five kids got hold of bad shit and cops traced it, sold by a dealer in my club. First, I do not need that attention. Second, no fuckin’ way am I cool with people dyin’ because of shit they sourced in my club. We cracked down, we still could not stem the flow. It’s was a fuckin’ nightmare. Got to the point, I wanted to control that, I’d have to close my doors. The Russians approached me, made assurances they would not recruit buyers in my club, advertise outside the premises so anyone wanted that shit, they knew who to go to. They promised they’d see to the dealers that were workin’ my club, sweep them clean. They got no problems doin’ shit I won’t do and won’t allow my boys to do, to see that happen. They use them, I ask no questions but I get a clean club. They also promised their shit would be good shit, not laced, not bad, someone fucked up, it would not be the shit they were takin’ but them. And last, I allowed the connection in my club but any deal goes down off the premises. I give them one. One fuckin’ dealer. He does what he does but only if people come to him. I keep an eye on that. The first guy they chose, he got ambitious. I went back to the Russians. They yanked him, put another boy in. He keeps a low profile. I got control of that. It sucks. Saw my Mom hooked to that shit, do not like it anywhere near me. And the Russian mob is fuckin’ crazy. But they get me, they know my boundaries, they keep their shit on the other side and it’s the only way that works for me. I do not get a cut of that because I don’t want it. They do not sell to my girls. They do not sell to my staff. One of them approaches their dealer, they report it to me and that person is gone. The only thing I get from that is a club free of that bullshit except what I control.”

Okay, all right.

Right.

“The girls come to you?” I asked cautiously.

“Yeah, believe it or not, some bitches get off on that shit. But not all of them, Anya. Most of them get in a situation where they need money. I am not a benefactor. Life leads them to that shit, I offer administration, vetting and protection. They gotta do it, they do it safe. That profession, babe, oldest in the world and it is never gonna die. You think it’s right or wrong, life led me to my code. That business is not legal and it fuckin’ should be. Women on the streets, they got nothin’ unless they’re really fuckin’ lucky and they got a man who looks after them, keeps ‘em safe and doesn’t expect freebies. That is rare. The only one I have ever known is me.”

“So you don’t take freebies?” I whispered and his face got hard, the room filled with his vibrating heat and I again whispered, this time quickly, “You don’t take freebies.”

“Me or any of my boys. They got a taste, they pay. My girls do not give that for free. And I have never stuck my cock in one of them. Not one. They do not walk the streets. They did for Nair. They do not for me. Exclusively clients. And they do not get paid twenty dollars a blowjob. They get paid what they should for givin’ that up to some asshole who gets off gettin’ it. I get my cut for keepin’ ‘em safe and dealin’ with hassle. Our first date, babe, the first day you spent with me, had a girl, too sweet for the fuckin’ business, too weak. Took it up the ass. Twice. Two different visits from this guy. She did not want that shit. She did not get paid for that shit. I did not get paid for providin’ that shit. And he did not say he wanted that shit. First time she took him, she didn’t report it. Second time, she called Rhashan and Rhash called me. Dude got a visit. He’s no longer on the client list and it was me, personally, who broke his cheekbone and his arm so if he thinks he can go to another shop and pull that shit, he’ll think again.”