I made a noise of protest, wanting the food right now, since I was still so hungry, but Coral grabbed my hand and pulled me into the bedroom. She opened the closet and started rifling through the clothes inside.
“Here,” she said. “You can put these on when you get done.”
She held up a tank top and a pair of short-shorts, both in black satin. I didn’t want to wear the clothes, since I would freeze in them, but they were clean, and she’d been so nice to me so far, so I just nodded and took them from her.
Coral jerked her thumb over her shoulder. “The bathroom’s right there. Try not to use up all the hot water, okay?”
“Thank you,” I whispered, clutching the skimpy clothes to my chest. “For everything.”
Tears stung my eyes, but I blinked them back. Coral frowned, and a shadow passed over her face, but the dark expression quickly melted into her usual sunny smile.
“No problem, kid.”
She winked at me again, then stepped back out into the main room, pulling the door to the bedroom up behind her.
I went into the bathroom, stripped off my filthy clothes, and got into the shower. I moaned at how good the hot water felt cascading over my skin, and I used up the better part of a bar of soap scrubbing myself from head to toe, along with half a bottle of shampoo washing my nasty rat’s nest of hair.
By the time I finished, I felt more like myself than I had in, well, since the night my family had been murdered. Sure, this apartment wasn’t much, not nearly as fancy as my bedroom had been, but the thought of leaving it behind and going back out onto the streets filled me with dread. Maybe Coral would be nice enough to let me stay with her for a few days. I could help her. Cook and clean and do whatever she wanted me to.
I’d do just about anything to keep from being cold and hungry and tired and scared again.
I wrapped a towel around my body and grabbed the black satin tank top and short-shorts from where I’d put them on the closed toilet lid. But instead of putting them on, I hesitated. Maybe Coral would let me stay if I didn’t use so many of her things, including her clothes. It couldn’t hurt to ask, right?
So I turned the water in the shower back on, then stopped up the tub so I could wash my clothes in it, before leaving the bathroom and going back into the bedroom. The door had swung open a crack, letting me see out into the main part of the apartment. Coral was pacing back and forth in front of the couch, holding a phone up to her ear. I stayed in the bedroom, not wanting to disturb her.
“Yeah, tell Reggie that I’ve got a live one for him,” she said. “A new girl. I haven’t seen her around before, but she can’t be more than thirteen, fourteen tops. She doesn’t seem like she’s been working, so we are talking fresh, new territory here. Know what I mean?”
She laughed, but her cheerful chuckle froze me to the bone. My breath stuck in my throat in surprise, and my damp fingers dug into the slick fabric in my hands.
“So how much will he give me for her?” Coral said, her voice as hard and brittle as her face. “I want some pills too. Double what he gave me for the last girl. Enough to last me at least a month this time.”
Fear spiked through me, sweeping away the lingering warmth of the shower. She was . . . she wanted to . . . she was going to sell me to her pimp.
The person on the other end said something, and Coral smiled.
“Good. She’s taking a shower right now, so tell him to come get her while she’s clean.” She paused, listening to the other person again. “He can be here in five minutes? Perfect. I’ll be waiting.”
I gasped. Her pimp was already on his way, and if he found me here, he’d beat me and rape me and then drug me up and make me work for him.
I had to get out of here—now.
I rushed back into the bathroom and started pulling on my clothes as fast as I could with my trembling hands. It was hard shoving the dirty layers of cloth on over my damp skin, but I managed it.
I didn’t want to think about what would happen if I didn’t.
I left the water in the bathroom running so Coral would think that I was still in the shower. I couldn’t go out through the front of the apartment, not with her waiting for me out there, so I stepped around the bed and hurried over to the window.
Cardboard held up with duct tape covered the space, but I tore at the tape with my fingernails, ripping it and the heavy sheet of paper away from the frame and throwing them down. I stuck my head out through the open space, my heart lifting at the sight of the rusty fire escape clinging to the side of the building.
The door at the front of the apartment screeched open, and the murmur of voices sounded—Coral’s, along with a much lower, deeper tone. Her pimp was already here.
More panic rippled through me, and I hoisted my leg out the window, ready to step out onto the fire escape. I glanced down and saw a man strolling around the side of the building, smoking a cigarette. I froze, half in and half out the window. I didn’t know if the guy worked for Coral’s pimp, but I couldn’t risk him seeing me.
I was out of time and other options, so I ducked back into the apartment, hurried over to the closet in the corner, threw open the door, and crammed myself inside. The door wouldn’t shut all the way, not with me and all the clothes and shoes stuffed inside, so I held on to the knob, peered out the crack, and concentrated on being as quiet as possible.
“Hey, kid,” Coral called out, stepping into the bedroom. “I’ve got someone I want you to meet—”
Silence.
“Dammit!” she snarled.
Footsteps snapped against the floor, and I got a flash of her running across the tiny room before she was out of my line of sight.
“Dammit!” Coral snarled again. “She must have gone out through the window. That sly little bitch. Eating my food without paying for it.”
Silence. Then another voice spoke, that same low, deep murmur I’d heard earlier.
“So what you’re saying is that you called me over here for nothing?”
I assumed the voice belonged to Reggie, her pimp. His tone was stone-cold. He wasn’t happy with Coral—not at all.
“I’m sure I can find her again,” Coral said. “A girl like her? She’ll never make it on the streets. Hell, she’ll probably come back here in a few days, begging me to take her in.”
She laughed again, but the sound was tinged with desperation.
“I told you before that this was your last chance, Coral,” Reggie rumbled. “You promised to find me a new girl to cover your debts for all those pills I gave you.”