Taking Turns (Turning #1)(10)

I’m not going. Not yet. But I would like to go upstairs and check out Rochelle’s apartment real fast before Smith gets back. I don’t think Quin looked around too much. I think he was in shock. And if Rochelle left anything behind I need to know about, I’d like to find it before he does.

A few minutes later I’m standing in the living room. The decor has a Bohemian flair. Crushed velvet couch, soft yellow in color. Too many pillows to count. Long, heavy drapes in the darkest purple you can imagine. The coffee table is a clunky thing. The kitchen is neat and tidy. It has a French-country feel to it. Distressed yellow cabinets and butcher-block counters.

The four-poster takes up most of the bedroom. It’s massive and Rochelle has long draperies hanging from the canopy at each corner.

I spy the new girl’s clothes on a chair and decide Smith had no choice but to dress her up. Jeans. Shearling boots. She couldn’t have come up through the front, which means Rochelle sneaked her in the back. Hid her.

And the woman went along. I guess that’s the part that troubles me the most. Why the hell did she go along with this? Why did she let Quin f*ck her? Did Rochelle tell her about our arrangement? Did she set us up with a new girl? So we’d forget all about her and leave her alone? Did she think we wouldn’t leave her alone?

The last question bothers me. Why would she go through all this when she knows we’d never follow her? We’d never look. It’s part of the rules. And yeah, we bent some of the rules. But leaving is sacred. If a girl wants out, she leaves. No discussion is required, or wanted, if I’m being honest.

I spend another five minutes checking for a message. An envelope with our names on it or something that might give me a clue as to what just happened. And more importantly, why?

It’s not like I really care that she’s gone. I’m not attached to her. I like her. She played the game well enough for me. But why bring that woman into it?

Rochelle has to have talked. Has to have told her what to expect once Quin came up here. Has to have explained our arrangement.

Which begs another question. Who the f*ck is that woman? And more importantly, what does she want? Will she try to blackmail us?

I shake my head. Conspiracy theories abound. But I’m not really a conspiracy theory kind of guy. So I let it go. I leave, go back down to Smith’s room. Sit at his table. And wait.

A good thirty minutes later he walks back in. The lobby has cleared out by now. Everyone has gone either home or downstairs.

Smith shrugs off his coat, looks up at me as he’s relieved of it. And then he’s passing the sentries as they hold open the black velvet rope and walking up the stairs.

“Well?” I say, when he enters the bar and takes a seat across from me where Quin was sitting. I’m in his chair and I know that pisses him off. But it has the best view. “What happened?”

“I really wanted to f*ck her in the car.” He says this while he fills the snifter the bartender has placed in front of him and takes a drink.

“Why?” I ask. Trying to think it through rationally.

He shrugs. “She’s dirty, I can tell. I played with her * in the closet and she got wet. She sucked my finger like it was a cock.” He shrugs again. “She’s new and shiny. And it’s been a while since I had a f*ck. So it crossed my mind. Are you going downstairs?”

“Are you going downstairs?” I ask, cocking an eyebrow.

“If you’re gonna play, I’m not staying behind. Are you gonna play?” He takes a long sip of his brandy, his heavy-lidded eyes trained on mine.

“Probably,” I say.

“Well, then,” he says, standing up. “Let’s go.”

I follow him out of the bar, then downstairs. We wait at the back-lobby elevator. “Did you get her name?” I ask.

“Nope,” he says.

I nod as the elevator doors open.

We step inside and descend.





Chapter Four - Chella




I met Rochelle Bastille about six months ago. I say about, because I’m not really sure when she first appeared in my life. The only thing I know for certain is that I first noticed her last July while I was at Buskerfest at Union Station. She was one of the street performers. A strikingly beautiful girl, but not in any of the classical ways that I often notice.

She was like a throwback from the Sixties. Long, straight, dirty-blonde hair with flowers weaved through braids on either side of her head that ended up as a chain of daisies.

She was singing. A church song I sang when I was a little girl. She strummed a guitar and even though Buskerfest is nothing if not wild, it was like she had a little sphere of silence surrounding her performance area.

That was the first time I noticed her.

The first time I met her was in a second-hand book and vinyl store half a block down from the art gallery I manage on the 16th Street Mall. It was about two weeks later, maybe. I was looking for a gift for my father’s sixtieth birthday. He’s a man who has everything and needs nothing. People like him require very thoughtful gifts or no gift at all.

I have tried the no-gift approach and didn’t find it quite got me where I wanted to be with him. So this year I made a commitment to find him something meaningful. Something he’d notice. Something that would show him that I cared. Remind him that I was still interested in his opinion.