What I Did for Love (Wynette, Texas #5)(70)

Bram shot Georgie a death glare and moved to Chaz’s side. “Let it go. You don’t have to defend yourself to anyone.”

But something seemed to have broken open inside her. She focused only on Georgie. Her lips pulled tight over her teeth and her voice became a snarl. “I wasn’t doing drugs! Never! I just wanted a place to live and some decent food.”

Georgie turned off the camera.

“No!” Chaz cried. “Turn it back on. You wanted to hear this so bad…Turn it on.”

“It’s all right. I don’t—”

“Turn it on!” Chaz said fiercely. “This is important. Make it important.”

Georgie’s hands had begun to shake, but she understood, and she did as Chaz asked.

“I was dirty and living out of a backpack.” Through the lens Georgie watched tears spill over the inky dam of Chaz’s bottom lashes. “I went a day without eating and then another day. I heard about this soup kitchen, but I couldn’t make myself go in. I was feeling crazy from not eating and it seemed better to sell my body than take charity.”

Bram tried to rub her back, but she pushed him away. “I told myself it would be just once, and I’d charge enough so I could get by until the cast came off my hand.” Her words pummeled the camera. “He was an old guy. He was going to pay me two hundred bucks. But after it was over, he pushed me out of his car instead and drove away without giving me anything. I threw up in the gutter.” Her mouth tightened with bitterness. “After that I learned to get my money first. Mostly twenty bucks, but I wasn’t using—I never used drugs—and I made them wear condoms, so I wasn’t like the other girls who were using and didn’t care about anything. I cared, and I wasn’t a whore!”

Once again, Georgie tried to shut off the camera, but Chaz was having none of it. “This is what you wanted. Don’t you dare stop now.”

“All right,” Georgie said softly.

“I hated sleeping on the street.” Muddy tears dripped down her cheeks. “And I hated trying to keep clean in public bathrooms most of all. I hated it so much I wanted to die, but killing yourself is a lot harder than you think.” She grabbed a tissue from a box on the counter. “I met this guy not too long before Christmas, and I got some pills from him. Not to get high. Pills so I could…stop everything.” She blew her nose. “I was going to save them for Christmas Eve, like this present to myself where I would take the pills, then just curl up in somebody’s doorway and fall asleep forever.”

“Oh, Chaz…” Georgie’s heart ached. Bram drew Chaz’s spine against his chest and rubbed her shoulders.

“All I had to do was wait until Christmas Eve, but I got too hungry.” She balled the tissue in her hand. “One night I saw this guy coming out of a club. He was by himself, and he looked really clean. When I went up to talk to him, he asked me how old I was. A lot of them asked that, and I would answer depending on what they wanted to hear, like sometimes I’d say fourteen or even twelve. But he didn’t seem like one of those creeps, so I told him the truth. He pulled out some money, gave it to me, and walked away. It was a hundred dollars, and I should have just said thank you, but I was sort of crazy from not eating, and I yelled that I didn’t need his charity. And when he turned to look at me, I sort of threw it at him.”

She pulled away from Bram and dropped the tissue in the trash. “He came back and picked up the money and asked how long since I’d had anything to eat. I told him I didn’t remember, and he took me into the bar and ordered hamburgers and stuff. He wouldn’t let me go wash my hands because he said I’d try to duck out the back, but I wouldn’t have. I was too hungry. I wrapped a paper napkin around the food and ate it that way, so my hands didn’t touch anything.”

She went to the sink and turned on the water. Keeping her back to them, she washed her hands. “He waited until I was done, and then he said he’d take me to this place, like this homeless shelter where they had social workers, and I told him I didn’t need any social workers, what I needed was a job in a restaurant, but even though my cast was off, I couldn’t get a job because I didn’t have an address, and I couldn’t keep myself clean.”

Georgie lowered the camera and licked her lips. “So he gave you a job himself. He invited a street kid he didn’t know into his house and gave her a job.”

Chaz spun back to face her—proud, defiant, sneering. “And he thinks he’s so smart about everything. I could have stuck a knife in him. He doesn’t understand how bad people can be. Do you see why I have to watch him so close?”

“I do,” Georgie said. “I didn’t before, but now I do.”

“I’m sure I could have held my own against a runt like you,” Bram said.

Chaz grabbed a paper towel and stalked toward Georgie, as if he hadn’t spoken. “Now that you’ve got all that in your camera, maybe you’ll leave me alone.”

“Maybe,” Georgie said. “Probably not.”

Chaz whipped around to confront Bram. “Do you see how weird she is? Now do you see?”

He slipped his hand in his pocket. “What do you want me to do about it?”

“Just—I don’t know. Just tell her she’s f*cking weird.”