Exposed (Madame X, #2)(4)

“That’s precisely what I’m supposed to do. Tell you to clean up your language. Tell you to keep your stupid, dirty boots off other people’s furniture when you’re in their home. And yes, I’m supposed to smooth out your edges, teach you how to behave in polite society as if you have a single well-mannered bone in your entire uncouth, barbaric body.” I let out a breath, rub the bridge of my nose. “But, honestly, Clint, I don’t see the point. You are probably irredeemable.”

“What the f*ck is that supposed to mean?”

“It means you are a grotesque barbarian with no manners whatsoever. It means that you have no charm. No poise. It means, furthermore, that I don’t really believe you even have the potential to learn any of that. It means, Clint, that you are a waste of my time.”

“Well Jesus, you’re a real bitch, you know that?” They stand up, brown eyes blazing with hate. “Fuck you. I don’t have to take this from you.”

“Indeed you do not.” I gesture at the door. “How does that phrase go? Oh yes: don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”

They leave, and I am relieved.

I really don’t know how much longer I can do this.

Pretend that what I do is “work.” That it holds any value. That I like it. That it means anything whatsoever. To me, to the clients, to Caleb. To anyone. It’s just . . . emptiness. Time wasted. A game. All of us playing pretend.

I can’t do it anymore.

I am suddenly overwhelmed, overcome. Anxious. Restless.

Angry.

I have this feeling inside me that defies description. A yawning chasm, a metaphysical hunger. A need to go somewhere, to do something, but I don’t know where, or what. A need for an intangible something. The need borders on panic, a feeling that if I don’t leave this condo, leave this building right now I might explode, might devolve into arm-flapping, screaming, gibbering insanity.

I stand up suddenly, try to force a measure of calm into myself by smoothing my white Valentino Crepe Couture dress over my hips. Wiggle my foot in my lavender Manolo Blahnik sandals. As if such physical gestures could soothe the disquiet within me.

I’m in the elevator, suddenly, and the ding of the car arriving drags with it a host of memories. I have the key now. Or a copy of it, at least. I can insert the key myself, turn it to whichever floor I want. The doors slide open and I’m shaking as I step into the elevator car. Fighting hyperventilation.

I need to go.

I need out.

I need to breathe.

I cannot.

Cannot.

I clench my fists and squeeze my eyes shut and stand in the center of the elevator and force my lungs to expand and contract. Compel my hand to extend and my fingers to fit the key to the slot, compel my fingers to twist the key. I don’t pay attention to which floor I have chosen. It doesn’t matter. Anywhere but here.

Ground floor. The lobby. Hushed conversation between a man in a suit and a woman behind a massive marble desk. The lobby is an expanse of black marble, three-foot-by-three-foot tiles veined with gold streaks. Soaring ceilings, easily fifty feet high. Thirty-foot-tall cypress trees rooted under the floor itself lining the walls on either side of the lobby. It is a space designed to intimidate. The reception desk is a continent unto itself, the receptionists on pedestals behind it, literally looking down at visitors. It reminds me of a judge’s podium from centuries past, when the judge literally sat several feet above you, thus engendering the phrase “to look down upon” someone in arrogance.

My heels click-clack-click-clack across the floor, each step echoing like the report of a rifle. Stares follow me. Eyes watch me.

I am beautiful.

I look expensive.

Because I am.

I did not know this, before.

Before I made the naked journey from my condo prison up to the penthouse, thus making a choice for my life.

After that, I began learning.

That my beloved crimson Jimmy Choo stilettos cost two thousand dollars. That my Valentino dress, the one I have on right now, cost nearly three thousand dollars. That each article of clothing I own, down to my underwear, is the most expensive of its kind there could be.

I discovered this, and didn’t know what to do with the knowledge. I still don’t. I didn’t pay for them. I didn’t choose them.

I allow my thoughts to wander as I cross the vast lobby, forcing myself to walk as if I am confident, arrogant. I let my hips sway and keep my shoulders back and my chin high. Focus my gaze on the revolving doors miles and miles in the distance, across acres of black marble. Acknowledge none of the stares. In the center of the lobby there are twelve large black leather couches arranged in a wide square, three couches to a side, each separated by small tables. People wait and converse and perhaps do business deals, and they all watch me cross the lobby. Surreptitiously, I count them. Fourteen.

Fourteen people watch me cross the lobby, as if I am utterly unexpected, a rare sighting.

A leopard stalking down Fifth Avenue, perhaps.

I try to capture that essence, pretend that I am a predator rather than prey.

It gets me through the revolving glass doors and outside. It is late August, hot, the air thick. The sun bright, beating down on me from between skyscrapers. The noise of Manhattan assaults me in a physical wave: sirens, a police car zipping past me, howling. An ambulance in pursuit. A garbage truck groaning around a corner, engine grumbling. Dozens of motors revving as the light turns green twenty feet to my right.