Willing Captive(31)

I scoff, “Yeah, right, you freakin’ harlot.”

Boo laughs. I cringe and whimper, “Oh God. You’re actually enjoying this.”

When she stops, she asks, “Your sister never tried this?”

Fisting the sheets, I reply through gritted teeth, “Oh, she tried. I karate chopped her ass.”

She says, “I don’t get it.” I open my eyes to find her looking down at me, “The whole you don’t have friends thing. You’re pretty cool, Deedee.”

Taking a deep breath and closing my eyes, I explain, “Well, Dad was always overprotective. Then it got worse. We weren’t allowed to go anywhere without him or Mom. I never really understood it.” Till now, I think.

“I mean, what’s the worst that could happen from me going to a sleepover?” I sigh, “Eventually, the little friends I had stopped asking me to come over and drifted away from me. My sister was always there for me, though. She had this way about her. I guess she still does. She’s always been popular, so no one questioned why she wasn’t coming out to parties and stuff. She’d just pass it off with ‘I’ve got a better offer’ or ‘Nah, it’s not really my thing’. Well, Terah got sick of Dad’s rules and started sneaking out and I- I didn’t. I’d stay at home with my book boyfriends and that was fine by me. Ow! Stop that!”

Plucking another stray hair, she pulls back and says, “Done.”

Standing, I walk over to the mirror and check my newly shaped eyebrows.

Not bad. Not bad at all.

I look back at her through the mirror and state, “So much pain for this? It doesn’t even look like you plucked anything.”

Lying back on the bed, she says, “Oh, it’s noticeable, alright. You’re lucky. You’ve been blessed with a great shape. You should see mine when I don’t pluck.” She lifts her head and looks at my reflection in the mirror. “Scary. I’d have a unibrow in the shape of the McDonald’s m.”

Turning around, I lean back on the dresser and ask, “Why do you even bother? You work with men, and I’m sure they don’t care that you pluck.”

She smiles slyly and bats her lashes, “Oh, but my man would.”

Eeek! Her man! Swoon.

Bouncing over to the bed wearing an annoyingly cheeky smile, I ask in a sing-song voice, “Oh, yeah? Who is he?”

Her answer shocks me so much my mouth gapes. “Rock.”

Leaning forward, I whisper-hiss, “No way!”

Chuckling, she replies, “Way, baby.”

My mouth hangs open and she laughs. I sputter, “B- b- but you guys act like you don’t even like each other.”

Nodding, she smiles sadly, “Technically, we aren’t allowed to see each other. It’s...” She actually lifts her hands and does slow quotation mark actions with her fingers, “…fraternizing. Nox knows, but he said he can’t really do anything about it unless it affects our work, which I would never let happen anyways. And what with Rock and Nox being best friends, I think Nox is actually happy to see that Rock’s got something good in this life.”

Confused by that last statement, I ask quietly, “What do you mean in this life?

Boo searches my face a while. She looks unsure before answering me quietly, “Babe, we don’t exist.”

Confused even more now, my brow furrows as I ask, “Come again?”

She lies back down with her arms resting behind her head. Looking up at the ceiling, she explains, “This thing - what we do - protection and elimination. We don’t work for anyone. We work for ourselves. I guess you could call it a made-up business. We all have titles within our sector, but the sector doesn’t actually exist. We’re all privately employed and we get paid a lot to do what we do. The condition of being employed this way is to be unseen, and our circle to be impenetrable. So everyone you’ve met here, they don’t have any form of real identification. Every document, ID card, and bank account we have is under a false name.” Turning her head to face me, she finishes with, “We don’t exist.”

Holy shit, that’s insane.

Staring right back at her, I surmise, “So everyone I’ve met here is going under a fake name?”

She nods and I ask, “What happened to who you were? You know, who you used to be?”

Smiling a sad smile, she responds quietly, “She died, babe. We all did.”

My heart squeezes as I whisper, “Well, that sucks.”

Boo turns to her side and we look at each other for a moment. We’re having a silent conversation.

My mouth droops and I frown slightly. I’m sorry, boo. That really does suck.

She shrugs slightly and winks. It’s okay. I’m okay with it.

Playing with my fingertips, I blurt out, “Constance? You chose the name Constance?”

She bursts into laughter and I do, too. We laugh together a short while before her face softens and she replies quietly, “It was my mom’s name. My way of never forgetting her. She was a Connie so it never felt right calling myself that. One day, Rock told me I was quiet as a ghost so he nicknamed me Boo, and I’ve been Boo ever since.” Suddenly sobering, she asks, “Do you have a boyfriend?”

Shaking my head, I tell her, “Not unless he’s the fictional kind. It’s just me and my books.”