“Desirée. What’s yours?” He didn’t answer.
Desirée was her street name, the name she donned along with the clothes; it made it easier to be who she had to be, to do what she had to do. She was wearing her Friday night outfit: a slinky gray top, worn off one shoulder; black spaghetti-strap bra peeking out from underneath; spiky red heels; fishnet thigh-highs; and a denim skirt so short it left an inch of toffee-colored skin exposed above the tops of the fishnets. Both stockings were torn—the front of the left thigh, the back of the right knee. She had two pairs of new ones in her dresser, but she’d noticed that she turned more heads—turned more tricks—looking like this. Men liked the ripped stockings; they seemed to get turned on by the idea that she’d been pawed or manhandled by other guys already. Made the sex seem dirtier; kinkier, she guessed.
Still standing on the curb, Desirée leaned down, forearms on the windowsill, giving the guy a good view of the lacy bra and the pale brown breasts. It was dark inside the car—a blue car with tinted windows—and the driver was wearing mirrored shades, so his eyes were hidden. But from the small reflections of herself dead center in the lenses, she could tell that he was eyeing her, or at least part of her. After she’d given him a long eyeful, she purred, “So, baby, you just lookin’, or you want a date?”
“How much?” His voice all cool, like he didn’t really care if he got any or not.
“Twenty if all you want’s a quick hand job. Forty for oral. A hundred for a full-on, un-for-get-able ride.”
He looked away briefly, then back at her, his fingers drumming the steering wheel in time to the music. “I’ll give you fifty.”
“Aww, don’t lowball me, baby,” she cooed. “Let me show you what I am talkin’ about.” She straightened, turned her back to the car, and planted the high heels wide, then slowly folded forward and put her hands on her knees, shimmying her legs and causing the skirt to creep up her thighs and buttocks. It was a trick she’d learned when she was dancing at the Mouse’s Ear, the strip bar in West Knoxville where the suburban guys with money went when their wives were away or their big-spender customers were in town. Once the skirt was riding high and she knew he had a good view of her thong and her business, she began to undulate, rotating her head and her hips in opposite directions. Her hair radiated from her head in shimmering golden spokes—an ironic, hypnotic halo, one befitting a fallen saint seeking a paying partner in sin. Stopping mid-sway, she arched her back and blew a pouty kiss over her shoulder into the cavelike interior of the car. “Best hundred you will ever spend, lover boy.”
“You remind me of somebody special,” he said.
“I am somebody special.”
“A girl in San Diego. My first time. A night I’ll always remember.” Desirée felt her hopes rising. “So I’ll go sixty,” he added.
She breathed a quiet sigh and clambered into the Mustang, the skirt still riding up as she settled into the low bucket seat. “Two blocks up, on the right, there’s the Magnolia Inn. Go around back and pull in behind the Dumpster.”
He turned toward her and shook his head. “No way, sister. I am not doing it behind a Dumpster in back of some hot-sheet motel.”
“It’s not about the Dumpster, baby,” she cajoled. “It’s nice and quiet back there. Dark. Private. Five minutes from now you will be in heaven.”
“Forget it.” The car wasn’t moving. A bad sign.
She needed the sixty. Really, really needed the sixty, and if she didn’t have it by midnight, she’d be headed down the rabbit hole of withdrawal. She tucked her hands under her thighs so he wouldn’t see that she already had the shakes. “You wanna get a room, honey?” Trying to keep the desperation out of her voice. “That’s cool. I’ve got a deal there. Twenty bucks for an hour. King-size bed. Clean sheets. I can do a lot more for you on a nice big bed.”
He shook his head. “Naw. I got someplace better. Five minutes from here. No cops, no drunks, nobody. Just me and you. I got some pot, if you want to get high. Got some blow, too, if you’re into that.”
She felt a tingle of excitement mixed with relief. Sixty bucks plus a ride on the white horse? That was as good as a hundred in cash. Nearly, anyway. “Customer’s always right,” she said. “I need payment up front, though.”
He laughed. “So you can snort the coke, snatch the dough, and run for it? Nice try, darlin’.”