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out of the hotel room, away from the scene of my crime. I took her up to the pool and we talked. Or didn’t talk, because she was still pretty mad. I wanted to fuck her. I wanted to kiss her. That was the first day I saw Simon’s abuse on her, his marks. His bruises. There was a bruise on her collarbone, and another one near her temple that she’d covered with makeup. I slapped her face sometimes because it got me off, but I never slapped her hard enough to bruise her.
    Imagine me there, wanting to blow a fucking gasket at this bruise on her face, knowing full well I’d just stranger-raped the shit out of her. I was glad I was in the water. I needed it to calm me. We both needed peace. I knew how to give her peace. I took her back to the room and did the same brutal shit I’d done to her when I raped her, only this time she knew it was me, and I got her off even harder than I’d gotten her off at the Park Hyatt. I made her come and come and come.
    I had to. I wanted to see her again.
    I wanted to keep exploring this heightened intensity between us. I had no idea then where I’d end up, alone in my place on Bleecker, with a pair of hunting binoculars clutched in my sweaty hands, trained on her window across the street.
    Stalking is fucking exhausting, because you can only know so much. Even private investigators can only learn so much. I knew about her classwork, I knew about her grades, I knew about her friends. I knew her habits, I knew her moods, or at least the moods she carried on her face. I knew when she met with her former pimp Henry at the Big Apple Diner, but I didn’t know why.
    They’d had a fight, her and her gay friend Andrew, just after she met with Henry. All I could think about was the resurrection of Miss Kitty, and Chere going back to escorting for Sublime Services. Why else would she have met with Henry? Why would she fight with her friend, when they’d gotten along so well for so many weeks?
    Why was she pensive and anxious when she ought to be looking forward to her final semester, and graduation?
    I thought about befriending Andrew and offering him money in exchange for information. He had access. He could have told me everything, told me what they fought about, what was going on with her, but it was too risky, so I was reduced to calling Henry myself. After all this time, I still carried his card in my wallet, because Henry was my one and only personal connection to Chere.
    He answered on the second ring. “Sublime Services. How may I help you?”
    Such a cultured greeting. He’d always run a classy show, even if he was a pimp who’d bled more money out of me than any decent person would. “Henry, it’s Price Eriksen.”
    There was a pause, maybe the softest sigh. “Mr. Eriksen. This is a surprise.”
    “I’m not calling to make a date.”
    “Oh. Just calling to chat, then?”
    “I need to know if she still works for you,” I said. “If she’s going back to work for you.”
    Again, the pause, because he had all the power here. “You mean Chere, I assume?” he said after a moment.
    “Yes, Chere. Is she coming back to work at Sublime?”
    “I can’t really talk about that kind of thing,” Henry said in a fuck-you tone. “But if I could, I’d probably answer no.”
    I let out a slow breath. What would I have done if she’d gone back to work for Henry? I would’ve lost my fucking shit.
    “You met with her,” I said.
    “How do you know that?”
    “I just know. How is she? Is she okay?” I pressed my fist against my forehead. If I was in the same room with Henry I would have grabbed him and shaken him like an addict looking for blow.
    “It’s been two years,” Henry said. “More than two years.”
    It had been two years, five months, and a week, but who the fuck was counting? “I’d just like to know if she’s okay.”
    “If you care, you should contact her yourse—”
    “Just tell me. Give me one of your non-answers that’s really an answer, if you have to. If