Chapter One - Paradise

Sloane

The heels of my Mary Jane pumps clicked loudly against the ground, despite the tell-tale signs of debauchery surrounding me. The red neon sign of the brothel at the end of the alley buzzed angrily, and the sounds of rats scurrying off to find their next big score was anything but cathartic. I wrinkled my nose in disgust when I heard a man grunting in the alley behind the dumpster as he pumped into some hooker.

I froze when my heel landed on something squishy. I glanced down and picked up my foot, cursing at the sight of the used condom.

“Dammit!” I hissed, scraping my shoe on the ground, trying to wipe it off.

I’m throwing these shoes away as soon as possible. Nick will be mad when he has to replace them, but all I have to do is smile sweetly and bat my lashes and he’ll give me whatever I want.

I approached my intended destination—Paradise. It was nothing of the sort. It was just a hole in the wall brothel that fed the desires of drunken men who wanted to slum it up with loose pussy and cheap booze before returning to their doting wife and children after a long day of work.

Fucking degenerates…all of them.

I snorted when the “s” in Paradise finally flickered out, spelling Para-d-i-e.

Someone is dying tonight—that, I guarantee.

I pulled down the skirt of my schoolgirl uniform that kept shimmying with each twist of my hips. I hated skirts and dresses—really anything girly, but Nick was adamant that I needed to look and play the part. I was eighteen, but I looked like an innocent, vulnerable 15-year-old whose curves were finally budding thanks to Mother Nature.

Before I left for my mission, Nick reminded me that sick fucks loved to prey on the innocent, and that if I completed my mission right, they’d never see me coming.

I stopped at the door and locked eyes with the glassy-eyed bouncer with the pudgy stomach and hair that looked as if it hadn’t been washed for weeks.

Or his body for that matter.

“What’s a sweet thing like you doing out here all alone?” he asked, taking a drag from his cigarette. I gripped the straps to my backpack tightly and peered around, attempting to be nervous and unsure. “Cat’s got your tongue?”

“I…I’m looking for my sister,” I stammered softly.

He grunted. “You’re gonna have to be more specific than that. We got a lot of sisters in here—daughters and mothers too.”

“I’m looking for my sister Cathy,” I said with some forced confidence.

He nodded while he took a final drag of his cigarette. “I know Cathy. She has a good mouth on her. I wonder if it runs in the family.”

“I can take you to Cathy,” a redhead with little to no clothes on said from the entrance. I held back a grimace. She was probably my age but due to the hard drugs, smoking, alcohol, and street life, she looked like she was pushing thirty.

“No one enters without my say so,” the bouncer expressed. “She could be an informant.”

“Are you blind, Steven? She’s the spitting image of Cathy. Y’know, I used to be a schoolgirl, too before I came to this place. I told myself I was going to study real hard and make it out with possibly a shred of my dignity left.”

“What happened? Why didn’t you leave?”

“Your whore of a sister used my room to entertain a client who thought it was a good idea to come all over my textbook and my final project. I couldn’t go to school with some old geezer’s cum all over my assignment. I failed, and that’s why your big sister has a glass eye. I plucked that shit out with my fingers.”

The redhead and the bouncer shared a laugh as she tugged me into the brothel. She encouraged me to go to the bar. I looked around and was somewhat surprised at how empty it was. It was late, but early. It was too late for decent folk to be out at this time of night, but too early for the hedonists to start their games. My eyes tracked to a tall, muscular, blond male who sat at the bar alone, nursing a tumbler of amber liquor. He was impressively built, and I couldn’t help but notice how his pronounced Adam’s apple bobbed in the mirror behind the bar as he downed his drink.

“Are you going to continue to stare at me all night or join me, sugar?”

“I’m looking for Cathy.”

“Cathy, huh? I heard she had a good mouth on her; everything else, not so much, but a good mouth can still curl your toes in your steel-toed boots and get the job done. You have any weapons on you?”

“No, sir.”

He whirled around on the stool and finally faced me. His analytical eyes roved up and down my figure, drinking me all in like the whiskey I smell coming off him.

“No, sir? Aren’t we polite?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I like you already. We could use you around here. The girls we have aren’t too nice to the fellas. They’re a little bitter if you asked me.”

“Why be bitter when you’re in paradise?” I found myself asking. The handsome man raised a brow inquisitively.

“You took the words right out of my mouth. Open the bag, sugar.”

“For what?” I asked a little defensively.

“To make sure you don’t have any weapons.”

“I told you that I don’t.”

“And you expect me to trust you? The last thing I want is to be stabbed in the back by a girl who looks like she just started her period. Open the bag or get the fuck out,” he demanded.

I yanked my backpack off my back and opened it for him. He peered inside and smirked when he realized all I carried were a few books and a cutesy Hello Kitty pencil case. “Are you satisfied?” I asked, zipping the bag back up.

“I’m never satisfied. Follow me.”

I followed behind him diligently and took note of my surroundings and possible exits if I needed to make a quick escape.

Master Nick promised this is my last assassination mission before I can retire and go to college like a normal teenager.