I slide the envelope across the table, careful to avoid the condensation ring left by Sean’s whiskey on ice. He stares down at the black (12) on the upper right corner and rolls his eyes. Good. He has heard of us.
“I’m not interested in whatever you think you have in here.” Sean shoves it back toward me before he stands that pompous way famous assholes like him do—straightening his jacket, ducking his chin to pretend he doesn’t want anyone to recognize him, looking around hoping someone does. Always soaking up the spotlight. Always too big to fall.
Except he’s not. No, I mean physically. On his feet, he’s short. These stars always seem like they’ll be tall, but they are often smaller than they appear on screen.
Right now, he’s puny.
My fingers intertwine, and I glare up at him through my eyebrows. These precious seconds are my favorite of any meeting—the moment after the scale tips but before the prick in front of me knows it’s no longer in his favor. “No problem, I’m sure the state will place Micah in a good home.” He pauses, the fingertips of his right hand lingering on the table’s surface. “The first foster home I went to was.” I continue. “My new parents tried to hide the fact that they weren’t interested in taking care of an eleven-year-old, especially one who looked like me.” I tilt my head and narrow my eyes on Sean. “Luckily, their teenage son had a thing for ‘dark girls with tight pussies.’ I’m sure Micah will find a foster brother or sister to fondle him, just like I did.”
Sean crashes into the booth in front of me and hisses, “What do you want?”
I nod toward the manila envelope he has yet to open. He huffs as he tears into it, then sifts through the evidence I’ve compiled linking him to his bastard son, the mother of whom is an undocumented immigrant. Deporting her would be a breeze. And God knows Sean won’t want the inconvenience of his child. “After what you did to Samson’s client, I thought for sure you wouldn’t mind your son having an older friend to play naked games with.”
He glowers at me and sighs. “Client?”
“You’ve sexually assaulted more than one of your backup dancers? It’s that hard to keep track?” When he refuses to answer, I continue, “Denise Arden wants her job back and a 20% raise.”
He scoffs. “We replaced her.”
“I know,” I sympathize. “I don’t know why she wants to work for her rapist, but she insisted.”
“If this is about the money, I can pay—”
“Your hush money? No, I’m afraid she doesn’t want any more of that.”
“She signed an NDA. Legally, I should get that money back now.”
“Now that I know that you raped her?” I smile in response to his silent fuming. “No, she’s in compliance with her NDA. She wasn’t the only one who knew what you did to her. Next time, pay off all the people you harass.” He’s drumming his fingers on the table. Buying time. Searching for a way out of this. I spread my elbows to the left and right and lean toward him. My voice low, I ask, “What was your favorite part? How she tasted? When she said ‘no?’ That made you hard, huh, when she didn’t want it. Do you like it when she begged you to stop? Did you fire her when she quit resisting? When it wasn’t fun anymore?”
His words are cold when he says, “She got boring. All of them do when they think they’re too good to get on their knees for the job.”
“Well,” I sit back and pull a packet of paper from my bag, “she won’t be boring now, will she?”
His lips twist into a smirk. “No. I suppose she won’t.”
I hand him the contract Denise and I drafted. “If you’d be so kind as to sign this. Please initial all the highlighted portions. Denise’s agent will be in touch, and you’ll never hear from me again.” I watch as he does, then snap pictures of each page once he returns them.
As he straightens from the table and smooths the buttons of his shirt, I say, “You know, you should always read what you sign.” Then into my shirt, I ask, “That should be enough to start, right?”
The plain clothes police officers in the booth behind me start toward Sean. The woman pulls handcuffs from her jacket pocket. Sean shouts over her while she reads him his rights, “I didn’t confess to anything. What the fuck is this?”
I hold my phone up and take another photo, this one of him getting arrested. Then I read from the page he signed, “‘I the undersigned, confess to forcibly raping Denise Arden on multiple occasions from the start of her employment in May 2017 to her dismissal…’ It goes on from there.” I tap on my phone. “And now TMZ knows.”
“They can’t make any of this stick.”
I shrug. “We really don’t care.” And we don’t. It just takes one, one survivor to step up and accuse a star of sexual misconduct, one domino to tip and knock the rest over. His other victims will come forward in the upcoming months. As long as his career is over, we don’t care if the police lock him up or not.
I snatch the envelope of blackmail from the floor and tuck it in my bag. I know what Denise requested, but I just can’t let the police have Micah’s mom. If they want her gone, they’ll figure it out themselves. My head ducks toward my chest when I scoot past the cops on my way to the exit. I’m not a fan of collaborating with the police, but Denise insisted. And I give my clients what they ask for—holistic justice.
Denise signed a nondisclosure agreement when she and her crackpot lawyer sat with Sean’s attorney. Money was exchanged, the amount, of course, she can’t tell me. Why they paid her, she, again, can’t disclose. I asked instead for a list of friends, family, coworkers, who could tell me her story for her. I didn’t need the whole truth, just enough to make him squirm.
She has her holistic justice. I have my thirty grand. Or most of it.
On my way out of the strip club, I message Denise from my Google number specific to her case: Without a hitch. LAPD have him in custody. Please wire remaining funds.
She replies within the minute. Funds transferred. Thank you.
Now I have my thirty grand. I don’t usually charge so much, but I showed my face to a high profile target and the police. Plus, she’ll get that money back and then some in her civil suit.
There’s a bar two blocks away. I know because I’ve worked a surprising number of cases at this club. Bentley’s Dive is something of a gem. It’s quiet and lit well enough to know how much regret I feel in the morning over the one-night-stand I meet there.
I never spend the night alone after I meet a target in person, which I rarely do. It’s impossible to know who can find me despite the security in my building and the fake names I do business under. I don’t have a boyfriend or roommate, and the guard puppy the humane society told me was an akita mix, grew up to be a medium sized dog who would sooner roll over for an intruder than bite him. The humane society does not take kindly to returns, but they do take them. So, besides me, my apartment is empty.
But I’m not going to sleep if it stays empty tonight.
I’m relieved to see an open stool at the bar. When I hop up onto it, sandy-haired guy in rolled up sleeves leans his palms on the counter. “What can I get for you?”
I study his face a moment, taking in his green eyes and freckles he should have grown out of years ago. “You’re new.” Maybe I frequent this bar too…frequently.
He pushes off the bar. “Yeah. Do you want a drink?”
“Old fashioned.” I put my hand out. “Wait, have you learned how to make one of those, yet?”
He glowers at me as he thumps the squat tumbler against the bar. “Ice?”
I nod. “What’s your name?”
“Cal,” he answers without looking up from the glass.
“Kal as in Superman?”
He shrugs. “It’s a nickname.”
“What’s your real name?”
“Linus.”
“Wow, your parents must hate you.”
He snickers. “You have no idea.” He tips his chin to me. “What’s your name?”
“Estlyn.”
“After E. E. Cummings?”
“Who?” I wink.
Cal coats the rim of the glass with the orange peel then drops it in my drink. “ID.” I reach into my messenger bag and pass him my driver’s license. “Estlyn Collins?” He raises an eyebrow.
“I prefer just Estlyn, like Zendaya or Beyonce.”
“What’s your address?”
I rattle off the phony North Hollywood address I have memorized.
“Mmhmm, and your birthday?”
I give him that, too. It’s only one day different than my real one.
“Where’s your real ID?”
“Excuse you, asshole, that is my real ID.”
He shakes his head as he bends the card back and forth. “You look like you’re nineteen.”
“Then why would I have my ID say I’m twenty-five if I needed to be twenty-one? That’s too great a lie to get away with.”
“Or is it the perfect lie?”
“Look, I have a law degree and a six-figure salary. I’m probably older than you.” I reach for the drink, but he picks it up and steps back from the bar. “Don’t you have other customers to not serve?”
“Where’s your degree from?”
“UCLA.”
Cal clicks his tongue. “Ooo…wrong answer.” He finally passes me my drink and my license.
“Aw, you went to USC, didn’t you?” He nods as I take a sip. “Do you think that’s why you’re behind the bar and I passed it?”
“Can I interest you in a table over there?” He points behind me. “Or the door?”
I shed my jacket revealing the low-cut top beneath. “Can I interest you in a night of no-strings-attached fucking?”
I expect him to be taken aback by my abrupt change in subject, but he responds in kind. “Sure. Do you have a less bitchy friend?”
I lean my chest against the counter to press my less than ample breasts together. “What if I don’t talk the rest of the night? Except, of course, to cry out ‘Linus’ during climax.”
“It’s Cal.”
“Sure,” I shrug, “I could scream ‘Cal’ instead.”
“I have a girlfriend.”
“Ah.” I twist the glass between my fingers. “Can you point me in the direction of someone less romantically entangled or more morally creative?”
Cal sighs and nods to the customer two seats away from me. “Another?” he asks.
I sip my drink and rotate to scan the bar for someone single and worthy of my utmost disrespect. It’s a Tuesday night. It’s not exactly packed in here. While I wait for the right guy to walk in, I pull my business card from my wallet. It’s a simple design—a white background with a black (12) on the front and my work email on the back. In pen I write, listen: there’s a hell of a good universe next door. I swallow the rest of my drink then secure the card and a twenty under the glass.
I relax into the booth Cal pointed toward and scroll through my email for prospective cases. About half of my inquiries concern infidelity, and this batch in my inbox is no different. Since I’m in the revenge business, I get a lot of requests to mutilate philandering dicks.
I have yet to take a machete to someone’s crotch.
Really, is that the most clever way to screw someone for screwing around? Also, I operate (mostly) within the law, and, because I’m a lawyer, I know that the law is a beautiful and fluid concept created to be twisted to fit my client’s needs. So, no, I’ve never accepted ten grand to castrate someone. But I have accepted fifteen to dismantle a cheater’s life brick by slimy brick.
I skim the bolded subject lines of the unread messages until that inquiry from this morning constricts my airways again. It’s not bold anymore. I’ve read it at least a dozen times, the name of the sender more than a hundred. I should reply. I have to. Because if he doesn’t go to me for revenge, he’ll go somewhere else.
“Your change.” I look up from my phone. Cal drops a few dollars and a receipt on my table.
I fold the bills and hand them back. “You need this more than I do, what with that enormous debt from your second-rate alma mater.”
He rolls his eyes, huffing as his fingers comb back his dirty blonde hair. Still, he doesn’t turn down the cash. I pick up the receipt and read the bottom. Cal scribbled the rest of the E. E. Cummings quote I started on my card: let’s go. I flip the receipt over to find he wrote, Shift ends at 10:00. I prefer you scream “Linus.”