“I need to use the restroom,” Nicole told Nathan, and deliberately left out the part about her plan to have a little one-on-one time with Holly. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
She headed across the room and slipped into the women’s lounge, where a few of the young girls were fussing with their hair and makeup. Because she was a new face in the crowd, they eyed her curiously, but didn’t say anything as she walked over to the closed door marked WOMEN and knocked.
There was no answer, but Nicole knew the girl was inside. “Holly?” she said through the door as she knocked again, more insistently this time. “It’s Nikki.”
“Go away,” Holly said, and sniffled.
Nicole closed her eyes for a moment. The despondent note to the young girl’s voice nearly broke her heart. The need to talk to her, to make sure she was okay, made her more persistent. “Let me in, Holly. Please?”
Nicole sighed but refused to give up. “I’m not going away until you do. If I have to, I’ll wait right here until you open the door to leave.” The girl had to come out sometime.
Much to Nicole’s relief, less than a minute later the locked unlatched and the door opened a few inches. Nicole took it as an invitation to enter and quickly stepped inside, then rebolted the lock behind her so they weren’t interrupted.
Her first thought was that Holly looked a wreck, physically and emotionally. Her puffy, red eyes revealed she’d been crying, and her makeup was smudged from wiping away her tears. Her eyes were filled with such hopelessness that Nicole had to resist the urge to reach out and take the young girl into her arms for a comforting hug.
Holly’s chin lifted in a show of belligerence. The small, diamond heart pendant glittered from the hollow of her throat, a stark reminder of who she belonged to. “What do you want?”
“Are you okay?” Nicole asked, and leaned back against the closed door.
The other girl crossed her arms over her chest and narrowed her gaze. “Why do you care how I am?”
Holly was back to being the hostile girl Nicole had initially met back at the nightclub. Remembering how she’d been able to reach past those defensive barriers, she attempted to do so again now. “Because I think you could use a friend.”
She scoffed at that. “And you think you can be that friend? You’re the one that Preston wants,” she added bitterly. “If anything, you’re the enemy!”
“I swear I’m not,” Nicole said, trying to convince her, and at the same time striving to establish some kind of trust between them. “I don’t want Preston.”
“Whatever Preston wants, he gets.” Holly turned back to the vanity mirror and tried to repair her smeared makeup with her compact.
Holly dropped the compact back into her purse and met Nicole’s gaze in the reflection. “Sloane told me I’m his favorite, and that’s why he likes to share me,” she said, her unsteady voice not holding as much conviction as it should have, as if Holly had her own doubts but was too terrified to speak them out loud.
God, how Nicole understood how the other girl felt. Hadn’t Mark used the same tactics on her to persuade Nicole to engage in a threesome with a virtual stranger? The similarities made her feel nauseous.
“Right now, I’m entertaining one of his friends, and when Preston sees how good I’m being, he’ll take me back and not want to share me anymore.”
Nicole had to forcibly swallow back her anger at the situation. “Are you sure about that, Holly?”
The young girl’s eyes flashed with irritation before she looked away and began digging through her purse. “I
Nicole’s stomach roiled as she watched Holly shake two white tablets from a small container. “Getting wasted isn’t the answer,” she said, speaking from her own experience.
Holly clutched the pills in her fist. “I
“What are you taking?” Nicole was not only curious, but concerned about what the girl was ingesting.
“I don’t know and I don’t care.” Despair etched Holly’s features, and her bottom lip quivered. “Gwen gave them to me to take and they make me feel relaxed and calm. Taking the pills is the only way I can bring myself to let anyone other than Sloane touch me. They make me forget things I don’t want to remember.”
“It’s only a temporary fix, Holly.” Nicole took a small step toward the girl, then another. “In the morning, nothing will have changed.”
“You don’t understand!” Her voice rose in anger, and she popped the pills before Nicole could stop her, then scooped up water with her hands from the sink faucet to wash them down.
Nicole felt so damn helpless, and hated the fact that she couldn’t get through to Holly. She watched as the girl closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and tried to recompose herself.
When Holly looked at her again, it was with reluctant determination. “I need to be good,” she said, calmer now. “I need to make Preston’s friend happy. If I do whatever Preston asks me to do, then he’ll know how much I love him.”
The anguish Nicole witnessed in Holly’s gaze twisted her insides into knots, and she gently touched the girl’s arm. “Honey, you’re not old enough to know what real love with a man is.”
Holly jerked away from her, a renewed fire igniting in her eyes. “So what if I’m only fifteen? I’ve had more experience than most girls my age.”
Nicole didn’t hesitate to call Holly on her slip. “Fifteen?”
Panic chased across Holly’s face as she realized her mistake, though she did nothing to correct it. Instead, she grabbed her purse and started past Nicole. “I need to get back to Richard before Gwen comes looking for me.”
Nicole stepped in front of the girl and blocked her path to the door. “You don’t have to do this, Holly. Let me help you. Let me get you out of this place.”
“I don’t want to leave,” Holly said, her voice choked with emotion. “I just want
“What happens when he no longer wants you?” Nicole asked softly, but her words were direct and painfully honest.
Holly shook her head, as if she wouldn’t even consider that as an option. “I have to
Knowing there was nothing else she could do right now, Nicole stepped aside and watched as Holly walked out. Tonight, she didn’t have any choice but to let the young girl
She wasn’t sure how Nathan was going to react to her decision, but Nicole wasn’t leaving this hellhole without Holly.
Chapter Sixteen
“See anything you like?”
Nathan wasn’t surprised that Sloane had sought him out, especially since he was standing alone in the lounge area of the playroom as he waited for Nicole to return from the restroom. It was the perfect opportunity for Sloane to try to negotiate with him, but Nathan was holding firm until the other man offered him what he’d come here for.
“No, not yet,” Nathan replied, smiling amicably at Sloane.
“What did you think of Lisa?” he asked, his gaze both curious and hopeful. “She’s quite willing to be your
