Josh Stallings - Out There Bad

“You ever run into any Russian bitches?” I asked, as casually as possible.

“You mean like from Russia?” His eyes darted away just long enough to tell me he was dodging the question.

“Yeah,” I said, smoothing myself back into street hustler mode. “We got some of those Eastern Block bitches up in LA, suck a golf ball through a garden hose.”

“They teach them good over there, yeah?” he said, back into his easy sales pitch. “You want a BJ, I gots a bitch with tits out to here, let you come on ‘em if you like. Twenty bucks, thirty if you want her top off.”

“Slow up ace, just hit town. I wanna look around a bit before I get my knob polished.”

“Then come on, I know what you need to see.” Taking my elbow, he led me down the block and through the curtain into Le Paris.

It doesn’t matter where you travel, a strip joint is a strip joint. A naked little Latina spun on the pole on stage, drunken men sat at the rail staring up at her with glassy, transfixed eyes. The tip boy pushed me down into a chair at a small cafe table, then went to get me a girl and a drink. Five minutes after hitting the door, I had a barely dressed, barely legal gal on my lap, a scotch in hand and I was only twenty bucks lighter.

“You want to fuck her, they have a back room, safe, I’ll wait at the door make sure it all goes down clean,” he said.

“I got it from here.” I slipped him a ten spot and told him to blow. Pocketing the cash, he faded into the dark club and was gone.

“You want to buy me a drink?” The girl asked.

Who was I to refuse her impossibly large brown eyes? A bar woman with massive cleavage and one wandering eye brought a tequila sunrise, it cost ten bucks and I saw her pass the girl on my lap several pesos.

“I’m Lucy,” she told me, pointing out a gold necklace with her name written in cursive. “Just Lucy, not like these indio girls, they have two, three, even four names.” Her English was heavily accented but good, even if her grasp of the Spanish origins of multi naming wasn’t.

Pulling my arms around her, she told me how much she liked big men, they made her feel protected and comfortable. Downing her drink in three deep gulps, she held it up, shaking it for the bar woman to see. “You don’t mind?” she asked me as an afterthought.

Forty bucks later, she was well on the way to sloppy. My scotch sat on the table calling for me to drink it. The amber glow was so inviting. Just one sip, it called to me. To forget the booze, I tried to concentrate on Lucy’s voice. She gave me the bar Cliff Notes version of her life, single mother, born in Monterey, her mother looked after her daughter while she worked. She was too young to marry, and no, she hadn’t heard of or seen any Russians living in Ensenada. She had dated a German tourist for one weekend, gave her two hundred bucks and a case of the crabs. When the mood hit her, she would grab my face and kiss my cheek, or grind her butt against my crotch, but her attention was too unfocused to get my blood flowing, that and the fact she was a kid, and I’m many things, but a pedophile ain’t one of them.

Across the club I watched a sunburned American dance with a squat Indian girl. The music in the room was Spanish techno, but he was moving slow to some ballad in his head. The girl parted his swordfish print Hawaiian shirt, running her hands over his swollen pink belly. After two more drunken turns around the dance floor, she led him into the back. He was done and stumbling out of the club ten minutes later. His grin looked more befuddled than victorious.

Lucy caught me watching the drunk. “You want to go in back? I fuck you good. You like fucking?”

“I think I’ll take a pass.”

“Whatever.” Her head leaned on my shoulder, tequila filled eyes fluttered. At three thirty, they flashed the house lights to let the drinkers know it was last call. I slipped Lucy off my lap, and after a kiss on the cheek I was gone. The streets were mostly empty as I walked back towards Motel 49.

“How was she, did she fuck you good?” My tip boy materialized at my side. “I told you she was primo gash, didn’t I?”

“Yeah, she was primo.”

“Primo enough for another tip?” he asked, with a Cheshire cat grin that showed off three gold teeth.

“Do I look like your ready-teller?” I let my eyes go cold.

“Shit easy, I’m just fucking with you, homey. So where you staying?”

“Baja Queen.” I didn’t want him or anyone else knowing too many details. After a long conversation where he tried to sell me everything including his virgin mother, I finally shook him off by promising to hook up with him the next afternoon. We had a street appointment for five PM, we both knew we would be there only if a better offer didn’t come up first.

“They found the tarot de muerte card on the body of one of my best earners two nights ago,” Santiago said. He was a tall, aristocratic gentleman in his early fifties, his silver-flecked hair tied back in a shining ponytail.

“This ghost with the tarot cards is an old woman’s tale.” Kolya stopped pacing and gave Santiago a cold stare. These fucking Mexicans were worse than gypsies, with their superstitions and fucking saints.

“This old woman’s tale gutted Gaspar like a fucking fish.”

“Stop whining, people die all the time. What does this have to do with me?”

“Everyone knows he hunts for Russian blood,” Santiago said, trying to regain control of his emotions.

“Bring it on. I’ll show this killer of pimps how we handle punks in my house.”

“Bold. Do you want me to write that on your tombstone?” Santiago felt his old arrogance returning. To hell with the Russian, if he was too ignorant to see a scorpion in his boot, then he deserved the bite. The tarot de Muerte killer was bad for business, his pimps and their minions had refused to work until the killer’s head was on a stake. His best men had their ears to the ground. Sooner or later he would find him, and if this Russian son of a whore couldn’t be warned, then Santiago would use him like a tethered lamb when hunting mountain lions.

The barking and snarling dog woke Nika from her drifting state, she heard the sound of a car arriving and then a short time later, leaving. What time or even what day was lost to her as she lay in the dark. She still hadn’t eaten. How many days? The night the other girls had been taken to meet the men, they had returned late, none had spoken, their eyes were dull and distant. Svetlana brought them a large bowl of warm water and then locked them in; she hadn’t even looked at Nika. One by one they washed themselves silently. Nika noticed the water growing pink as Yumma scrubbed between her legs.

After sitting on her bunk and lighting a cigarette from a new pack, Yumma looked at Nika. “If you have to starve to death, don’t leave this room.”

“What did they do to you?”

Yumma didn’t answer. Instead, she lay back and blew a thin stream of blue smoke toward the ceiling.

Later in the dark, Nika could hear Guzel, the girl from Norilsk, snoring and whimpering. When they finally dragged her in she was covered in cuts and bruises. Her nose had been badly broken and was swollen and caked with blood. Nika had cleaned her up the best she could, cooing to her like she imagined a good mother would. The next afternoon, when Svetlana told the girls more men had come and it was time for them to earn their meal, all the young women lined up, heads down, eyes on the floor. Guzel stood on trembling legs and joined them. They reminded Nika of zombies.

“Well, my little princess,” Svetlana said to Nika, “are you ready to eat?”

Nika rolled away from the older woman whom she had thought for one foolish moment might be her savior.