Hannah rolled her eyes dramatically, then wailed, “You’re not serious, are you? My wedding’s happening in a couple of days! What if I can’t fit into my dress? I can’t possibly ask his mother to alter it on the spot, can I? The dress was custom-made and embroidered by hand! It cost an absolute fortune! I’m on the verge of moving out. I have to lose weight, or there’ll definitely be a problem.”
Hannah’s noisy complaining could not hide the traces of a smile hovering over her lips. I grinned at that. If a little weight gain was all that Hannah had to worry about for the rest of her marriage, she’d have many blissful years ahead of her.
Hannah’s endless rambling was finally put to a stop by an incoming call from Chandler. She answered the phone only to redirect her flood of words into the mouthpiece. On the other end, Chandler just absorbed everything patiently.
I suddenly found myself very much an outsider in this romantic display of affection. I surveyed around the cafe casually. Abruptly, a familiar face popped up within the field of my vision. I froze.
I was slightly myopic, so I couldn’t be certain that the figure was indeed who I’d taken it to be. I squinted as hard as I could in that direction, but to no avail. I thus reached out and tugged on Hannah’s sleeve, gesturing subtly in that direction.
Hannah paused and looked over. She was similarly taken aback. Hannah quickly mumbled into the phone, “Chandler, I just saw someone I know. I’m hanging up!”
After she’d ended the call, Hannah hauled me out of the cafe. When we’d gotten outside, she immediately shrieked, “That woman was Rebecca, wasn’t she?”
I wavered, unable to say for sure.
We didn’t approach her, however, but merely continued observing from a distance.
K City was a bustling, modern city. Life here was fast-paced, and it was common to see people dashing from place to place. Nobody paid any heed to the sight of a woman pulling on a man and shamelessly begging him for money.
Hannah glanced at her watch, then looked at me with a horrified expression. “It’s only seven in the evening! It’s not even midnight yet. Is she doing what I think she’s doing?”
I bit my lip and continued gazing in Rebecca’s direction. She had on a thick layer of makeup and wore a revealing dress that exposed various areas of her body with utter disregard for the winter cold. She looked as indecent as she was legally permitted to be.
Rebecca had a gorgeous face and a lovely figure. It was usually sufficient for attracting stares anywhere she went. If the scene unfolding before our eyes had played out anywhere else, I would never have given it a second thought.
Where we were presently standing was K City’s most notorious red-light district. Vice oozed out of every pore of her. Rebecca’s scantily-clad self, placed against this surrounding, made our suspicions perfectly reasonable.
Hannah dragged me closer to take a better look. We could hear the sound of Rebecca’s cries now, clear as a bell. “Mr. Tuffin, you promised that as long as I agreed, you’d give me the money! Now that I’ve done it, how can you go back on your word? You can’t do that!”
The man looked visibly irked by Rebecca’s constant pleas. He fished out a couple of bills from his wallet and flung them roughly at Rebecca, vehemently cursing her all the while.
I was dumbfounded. Did we just witness Rebecca selling herself? How can this be?
Even if Ashton no longer cared for Rebecca, Joe clearly worshipped her. He would never have sanctioned this degradation of Rebecca’s dignity.
Rebecca stooped to pick up the bills, utterly focused on counting them while shivering helplessly from the bitter cold. Clutching herself to preserve what little bit of warmth she had, Rebecca scampered off and disappeared into the nightclub behind her.
Hannah’s stupefied expression mirrored mine exactly. We were stunned while we looked at each other as if to confirm what we’d just beheld. Haltingly, Hannah asked, “That was Ms. Larson, wasn’t it?”
I craned my neck in the direction that Rebecca had slipped off to, then nodded reluctantly. “I think so.”
“What happened to her? How did she end up that way? Wasn’t she so glamorous previously? How did she suddenly end up like this? What in the world happened?” Hannah asked urgently. She was evidently still in shock. I could see the cogs in Hannah’s mind turning as she struggled to process what she had just seen.
I didn’t have the answers to Hannah’s questions and said so frankly. “I don’t know what just happened either. I think Ashton gave her an apartment and a car that we never asked her to return. Joe has also given her lots of money. There’s really no logical reason as to why Rebecca would be so desperate for money that she’d need to sell her body!”
Hannah bit her lip. Soberly, she said, “Come on, let’s go over and take a look!”
The incident at the Imperial Hotel had left me with a lingering uneasiness. I hesitated, then shook my head. “I don’t really want to. It’s too chaotic over there and isn’t safe.”
Hannah was insistent, however. She pouted, then wheedled, “It’s not. I’m going in with you. Don’t worry. As long as we don’t cause any trouble, nothing will happen to us. Don’t worry!”
Without waiting for my consent, Hannah dragged me across. Upon entry, the dance floor rose to meet us, packed with teenagers wearing the barest slips of clothing. The DJ’s hollers were deafening over the speakers, and the drunk partygoers gyrated to the pulsing music without a care in the world.
Hannah burst out, “What’s wrong with all of these people? Have they gone insane?”
She tightened her grip on my arm as we move through the crowd, searching for Rebecca. But, she seemed to have vanished off the face of the earth. Hannah puzzled, “Why isn’t Rebecca on the dance floor?”
I pondered this, then realized, “She’s in terrible need of money, isn’t she? She should be hard at work right now.”
Hannah smacked her forehead exaggeratedly. “That’s right! Why didn’t I think of it?”
