Robin’s mouth opened to respond, but John stopped her. He held up his hands, saying, “No, really. That’s okay.”

“I always pay my debts,” the old hooker insisted. “Kindness of strangers or whatever the fuck.” She followed a car with her eyes as it pulled into the parking lot. “Shit. That’s my regular,” she said, using the back of her hand to wipe the blood off from under her nose. She waved at John as she jumped into the man’s car, yelling something he couldn’t make out.

John watched the car leave, feeling Robin’s eyes on him the entire time. She had the same steely stare as a cop: what the fuck are you up to and where do I have to hit you to bring you to your knees?

She said, “I’m not her fucking stand-in.”

“Don’t worry about it,” he said, throwing up his hands again. “Really.”

“What?” she demanded. “You too good to pay for it?”

“I didn’t say that,” he countered, feeling his face turn red. There were five or six other hookers openly listening to their conversation and the amused expressions on their faces made him feel like his dick was getting smaller and smaller with every second that ticked by.

He added, “And she didn’t say anything about paying for it, anyway.” When Robin didn’t jump in with something else, he said, “I was just doing her a favor.”

“You didn’t do me any favors.”

“Then don’t do me any,” he said, turning to go.

“Hey!” she screamed. “Don’t walk away from me.”

Without thinking, he had turned back around when she yelled. She was obviously playing to the crowd. He felt himself shrink another few centimeters.

He tried to moderate his tone, asking, “What?”

“I said don’t walk away from me, you stupid prick.”

John shook his head, thinking his day couldn’t get much worse. “You wanna do this?” he asked, reaching into his pocket. He had saved twenty bucks a week for the last three weeks just to make sure he could swing the payments on the TV. He had fifty bucks in his pocket and seventy tucked into the sole of his shoe. John doubted the girl made even half that during the lunch rush. Hell, he barely made that in a day.

Her chin went up in defiance. They must have picked up the gesture in hooker school or something. She asked, “How much you got?”

“Enough,” he said. What the fuck was he doing? His tongue felt thick in his mouth and he had more saliva than he knew what to do with. Flashing the money had worked, though. The peanut gallery had shut up.

Robin stared at him another beat, then nodded once. “All right,” she said. “You want dinner and a drink?”

John chewed his lip, trying to figure out how much that would cost him. “I just ate lunch,” he told her. “If you want something to drink…”

“God,” she groaned, rolling her eyes. “Are you a cop?”

“No,” he said, still not following.

“Half-and-half,” she told him. “Dinner and a drink.”

John looked over at the other women. They were laughing at him again.

“Shut up,” Robin barked, and for a minute John thought she meant him. “Come on,” she said, grabbing his arm.

For the second time that day, John was being led down the street by a hooker. This one was a hell of a lot better than the last one, though. She looked cleaner, for one. Her skin was probably soft. Even her hair looked good—thick and healthy, not stringy from too many drugs or covered with some cheap wig. She didn’t smell like a smoker, either. John’s cell-mate had been a chain-smoker, lighting one off the last. The guy couldn’t even sleep for more than an hour without waking up to have a smoke and there were some days he smelled worse than a wet ashtray.

Robin pulled him into the woods behind the Colonial Restaurant, tossing over her shoulder, “You got enough for a room?”

He didn’t answer, couldn’t believe this was actually happening. She was holding his hand, walking him through the woods, like they were on a date. He wanted to hear her voice again. The tone was soothing, even though she was obviously in a hurry to get this over with.

She stopped, still holding his hand. “Hey, I asked if you have enough for a room.” She indicated the woods. “I don’t do it outside like some fucking animal.”

He had to clear his throat so he could speak. His heart was pounding so hard in his chest that he could feel his shirt moving. “Yeah.”

She didn’t move. “You’re sweating.”

“Sorry,” he said, taking back his hand, wiping the palm on the leg of his jeans. He felt a stupid, uncomfortable smile on his lips. “I’m sorry,” he repeated.

She was giving him that hard look again, trying to figure out what he had in mind. Her hand was tucked into her purse. “You okay?”

John looked around, thinking no matter what she carried in her bag, it was a real mistake for her to be taking strange men into the woods. “It’s not safe here,” he said. “I could be anybody.”

“You’ve never done this before.” She wasn’t asking a question, just stating the obvious.

He thought of Randall, that kid at the rental store, the way his Adam’s apple had bobbed in his throat when John crowded in on him. John could feel his own throat clenching, making it hard for him to talk.

“Hey,” she said, rubbing her hand on his arm. “Come on, big boy. It’s okay.”

John noticed that her voice had changed. He didn’t know why, but suddenly, she was talking to him like he was a human being instead of something she had to scrape off the bottom of her shoe.

“I didn’t want to do this,” he told her, realizing his tone was different, too. Soft. Real soft like he was trusting her, sharing something with her. Without warning, his mouth opened, and out slipped, “Oh, God, you’re so pretty,” like he was some kind of pathetic freak. He tried to make it better, adding, “I know that sounds stupid, but you are.” He scanned her face, trying to come up with something else to say, some proof that he wasn’t some kind of freak she should pepper spray.

Her mouth looked soft, the kind of mouth you could kiss forever.

No, he couldn’t talk about her mouth. That was too sexual.

Her nose?

No, that was stupid. Nobody talked about pretty noses. They breathed, they ran sometimes and you blew them. They were just there on your face.

“You okay?” she asked.

“Your eyes,” he blurted out, feeling like even more of an idiot than before. He’d said the words so loudly that she’d flinched. “I mean,” he began, lowering his voice again. “I’m sorry. I was just thinking that your eyes…” Christ, she was wearing so much makeup it was hard to tell. “I think you have nice eyes.”

She stared at him, probably wondering how fast she could get the Mace out of her purse and douse him, maybe wondering if she could snatch his money when he went down. “You know,” she finally said, “you don’t have to woo me. Just pay me.”

He tucked his hand into his pocket.

“Not now, baby,” she said, nervous suddenly. He was doing something wrong. There was a way to do this and John didn’t know.