Rory's Christmas

Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Rory’s first response was panic. And then—anger.

It washed over her, white-hot, and the map crumpled between her fingers. Had he just run off? They were barely a block away from that miserable motel and he was already gone? What kind of a stupid, insolent, overly self-obsessed asshole would do that? Here she was, all alone in this stupid foreign place and the only thing that was relatively familiar to her—well, the only person—was gone. Already. It wasn’t often that Rory called on her just-recently-departed-inner-teenager, but right now all she could think was WTF??????

A few more seconds later, logic settled back in and she started to worry.

Their little excursions this morning had showed that this was by no means your friendly everyday neighborhood. And Drew had disappeared practically soundlessly, which made her throat tighten and fear creep up her spine as she wondered if maybe he had been—

“Hey! Ro! OVER HERE!”

She snapped her head around the other way and saw a long arm waving at her. It was Drew. He was sitting outside the place they had gotten drinks from earlier, and beside him was…

A hooker?

Rory made her way across the road and over to them slowly. Very slowly. Deep breaths. Calm.

“Where the hell did you go?” she demanded as soon as she got close enough. She eyed the other woman suspiciously before narrowing her eyes back on Drew, who was shuffling his feet with anxiety—but it was clear, from the way his eyes were flashing brightly, that he was thrilled about something.

“I met a prostitute,” he said enthusiastically, grasping her wrist with too-warm fingers that made her feel all weird and tingly and pulling her to him until they stood shoulder-to shoulder. He gestured to the scantily-clad woman in front of them. “This is Lotus. She won’t tell me her real name.”

Lotus certainly wasn’t dressed like one. Fishnet stockings, waist-high shorts that Rory suspected probably showed off the woman’s butt, some sort of corset-like-lingerie-like top made of sheer lace, and…

A sparkly jacket much like the one Rory was wearing.

She shifted uneasily, but then remembered her manners. “Nice to meet you,” Rory said, automatically extending a hand. She tried not to think about where the fingers shaking hers might’ve been, but the woman gave her a wry smile.

“Don’t worry,” she said softly, her voice much smoother than Rory had expected. “I haven’t worked for a few days.”

“Oh. Um…” Was she supposed to say sorry for the bad business or something?

Drew saved her. “So I saw Lotus standing on the street corner and I went to talk to her—sorry about ditching you, by the way—and she says she saw us coming in to the motel last night! Didn’t you, Lottie?”

Lottie? LOTTIE? Were they already moving on to the nicknames stage now?

“Lottie” nodded. Rory felt extremely awkward in the presence of this woman with the kind of body that men probably had wet dreams about, and looked down at her own two feet. She was wearing a pair of pink flip-flops with glitter all over them. It seemed like her drunk self was quite fond of girly things.

“You came up the street and nearly walked right into me.” Lotus laughed softly, and Rory caught Drew staring at the other woman’s chest as it bounced with the movement. She stomped on his feet and he bent over, gasping in pain. Lotus didn’t even notice. She was gazing at Rory with rapt curiosity. “You…you said something, and then he said something, and you looked at me and you asked me if I wanted to stay with you guys for the night, and I said I’d have to charge, but you said you just wanna have fun. And then you two started singing a bunch of really weird songs, and he was like,—”