Page 8 of The Client
“Are you ready, Miss Jasinski?”
He asks as ifheisn’t quite ready, as if he hates what he’s about to do.
Wordlessly, I nod.
“I’ll escort you to the in-house spa,” he says. “This way.”
He picks up the shopping bag. We’re back in the elevator. The floor feels like it’s bottoming out, unbalancing me like the damn milking stool. It takes all my will not to crumple into a ball in the corner.
There’s no sense in asking the assistant for help. I know better than that. Besides, why would he risk his job trying to help me? I’m one of many, hundreds—maybe thousands—to take this exact same ride.
The doors open and spill me out into the bright white hallway of the spa, where a woman in a black button-up smock and white palazzo pants waits. She doesn’t smile or greet me, just leads me to a small room with a padded table covered in white paper. A pink robe is folded on the foot, waiting for me to slip into it.
She doesn’t leave the room as expected, so I undress with my back to her, feeling the weight of her eyes on my naked back before I slip on the plush, velvety robe, and for one blissful moment, I feel shielded from what my life is about to turn into.
And then comes the pain.
3
IZABELA
The car arrives at exactlyeight p.m.
My roommates don’t ask where I’m headed. I haven’t said a word to any of them since I got back from my meeting at KZM yesterday, but the looks they exchange suggest they already know what’s happening tonight.
The black sedan at the curb below our living room window confirms it. Or maybe the three times I threw up in the bathroom in the past hour, not quietly, gave it away. They’ve all been in my shoes before, haven’t they? They know what it feels like, waiting for that black car.
Wondering what’s going to happen when it delivers them to their final destination.
I’d stashed the white department store bag inside my slouchy, oversized duffel so no one would see it. I still haven’t looked inside, so I have no idea what type of outfit Konstantin Zoric chose for me. I’m afraid to find out. Since he forbade me from getting ready ahead of time, he could have given me the bag this evening, but I think he wanted me to cart it around as a cruel reminder that I’m not a free woman.
He owns me, and my body, and starting this evening, I’m going to be nothing more than a toy for the pleasure of paying men. A toy to be manipulated, played with, used and discarded. Over and over again.
Nausea bites the back of my throat as I turn away from the window and head to the door.
Diya gives me a hug in the hallway. I cling to her like she’s a life raft.
“Don’t let it break you, Iza. Just close your eyes and pretend you’re in Spain, on the beach, with the sun on your face.”
Her words follow me out, cut off by the closing click of the door. My knees tremble as I descend three flights of stairs to the lobby. My fingers feel numb as I push the heavy glass door open and step into the balmy night air. Glancing up at the window of my apartment, I see three faces staring down at me. Watching.
Diya waves slightly. I don’t wave back.
The driver gets out, nods, and opens the back passenger door. He doesn’t make eye contact, doesn’t confirm my identity, doesn’t say a word. As I slide onto the seat, it hits me that my name doesn’t matter. Any woman who lives here, in a KZM apartment, is just another commodity.
On the drive over to the auction venue, I do my best to gather myself, but my nerves are too chaotic. Closing my eyes and imagining my sister’s face is the only thing that keeps me from flinging open the door and throwing myself out into traffic.
About twenty minutes later, the car comes to a stop in a dark alley, the brick walls of the adjacent buildings only visible by the headlights.
Panic courses through me. I think I might be sick again.
My cousin gave birth when I was fourteen. It happened fast, catching both of us off guard as we worked in her mother’s vegetable garden. Lena lay down in the grass after the pains started suddenly, and before I could run for help, she started pushing. Her breaths came fast and gasping. Fear sparked in her eyes as she struggled against it, panting, bracing herself, crying when she realized that what was happening was out of her control. There was no way to protect herself from the unknown that lay moments ahead.
That’s how I feel right now. I’m caught in an ominous swell, but without any sweetness on the other side to make it worth it.
I nearly jump out of my skin when the driver opens my door and offers me his hand. I’m trembling too hard to take it, so he waits for me to slide out of the car and then ushers me to a nondescript black door. He knocks three times. It opens a few inches before catching on a chain.
“Another Zoric girl,” the driver says. “Izabela something.”
