Total pages in book: 37
Estimated words: 34198 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 171(@200wpm)___ 137(@250wpm)___ 114(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 34198 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 171(@200wpm)___ 137(@250wpm)___ 114(@300wpm)
The bearded one nodded with a gulp.
Seamus walked to the corner and yanked the woman up.
She screamed. “Don’t hurt me!”
“Lady, you’re lucky I haven’t put a bullet through your head yet. If you don’t want me to hurt you, I’d suggest you come with me and don’t put up a fight because right now I’m feeling very generous. I’d rather you not see my bad side.”
She yanked her arm out of his grasp and backed away from him. She looked around the room as if weighing her options before dropping her head and releasing a sigh. “Okay. I’ll come with you.”
“As if you have a choice, sweetheart.”
2
Tam had jumped out of the frying-pan and into the fire.
What kind of man was this? It felt like she was trapped in a nightmarish video game called ’My Shitty Life’ where at the end of each level she battled an enemy worse than the last.
The first had been her mother who was neglectful at her best and verbally abusive at her worst. She, however, had nothing on the parade of men she brought home. Some of them were okay but the others were sleazy scum bags who would offer her things so they could “play with her” A few of them had assaulted her when she’d turned them down. By sheer luck, she managed to get away just about every time except with the last guy, who would have stolen her virginity had her mother not walked in on them.
Of course, it wasn’t so simple that her mother would call the cops on the man who’d nearly raped Tam. Oh, no, because according to Gloria Smith, Tam was a slut who obviously threw herself at the man. So, at the tender age of fifteen, Tam had found herself tossed out of the streets. For the next few years, she stayed at different friends’ houses. Because she was constantly moving from place to place, she eventually dropped out of school.
Again, she found herself homeless when a friend’s father thought that Tam should show her gratitude by sleeping with him.
That had led her to a life on the streets, where she’d been fending for herself for the past eight years. She did what she could to survive, whether it included getting odd jobs under the table, hustling, or panhandling. She stayed at shelters whenever the opportunity arose and she navigated the streets the best she could. Sometimes she had to do things she wasn’t exactly proud of but she’d managed to make it so far.
The biggest danger, however, were characters Rico who had taken a sickening interest in her. He had been a local pimp who had no problem snatching young girls off the street to work for him and he’d had set his sights on her. It was how she’d ended up at that rundown rat trap. He had used one of his girls to trick her into going to that sleazy motel by telling her that they would pay her a few bucks to be a lookout for them on what was supposed to be a quick hustle. It was something Tam had done before so she’d agreed. But when she got to the room, Rico was waiting for her, knife drawn.
She’d never fought so hard in her life to just survive as he smacked and punched her with one hand while threatening her with his weapon in the other. Tam had already decided that she would rather die than to be one of his women. She’d seen how he treated them. Most of the ladies were emaciated from not having eaten days at a time, not to mention their arms and legs were covered in track marks from repeated drug use.
They’d struggled until she was able to grab a lamp that had fallen off a nearby nightstand. Using all her remaining strength, she’d bashed him in the head with all her might, causing him to lose his grip on the knife. She then grabbed his knife.
It had only been her intention to use it for protection to get away from him, but when he’d lunged at her, she instinctively slashed the weapon against his throat. She’d never seen blood squirt from someone’s body like that other than the movies. She watched in horror as the life slowly drained from his eyes.
Her nightmare continued when those two thugs burst in and had taken her to Big D. She’d never met him before their encounter, but she’d heard of him. He practically ran all the illegal activities this side of town.
Everything she’d heard about him wasn’t good so when she found herself at his mercy, Tam was certain she would have been better off with Rico, especially when he spoke of her now owing him a debt because she’d killed Rico and the money that he’d owed Big D had become her burden to bear.