CHAPTER ELEVEN #2
Her words confuse me, but in an industry like ours where the client is always right, I don’t really have a choice, and I hope that the next fifty-five minutes goes by quickly.
The last thing I want is for the spa to gain any negative attention.
Even being friends with the owner’s granddaughter and them helping watch after me while my dad was on a mission, I’d never take advantage of our relationship to leverage to secure my job, if I’m in the wrong.
Linley moves to stand in front of me, leaving the massage table between us. Her eyes are wild, and I swear they look glazed over.
“If you’ll remove your jacket we can get started.” I gesture to her heavy coat, but she doesn’t make a move to remove it. “Is there a certain area that needs more attention?”
Instead, Linley brings her right hand to her pocket and pulls something out.
Oh my God!
“I don’t think I’m in the mood for a massage today,” Linley sneers, tightening her grip on a metal pipe, the length of my forearm. “I wanted to give you a message.”
My body starts to shake as my mind tries to wrap around what it is seeing. All the joy and bliss I was feeling a few minutes ago has left my head, while dread and panic settles in its place.
“Wh-what are you doing Linley?” My hands go up in front of my body in a surrender gesture.
“I’ve come to take back what was mine. What was stolen from me.”
Linley makes a move to the top of the table, and I mimic her steps and head to the bottom of the table. Looking over her shoulder I realize my mistake. I’ve now put a greater distance between me and the exit; the only way out is having to go right by Linley.
“I’ve not taken anything from you Linley, I swear,” my voice is void of confidence and quivers as I try to figure out how to get out of this situation.
“Liar! You’ve taken the one thing from me that was the most important.”
“Linley, you have an amazing career. You’re on every magazine cover and have all kinds of deals working for you.”
“You think that will last forever? The rules of the game are to strike while the iron is hot because there is always a newer, younger, thinner girl waiting in the wings to take everything from you. I have an expiration date. We all do. Lincoln was my meal ticket when modeling fizzles out. He was waiting for me to come back from Milan for us to be together, but you ruined it. All of it!” She bangs the pipe on the table.
Her voice is starting to get louder, and I can sense her desperation.
Whatever she’s possibly taking is putting her on edge, or she’s having a full-blown mental breakdown.
“Please Linley, put the pipe down and we can walk out of here as if nothing happened. I won’t say a word and we can both pretend this never happened.” I plead. “Linc can come and speak to you, and y’all can work it out.”
She has a manic laugh, and it sends shivers up my spine.
“How much is he paying for your time? Surely, it can’t be as much as he pays me for mine,” she starts rambling and what she’s saying is confusing.
Linc isn’t paying me but why did she say he pays her?
“Blaire hooked me up with Lincoln after I did my first campaign for the covers of several magazines and landed the biggest perfume ad. She apparently only allows the bigger models to be on the arm of Lincoln since he pays top dollar for us. The sex after is quite a bonus, isn’t it. He sure knows how to use his dick.”
What is she talking about? Why would Lincoln pay for sex or pay to have models be on his arm? Bile threatens to come up at her words and the room feels like it’s closing in.
“Blaire puts us through the wringer when it comes to him. She only wants the best for him, but I think it’s because she’s fucking him on the side too,” Linley continues to spew more and I know I need to get the hell out of here.
She is a ticking time bomb, ready to explode, and I don’t want to be anywhere near her when she does.
“There’s rumors we know of, but no one knows for sure.
I just know from my own experience what a great lay he is.
Has he spanked you up yet or called you his good girl?
Drea said the same when she was his arm piece before me.
” She gives this salacious look like she’s finally gotten under my skin, and I hate to think of him with others.
Especially since we just shared our first time together last night.
I’m sweating all over my body and my heart rate is so high that the vein in my neck is throbbing.
I’ve got to get out of this room or it’s not going to end well for me.
I’m running out of options and talking with her is like pleading with a concrete wall.
She’s beyond listening to reason and it’s now or never to make a move.
Pushing off from the table and giving it a hard shove, I’m able to make her stumble back as I make a break for the door.
“HELP! SOMEBODY HELP ME!” I’m screaming at the top of my lungs as the exit door to the main hallway is getting closer and closer. Help is just on the other side as long as I can make it there. “HELP!”
The words escape me but all too soon, as my feet are tangled in my rolling chair that was placed under the massage table.
Linley must’ve pushed it over to stop me from making it to the door.
I stumble and my hands catch the ground before my face does.
I groan as my wrist buckles from the sudden weight of the fall.
“Did you think I’d let you leave so easily?” Linley spits as she shoves my shoulder so that I’m now flat on my back. Her feet straddle my hips as she stands above me with the pipe still glued in her right hand. “The only way for us to be together is for you to be out of the picture.”
“Please, please don’t do this. He’s yours, you can have him,” I beg. I’ll say anything at this point.
“Too late.”
“This will ruin you if you don’t let me go, Linley,” I plead. “You’ll go to jail for this.”
“Everyone loves me. No one will ever believe that I did something like this. I’m the most sought-after person in the world,” she delusionally says. “Which means I can get away with murder.”
Linley raises her arms, and I let out the loudest earth-shattering scream as the pipe comes raining down.
My arms shoot up to try and block the impact that’s coming for my head, and I feel a crack to my forearm as a white searing pain shoots through me.
Linley repeats the action again and, even though my arm is on fire with pain, the next blow seems to hurt even more as she hammers my hand and fingers as I continue to block her hits.
Off in the distance, I hear screaming but I can’t think or take my eyes off of Linley, who’s continuing to pummel me.
My body must be in shock because the blood that’s splattered on her makes me think I’m watching a bloody murder scene at the movies.
All too soon, my arms can’t hold up any longer and I think my life is about to end with the next hit.
My eyes are blurry, and slowly closing. I feel my body try to curl in the fetal position on instinct, but I’m not sure at this point.
This is it, I’m dying on the floor at my place of work over a man who’d taken my virginity last night. A jealous ex is going to kill me because I fell in love with the wrong man.
For a brief second, my eyes focus on Linley for the last time.
She looks like a crazed lunatic with splatters of my blood sprinkled across her pale face.
Is that all from me? Her eyes are completely dilated and she’s sweating like a stuck pig, huffing and out of breath.
She must notice that my arms can’t support and block her attack because she gives a satisfying smirk before she raises the pipe one final time.
My eyes start to close as I follow the movement of the pipe on its way down.
It all happens so fast that my eyes can’t stay open any longer.
They close before the pipe lands on my head, and I’m pulled into a black oblivion where my pain stops.