Chapter Sixteen
I woke up in the arms of a crypto billionaire.
He was the obnoxious brand of new money who peacocked in fur coats and jewel-encrusted hats on land and wore a banana hammock at sea. I was spared his juvenile sense of humor when he slept.
The rocking ship reminded me that I was umpteen nautical miles off the coast of the Canary Islands.
I sucked in the dry sea air, tasting salt, praying for daybreak.
I listened to the man’s heavy breathing for a while, watching the way his lips moved as he drooled onto the pillow. He was out cold. I had time.
I wrapped my thumb and forefinger around his wrist, picking it up with glacial slowness as I slid out from between the sheets.
My nightdress, like everything else I’d been instructed to pack, was white.
The silky scrap of fabric was little more than a camisole that grazed the middle of my thighs.
It was warm enough that I didn’t need much more than that as I tiptoed, barefoot, from the cabin and onto the deck.
I’d scarcely closed the door when I bumped into one of the crew members.
“Sorry, Maribelle,” she said, catching my elbow apologetically. “Breakfast is almost ready. Shall I bring it to the two of you in bed?”
“I’m going to let him sleep for a little while longer,” I whispered, though it was unnecessary. The wind and waves made more noise than I did. “Could I get some coffee? I was just going to watch the sunrise.”
“Of course,” she said. “I’ll meet you on the main deck.”
Anticipating my needs, she brought a fruit tray, a sugar bowl, and a blanket. “Is there anything else I can get you?” she asked.
“I don’t suppose you have honey?”
She nodded and took off toward the kitchen.
She, like most of the crew, was probably qualified and excellent at her job, but first and foremost: She looked like she had been plucked out of a modeling catalogue.
Most of the crew was composed of women, save for the yacht captain and a few responsible for grunt work who stayed out of sight and out of mind.
I suspected they were hired specifically for being pleasing to the eye.
That was why I’d been hired, after all.
I could tell from the way they looked at me that the crew knew precisely why I was there. He’d introduced me as his girlfriend, which had been kind but unnecessary. I was to play the role of rebound. His long-term escort, Ivy, had begged me to take the job.
While I waited for sunrise, I watched the memory that had landed me on a ship in the middle of the sea.
She’d called over video chat, which had worried me.
I’d picked up from my computer on the second ring. “Ivy? Is everything okay?”
Ivy, with her balayage hair, her natural DD cups, her hourglass waist, and her eyes the color of tea, should have been an underwear model, and as far as the world was concerned, she was.
It helped explain her mysterious income, her social media posts in thongs on exotic beaches, and her rendezvous with celebrities.
I’d met her through Taylor the day before starting my new life as an escort and had liked her instantly.
She’d never said anything mean about a living soul.
I wished I could be so gracious, but I wasn’t.
“Oh, thank god, Maribelle. How would you like to be filthy rich?”
I looked around the apartment. “I’m doing pretty well for myself.”
“It’s a month-long gig,” she said. “I’ve done five of them, and I’m going to kill myself if I do another.”
I sank onto the couch, balancing the laptop on my thighs. “You’re doing an excellent job of selling this.”
“Listen: He’s prescreened, and I’ll send along all his credentials. You’ll get a hundred grand, all cash, untaxed. It’s a luxury vacation. It’s perfectly nice. But I get so sick to my stomach whenever I’m on a boat. I can’t keep doing these yacht trips.”
“Hold up.” I pushed the laptop from my legs and settled it on the coffee table. I had to be hearing things. “A hundred grand? You’re fucking with me. Unless he’s some Russian oligarch, that’s a made-up number.”
I was already a top-earning escort. Meeting Taylor had meant skipping over the back pages, the websites, the uncertainty.
My friends in the business and I were word-of-mouth only.
Our anonymity and exclusivity were enough to justify charging an hourly grand.
After all, you were worth whatever people would pay, and if you told them they were buying luxury, they’d believe you. But this amount of money was fictional.
She shook her head. “The guy’s a billionaire, thanks to Bitcoin or whatever.
He makes that much in passive interest every time he sneezes.
Plus, you sign ten thousand pages of non-disclosure agreements.
You get blood tested and examination results faxed to his assistant.
You’re paid from offshore accounts. It’s a whole ordeal.
But it’s thirty days, and the entire thing is floating on the ocean.
He does these twice a year, and it’s so hard for me to stay friendly while seasick.
I fill my entire suitcase with Dramamine and it’s never enough. ”
“But one hundred…”
“It’s first-time numbers,” she said, addressing my obvious skepticism. “I made that much on my first booking, and then I took the luxury cut for every month-long booking after.”
The luxury cut. I knew it well. Clients who paid for our designer bags, our shoes, our bills, our meals, our private jets, our consistency…
Well, they scratched our back, and we scratched theirs.
It was better to have a twice-yearly customer at one hundred grand if those were repeat numbers than a one-off for twice the price.
I tried to do the math. I generally booked three-hour minimums at one thousand an hour. Twenty-four hours a day, thirty days…I supposed he was getting quite the discount from buying in bulk.
Then I understood the catch. Uneasiness spread through me.
“Being at sea, though? Doesn’t that seem…” I twisted my fingers. Sex workers made for vulnerable targets. And being in the ocean with no one around…
She supplied the name and a handful of details. I didn’t have to google him, as I was wildly familiar with the crypto tycoon. Still, I wanted to look into the face of the man I was about to sign away thirty days of my life to.
“Is he nice?”
She made an apologetic face. “He’s…entitled.”
“He sucks,” I supplied, knowing Ivy well enough to understand that she wasn’t going to badmouth her former client, even if he deserved it.
She did her best to salvage the pitch. “He just wants someone pretty to pretend to listen to him for a few weeks. He’s smart, but not as smart as he thinks he is.
I’m confident you’ll be bored stiff. I’ve already texted him your pictures.
He thinks you’re gorgeous, which, of course you are. You’re exactly his type.”
“Fine,” I said, still twisting the fabric between my fingers. As uncomfortable as I was, dollar signs danced before my eyes.
“Oh, good! Thank you, you absolute sparkle cupcake goddess sunshine flower.”
Ivy remained in contact over the next few days as I shopped and packed for the trip.
She answered any questions I had, sent voice clips of pep talks, and remained available right up until I stepped onto the private jet he’d sent to get me on the eleven-hour flight from the States to Morocco.
I’d been writing for several months, but I had hit a roadblock with the main character’s climax.
I’d used the trip to outline several possible outcomes, pounding away at the keyboard as I threw back as many champagne flutes as the attendants would give me.
As it turned out, the limit did not exist.
I was dragged from the flashback of the choices that had led me to this moment.
She was so much more than a crewmember—she was a speck of joy in a flat horizon of deep, dark blue.
The rising sun carved a harsh path across the rolling waves directly to the ship, illuminating her in early shades of ginger and salmon. She offered a smile.
“Is this how you take it? If so, I can ensure there’s a honey pot with the French press every morning.”
I smiled. “Hey, could you sit with me?”
She looked around uncertainly. “I’m not really supposed to. I’m on the clock.”
I lifted a shoulder sympathetically. “So am I.”
And maybe it was the honesty, or maybe she was every bit as miserable trapped on a ship surrounded by sycophants and a member of the pretentious elite, but she sat.
Her name, I learned, was Erin. She was a few inches shorter than me and had light brown hair and the most dazzling smile.
She shared my coffee that morning. I learned that she was from Alberta.
She’d dropped out of college after her first year.
She’d applied to numerous modeling agencies.
A friend had recruited her to the yacht circles.
But more importantly, I learned that she was allergic to bees.
That she had a younger brother. That she devoured thrillers and hated seafood, which made eating on the ship exceptionally challenging.
Erin listened to my pitch for my novel, asked several questions about South America, and squeezed my hand sympathetically when I talked about my childhood.
“Is he…okay? To be around?” she asked of our shared employer.
I laughed. “He’s exactly like you think he is.
The worst part is that he’s a cuddler. I know that men need intimacy, and I know I provide something important to the human experience by offering touch and hugs and those moments of comfort, but I do not want to be touched when I’m sleeping.
I want it to be as distant as the North Pole and Antarctica.
It’s really hard for me to fall asleep when someone else is touching me. ”
“Have you tried sleeping pills?”