Chapter 3

The end of everything.

A week before her due date.

I don't know where she picked up the rumor.

She shoved open the door of the private room upstairs at the postpartum care center.

Cigarette between my fingers, a model tucked under my arm, I froze.

The music cut off.

I looked at her, a little awkward.

"Sara..."

She didn't say a word.

She crossed the room in a few strides.

And slapped me hard across the face.

"Ma'am, please, calm down!"

The agent rushed over in a panic.

She turned and slapped that agent hard across the face too.

"So this is what you people call top-tier service!

"Running this kind of business upstairs at a postpartum center! Are you all that desperate to survive? Do you have any conscience left at all?"

This agent was also Sara's midwife.

Her eyes were red.

The model I'd hired shrank against me in fear.

Sara pointed at her, eyes rimmed red.

"Do you even know what kind of place this is?

"Do you know the men you're servicing are all fathers-to-be?

"Have you got any shame left?"

She grabbed a fistful of the model Crystal's hair.

The room dissolved into chaos.

A liquor bottle toppled to the floor.

The whole private room filled with her crying and cursing and the models' shocked screams.

Threaded through with the agent's frantic pleading.

I closed my eyes for a second.

Then grabbed Sara by the arm.

"Are you done making a scene?"

"Me? Making a scene?"

Sara's eyes brimmed with tears.

"Roy, tell me the truth. When you booked this postpartum center, you already knew, didn't you?"

I said nothing.

"You book a place like this, and you still have the nerve to say I'm making a scene?"

She'd yanked my collar into wrinkles.

A thread of irritation rose in me.

I pushed her off.

"Then pay for it yourself!"

She stood there, frozen.

"Go on! Book a postpartum center with no working girls in it! Go ahead!"

Her trembling hands cupped her belly.

"I'm pregnant. How am I supposed to earn money to book a postpartum center?"

I felt myself getting agitated.

"Go sell yourself, then."

She went blank.

Swallowed hard.

And forced the words out, hoarse.

"What did you say?"

"Go sell yourself! It's not like there aren't pregnant ones doing it here.

"They can do it. Why can't you?"

Her tears nearly spilled over.

She bit down hard and held them back.

"Roy, are you even human?"

Watching her shake, unable to get a word out.

Something in me twisted too.

So I turned my face away.

And spoke like a man digging in out of spite.

"No money, then go back down.

"Rest downstairs where you belong.

"Don't worry. I won't actually do anything with them."

"Roy, you animal!"

Sara lunged at me.

I instinctively moved to stop her.

But her swollen feet gave out first.

Thud. She went down on the floor.

The agent.

Her midwife too.

Stepped in and caught her.

Looked at the fluid spreading across the floor beneath her.

The agent cried out.

"Ma'am! Your water broke!"

I stood there, stunned.

"Sir, we have to get her to the delivery room right now.

"Three thousand. Pay the fee first."

Sara clutched her belly.

Struggled to lift her head and look at me.

Tears still glistened in her eyes.

But her voice had turned into a plea.

"Honey... help me..."

I turned.

Pulled three thousand in cash out of my wallet.

"Didn't you say you don't know how to earn money?

"Come on. Let me teach you how it's done around here.

"Kneel down. Bite it.

"Then the money's yours."