Everyone Lies by A. Garrett D. Read Free Book Online Page A

pleads.
    Marta suppresses a sigh and strokes his arm. Most men leave after they’ve fucked her, but there is still ten minutes on the clock, and Trevor will take every minute owed. ‘Okay. I’ve never told anybody this …’ She settles in his arms and makes up some new stories – the small dusty town she came from; her family’s vegetable patch and the chickens she would feed as a child and which terrified her because they pecked her legs – and it makes her tired, because now she’ll have to remember all this stuff.
    When the half-hour is finally over, she watches him tuck these intimate details of her life near his heart, like a lock of her hair, and hates him for it.
    He’s dressed and, eager for him to go, she swings her legs over the side of the bed and reaches for her silk night robe. He catches her hand and entwines his fingers in hers, turns her hand over and begins kissing her palm. She thinks it’s an overture to more sex, but he holds her arm straight and examines the crook of her elbow.
    ‘What are you doing?’ She snatches her hand away. ‘You think I am junkie, Trevor?’
    ‘I’m sorry,’ he says, immediately. ‘I’m just concerned. It was on the evening news, didn’t you see it? Girls are dying – bad drugs, they think.’
    She throws on her robe and fastens the silk cord tight. ‘I work nights, Trevor. I don’t watch news.’ She moves to the door. ‘And I don’t do drugs.’
    ‘Marta, please, it’s only because I care about you. Please ,’ he says again, and she softens her eyes, even though what she wants to do is slap his face.
    ‘Of course,’ she says. ‘Come, I’ll see you downstairs.’
    He is reassured, and flattered, too, because he doesn’t know what all the girls know – that she is walking him down to reception to make sure he leaves.
    After he has gone, she can’t recall her mother’s face. Georgs, Veronika, little Toms; they’ve all vanished. She locked them in a dark room with the rest of her past when she came here, and now she can’t find the key. For a second she can’t breathe, starts to panic.
    ‘You all right?’ Amy is working reception tonight because Sharon, the old pro who usually does it, has called in sick. Amy is brunette, tanned and slim, though the tan is sprayed on. She has brown, heavily lashed eyes, and there is not one atom of human compassion in them. ‘You shouldn’t let them get to you, Marta.’
    To hell with it. Marta turns on her heel and heads back through the archway. It’s only half an hour until her shift ends, and anyway, there is no one waiting in the lounge. She turns left, into the kitchen. She opens her locker and takes out her purse, slides the fee from Trevor into the wallet section. She keeps a photograph of herself with Veronika in the ID section. It reminds her why she’s here, and she touches it, for good luck.
    Candice is sitting at the table, fully dressed, drinking coffee.
    Marta’s phone is in her locker. She checks her text messages: one from her mother. Tweets from two friends who know nothing about what she does for money, sent at one in the morning from a club in the city. She follows a link to ‘yfrog’ and finds a picture of them dancing, laughing. They look very drunk, and very happy.
    Candice sniffs every few seconds, like she has a cold, and sits hunched over, both hands wrapped around her cup, although the place is always overheated. As she bends to take a sip of her drink, she shows a half-inch of dark brown grow-back at the roots. Her make-up is three shades too dark for her complexion, and completely fails to hide the heroin sickness underneath.
    Marta’s phone jingles – another text. She feels a shiver of excitement – it’s from Gary. ‘Ready for a F2F?’ – a face to face – for the first time.
    Candice finally realizes there’s someone else in the room. ‘Oh,’ she says. ‘Hiya.’ Her eyes go to Marta’s phone. ‘Boyfriend?’
    Marta shakes her head, smiling.
    ‘Oh,’