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Saturday dawned cold, and it seemed to get colder as time went on. Adeline returned to Hackney early in the evening, and spent an hour in Cal’s townhome. The sun was setting now, and she was in the passenger seat of his car, frowning at the world outside and fiddling with the fabric of her skirt. It was much too cold for a skirt like this, but Cal seldom gave her any say in her attire – or anything else, for that matter.

“You be good for me tonight, Adeline,” he was saying as he lit up his cigarette. Adeline hated cigarettes – it seemed like everyone who ever made her feel bad about herself smoked. It was directly correlated with negativity.

And, it made her nose itch.

“I will,” she said softly.

Cal smirked. “I know. You always are. It’s so nice having you around. You really should work with me more often.”

Adeline bit her lip to keep from crying out at the thought. She would sooner starve.

But would you let Michael starve? Her thoughts taunted her, because she knew that she couldn’t honestly answer herself. Wasn’t the fact that she was here proof enough that she would subject herself to anything if it meant Michael didn’t suffer more than he already did?

“Tonight will be very good for you,” Cal was saying. He leaned over to rest his hand on her leg, and Adeline cringed. “There’s a big event going on in London tonight, which means lots of very rich men and very fancy wines. Maybe they’ll even let you have a taste.”

She didn’t answer. She just shut her eyes and pretended she was anywhere but here, going anywhere but where she was heading.



London was alive tonight. The boys found themselves in high company as they strolled through the busy event hall, rubbing elbows with everyone from label representatives to politicians. What was the event? None of them were entirely sure, though it had been explained to them several times. All they took note of was the number of people and the quality of the champagne.
Bright-eyed Liam was the only one of the bunch to decline his champagne, making do with a glass of sparkling water and laughing as his friends made a show about the taste of their beverages. By the time the toast took place, they had been there for hours, mixing and mingling. Now it was nearing the end of the night, and they were seated at a table away from the little-used dance floor, distancing themselves from the chatter.

“What a night, eh?” Liam said softly to his best mates.

Niall grinned at him across the table. “Hard to believe this is the life, innit?” The boys all nodded their agreement. Was it really so long ago that they were just five boys, hoping someone would give them a shot at their dreams? Now they lived their dreams every day, and sometimes they still thought they’d wake up and find that none of it was real.



The gathering was ending. Adeline could tell by the way the attendees trickled out the massive double doors, and the way Cal squeezed her shoulders in a way that was almost threatening before he stepped back and leaned against the wall behind her. She leaned casually up against the light post, although she felt anything but casual. She felt like part of her was dying; part of her died every time she did this. Sometimes, in her darker moments, she wished that it would be the last part.

“Well, aren’t you tidy!” The speaker was coming up the pavement to her left. She took a breath and changed her face. It would not do to be herself tonight. She glanced at the man out of the corner of her eye, studying him while giving all the appearance of boredom.

“Tu pense?” she questioned dubiously. Cal did not allow her to speak English. He wanted her to appear more exotic – Parisian trash instead of London filth. It didn’t matter. The man was grinning at her now, and his eyes looked her up and down.

“Oh, you’ll definitely do. You want to have some fun, don’t ya lass?” He couldn’t see, wasn’t looking, but her usually blue-grey eyes had hardened to a flat, dull tone, the color of the cloudy London skies.

“Tu es trés genial, monsieur.” That was a lie. He was not nice. Nothing about him was nice. He was disgusting. He was disgusting, and she was a whore. He was looking behind her now, at Cal.

“She’s a pretty little French bird, eh? Well, that’s interesting. They say that pleasure sounds the same in every language. Maybe I’ll test that.” Adeline could not let her eyes betray that she understood, but her heart was caught up in her throat, the same as it was every time. It was racing, too quickly, at the thought of what she would have to go through tonight. Cal was talking to the man now, closing the deal, and again Adeline thought, How lovely it would be to die.



“Excuse me!” He wasn’t sure what caused him to break away from his friends, toward the girl across the street. He didn’t know what caught his eye. He only knew that he recognized her. It was the girl with the frightened eyes, the girl who ran away from the diner with a pilfered loaf in hand. As he called out again, his friends turning to him as he crossed the busy road – paying little heed to the traffic of the late night – to the post against which she leaned. There were men behind her, men with greedy eyes and creeping countenances.

“Pardon, monsieur. Avez-vous dit quelque chose?” He paused as he looked at her. This was the same girl, wasn’t it? She looked… different, and he thought he might prefer the ragged clothes of the day prior. After a moment longer, though, he was sure – because her eyes held the same fear as they had when he had held out his hand to her in the restaurant. She recognized them, he was sure.

“Lou, what’s gotten in to you?” The young man frowned before turning to his friend.

“Harry, don’t you recognize her?” The look in the other boy’s eyes said he didn’t, and Louis wasn’t terribly surprised. He wasn’t sure why he remembered the girl.

“I do.” The pair of them turned to look at Niall as he spoke softly from behind them. “She’s the little lass who fell at lunch yesterday, isn’t she?” Louis nodded, his heart going out to his blond companion for mentioning only the fall, and not the circumstances.

“Excuse me, boys, but were you lookin’ for some company. If you were, you might have to settle that with this gentleman here, because he’s looking to occupy our lovely Adeline for the evening.” The boys shared a glance, and it said all that was needed. Liam stepped forward as their eyes designated him the spokesperson of the group. He crossed to the two men and spoke in hushed tones. The girl – Adeline – watched him walk by with wary eyes.

“Hello, Adeline. That’s your name, right? Adeline?” The girl’s eyes, glinting gunmetal in the street light, narrowed at Louis as he spoke.

“Vous n'êtes pas un acheteur très bon. Les acheteurs ne doivent pas parler aux putes.” Her words came out like venom, and Louis backed away, shocked at her tone though her words were foreign to him.

“What did she say, Haz?” But the other boy was looking at the girl solemnly.

“Ne dites pas que,” he said softly to her at last. Adeline sneered at him and turned her head away, looking back to where the three men – Cal, the buyer, and the strange newcomer from this group – stood, still speaking. She made it quite clear that they were uninteresting to her; if they left, she would still work tonight, and so she felt nothing at spurning them, because in truth she would rather go with the sleazy stranger than be subjected to the whims of a group.

“She said,” Harry finally whispered lowly to his friends, “that you aren’t a good buyer, and that you shouldn’t talk to her.” There was more than that, Louis knew, but it didn’t matter. Liam was returning now, and his face was grim. The other men had very opposing expressions – one of them looked like he was celebrating Christmas, whereas the other looked like he had just been robbed, and in a way he had been.

“You be good for our new friends, Adeline. Vous êtes bonne pour eux.” Cal put a hand firmly on her lower back and bent down to whisper in her ear. “They’re paying very well for the pleasure.”

As he pushed her forward, Adeline raised her chin defiantly, but inside she felt like she would never get enough air again.