But this was her life now. It would have to be enough. And there was always Jeb, lurking in the background. If she craved sex, she could turn to him – and shamefully, she often did. She was never going to be free of him; after everything that had happened, they were linked and could never be separated. He’d seen to Kylie and she had paid him, in cash and in kind. That was what her life amounted to now.

79

79

Suki was still spying out the land. She’d walked past the club many times among the hustle and bustle of New Yorkers on the sidewalks. She found that she rather liked New York, the yellow cabs thronging the streets, the noise, the sheer liveliness of the place. After the trailer park, it felt like heaven. Like things were happening, all around her, for the first time ever.

She must have hovered outside Sylvester’s a dozen times before she summoned the nerve to actually walk through the black doors and speak to one of the big muscle-bound men there.

‘You know the advertisement? The one on the wall?’ she asked one of them, who was smiling at her.

‘Ah sure do,’ he said, aping her accent. ‘Where you from, honey chile?’

‘Baton Rouge,’ she said.

‘Phewee! That accent’s to die for. You sound warm as molasses, baby doll. You really do.’

‘Thank you,’ said Suki. ‘Um. The job? I’d like to apply, if I can.’

Now his colleague came over. He was smiling too. Suki had that effect on men, in general. She was used to them staring and acting the fool around her. Look at Stefan. Look at Mike.

‘Come on up to the office, I’ll see if the boss is home to visitors today.’

Suki went in, gazing around at the club. It looked elegant and expensive, and there were girls up at the bar chatting and laughing, all of them squeezed into tight costumes in various colours. A brunette in scarlet. An ash-blonde in cool primrose-yellow. An ebony-skinned stunner in bright Caribbean lime-green. They looked gorgeous.

She followed the doorman upstairs and at the top he knocked at one of two closed doors, and opened it. ‘Hey, Donna? Got a lady here wants to apply, if you’ll see her?’

Donna, thought Suki. Not Claire. If Claire had once been one of the girls downstairs, she’d have been out of the job long since. Only the young and glamorous could hack that. Or maybe she hadn’t been one of the girls at all. Maybe she’d been a cleaner. Or worked in the kitchens. Or behind the bar. Suki itched to ask either the man or the middle-aged woman behind the desk if Claire Milo was still here. If she wasn’t, no matter. Suki would just go right on searching until she found her.