Part III: Labor Day It's been six months since I last heard from Paolo or Gio. Life has been… well, life. Everyday routines set in, and I have more free time than I've had without the car wash. Still, I struggle to forget what happened and those anxious and exhilarating few weeks. Something Paolo said has stuck in my brain, "Gio is at his day job, shall we say." Funny way of putting it. Like his job is unusual. Much like...

It's been three weeks since the night at the car wash. I am confident Kevin was not the person viewing the security camera; he's been blissfully unaware. But I am anything but blissful. The memory of that night races through my head and the paranoia of precisely who was watching. I need to know. I pull up Gio's number and text, "Hey Gio, hope everything is going well at the car wash. I want to talk. The security camera ha...

Part 1: Breach of Contract It’s Friday at 4:45 pm and I’m finally done with my last meeting of the week. I look at my phone to see six missed calls and two voicemails. I know the number, it’s the woman I sold the car wash to just two weeks ago. My long-term boyfriend Kevin and I owned a successful car wash for seven years as an investment. I’ve been successful in my fitness equipment sales career, but now nearing fifty, I...

This story goes back a few years, to shortly after I married Julie. During our first year of marriage we lived in a studio flat in southeast London. Like most newlyweds, we struggled to make ends meet. Besides my day job in the city, I managed to supplement my income in the evenings by selling cocaine in pubs in and around my local area. Trouble is, Julie and I seemed to snort all the profits ourselves rather than turn it...

It was about 2 AM when the phone rang. The voice on the other end simply said to get dressed. He told me exactly what to wear. Exactly. He wanted me in a black micro mini skirt, little black mesh top that barely came below my nipples, five inch platform heels, lots of junk jewelry and a bushy Vegas platinum blonde wig. He said to come to the Diamond Motel on the Gulf Freeway and then he hung up. I recognized his voice as...

I was in my mid twenties and Desiree was just twenty years old, but did look a bit older. She'd already lived a hard life and had many tattoos, but was still very sexy and beautiful. She was a sexual dynamo and loved exploring different fantasies and debaucheries. We lived together for about a year and a half, until she became bored and it was time for her to move on. She was a wild street girl who couldn't stay in one pl...

KINGS IN EXILE Carl’s feet were on the ground even before he had tossed his sheets off him. His mind had quickly switched into survival mode. The knocking on the door was still fresh in his senses as he grabbed the only thing he had at had to dress himself. He wrapped the towel about his middle and knotted it quickly. If this is Ballaz coming for my ass, thought Carl, then it's do or die. I ain’t running no more. Carl pus...

KING IN EXILE   "Yo ese, where are you?"  Carl was still trying to work out the answer to that question, fifteen minutes after he had been dumped here. All he knew was that it was raining, he was wet, and a little further down the road was a large truck stop. He was still making his way down the freeway towards it as he spoke on his cellphone.  "I don't know!" Carl replied, trying to the keep the edge of panic out of his...

The passing traffic looked like a blur to Keyaron's eyes, fuzzed lights in a sea of glare. Anything beyond that was just a foggy haze of looming shadows, and blackness. The sound of passing cars and trucks were hard, but nothing hit him as the constant shock of the cold. Bradford was bitter some nights, and it wasn't even snowing. It was the type of cold that cut straight through whatever you were wearing.Not much further...