YOU DIDN'T MISS WEDNESDAY'S CHAPTER DID YOU???
That's right, I'm posting twice a week now! If you missed Wednesday's update, go ahead an check her out before you read this. Otherwise, here's the next chapter...
I hope you enjoy this little aside from Vivian's POV. It was harder to write than I expected. I had hoped I'd have an easier time writing the POV of a powerful, take-no-BS woman, but it was actually really hard . Guess I'm not the badass I thought I was 😂😂😂
Anyway, I hope you enjoy. I'll see you again on Wednesday!
Vivian
Vivian Townsend's trade was not one a civilized person might call ethical. The religious crowd would call her a lascivious, sinful glutton for passion. A dealer of damnation. The more secular righteous would call her a predator and a snake, profiting off the bodies of young women and the hard-earned coin of the men who lusted after them.
In truth, neither one of those groups would be wrong. Not all whores enjoyed their job, but Vivian did. She was good at it, as skilled at teasing pleasure from her own body as she was at milking it from her clients'. She was, indeed, a glutton for the rolling bliss of a well-earned climax. And she was, indeed, obsessive about the ever-expanding number on her ledgers. She had never known life outside the confines of a brothel, and she had found a way to thrive within them.
Yes, she was a wanton temptress. Yes, she liked to count her money. But just as her happiness was confined to the bounds of her reality, so too was her concept of right and wrong. A lilly-white damsel and her dandified husband might find her a wretched blight on society, but to her girls and in her own studiously introspective regard, she was the height of honor.
There were three immutable and unbroken rules around which her ethical code was based.
First-- the girls she hired had nowhere else to go. She never forced a girl into service. Never kidnapped her off the streets or sent her to work before she'd reached her majority. All of her employees were rescued from circumstances that allowed them no other alternatives. She improved lives, she didn't diminish them.
Two-- the girls she hired didn't have to work the way Vivian had been forced to work. She pulled her girls from abusive brothels, from dark alleys and street corners, and she gave them a choice. They could whore for her-- clean bed, fair pay, and protection from their unruly customers. Or they could work for her in other capacities, cleaning or serving drinks or waiting tables. She had never been given any option but to earn a living with her body. She took great pride in offering a choice to others that had been denied her.
Three-- the girls she employed were safe. She vetted her clients, and she controlled them. Nobody abused Vivian's girls and got away with it. They lost kneecaps. They lost balls. They lost lives. The punishment met the crime, and Vivian saw that the punishment was meted out swiftly and justly.
It was a dirty code of honor, but it was a code nonetheless, and she was ruthless in her adherence because she was determined that the harsh brutality of the world would not reduce her to some hapless, tormented victim. She had learned very early in her life that a woman's body was a trap. The strictures of society and her own physical vulnerabilities made her a target and lessened the avenues by which she might escape both her predators and her circumstances. Shortly after she learned that her body was a cage, she decided that she could hone the bars of that cage into deadly instruments. She could kill with them. Earn with them. Rule with them.
At the end of the day, women were the weaker sex. The frailer sex. She couldn't best a man in a fight or outrun him if he gave chase after her. But men were fatally weak in the groin, in more ways than one, and Vivian was a master of exploiting that weakness.
So it was with pride, not with shame, that Vivian strode the short but lonely stretch of dirt path to the establishment she owned, part and parcel. The fire that had burned her first saloon to the ground had made her stronger-- fueled her thirst for success. She had found this place within days. Bought it. Fixed it up. Made it her own. Her girls were safer here than they had been in the center of town-- less exposed to random acts of callous anger. If anyone attacked them here, they'd have to have intent. And anyone who had intent was already in her sights.
It was dusk when she arrived home, weary from her journey. Her trips to the cities were never fixed to a schedule. Sometimes she was gone for months. This time, she'd been gone for a mere three weeks. She'd intended to bring back a new girl, but she hadn't found anyone in a position to justify her interference. Sometimes it went that way, and it was never a disappointment. It was better not to find a girl at the very edge of her spiritual and physical endurance. At the end of the day... yes, it was better. Vivian did not hurt for employees.
Summer sunsets in this part of the world were a lovely thing-- pink and red and dusky green, whatever color God chose to paint Her majesty. Whatever was Her whim. Vivian enjoyed the sunset, but was not seduced by it. A master seductress could not be seduced. Instead, her ears were trained to the quiet woods around her. She was confident not stupid, and she had been attacked before. It was an attack that had left her penniless and dishonored, on her back while a man rutted over her, grunting a release into her young body that he paid for with pennies.
There was no attack that evening. Nothing but crickets and that glorious sunset to accompany her as she climbed the stairs to her home-- her tiny, inviolable corner of the world. She could hear tinny music from inside-- someone was playing the piano, and not very well. Voices and chatter. Glasses clinking. Men's rumbling voices and women giggling.
It was a gentle homecoming.
Inside, she found the place much as she had left it. There was really no way to distinguish one night from the next in this little town. Same customers, same degrees of drunk. Same drinks in their grubby hands. Same girls, same fake laughter. Same rotating outfits-- silk and lace and satin for the girls. Dirt- and sweat-stained cotton for the men.
The girls greeted her when she walked in-- a melodic chorus of welcome. The men greeted her as well-- less melodic. Less coherent. Less polite.
Vivian no longer considered herself lithe and beautiful, as she had once been. She wasn't an old woman, but her body was not the lovely thing it used to be. Her breasts had sagged, her curves shifting and growing. Everything she consumed seemed to drop, heavy and unwelcome, into her belly. Once upon a time she'd worn all her gluttonous indulgences in her ass and her chest, where they were nice to look at and fondle. Now she felt lopsided and ungainly.
Despite her evolving form, she knew she carried the allure of confidence and reputation. She didn't brag, and she rarely took clients anymore, but her reputation didn't need a hundred men spewing her praises. She was a woman with needs and occasionally she found a man to help her see to those needs. Her favorite, these days, with Sheriff Lee. The quiet ones were always the most alive in the bedroom. Something about all that pent up energy made them explosive and downright formidable between the sheets. But the sheriff wasn't her only partner, and word had gotten around--
Vivian Townsend was an expert in her own business.
So it was with confidence born of genuine success that she strode across the room, admired but unmolested, and sank onto a stool at the end of the bar. Cigar smoke tickled her nostrils as her boot heels echoed hollow against the pine wood floor, and the off-tune piano continued to play its pitiful, nostalgic tune in the background. She set her travel bag beside her as Caroline came to greet her.
"Welcome home," the girl said, although 'girl' was a relative term. Caro was in her thirties, her face and body, like Vivian's, showing the signs of a hard life. She had deep grooves in her forehead and tiny wrinkles bracketing her eyes and mouth. She would outlive her beauty, though, sharp as a tack and ruthlessly diligent in her duties. Vivian never wanted to retire-- to sink into nameless quiet-- but someday she would die. She could think of no better heir to her legacy than Caroline.
"How's it been?" she asked, looking around, searching for the one face she always hoped she wouldn't see. Every time she left, she harbored a secret hope she would return and find him gone. It was her deepest fear and her greatest dream-- that he would finally liberate himself of this life he had never asked to live. But there he always was, standing in the corner, watching the room with world-weary eyes that had been too old for his face since the first time she had looked into them.
"Quiet," Caroline said, drawing Vivian's attention back from where her son stood, leaning against the wall by the door. "For the most part, anyway. Reverend Peters stopped by."
Alarm was like a bolt of lightning, locking up her muscles and making her hair stand on end. She nearly toppled out of her chair, reaching like a drowning woman for the glass Caro placed by her hand. She gripped it so hard she worried it might shatter.
"What?"
"The reverend," Caroline said, jerking her chin toward the door as if that answered all her questions. "I guess his wife disappeared, about a week ago. He came here looking for her. Said we kidnapped her or something." The other woman rolled her eyes and wiped at the bartop with a rag. "What use we'd have with a prude like that is beyond me, but he was convinced. Searched the whole place top to bottom."
"Guess he didn't find her," Vivian said, trying to sound wry even while her heart pleaded for a genuine answer. Truth be told, she didn't care what happened to the preacher's wife. What she cared for was the toll the woman's pain took on her son.
"Not here," Caroline laughed. "Put Gabe in a foul mood, though..." she trailed off, and both women glanced at the man in the corner. Vivian was not, in her own opinion, a very good mother. She had raised her precious, perfect child in harsh and cruel environments. Allowed him to be hurt and corrupted by forces he was too young to understand. But whether she was a good mother or not did not make her any less of a mother. And that second heart inside of her-- the one that beat in time with his-- clenched when she let her eyes rest on his face.
Something was wrong.
Abandoning her drink and her travel bag, and Caroline, she crossed the room in feigned unhurried ease, and joined her son at the wall. She leaned back, crossing her arms over her chest and mocking his posture.
"Welcome home, ma," he said. "How was your trip?"
"Fine," she said dismissively. "What's this about the reverend's wife?"
Anyone else in the world would have missed the way he flinched, but she had been reading his subtle cues as long as he'd been alive. He'd never been a cooperative spirit. As a baby he'd cried so little she thought he was damaged coming out of the womb. As a little boy, it had taken him so long to talk her suspicions intensified. She loved him no less, but she worried all the more for the stunted, brain-damaged child she had brought into the world.
And then he'd started speaking-- not words, but sentences. Short ones. Quiet ones. Intelligent ones. While other children babbled and rambled, her sweet little angel told her precisely what he needed, asked her precisely what he wanted to know, and no more. And she realized that he wasn't broken at all, he just didn't like to share the inner workings of his heart and mind. She had to learn to read the words that came in the silence, because his body and his face spoke more clearly and more often than his mouth.
"Reverend's wife went missing," he said, the words short and concise, while his body screamed at her of worry and fatigue. "Sheriff came looking."
"Did he find anything?" she asked.
"Of course not."
"Alright, good," she said, gazing at the crowded bar room. She had a hunch-- an itchy, maternal feeling-- that she knew exactly where the reverend's wife had gone. "Let's have a cup of coffee and talk about the books after the night winds down."
"Alright," he said, his jaw clenching and releasing. She'd have to teach him to be more subtle about his tells. He'd never be any good at cards, this way. At least not if he played with her. Not that he ever played cards. She had a feeling if he played with anyone other than her, he'd be brilliant. It was, after all, in his blood.
"Alright," she agreed. "I don't know if I have any coffee in my rooms. I'll come to yours?"
He stiffened, every muscle in his body locked tight. Then, like a blink, it was over. "Maybe not, ma. My room's a mess."
She sighed. She had raised a good son. A strong son. A loyal son. A smart son. A kind son.
What she had not raised, it seemed, was a competent liar. At least not to her.
"I can probably scrounge something up," she said, nudging him in the ribs with her elbow. "But you have to be honest with me, Gabriel. Truth for coffee, you know the deal."
* * *
It was near dawn when the crowd finally dwindled. Sunday nights, ironically, were their busiest, longest night. Like children fresh out of the bath, churchgoers were always extra eager to smear mud and shit on their unblemished skin. She was exhausted from the day of traveling, and from a night of working, when the last customer finally left and she was able to steal away to her rooms. She unpacked her bag and set a kettle to boil on the small stove in the corner of her room. She'd nearly given up on her son when the quiet knock sounded at the door.
"Come in," she called, tugging a shawl over the worn blue nightgown into which she'd changed. Titillating lingerie was no longer her preferred sleepwear.
"Hey, ma," Gabe said quietly as he slipped into the room and shut the door behind him.
"Sit," she commanded, pointing at the empty chair across her small table as she sank into its partner. He obeyed, as he always did. He had this idea, her boy, that he owed her. What he thought she'd done for him that she didn't already owe him was beyond her. He was her son. He hadn't chosen life. She had thrust it upon him. Everything she did as his mother was her duty. He owed her nothing. She owed him everything.
It was for Gabe that she'd begun to take charge down in Texas, climbing the ladder of leadership within the brothel she'd thought would chew her up and spit her out. It was for Gabe that she squirreled away her cash. For Gabe that she learned to love her job and thrive in a place that had, until the moment of his birth, threatened to destroy her.
He was the angel that had pulled her from a life of aimless survival, showing her the meaning of love in a world that had offered her nothing but hardship and cruelty.
He was the bright, immovable star that guided her journey from squalor and shame to pride and bounty.
He was her favorite person. Her saving grace. Her one pure good.
"You look tired," she said as the kettle began to boil behind her, rattling and coughing out a strained, stuttering whistle.
"So do you," he shot back, tapping his thumb on the use-polished tabletop.
Tea instead of coffee, she decided, not bothering to ask him his opinion as she stood and retrieved her tea brick from the shelves by the stove. He wrinkled his nose as she shaved a serving off into a cup and passed it off to him, but didn't protest.
In silence, she fixed the tea and set the kettle aside. Gabe accepted his cup and stared down at the liquid. She looked down as well-- at the dark leaves and the stained water, steam billowing off the surface. She pulled in a deep breath that smelled vaguely of leaves.
"Shoulda made coffee," Gabe muttered, and she laughed. Anyone who thought her boy was soulless just didn't know how to listen to him.
"So are you going to tell me the truth, or do I have to lose sleep over it?" she asked, half joking but fully serious in her pursuit of the truth. A little guilt went a long way with her son.
He pulled in a deep breath and let it out on a sigh, raising his tea for a sip, grimacing.
"Tastes like puddle water," he grumbled.
"Well, stop drinking puddle water," she shot back. "Maybe your pallet will be more refined. Don't dodge the question, Gabriel."
Setting his cup down, he met her eye in the low light. Grey sunlight spread from behind the heavy curtain on her window, mixing dreamily with the flickering lantern on the table.
"Reverend's wife went missing," he said succinctly.
"Yes, I got that." She rolled her eyes, wrapping both hands around her tea. "Where is she?"
His eyes dropped to the table, fingers tightening around the handle of his cup.
"Gabe..."
"She's in my room."
It was, she realized, what she had expected all along. Not what she had hoped, of course, but what she had expected. Her strong, pragmatic son had always had a troublesome soft spot where Katherine Williamson was concerned. Katherine Williamson Peters, she reminded herself with distaste.
She knew it was wrong, but she didn't care much for the girl. She'd liked her well enough when she was a sweet, innocent friend for her sweet, innocent boy. She'd liked her quite a lot when they had begun sneaking off together in the darkest parts of the night. If there was anything Vivian understood, it was sex. She knew how it felt when it was a chore, and knew how it felt when it was a rapturous exchange of souls. She had loved Katherine like a daughter for those short periods when she thought her son had found that glorious homecoming.
But then reality had set in, and Vivian realized Katherine was no different from everyone else in town. She used, and Vivian could forgive her selfishness except that it had hurt the one person she cared for more than herself. Katherine had used her son for friendship. For comfort. For companionship. For pleasure. She took and took, and all she ever gave him in return was heartbreak and betrayal.
But there was nothing she could do for the fact that the one person to whom Gabe offered more loyalty than he offered his mother was Katherine Williamson Peters. There would be no talking him out of giving her his all, just as there would be no talking him into abandoning this life and seeking something better. It was one of the most difficult things about motherhood, she was learning-- accepting that her son was no longer an impressionable boy but a strong-willed man whose code of honor didn't always align with her wishes.
"How long will she be staying?" she asked, fixing her eyes on his face and watching for the little twitches that had always told her more than he'd say with words. His jaw firmed and his eyes flickered down to the table before locking back on hers.
"As long as it takes," he said. "She's hurt, ma. She needs to heal, and I need to find somewhere safe for her to go."
That gave her pause. Vivian didn't like sweet little Katherine, but that didn't mean she wanted to see her hurt.
"Is she alright?"
"She's okay." His mouth twitched, nostrils flared, and he pulled in a shallow breath, glancing at the empty wall behind her as if there was a clock and he desperately needed to know the time.
"Gabriel..."
"She's hurt, ma. Bad. He beat her. He hit Isobel. The kid's alright, she's okay," he rushed on, before her fury could rise up and overtake her. Even so, she was halfway out of her chair by the time he got the words out. Settling back down, jerked her chin for him to gon on. "Just a bruise, and she's already better. She's a strong kid. But Katherine is hurt bad. She needs to stay here, for a few weeks at least. I know she can't stay long. It's not safe for you and the girls. Just a few weeks."
Damned, if it didn't break her heart, his stubborn refusal to see that it was never about her. None of this was ever about her.
"It's not me and the girls I'm worried about," she said softly, reaching across the table and resting her hand over his. "When are you going to let this girl go, angel?"
He grimaced at her, and she saw the dirt-smudged boy that he used to be. No little boy liked to be doted upon by his mother, and her Gabe was remarkably normal in that regard.
"Ma..."
"When, Gabe? She's been pulling you into trouble since you were children. I didn't mind it when she gave you friendship in return, but I'm tired of watching her drag you through hell for nothing. When are you going to move on?"
He scowled, pushing to his feet, his tea abandoned on the table.
"It's not about moving on," he said, pushing his chair in. "She needs help."
She sighed, leaning back in her chair and wondering how it was that her the helpless, wrinkly infant she'd birthed had turned into this infuriatingly mule-headed man.
"When, Gabriel?"
"When she's safe," he said plainly. "I gotta get some sleep. Welcome home, ma. It's good to have you back."
His mug was still steaming, gentle ripples vibrating across the surface of the liquid when he shut the door behind him.
Vivian wasn't sure who had fathered her one and only son. She had some guesses, but in the end there were too many options. In the end, she didn't really want to know. It had always been just her and Gabe. He mattered more to her than any lover or partnership, and she liked to think he had not hurt too terribly for the lack of a father in his life.
Times like this though, she wished he had a father. Not to help her manage him, or to talk words of wisdom into his ear. She'd just like to have someone else to turn to and say "this is your fault" when he got stubborn and stupid. It grew tiresome having to look at him and see his idiocy and his aggravating strength and know that there was only one person to blame for all the things she loved and hated most about her son.
He was her son, and only hers. Her proudest achievement. Her greatest weakness. Her sullen, beautiful earthbound angel.
He was all her fault.