Chapter 46 – Impasse

The cursor blinked. Blinked. Blinked.

Chloe stared at the screen as if she could force the words in her investigation document to make more sense through sheer willpower. Three days had passed since the party, during which she had read the same fragments over and over again, trying to read something else into them than what she feared they meant.

Thompson. John. Logistics. Girls. Merchandise. Dubai.

She scrolled up to her older entries. Then back down. Then up again. As if that would change anything.

She opened a new tab and typed in the name of her stepfather’s company. The search engine spat out exactly the handful of results she had expected. The somewhat cheap website that looked like it was from the 90s and didn’t reveal much, an article in the Oak Springs Gazette about the new community center that John’s company had built a few years ago, and a few entries in industry directories.

She clicked through the website. “Thompson Construction & Development – Your partner for quality and reliability since 1992.” There were photos of completed projects: warehouses, barns, residential homes, a church even. A damn church. But sure, someone had to build churches too, after all.

And what exactly am I supposed to find here anyway? A page with “Our Services: Construction Projects, Renovations, and oh yes, Human Trafficking”?

She didn’t even really know what she was looking for. Financial irregularities? Suspicious customers? How would she even find out about that? She wasn’t a forensic accountant or whatever. She was an eighteen-year-old porn actress sitting on a squeaky mattress in a dump, trying to solve a crime.

Chloe leaned back and rubbed her eyes. The problem wasn’t just finding information. The problem was that she didn’t know how to gather evidence in the first place.

She had gone through every possible angle over the last few days. Recording devices? Impossible. They took her clothes off at Valeria’s parties and squeezed her into that damn bodysuit that was so tight you couldn’t even hide a pen and paper underneath it.

Can’t even shove it up my ass.

The thought made her shudder. Given what happened to her body at these parties, even that wouldn’t work. At those parties, every opening, every crease of her body was potentially open to greedy fingers and hungry mouths.

Her gaze wandered back to the screen. The search bar blinked at her, waiting for input.

How do you prove a human trafficking conspiracy?

She didn’t type the words into the search engine. Of course not. Just the thought of typing those words into a search engine made her feel crazy and paranoid. Like an insane conspiracy nut in her basement, connecting red threads between newspaper clippings.

Except that the conspiracy was probably real. She had heard it. She had felt George’s hand in her hair while he talked about “inventory” and “supply chains” because he didn’t really realize, or at least didn’t give a fuck, that there was a real person kneeling between his legs.

John knows exactly what’s going on.

Chloe closed her eyes and took a deep breath. The air in her apartment smelled mainly of instant ramen, which had been her only real meals for the past few days. She really should air out the place, but the air coming in from outside was perhaps a little less stale than the mustiness of her dump but hardly smelling less unpleasant.

You don’t know if they really mean him. Thompson is a common name. There are probably a thousand John Thompsons in California.

But how many of them played the “puritanical conservative for the public”?

She opened her eyes again and stared at the document. When was the last time she had slept properly? It didn’t matter.

What kept her awake and exhausted was that she was completely alone with this knowledge and had no one to talk to about it. Alone with the suspicion that her stepfather might be involved in a network that treated women as “merchandise.” Alone with the question of whether Samantha had found out about it. Alone with the fear that this might be the very reason her sister was dead.

Her phone vibrated on the nightstand. She ignored it.

It vibrated again.

And again.

With a sigh, she reached for it. The screen lit up, showing a series of unread messages.

Steve online

Hey! Fancy some nuggets and gaming?🎮🍗

2 days ago

Everything okay? You’re so quiet.

Yesterday

Elena Rodriguez online

Hey Chloe, how are you after the party? Just wanted to check if everything’s okay. Let me know if you want to talk❤️

Yesterday

Trevor Knight online

Hey Chloe, wanted to ask if you’d like to grab a drink sometime?

15:22 PM

No pressure, only if you feel like it.

15:23 PM

Chloe stared at the messages.

Steve. What should she write to him? “Hey Steve, sorry for the radio silence, I’ve been really busy trying to figure out if my stepfather is part of a conspiracy to sell women to Dubai”?

Elena, who had warned her and who knew that “more” was going on at Valeria’s parties. But Elena had also made it clear that she didn’t want any questions asked, that they should stay out of it. And if Chloe started talking, she might not be able to stop.

Trevor, whom she had only given her number to because she thought he was a suspect. But she was now pretty sure she had gotten everything she needed out of him. What should she do with him now? She definitely didn’t feel like going on a date with him.

She started typing a reply to Steve.

“Hey! Sorry, I was a bit…”

She stopped. She deleted the text and put the phone away. She just couldn’t manage to feign normality convincingly. Not now. Not with everything swirling around in her head.

So she did nothing. Once again.

You’re burying your head in the sand. That’s not healthy.

The phone vibrated again and wouldn’t stop. A call, not a message. She reached for it and looked at the display.

Ben Ziegler.

She hesitated for a moment, then answered.

“Sunshine!” Ben’s oily voice came out of the speaker. “How’s my rising star?”

“Hey, Ben.” She tried to put Chloe Heart in her voice. She only half succeeded.

“I have a request for you, if you’re feeling well enough again.” A short pause, as if he were deliberating how to phrase it. “Okay, well, it’s Gangbang Galore. They’re calling me for the third time in two weeks. They really want you.”

Who doesn’t these days.

“Before you say no,” Ben quickly continued, “I know this might not be your thing. But they’re persistent, which usually means we can negotiate a good price.”

Chloe was silent.

A few weeks ago, she would have refused immediately. Without even the slightest hesitation. It was beyond anything she could ever have imagined. But now?

She looked at the laptop. At the document with all her questions and assumptions. At the blinking cursor that just kept blinking.

The investigation had become so murky. It was a damn difficult problem, so difficult that she had no idea how to solve it. So impossible to do anything with it. She was stuck here, unable to move forward, unable to trust anyone, unable to even think clearly, but also unable to simply do nothing with this knowledge.

Getting fucked by a dozen guys suddenly seemed ridiculously easy in comparison.

“Chloe?” Ben’s voice sounded uncertain. “Are you still there?”

“I’m here.” She took a deep breath. “I’ll do it.”

Silence on the other end.

“Really?” Ben sounded genuinely surprised. “I mean, great! That’s great. I just wanted to make sure you knew what you were getting yourself into, I mean, it will be…”

“I know what a gangbang is, Ben.” Her voice was calmer than she had expected. “Please negotiate hard with them, okay? If they really want me, they’ll have to pay for it.”

“Oh, I will.” She could hear him grinning through the phone. “Any restrictions?”

“No anal.”

“Sure, that goes without saying. I’ll get back to you with the details.”

He hung up.

In a few days, she would be filming a gangbang. And the crazy thing was, she felt relieved.

~

It was still dark outside when Chloe rolled out her yoga mat. It was only five in the morning. She had to drag herself out of bed and yawned the whole time, but the ritual was more important than a few more minutes of sleep.

Twenty minutes later, she was in the shower, letting the lukewarm water run over her, shaving her legs and between her legs, and going over everything in her head again. There would be eight men, she had been told, including one who was filming for the first time ever. She had read the rundown for the scene, watched a few more videos from Gangbang Galore and knew in theory what to expect, who would be where, how the scene would unfold.

If she was honest, long before she became Chloe Heart, when she saw scenes like that online, she had wondered what it would be like. The idea had always been abstract though, something other women did, other women experienced, in another world.

And now I’m going to find out.

She looked at herself in the mirror as she applied subtle makeup, just for the trip. She didn’t really need any, but she wanted to do something for social media and didn’t want to take selfies without makeup.

Her stomach fluttered slightly.

It’s just sex, Chloe. A lot of sex, all at once, but still just sex.

The thought only helped to some extent.

~

The taxi driver was an older man with a gray mustache and friendly eyes who watched her in the rearview mirror.

“Up early,” he remarked.

“Yes.”

“You look good, really chic. Going on a date?” A fatherly smile.

Chloe smiled back. “Something like that.”

She pulled out her phone and opened hitter.

Chloe Heart @ChloeHeartXXX

The early bird catches the worm🐦 Off to an exciting shoot today! Can you guess what it is?

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The studio was a converted warehouse in the east of the hub, and when Chloe entered, a few heads turned.

“Hey, Chloe!”

“Morning!”

No one asked if she was Chloe Heart anymore. She was no longer a stranger.

Strange how quickly that happens.

She even saw someone she knew. One of the cameramen had also been at Sinful Stepsisters. He had filmed her scene with Steve in the dryer, a laid-back guy with a worn baseball cap.

“Hey! You work for Sinful Stepsisters, right?” Chloe smiled.

“Yeah, I’m a freelancer! I’m Mike.” He held out his hand to her. “Nice to see you again.”

“Likewise.”

Mike looked her over briefly. “Your first gangbang, I hear?”

“Yes.”

“It’ll be fine.” He shrugged. “Rick is good, and the guys are professional, at least the ones I know.”

“Thanks.”

He said goodbye, disappeared toward his camera, and Chloe looked around. There were men standing everywhere. Some were talking quietly, some were scrolling on their phones. She recognized some of them from videos she had watched in preparation. All reasonably good-looking.

So many. Are there really only eight?

Her gaze fell on a young guy standing a little apart. Really young, maybe her age, not unattractive, with dark curls. He was bouncing nervously on the balls of his feet and didn’t seem to know what to do with his hands. He looked completely overwhelmed.

Oh God. That’s the new guy, I bet.

Chloe walked over to him.

“Hey.” She smiled. “I’m Chloe.”

He looked up like a deer in the headlights. “A-Adam. Hi. I know who you are. I mean, I’ve seen you. I mean, on the internet.” He trailed off and blushed.

“Is this your first job, by any chance?”

He nodded miserably.

“Okay, listen, you really don’t need to be nervous.” Chloe lowered her voice. “The director will tell you exactly what to do. And once it starts, it’s much less nerve-racking than all the waiting beforehand.”

Adam exhaled. “Really?”

“Really. Then it’s just sex and muscle memory kicks in, easy. I mean, you’re not a virgin, are you?”

He shook his head vigorously. “No, no, of course not.”

“See.”

A few crew members nearby had overheard the conversation and grinned.

So now I’m the one giving advice.

It was a strange realization. A few weeks ago, she had been sitting nervously in Randy’s shabby studio, with no idea what to expect.

“Okay, everyone!” A loud voice cut through the room.

Rick, the director, was a tanned, stocky man in his early fifties with a bushy mustache that would have fit right in in the eighties.

“I’m Rick, for those who don’t know me yet. Quick run-through, then we’ll get started.”

The men gathered in a loose semicircle. Chloe counted. Eight plus a thin, mouse-faced guy who was probably supposed to play her “husband.” The story they were supposed to act out was a little far-fetched, to say the least.

“As always, the story is downright Oscar-bait,” Rick explained. “Kenny here got into debt with the wrong people while playing poker and gambled away his wife. His wife” – he pointed to Chloe – “is the payment, and he has to watch all of you fuck her. Kenny, I mainly need a few pathetic facial expressions from you while you watch the boys run a train on your wife.”

Chloe suppressed a grin. It was so absurd.

“We have two cameras,” Rick continued. “Mike is doing the close-ups, Luis is on wide angle.”

A tattooed, muscular guy with a shaved head and a mischievous grin nudged Kenny with his elbow. “Hey, Kenny. Are you looking forward to watching?”

Kenny rolled his eyes. “Shut up, Marco.”

Laughter from the others.

“Listen up again, this is important.” Rick’s voice became more serious. “No anal. Period. Anyone who tries sticking it up her chute will be kicked off the set and blacklisted. Got it?”

General nodding and murmuring.

“Chloe.” Rick looked directly at her. “This is probably going to be pretty exhausting for you. You can take a break anytime, just let us know. No one here will give you any grief about it.”

“Understood.”

“Good.” Rick clapped his hands. “Chloe, off to makeup. Guys, get ready. We’re rolling in twenty minutes the latest.”

The makeup artist worked quickly and had Chloe’s makeup done in no time, then led Chloe to the dressing room. Her outfit consisted of nothing more than high heels and a short black dress that barely covered her thighs.

I won’t be wearing it for long anyway.

Then she was called to the set.

Chloe paused briefly, took out her cell phone, and took one last selfie. She smiled a perfect Chloe Heart smile, and behind her was the set and all the men getting ready.

ChloeHeartXXX

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ChloeHeartXXX Choo choo, the train is coming🚂💨

And send.

Then she put her cell phone on her folding chair and walked toward the set.