Void Read online

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Epilogue

  Other Books by Cassy Roop

  Acknowledgements

  About The Author

  VOID

  Copyright © 2015 by Cassy Roop

  Editing by Emma Mack and Desiree DeOrto

  Cover design by Cassy Roop of Pink Ink Designs

  Formatting by Pink Ink Designs https://www.facebook.com/PinkInkDesignsbyCassy

  Front Cover Photo by Mandy Hollis Photography

  Front cover model: Rainey Wilson

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products, bands, and/or restaurants referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  To Emma

  Thank you for your sparkle.

  And for believing in me.

  I SAT IN A CHAIR THAT was four times bigger than I was. The man across from me pushed the glasses he wore back up the crooked bridge of his nose as we sat staring at each other. Mom and Dad sat in chairs right next to me, yet no one said anything. The old man, whose hair was parted over the side of his head to hide the balding, shiny flesh of his skin, never took his eyes off me as if expecting me to say something.

  From the time I could remember, I was told I was different. My parents bragged about how I never cried as a baby, nor did I throw temper tantrums like a majority of children my age did. I never got angry or upset, and often wondered why people did cry or got upset.

  When I was three and a half, my goldfish died. I remember the housekeeper, someone who often spent more time with me than my own mother, sat me on a chair to try to explain what had happened to Freddie. I shrugged her off and simply said “okay.” When I was four, I fell off my bike and got a nasty gash on my right knee, but not once did I shed a tear. Sure, it hurt like crazy, but the pain wasn’t unbearable.

  This was the fourth time my parents had brought me to see this old man, who only seemed to ask me way too many questions, ones mainly about how I was feeling. Truth be told, I was often bored. I felt no connection to this man or any of the questions that he asked me.

  “Nicola, do you ever feel sad?” The doctor asked as he scribbled something down on a piece of paper in front of him. I looked around the office noticing books that took up the entirety of one wall. A large window was adjacent to the books and on the two other remaining walls, were certificates or awards of some kind.

  “Nicola? Do you understand what it means to be sad?” He asked me again when he noticed my attention had turned elsewhere. I nodded my head as I stroked the blonde yarn hair on the doll that sat in my lap.

  “Have you ever been sad before? Have you ever been angry? Maybe at your mom or dad?” I looked over to my parents who were both looking at me as if they were anticipating my answer.

  “No,” I replied, telling them the truth.

  The old man blew out a breath and removed his glasses from his face before wiping them and putting them back on.

  “Nicola, you can go over to the table in the corner of the room and play with the blocks if you wish.” I scooted off the chair and made my way over to the corner and proceeded to stack the blocks one on top of the other. I was thankful to be away from the old man’s scrutinous stare, but I could still hear the conversation he was having with my parents, like I wasn’t even in the room.

  “Senator and Mrs. Forbes, obviously you know that Nicola is…different. That much is obvious because you chose to seek treatment for her.”

  “What do you think we could do to get her to…I don’t know,” I heard my father ask.

  “Experience emotions? Because that is what seems to be lacking here. I will admit to you that she is the first case I have seen of this condition.”

  “What condition would that be?” Asked my mother in her sweet, poised, and well-practiced voice.

  “Mrs. Forbes, we believe that Nicola has Alexithymia. It is where a person doesn’t experience emotions like you and I do. You said yourself she didn’t cry as an infant. She didn’t react to some of the questions I have asked of her. She doesn’t show any emotion. The only time I have seen her attempt to feel anything is when she is in physical contact with either one of you. Like when you hugged her before walking into my office, or when Mr. Forbes put his arm around her. It seems that she seeks physical contact in order to experience some feelings.”

  “You are saying she has no emotions?” My father asked as he leaned in towards the old man.

  “I’m not saying she doesn’t have any. I’ve watched her become a bit irritated at my questions. I’ve also seen hints of anger, but nothing that would cause a reaction out of her. She’s just…”

  “Void?” My father chimed in.

  “I wouldn’t say that necessarily, Senator. She just doesn’t have the ability to process them as you and I do.”

  “What can we do to help her? I love my daughter, but it’s like she’s a complete stranger to me, Doctor. I want to experience all the things that a mother normally gets to with her daughter.”

  I didn’t understand much of anything that my mother was feeling at that moment, but I could hear the thickness in her voice and saw the tears in her eyes as I glanced up and saw my father take hold of her hand

  “I understand that, Mrs. Forbes, but someone with her condition isn’t treated easily. It could take weeks, or even years, for us to find her trigger.”

  “Trigger?” My parents both asked in unison.

  “We need to do something that will set off a sort of chain reaction within her. Shock her into feeling something. Dig deep within her mind to find whatever it is that is keeping her from processing her emotions.”

  “What do you suggest?”

  “Therapy. Hypnosis. It may take a while, but we will find your daughter hidden inside this shell of a person that you see before you. We just have to find the catalyst to bring her out.”

  My mother and father shook hands with the old man whom I knew now to be a doctor. I tried to read people’s faces to better understand what they were feeling. My mother’s eyes held a sense of vacancy within them. Almost like the fight she had been putting forth all my life suddenly left her. The relationship between my parents and me was never the same after the appointment. Hearing that you are void when you are only five years old wasn’t something that someone my age really understood. I’m not sure I understood it, even as I grew up.

  That visit turned into several sessions a week and another doctor later in the span of nearly twenty-four years. It was near the end of that twenty-fourth year in therapy that I fou
nd what, or should I say whom, my trigger was.

  I SWEAR TO GOD if I had to fake one more orgasm today, my fucking head was going to explode. The heavy-set older man’s sweat dripped onto my back as he tried ferociously to pound into me from behind. He was breathing so hard I feared that he would have a heart attack if he didn’t lose his fucking load soon.

  “Oh baby. Yeah, like that,” I said in my well-practiced, seductive voice as I stared down at my nails while thinking about how I needed to schedule an appointment for a manicure. I needed to call my agent as well and tell her that if she scheduled me with anymore older men who had issues keeping it up long enough to even penetrate me, then I would throttle her.

  This wasn’t the way I envisioned my life playing out when I was younger. I never had the thoughts of “Hey, I’m going to be an escort when I grow up”. I know what you are thinking. Escort, call girl, prostitute, whore. What’s the difference? The difference is I don’t care. I don’t care about the men I fuck on a daily basis. I don’t care that they might have families at home. I don’t care if they are some of the most powerful men in the news or the movies. The difference is I just don’t care.

  I don’t experience many of the emotions or feelings that normal people do. I don’t feel remorse. I don’t feel emotional pain. I occasionally experience happiness, anger, and agitation, but I sure as hell don’t feel love. It is something that I have always dealt with. I don’t have the ability to identify or describe most of the everyday feelings that people experience. It is a condition I was born with. Gifted by the grace of God to live almost emotionless in this world of fucked up shit.

  What is the one thing I do experience? Pleasure. Having sex is the only time that my mind and my body get to truly...feel. I guess you could say that is the reason behind my chosen profession. Having sex with men gives me a sense of tipping the hat at normalcy. Having someone buried deep within the walls of me is the only occurrence in which I don’t feel like a stagnant, vacant person.

  “Oh Jericho, your pussy is tighter than I remember,” the man behind me said as he pounded into me with as much force as he could before he choked out his release. I tried to clench my inner muscles as tight as I could, willing for even a hint of an orgasm to follow.

  Nope.

  Nothing.

  Fuck.

  I hung my head in frustration as the man pulled out of me. Pressing my palms into the mattress, I lifted my chest and scooted to the side of the bed to put my clothes back on as the man walked to the bathroom to discard the used condom. I watched as his wrinkled, sagging ass jiggled with each step he took. I would have laughed if I felt some amusement. I would have shuddered in disgust if I knew what that felt like. Instead, I reached for the brown envelope on the side table and slipped it into my bag. Mr. Patterson was probably the easiest grand I made. It took him all of about five minutes when he could have had a whole hour. My policy though is once you cum, we’re finished and the session was over. My clients know this. It kept shit from being personal and gave me a reason to high tail it the fuck out of there without having to actually engage in conversations I couldn’t care less about.

  “Always a pleasure, Jericho. I put a little something in your envelope this month. I will call and schedule another session with Alexandra soon.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Patterson,” I said as I put my coat back on and slung my purse over my shoulder and exited the hotel room.

  The frigid air of New York hit me in the face as I finally made my way outside. Walking to the curb, I threw my hand up in the air and allowed my leg to stick out a little from my coat. Sure it was cold enough to freeze my pussy lips shut, but I’d do anything to be able to get into a cab faster.

  One of the familiar yellow cabs with the stereotypical Middle Eastern man pulled up to the curb, and I hurried my freezing ass into the car. After barking orders to the cabbie to take me to my downtown Manhattan apartment, my phone rang from inside my bag.

  “Lexie,” I said, addressing my agent.

  “Are you done with Mr. Patterson already? Wow, that is a record, even for him,” her throaty, cigarette smoke produced voice said through the speaker.

  “Why the fuck do you keep scheduling him with me, Alexandra? It is a waste of a good orgasm that some other man could have given me. If I’m going to fuck someone, I should at least get the benefits of it.”

  “So I’m Alexandra now. Are you pissed? Wait. Never mind, forget I asked. Stupid question.”

  “Why are you calling if you knew I was with Mr. Patterson?”

  “Because I know Mr. Patterson,” she chuckled again while I stayed silent. “Ugh, you are such a hard ass, Jericho.”

  “I don’t feel like playing games, Lex. I have nasty old man sweat on me, and all I want to do is curl up in my tub and give myself the much needed and deserved orgasm that your Mr. Patterson deprived me of tonight. Shit, it’s been like four times in a row now. I think you should give him to one of the other girls.”

  “I tried, he wants you.”

  “Everyone wants me.”

  “Conceited much?”

  “Get to the point.”

  “I need a favor. Kiki sprained her ankle or some shit and her client is refusing to cancel. He said to provide someone else, or he wouldn’t require our services anymore.”

  “Not my problem, Lexie. I’m done. As I said, old man sweaty, wrinkled balls is reeking off of my body.”

  “Jericho, when do I ever ask you for a favor?”

  “All the time.”

  “Point well made. But, please. He is one of our biggest clients. He pays well. Cash. Four grand.”

  I paused from our conversation to try and process what Lexie was saying. Four grand? That would cover my living expenses for the month plus have plenty left over to go shopping. But who the hell would pay that much money to be with a woman one time? The thought had me a little turned off. What if he was old like Mr. Patterson? What if he wanted some kinky animal shit going on?

  “He isn’t some sick motherfucker who is into bestiality and shit like that either, is he?”

  “Oh my God, no. I would never send any of my girls to a client like that. You know very well that we screen all of our clients thoroughly. It is my job to protect you girls while you make money for yourselves as well as for me.”

  “Fine, but I want next weekend off, Lexie. I’m due for it.”

  “Deal. But there are a few stipulations.”

  “Why doesn’t that surprise me?”

  “The client requires complete anonymity. You have to wear a blindfold the entire time you are in session and will not be allowed to remove it until after he leaves.”

  “That I can do, Lex. At least that way I don’t have to look at his wrinkles or his hairy ass and can imagine it’s someone like Brad Pitt fucking the hell out of me.”

  “Good. I’ll send his driver to your apartment in the next hour. Jer, this one is important. He is one of our highest paying clients. Do your best.”

  After hanging up, I wondered what kind of man I would have to deal with tonight. I was tired, even after my lack of orgasm with Mr. Patterson, but maybe I could get my much-needed release after all.

  The cabbie pulled up in front of my apartment building, and I handed him a twenty through the slot in the glass that separated us. After telling him to keep the change, I made my way through the frigid New York air and into my building. The Camarades was a small set of ‘for sale’ condos housed just minutes from downtown Manhattan. They leaned more towards the luxury side of life and I found solace in knowing that I worked my ass off, literally, for the amenities of them. After a short elevator ride to the top floor, I produced the key from my purse and opened the door to my apartment. Sitting in the corner of the building, my apartment produced a beautiful view of the Manhattan skyline. Lights twinkled in through my windows, casting illuminating shadows across the dark, stained wood floors.

  Flipping on the light, I sat my purse down on the bar and noticed the blinking red light on
my answering machine. I didn’t have time to listen to whoever was trying to reach me because I needed to get ready to meet Mr. Mystery Client. Padding into my bathroom, I turned the shower onto a temperature that wasn’t quite scalding but would be hot enough for me to stand while I washed the remnants of Mr. Patterson from my body.

  I did a double check to make sure my body was smooth everywhere, something that most of my clients preferred, I lathered up my preferred honeysuckle body wash onto a loofah and began scrubbing my skin. Using the same scented shampoo, I paid special attention to the long strands of my pin straight, blonde hair that contained highlights that only the expensive salons in town were able to produce.

  I came from a very prestigious family. My father was a New Jersey senator, and my mother ran in the highest of social circles. From memory, they were good parents, but they weren’t around much of my childhood, which was spent mostly in dormitories at a boarding school. Little did I know that not only were my parents broke, but they left me with absolutely nothing the day I was told my freshman year that they were both killed in a plane crash. Now, if I experienced emotions like normal people, I would have broken down and cried that day, but instead I felt nothing. My heart didn’t ache, nor did I cry a single tear. Not even when they were placed in their coffins and lowered into the ground.

  People take me for a hard ass. Someone who has no empathy for the things that would affect others. It isn’t that I am doing it on purpose; I just have no control over what I do and don’t feel, except when it comes to pleasure. When my parents left me with nothing, I mean they left me with nothing. The house, that I lived in, was foreclosed on. The boarding school that I went to kicked me out because my parents had failed to pay the tuition for several semesters. I was left with only the clothes on my back and the ability to not let my circumstances affect me.

  That is why I became what I was today. I had to find a means of survival—a way to put food in my belly and a roof over my head. I had no family, my grandparents all having died before I was born. I had no siblings, no close relatives. I was completely and utterly alone. When I was approached in a dark alley, in a less than desirable neighborhood of somewhere in New York, by a man willing to give me fifty dollars for a few moments of time in my pussy, I said what the hell. When he gave me seventy because I was quote “the best pussy he had ever had”, my profession was born. I worked for several years on my own and then I met Alexandra, my agent. She started booking me with clients instead of me finding them on my own. I got paid more money, she got her cut, and we were both happy.