Pale Carnations -ch. 4 Update 4- -mutt Jeff- ... | Instant

End of Scene.

“Mutt,” I said, sliding the door shut. The latch clicked with a finality that made his shoulders twitch.

I picked up the photograph and slid it back into my pocket. “The club wants her ready for the main event. No more ‘private exhibitions.’” Pale Carnations -Ch. 4 Update 4- -Mutt Jeff- ...

“Club wants a lot of things.” Jeff stood, slow, his joints popping like distant gunfire. He loomed, not tall, but wide—a bulldog in a stained vest. “But you tell them this: Mutt Jeff delivers what he’s paid for. And what he ain’t paid for stays in the back room. Under the floorboards.”

I left the card on the table.

“She’s asking about the fourth round,” I said. “The private exhibition. The one not on the club’s books.”

He laughed—a wet, phlegmy sound—and leaned back. The chair groaned under his weight. “Fourth round ain’t about pain, pup. It’s about want . You strip a girl down to her last nerve, and then you offer her a glass of water. That’s the game. The audience doesn’t pay to see her cry. They pay to see her choose to crawl.” End of Scene

He held out the deck of cards to me. “Pick one.”

“Your little blonde,” Jeff continued, tapping the photograph with a yellowed nail, “she crawled. Fastest I’ve ever seen. Didn’t even make her beg. She just… folded. Like a paper hat in the rain.” His eyes flicked up to mine, and for a moment, the showman’s mask slipped. Beneath it was something hollow. Hungry. “That’s the part they never put in the contracts. The folding.” I picked up the photograph and slid it back into my pocket

He turned his back to me then, a clear dismissal, and began shuffling once more.