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Barbara couldn't be sure how much time had passed - days, weeks, months? Her phone had long since died and subsequently been taken and sold by one of her captors. She was given a cheap burner in it's place, which she was only permitted to use for purposes of contacting Whitney or her hired muscle when necessary to obtain payment from a John. Though her brain was foggy, perpetually clouded, she could somewhat recall the first night that her blackmail began. She remembered the air being warm and thick. In contrast, the air at present had a biting chill, causing goosebumps to rise on her stockinged legs. This signaled to her that a good amount of time had passed, but time didn't matter to Barbara anymore. She measured her existence in the number of cocks she took between fixes.
Barbara had proven to be a profitable body for Whitney and her crew - a blondie with a track record of being a scummy, racist pig, fallen from "grace" to become a strung out, junkie whore. The appeal was there, and men paid to fuck her not just for sexual gratification, but as a form of justice: karma had come back to bite her. And the income she generated served to seal her fate, as Whitney and her other captors decided they wouldn't ease up on the blackmail. The statute of limitations on hate crimes and battery meant that they had years remaining to dangle the shattered glass tumbler over Barbara's head. She knew that getting her fixes in prison would be far more difficult, if not entirely impossible. And even if she could leave without fear of prosecution, she knew that Whitney wouldn't let her run tricks around here on her own. How else would she make money? How else would she buy her drugs? She was left with only one clear choice, and she didn't really care to consider any other options.
Barbara swayed under the orange glow of a streetlight, tapping her heeled feet impatiently and taking a drag of a cigarette, unable to recall when she took up smoking. This corner had far less traffic than the main "Hooker Alley" corner, but the ladies there wouldn't let Barbara stand with them as they knew who she was in her past life. She had been on the corner for nearly an hour already with not a single John in sight. She knew that she couldn't go back to the brothel until she had made some money, as Jackson wouldn't fix her up for free and Whitney wouldn't let her stay there unless she performed well. A wave of excitement washed over her when she saw headlights approaching in the distance.
She recognized the car as that of one of her regulars, a man named Jake who ran in the same circle as Leroy. He pulled over next to her and gestured for her to get in the car. She knew that Jake always had various forms of cocaine and crack on him at all times for dealing purposes. This thrilled her, as another lady at the brothel had recently advised her to start smoking or shooting up her drugs instead of snorting them, given that her tolerance had become so high. Each fix had become simply a means to stay right, rather than a chance to get high. But she wanted to fucking fly again.
"Hi," she muttered, climbing into the passenger seat. The other ladies would all put on a show for the Johns and try to be sexy, but Barbara didn't really bother unless they wanted her to. Her appeal wasn't that she was particularly sexy - it was that she was a useless fuck toy with no other option besides letting every man have his way with her.
"Did I speak to you, bitch? Don't speak unless you're spoken to," Jake growled, exhaling smoke from a blunt out his window. He didn't seem to have any specific kinks aside from being in control. He didn't like anything in particular other than getting Barbara to do ridiculous sexual tasks.
Not taking his eyes off the road, he extended the blunt towards Barbara. With every passing minute, she was coming closer and closer to crashing. It had been hours since she used, and although pot wasn't going to get her straight, it may help her cope with the fact that her head was pounding and her skin felt like knives. She reached out to grab the blunt from Jake's fingers and he recoiled, his face painted with anger.
"Nah bitch! I'm not smoking you up. The fuck do you think this is? Pull up your skirt. You're my ashtray." Holding the blunt between his pointer finger and his thumb, he tapped the blunt with his middle finger to ash it over Barbara's lap. A burning ember cascaded onto her lap, landing just above her crotch. She winced but didn't dare squeal, as she knew she needed to please Jake.
"What are you, bitch?" he asked, pulling over into a vacant parking lot. Barbara, her brain muddled with imminent withdrawals, looked at him confused. Jake let out an angry sigh and shook his head furiously. Fear shot through Barbara - she was terrified. She wasn't scared of him hurting her, as he always did and she knew he would, but of him kicking her out without fixing her up. She wouldn't be able to survive the walk back to the brothel, or whatever punishment awaited her, without a fix.
"I'm your bitch, Jake. I'm whatever you want me to be, I swear it," she desperately declared, leaning over the seat and pawing at him to try and initiate some sexual act that he couldn't refuse. He shoved her back into her seat and ripped her skirt above her waist, then slowly began to bring the burning tip of his blunt towards her thigh.
"You're my ashtray, bitch. I already told you this, fucks sake," he spoke angrily between his teeth. Barbara pulled away from him, instinctually trying to distance her skin from the searing heat.
"You're already not listening and we're just getting started. You sure as shit don't seem to me like a bitch who wants a fix," Jake said with a raised voice. Barbara could tell he was getting angrier by the second. She pushed her muscle memory and knee-jerk reactions to the back of her head in an effort to avoid recoiling at the heat of the blunt. This made room for her to focus on the gnawing feeling that was quickly overcoming her ability to exist, and she realized she would do anything for a hit of the miracle dust Jake no doubt had in his pocket.
"I'll be a good ashtray. I swear. Here," Barbara said while gesturing to her thigh. He jammed the tip of the blunt against her thigh, and she could feel the embers crushing against her melting skin. She wanted to yell, cry, punch him in the face, recoil in pain, but even more than that she wanted to get fucking high. So she didn't even flinch. Jake laughed, watching her lack of expression with amusement.
"You're one desperate whore, huh?" he asked. Barbara nodded, as Jake was right. She was desperate.
"Do you have any rock?" she asked, full of hope that Jake was holding something that would make her feel something other than discomfort and pain once more.
"Maybe. But who said you could ask questions? Wanna know what fun I have planned for us?" Barbara didn't want to know. Jake had a talent for forcing Barbara to do humiliating tasks for often pathetic amounts of drugs in exchange. She believed he could've been a very successful evil genius had he been dealt a better hand of cards. Despite this, she feigned interest and nodded sweetly, thinking of nothing other than the rush of ecstasy she'd soon be feeling if she pleased him.
"Alright junkie slut. You're gonna suck my cock. You're gonna deep throat it, gag on it, and be gasping for fucking breath. You don't pull away until I tell you," Jake instructed. Barbara felt a small sense of relief - this was easy enough. She nodded and leaned over the middle console of Jake's car, preparing to pull his cock out of the waistband of his sweatpants.
