Page 9 of The Toy Maker

“Toys?” I assumed we weren’t talking about Lego building by proxy.

“Sex toys. The ones that Jason makes.” She said it as if it were so obvious.

If we were in a cartoon, a giant question mark would have been hovering above my head. “Who’s Jason?”

Jade’s lips curled in amusement. “The owner of the store.” I pieced together the information they were giving me. The owner of the store made the sex toys. Cherries were human dolls for strangers to use the toys on.

My mother’s laughter rang in my ears. She’d love to see my “stubbornness” come back to bite me in the ass. Especially after I packed my bags and high-tailed it out of town, only to return for limited holidays.

I pried as much information from them as I could before Kitty finally bounced into the room.

“Good job, girls, we’re already doing better than last month,” she announced.

“Kitty, you need to explain the ropes to the new girl or else she’s going to scare customers away,” Sarah whined, tugging at her bra straps.

Confusion aside, I was more concerned about legality. I thought I was interviewing for a boring, department store sales job. But by the end of the night, I’d be paraded around half-naked for strangers?

My horoscope didn’t mention anything aboutthis.

Kitty focused her attention on me. “What do you want to know, honey?”

“What do the people who…buy usget to do?”

“They own you, within reason. If they tell you to crawl by their side, then crawl. If they rent a collar, then wear the collar. But most of the time they just decide what toy to watch you on,” she responded.

I didn’t want to play Naughty Simon Says with complete strangers. Swallowing, I said, “I still don’t understand the concept of the toys.”

This time, all three of them exchanged a look. “You’ll have to see them to understand.”

The thing is, I didn’twantto understand. I wanted to sprint home as fast as my on-sale Michael Kors heels would carry me through the night. At least that was what I told myself. But if I didn’t go through with this, I’d always wonder what Pink Cherrie really was and how I managed to stick around for so long.

Kitty draped her fingers over my bare shoulder. “Don’t worry, I made sure you were assigned as a watcher tonight.” She beamed.

I forced a smile and held back the rampant screaming in my head.

By the timeall the Cherries had settled down, the final numbers for the night were held in Kitty’s hand. The girls pushed me to the back of the crowd to get the name of theirassigned customer. They were so eager to bend over backward, literally and figuratively, for complete strangers.

I wanted to be disgusted, to cling to a familiar feeling, but something inside me was curious,intriguedeven.

Sarah and Jade never left my side, and when Kitty gave them their assignments, one of them seemed to hit the jackpot. Jade’s smile stretched across her face, but Sarah stared down at the slip of paper as if it ordered her immediate death. She still hadn’t recovered.

I couldn’t wrap my head around how comfortable all the Cherries appeared to be. I would be nervous, panicky, maybe pacing back and forth with the ultimate desire to cower under a rock.

“Hey,” Jade’s voice derailed my train of thought. “It’s going to be okay,” she assured me. It took me a moment to process Jade’s comforting words and realize they weren’t meant for me.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, brows furrowing.

Sarah looked up with a grim expression. “I got Lucas,” she said sullenly.

“Who’s Lucas?” I could already tell that being an employee of Pink Cherrie included a steady flow of gossip. During the brief wait, both of them told me all about Brittany’s nose job, Amy’s not-so-secret pregnancy, and how Kat’s nickname is Kitty because of how picky she is about who gets to pet her.

“Sarah’s ex-boyfriend,” Jade answered before pulling her into a hug, giving her a sympathetic look.

“Why would her ex pay for her?” I asked, and they both turned to look at me. “Not that you’re not worth it, of course.” I made a plan to go to the nearest cemetery and dig myself a place where I couldn’t put my foot in my mouth anymore.

Sarah fidgeted, twisting the ring on her finger. “I’ve hung up on him a few times. We dated for a few years, but last month he told me that it was either my job or him and?—”

“You chose the job,” I guessed, the words slipping out before I could stop them.