Somebody's Daughter (17 page)

She was dreaming, she had no idea that Lou considered her a trophy that he would flaunt in the face of the Nova Scotia pimps. Releasing her would be the same as telling them he could not hold onto her either. He had to prove he was a better man then Manning Greer and Taunya would help him do it. Lou's respect was on the line: he had to keep Taunya out on the street to show the Greer family that he meant business—he also had a brand-new gun to put some muscle behind his demonstration of superiority as a player.

The night of July thirty-first, an angry, confused, and frightened fourteen-year-old was turned out again on the prostitution stroll of Montreal. Her friend Lori had managed to snatch a few moments with her in the washroom at Harvey's, warning Taunya that Eddy was still looking for her and that the Scotian girls had been ordered to contact him if she returned to the stroll. Back outside, Taunya became more and more frantic. Her life was a mess, all she wanted was to break free but she had somehow managed to place herself in the centre of a war with her as the prize. Tears welled in Taunya's eyes as she paced back and forth along the sidewalk, trying to figure out how to get off this treadmill.

Finally, Taunya did the first sensible thing she'd done in months; she went to a pay phone and called her mother—collect. She was working for a pimp in Montreal and she wanted to come home, but she was afraid; would her mom call the police? Would she tell them to come and get her? Of course, Mrs. Terriault promised; less than an hour later, a patrol car showed on the stroll and the officers began looking around. Taunya couldn't believe it; the car was right there but the officers were doing nothing, they just sat and looked at the girls. Taunya wanted to walk to the car, but then Lou might guess the truth and come looking for her; bad enough Eddy and the Big Man were after her; she didn't need trouble from Sweet Lou as well. The cruiser stayed only five minutes, then pulled away.

An hour later, with a coolness born of despair, Taunya called her mother back. This time she asked Mrs. Terriault to describe her outfit to the police so they'd know who to look for; once again her mother agreed, and Taunya turned back toward the curb. Just then, one of her regulars showed up, a businessman who had “dated” her a few times while she was with Eddy. Taunya saw to her client, and when she returned to the stroll twenty minutes later, there was the police car; but the officers still didn't seem to notice her. Her heart pounding, Taunya strode boldly up to the car, ignoring the girls' stares. “I think you're looking for me—my mother called,” she said quietly but firmly. “I'm from Halifax, and I want to go home.” The policeman in the passenger seat opened his door, then motioned her into the back of the cruiser. Taunya didn't even look back at Lori as they drove away. The following morning, an officer from the Montreal police juvenile division took Taunya to the airport and put her on a plane to Halifax. She had been asked to make a statement naming the pimps she was working for, but when she refused, no pressure was put on her.

The same could not be said for what she faced back in Nova Scotia: she was home, but not home free. Taunya was able to return to her old job in the office of a vacuum cleaner sales outlet, but she made the mistake of looking up some of her former friends, and it didn't take long for the family to find out she was in town. Within a week of her return, a sixteen-year-old cousin of Manning Greer's, Greg, tracked her down and told her bluntly that she still belonged to the family. She hadn't paid her leaving fee, and neither had Sweet Lou. There was no way Taunya could come up with the seven hundred dollars that would buy her freedom, and like every other pimp in The Game, from minor players such as Greg to the big guys of his uncle's level, he was not prepared to accept payment in installments. Her only choice was to work for him until she'd earned the fee. Like Stacey Jackson, Taunya pleaded with the young pimp to keep her off Hollis Street so that her mother wouldn't find out she'd gone back to The Game—someone might recognize her and call Brenda Terriault, who had made it clear that Taunya was only welcome at home if she worked at the vacuum cleaner shop and stayed away from prostitution. Greg's solution served his own needs more than Taunya's, but that was typical of a pimp. It seemed he had a cousin who had recently opened an escort service in Dartmouth, and she could work there strictly as an in-service prostitute; he generously added that she could service clients during the evening and hang on to her day job that way.

It seemed Taunya's problems would soon be over, but on her first day at the old apartment building in north-end Dartmouth, she learned that her freedom wouldn't come cheap. Greg began by introducing his cousin. Ricky, a short, stocky man with a salesman's patter and flare for hyperbole, informed Taunya he was not a pimp but a businessman; the escort service was one of his many enterprises. Taunya, who was aware of Ricky's activities, knew he ran girls down on Hollis Street—so much for his claim to legitimacy. As long as he paid her—and that was when Greg pulled another maneuver typical of his profession: Ricky, he said, would keep half the money she earned, and he would get the rest. When Taunya protested—what about her leaving fee?—Greg blew up and threw her to the floor, kicking her as she lay curled in a fetal position on the carpet. His teeth clenched in rage, he promised he would beat her worse if she ever dared to disrespect him in front of another man again. He told her she'd better work her butt off if she expected to buy her freedom. The next night was just as bad: Taunya thought it would be all right to ask Greg about her fee while they were alone in the car on the way to Dartmouth, but she was wrong—Greg struck her in the head, told her to shut up about “his” money, and kept driving.

This has to stop; Taunya told herself, and decided to ask her square boss for help. As a close friend of the family, he knew about her troubles in Montreal and had promised to do what he could if anyone tried to hurt her. True to his word, he arrived at the agency only a few minutes later. Taunya ran out to his van and Ricky followed her. Taunya watched as her boss stared down the owner of the escort service. If Ricky wanted to try anything he thought better of it after seeing the anger in the man's eyes. Taunya's boss drove her home. She was free.

By mid-August, however, Taunya was back on the treadmill. Lori was back in town, still working for the Scotians, and the two girls often hung out together before she went down to Hollis; but one afternoon, when her friend and a stranger picked Taunya up at work, she knew she was in big trouble, just by the way Lori said she was sorry—and nothing more—
after
the car had picked up speed. When the young man at the wheel told Taunya she was going to North Preston, where someone wanted to see her, she figured she was in for a serious beating for leaving the escort service. Taunya stayed quiet during the drive; and she and Lori sat in silence while the driver was inside the split-entry house where he had parked. He was gone a long time, but neither of the girls even considered trying to make a run for it. They were both feeling trapped; in the almost palpable stillness, Taunya reached out and touched her friend's hand, as if to say, “I understand; it's okay.” Finally the girls were told to go inside; Taunya was directed and she very slowly made her way to the basement level of the house.

There, sitting near the bottom of the stairs, waiting for her, was Manning Greer. As she approached, he stood up, towering over her. Then he led the way outside to a beat-up Chevrolet parked in the driveway. She was surprised to see him driving such an old wreck when he had that fancy yellow Corvette in Montreal. As was his custom Greer had flown to Halifax and was borrowing this car for the visit. As Greer drove towards the main road out of North Preston, Taunya, feeling sick to her stomach, was wishing she had stayed in Montreal and stuck with Eddy. Where was he taking her? Was he going to kill her for running out on the family without paying her leaving fee? Just then he pulled into the rear parking lot of the old school, now vacant; the two of them sat silently for a time and watched a group of kids playing in a nearby street. At long last, the Big Man broke the silence: “You know why you're here?”

“I guess … I don't know … I'm not sure.” In response, Greer pulled the rings off his right hand, placed them on the dashboard, and struck Taunya with a fast, ferocious backhand blow across the face. Her lip began to bleed immediately.

“Don't play stupid with me, girl. I asked you if you know why you're here.”

“Because I left.”

Greer slapped her three times in rapid succession. “You disrespected my family, girl, and that means you disrespected me. Now what are you going to do about it?” Taunya glanced down at the door as she turned her head away from the Big Man to protect her face. He slapped her again. “I said, what are you going to do about it, girl?”

“I don't know, what do you want me to do?” Greer slapped her again, and said again: “Don't play stupid with me. What are you going to do?”

“Go back to the escort service and work for Greg?” Wrong response; the Big Man slapped her yet again. “You better tell me what you plan to do to make this right, or I'm going to have to kill you,” he said. “You understand that? I don't want to kill you, but unless you do the right thing by me, I will. You disrespected me—now what are you going to do?”

“You want me to go back to Montreal with Eddy?” Once again Greer struck her, and this time the pain didn't seem as severe. “You disrespected me. How's working for Eddy going to fix that?” Suddenly Taunya understood, and the slight dizziness became nausea as she realized that Greer wanted her to work for him. Why didn't he just say so? Why was he beating her? What Taunya didn't understand was that Greer wouldn't openly steal a girl from Eddy; they were family, and that would be wrong. If the girl chose him, that would be different; and the leaving fee, if any, would be modest. The girl would still be in the family, and Eddy would be able to maintain his own level of respect without challenging the Big Man. As Taunya sat there, sickened, hesitant, terrified, Greer pushed her head against the passenger window so hard she thought the glass would break; finally she said what she knew he wanted to hear: “I could go with you. I could work for you.”

“Is that what you want to do?”

“Yes.”

Greer put on his rings and took Taunya back to the house, a friend's place where he was staying while in Halifax. Inside, several of the pimps Taunya had seen in Montreal and at the escort service were playing cards. Neither they nor Lori, who was sitting quietly on the couch, looked up as Greer led Taunya into a bedroom. He sprawled across the bed, propped his head up on the pillow, and fixed her with a stare. “Okay, girl, if you wanna be mine, I gotta see what I'm selling. Take them clothes off.” Taunya trembled as she pulled off her things and obeyed his command for her to turn around. “Well, whatcha gonna do? You just gonna stand there?”

“Can I put my clothes on, please?”

“Is that all you're gonna do?”

“Please
, can I get dressed now?”

Greer would probably have forced Taunya to have sex with him, but something changed his mind. “Yeah, get dressed now,” he said curtly. “I got things to do.” He walked out of the bedroom and left Taunya to put her clothes on and join Lori on the couch in the family room. The cards were back in the deck, and the players were going back to their primary game.

“You two clean this house,” Greer told the two girls as he headed for the door; Lori and Taunya scrubbed the place then spent a tense few hours waiting for the Big Man to return. When he did, after midnight, he told Taunya she'd be going to Montreal with him in the morning, then, to her surprise, left her to spend the night on the couch. Her sleeping was fitful and her dreams were lurid with images of the abuse and torture she was sure she faced if she didn't cooperate with him—although the real nightmare was what she had in store if she did. Her mind raced as she tried to consider her options. She considered calling her real boss from the vacuum shop again but discounted it. Greer would either kill her boss or kill her, if he tried staring down the Big Man as he had with Ricky at the escort service. Her mom couldn't help—anyway,
she
kept saying, these days, that Taunya was doing exactly what she wanted, and that her trouble was of her own making. The police hadn't been much help in Montreal. No, all she could do was return to Montreal with Manning Greer. Somehow, accepting her fate made it easier for her to go to sleep; and there were no more dreams.

What Taunya didn't know was that Greer had come back to get her not only because her flight from the family had been an insult, but also because his main girl had vanished, and he needed a replacement—someone fresh, young, pretty. It was a bonus that he had a “justification” for insisting she owed him the ownership of her body; even better, she was just so easy to terrorize. That didn't mean he had forgotten about Lynn—not that he cared about her as a person, but she had been an extremely profitable and dependable prostitute, and her disappearance angered rather than worried him. At first he thought she had taken another unscheduled vacation but he knew that wasn't it, he had not beaten her when she returned from the first but he had promised he would if she repeated the behavior. That she might have been killed by a bad date simply didn't cross his mind. Greer's constant obsession with the renegade Jamaicans was his only focus for the loss of Lynn, and once again he vowed to hunt down the pimps who had taken a girl of his; they would pay for messing with Manning Greer and his family.

Manning Greer had no trouble drifting off to sleep; he was safe in Halifax, where Jamaican pimps wouldn't dare to make a move on him. It was always enjoyable to come home, but the real game was in Quebec and Ontario and he couldn't stay here with the minor players, not for long. As usual, Greer's only concerns were with problems other pimps might create for him—not the police. As long as he kept his people in line, and no-one made any trouble for him, the cops would stay away. Greer was certain the police had better things to do with their time than chase him and a few runaway girls. Manning Greer had no idea that two police officers working within a few kilometres of him were very interested in his actions and would soon find out that he had returned to Nova Scotia, and why.