Biloxi Doxy

I was driving to Biloxi from my home in New Orleans when one of my girls called me. "Hello, Carmen. What's up? I'll be in Biloxi in an hour or so, and I'm looking forward to getting together with you."

"Chris, oh, Chris. There's some trouble going on here, and it's really, really bad." Carmen was weeping as she told me this.

"What? Are my parents, okay? What is it?" I felt anxiety rising in my chest. In our business, things can go bad quickly. With the Russians and Serbians moving in from all sides, you never knew what those crazy bastards might do.

"Your parents are fine. It's Cherry." Carmen was now sobbing. It was becoming hard to understand her. "A client whipped her bad. Her ass looks like hamburger meat, they said. They said it was going to scar no matter what they did." Carmen wailed, "Oh, Chris, I'm so scared!"

"Where is she now? Do they know who did it?" I liked my sister-in-law. Plus, she was one of my mother's best girls and a great source of income. I had to wonder how this would affect our bottom line.

"They took her to Merit Health. They don't know who beat her, but" Carmen stopped sobbing and sounded hesitant now.

"But what?" I demanded impatiently.

"Chris, I think it was your brother." Carmen whispered.

"My brother! Are you kidding? He loves Cherry. He'd never hurt her. He'd never hurt anyone." I practically exploded over the phone in indignation. "Why the hell would you think that?"

Carmen was sobbing again. "I'm sorry, Chris, but I saw him upstairs in the hallway."

"What? My brother never goes into any strip clubs, let alone a whorehouse. He's so strait laced you could put a halo on him, and it would fit." I chuckled at the thought. "You must be mistaken."

"No, I'm not." She insisted. "One of my regulars left the door open as he was leaving, and your brother was walking by. He looked straight at me, and I recognized him from the pictures in your apartment."

"Holy shit. I wonder what's going on. He's never had any problem with Cherry fucking other people. She was doing it before they married and has been doing it most of their marriage. He's never complained." I thought for a moment. "Don't tell anyone else what you saw, not even my mother or father. No one, understand, Carmen?"

"Okay," she whimpered. "But I'm scared. Can I stay with you tonight?"

"That's what I planned, but now I must check with my mother. With Cherry out, she might need you. And if it was my brother, you've got nothing to fear. He doesn't even know you. You just went from the house in New Orleans to Biloxi two weeks ago. There's no way he knows you."

"Oh, okay." Carmen responded, obviously unconvinced by my assurances.

"I've got to go, sweetie. I'll see you in a while, after I check in with Mom." I hung up and dialed my brother's phone.

He answered on the second ring. "I'm glad you called, bro. I was going to call you before I ditched this phone."

"What the hell happened, Brian? What did you do to Cherry?" I asked, now believing that he was the one responsible if he was planning to ditch his phone.

"I came home early and found out that Cherry's been working as a prostitute at Doxies. And as a stripper!" Now my brother was sobbing. It was my morning for people to cry on my shoulder. "And I found out that Mom got her into it." I heard Brian pounding on something. "And that bastard Brad's been fucking my wife!"

I was quiet. I was surprised that my brother was surprised by this. At least the part about Cherry. I knew that Mom and Dad had kept their businesses hidden from Brian. Mom thought that the five years he'd spent with his father had screwed him up. "His father made him soft. He's always seen everything in black and white, even as a kid. No, I was right to keep my life from him." She'd looked at me and added, "I'd have kept it from you, as well, but your father was so proud to have a son that he had to take you everywhere with him, even when he was checking on our stables.

"And unlike Brian's father, yours was happy to have a wife that other men desired." Mom smirked when she said that.

I decided that Brian should know that full story. "Where are you, bro. I've got things to tell you, and I'd rather not do it over the phone."

I could hear suspicion in my brother's voice. "Why? Why do we have to meet? You know the police are probably looking for me."

"As far as I know, no one's identified you yet." I assured him. "But I'm on my way from New Orleans and have only talked to one of the girls. The one whose room you looked into last night. I haven't talked with anyone who would really know. But what I have to tell you will be hard to take and would be easier in person."

"Well, Chris, by the time you get to where I am, I'll be gone, out past the three-mile limit, on my way to a new life." Brian stated firmly. "If you've got something to tell me, do it now."

So, I started explaining. How as a child, our stepfather told me he thought he was my real father, since it was his condom that broke. How I didn't even understand that until I was older. Brad had confirmed my paternity later when DNA became common and less expensive.

I then revealed that our mom had been a prostitute. I didn't get the reaction I expected. "I know," Brian said calmly. "Mom told me last night, thinking that somehow that justified pimping out my wife."

"Well, did she mention to you that she owns half of Doxies? That she used her earnings as a whore to buy it? Or that she has another house she owns outright in New Orleans?" I took a deep breath and plunged onward. "Brian, I'm not an accountant. The only accounting, I do is for Mom's New Orleans whorehouse. I manage it." I listened to the silence on the line. It went on for several minutes.

"Brian, are you still there?" I asked.

I heard him sigh. "Yes, I'm here. So, you're a pimp?"

"Well," I laughed, "I prefer brothel keeper, but I supposed pimp is also accurate."

"How did mom get these houses? Do whores make that much?" Brian inquired.

"No, not usually, but Mom saw an opportunity and became a procurer. Brian, Cherry's not the first girl Mom's turned out. Not nearly. She's gotten hundreds of women involved with various pimps and whorehouses, and she collects a percentage of their action from the pimps every month. She gets thousands each month, maybe tens of thousands, just from her strings of girls."

"How did I never know any of this?" My brother sounded flummoxed by my revelations. It could only get worse.

"She kept us sheltered from all that. I mean, she cut back her work at Doxies after I turned two and you were seven. She felt that you were likely to have problems with her actions, even then. So, she only worked with her regulars and special requests for parties and orgies. Brad helped keep us in the dark, until he began taking me with him on his trips to check on the girls and collect from the pimps.

"Anyway, she plowed the money back into Doxies and Frenchie's, the house I manage. Now, she makes in the millions each year, all illegal. She launders some of it, but most is now offshore."

I explained to my brother how Brad had sworn me to secrecy and how I hadn't known about Mom until we stopped at a house to make a collection, and I had to use the bathroom. I'd never been in a whorehouse before, Brad had always made me wait in the car. But that day I couldn't hold it and so he took me in. As we passed a large room, a roar of approval made me look in. On a stage was my mother, held up between two men, naked. I saw the naked but didn't understand what was happening for many years. Brad had rushed me to a restroom and made me swear never to tell my mother what I'd seen. I'd never seen Brad so scared. I think Mom terrifies him.

"Brian, she's not the woman who raised us. That was a nice woman, but it was an act. I've gotten to know her and she's a mean, hard woman. I've seen her punish girls who don't follow her orders. I've seen her cut them. I've seen her have them drugged and shipped out to mining towns in Africa and South America, where they end up drugged-up slaves, prostituted until they die. She has no heart."

Brian growled, "But you knew what she is. And you knew what she was having Cherry do? How the fuck could you do that to me? Were you fucking my wife, too?" His anger was loud and hot over the phone.

"NO, I wouldn't do that to you. I NEVER slept with your wife." I was afraid I'd lost my brother with my story. "But, yeah, I knew Cherry was working at Doxies, but I thought you knew. I heard about the OA house and thought you were okay with it. I never said anything because I thought you wanted to keep it private."

The silence continued, again for several minutes. The Brian said, "You never slept with her?"

"No, man, you're my brother. I won't do that to you. Besides," I continued, "I have all the pussy I could ever want. Did you forget where I work? I mean, Cherry's beautiful, but I love you more, bro."

After a moment, I heard, "Okay. What else? How'd you get into this?"

I told him how Brad had been educating me most of my life about the ins and outs of the business. When I turned 18, he'd taken me to the New Orleans house and let me spend a week learning about the actual workings of prostitution. I sampled every girl and was given lessons by all of them. Then when we returned to Biloxi, I got the run of Doxies. "Cherry wasn't there yet. You'd just brought her back to Biloxi and gotten married. She didn't show up until you were out on the rigs. Turned out Brad arranged for your extended stays so Mom could have one of her regular johns put the moves on her. Brian, it was Cherry's boss. Mom had arranged for him to hire her. Mom figured that if you were away, Cherry would be vulnerable. Then Mom would be able to convince her that to save her marriage, she needed to satisfy her sexual needs.

"Mom had known about the little sister act at the Omega house. She kept an eye on you all through college. I think she saw Cherry as the perfect addition to her stable. But really, bro, I thought you knew. If you were okay with her screwing everyone at the frat, why would I think you had problems with her whoring for Mom?" It sounded weak, even to me, but it was the truth.

"The clients pay way more for Cherry than for the other girls. I thought that might have been a factor." I paused. "I mean, I don't think that money really means anything to Cherry. She talks about saving enough to have you retire from the rigs so she could quit and have you to herself all the time. That's all she ever wanted. But I really think she believed Mom when she told her that she had to prostitute herself to save her marriage. I'm sorry, dude, but your wife's not the brightest bulb out there." I thought that I'd covered the worst of it. I waited for Brian's response.

It took a while to come. "You knew, but thought I'd approve? You thought because I had to let the love of my life share herself with the house that became her family, I'd let my wife whore herself for money? And because it was a lot of money, that'd make it all right with me?"

He was quiet again for several moments. "Beyond that, I thought you were Cherry's friend. But you're just a pimp. You see nothing wrong with her destroying her marriage and her life, whoring, when Mom tricked her into it to make a profit." Brian sighed. "I'm done. With her, with mom, with that asshole Brad, and with you, pimp. I don't have a family."

He hung up. I tried again and again to call him back, but I finally concluded he had destroyed his phone, as he had said he would. I'd lost him. I'd lost the brother I loved.

Brian was 5 years older than I was and our lives were totally different. We grew up associating with different people, had different experiences, and given our current professions, had vastly different outlooks on life. But Brian had always been there for me.

When we were kids and I was bullied, Brian was the one who straightened it out, sometimes with threats, other times with fists. He'd threaten bullies my age but often had to fight either their brothers or the older bullies who preyed on younger kids. Some were older and bigger than he, and he'd sometimes lose, but he wouldn't give up. He'd kept going back until the bullies figured it wasn't worth it and left me alone. When my high school friends introduced me to drugs and Brian found out, he was the one who came back to straighten me out. I think he was away too long and that's why he lost his scholarship, ending up changing colleges and meeting Cherry.

I'd worshipped my older brother growing up. I admired his principles, his strong belief and his willingness to see the good in people. He was a Galahad, a pure soul in a pure body.

My brother always put others first. Until now. Now he was going off on his own, disowning all of his family. Including me. I suddenly saw myself through his eyes. A pimp. A low life who profits off the misery of others.

Sure, there were girls like Carmen, who actually enjoyed most of her life as a prostitute. She'd been making pornography before coming into Frenchie's looking for work. But I knew a lot of the other girls, the ones Mom sent to me and the ones she had working at Doxies, weren't willing workers. Many had husbands on the rigs, women who Mom had manipulated into compromising situations or into debt. Mom then blackmailed them into working shifts while their husbands were off-shore. Sure, Mom paid them, but they had no choice, not only forced to prostitute but forced to perform any service Mom demanded of them.

And the ones that argued? Or threatened to tell their spouses or the police? Well, for arguing, Mom might have then tied up and had them whipped by a BDSM client who was glad to pay for the privilege. Mom always knew how to turn a profit from any situation.

And the ones that threatened her security? They were the ones that were drugged and shipped out, to spend their days in miserable back country mining towns, in virtual slavery in drug hazed mindlessness. They were lucky if they ever had another conscious thought, other than a craving for more drugs.

I think Mom had married my dad, Brad, not because he knocked her up, but because he provided opportunities. He scheduled the workers on the rigs and was able to keep my mother appraised of the movement of the husbands. Her girls were never surprised by the unexpected arrival of their husbands. Brad could also force some overtime if clients made special requests for one of the girls at an inconvenient time.

Brian had always told me that his work required his three month shifts on the rigs and I'd never questioned it. But thinking about it and having grown up in Biloxi, I'd never known anyone else who had had to stay out that long. I hadn't seen it before, but now I knew that Brad had forced my brother to stay away so my mom could prey on his wife. My mom. My mom had screwed over her own son. My loving mother. And Brad.

I hurt, but not because I now realized that my parents were shits. I think I'd always known that. No, I hurt because I was so self-absorbed, enjoying my life of whoremongering and pimping, that I couldn't see how my brother was being abused. I had never imagined that anyone could hurt Brian, could hurt Galahad. I always thought, deep down, that he was invincible in his goodness.

By the time I got home, I had an anger simmering deep in my soul. I felt ready to hurt someone.

When I entered the house, I heard my parents screaming at each other. They stopped when I came into the room.

"What's going on?" I asked.

"Oh, your father's gotten himself fired." My mother snarled. "Now he's useless to me. Now we can't be sure when the girls' husbands are due back with any certainty. This is a disaster!"

"Yeah," my father whipped back. "I got myself fired! Who demanded that I keep her son out on the rigs for three months at a time, huh?" He wiped sweat off his forehead. "And your brother screwed me, telling the company that I was fucking his wife. They had no trouble finding out that that was true."

He shook his fists at his wife. "Then they demanded to know why Brian was kept out on the rigs for so long. I couldn't very well tell them that it was so his mother could turn his wife into a prostitute, could I. So, they decided that I did it to be able to fuck his wife! They said that that was a firing offense and that I was not only fired but was losing the pension I've worked thirty years for! I didn't even know they could do that."

He sat down and rubbed his face. He looked at me. "To make matters worse, this bitch says I'm no fucking good for her and I have to get the fuck out of her house, now. She's kicking me to the curb, with just what I have in the bank. No money from her, no pension. I'm fucked."

He glared at Mom. "Well, don't forget I know where the bodies are buried. I know where your accounts are offshore. I know..."

I saw the look on my mother's face before my father did. It was a stone-cold look. It was the look the whores got before being shipped to points south.

Brad saw the look. He dropped his eyes to the ground and raised his hands in surrender as he stood. "I'll go," he said. "I'll leave right now. You'll never see me again. I won't, I won't say anything to anyone. I'm gone, now."

With that, he was out the door. He didn't even pack. He just left.

I looked at my mother and saw that she wouldn't ever see Brad again. And neither would anyone else. She picked up a phone and quietly said a few words into it.

When she put it down, I asked her how Cherry was. "Not good," my mother said. "Your brother scarred her for life. She won't turn anyone on with that ass, now. I talked with a plastic surgeon who thinks he can repairs some of the damage, but not all of it. I'm not even sure she'd be able to work as one of the cheap hookers. It's really not pretty. I don't think it's worth the money to even try to repair her ass.

"Your brother screwed us. Cherry was our most profitable girl. The best part was I only paid her the same as the cheapest girl in the stable, while charging the highest prices. We got the house cut, the pimp's cut and almost 75% of Cherry's cut. This is definitely going to hurt the bottom line.

"Now she won't even be able to work as a regular whore. Even if her ass heals right, they think that her mind's gone. She screams and cries non-stop and the psychiatrist at the hospital thinks she'll probably end up institutionalized."

She looked at me, "You know, don't you, that your brother did this? He beat her and left her tied up all night, in pain and bleeding. Then he dropped of that resignation letter at Biloxi Gas that got your father fired." She had a tight little smile on her face. "I didn't know Brian had it in him. I'd almost be proud of him if he hadn't fucked me over so much. How the fuck are we going to keep track of the husbands with Brad gone?"

I looked at my mother, emotionlessly. This woman was proud that her son with such a beautiful spirit had been twisted into someone who could beat the woman he loved like he had. This woman who had manipulated her son and his wife to create the situation that led to his and her debasements. And this woman who made me the pimp I am today.

"Well, Mom. I have some ideas. Let me make a phone call and I'll bring us back some wine, and we can work this out." I got up and went to make that call. I returned with the wine.

"You know, Mom," I began as she sipped her wine, "the power of attorney that you gave me to handle affairs at Frenchie's doesn't really limit my authority to that house. It's actually open ended." I sipped my wine. It was good. I savored the taste for a moment, while my mother drank more of hers.

"I could use that power of attorney to handle all the business at Doxies, too." I laughed as my mother fought to keep her eyes open. "And I think it will give me access to the offshore accounts, as well."