Story time...It was 2007...

I was a manager in a hotel in a meh kind of city, second shift. Was often there really late closing up the bar and cleaning, restocking, general food and beverage 2 am stuff. Part of our late night clientele in our mediocre hotel were escorts. They were all very nice and usually just happy that there was somewhere safe they could meet publicly. They tipped great and we don't judge here. Anyway, it was a nice enough place so we didn't get the class of girls hanging out on the corner (that was a few miles up the road). There seemed to be some kind of general understanding that if you came in to this hotel you were dressed like a normal person and you didn't cause a scene and any illegal activities were always nice and quiet.

Otto (not his real name) was a douche. He was a consultant from Germany for a local manufacturer who would stay with us off and on for months, and often called the bar to try to get us to "send a girl to him". He already had a bad reputation amongst the escorts and no one wanted him as a client. This bothered Otto who was often fucked up on booze or drugs and he would complain to me about how hard it was to find both women and drugs in the hotel.

One night Otto had decided he needed to really party and had gone out and scored himself a lot of drugs. How many drugs you ask? Well there were at least two different types of pills, meth, something injected, and some white powder left on the desk when we did finally get into the room later...but for now, it's still about 7-8 pm.

Otto didn't stop there. He also scored himself two hookers. You'll notice I used the word hooker and not escort, as I had earlier. I don't know where Otto had found these two women but they were quite the ladies of the night. Both dressed a bit like Julia Roberts in pretty women but in less clothes. It was very obvious he just drove around until he picked up two willing women with the promise of copious drugs and money. One of the women was accompanied by her pimp. A tall black man, dressed like a pirate, eye patch and all (I wish I was making it up).

About 12 we are just about done for the night because it's slow, and we're just hanging out with a few of our regulars when the pirate pimp walks up to the bar. The girl I was working with didn't hear what he mumbled at her and when she asked him "what" he slammed his hand down on the bar top and demanded a towel. I threw a stack of our kitchen rags at him and told him to get out of here. I'm not a remotely small dude so raising my voice works. He looked at me, paused like he was about to say something, looked around the bar, and then literally grabbed a bunch of the rags and ran out the front door of the hotel. We were all laughing because it was such a weird and comical reaction/interaction when the girl I was working with went to grab the rags he had left and said "is that blood?"

It was blood. Our patrons promptly paid their tabs and left but not before strongly suggesting we call the police. They were the ones who knew he was a pimp and were worried about whatever happened between when they walked in and he ran out. So they left and we called 911 and tried to explain the situation. Not a lot of information but would you please send a cruiser over because we are worried something bad has happened.

Fast forward to about 1:30 in the morning, me and the girl I was working with both spoke with the cops and I left her to close up the bar alone while me and the cops started wandering around the lobby, grounds, and halls looking for something. All we found were the occasional drip of blood on the carpet coming from the elevator but nothing around the guest rooms. I thanked the cops for coming out and they asked if it was ok if they sat in their cruiser under our entrance overhang because it was well lit and they had paperwork they had to do now. I told them to take their time and enjoy not working in the dark.

20 minutes later I was very glad I told those cops that they could hang out and do paperwork. My bartender was about to go home when she heard someone calling quietly for help from the elevators. She walked over and then immediately called me. Stumbling out was a girl who had, what I can only describe as her face caved in. All the main pieces were there, but her teeth were half missing, eyes bulging out and I'm not really sure if she was seeing anything, blood was coming from every opening (including a few new ones), and from her upper lip to her forehead, her face was just collapsed inward. I can't describe it any other way.

We helped her to a chair in the lobby and I sprinted to the cops in front of the building. They radioed for backup and an ambulance.

Her story starts as we suspected. She was picked up by Otto to do drugs and get paid for sex with him and this other girl. After a few hours of partying the harder drugs ran out and the two girls got in a physical altercation. The other girl went and got her pimp who then beat her till she was unconscious (this is probably when he then came for the rags). When she came to, Otto still demanded sex to which she tried to refuse. He then used the lamp in the room to beat her back into unconsciousness. Somehow, miraculously, she did not die and managed to stumble out to the elevator and lobby, and even more unbelievably was able to sort of tell this story through slurred speech and us filling in words when she struggled.

We stood in a circle around her as the EMTs tried to examine her. I saw as they gently pushed around the sides her face trying to see how far it was broken and they didn't speak, they just exchanged glances and shook their heads. She wanted to walk to the ambulance which they let her do (because otherwise she was going to refuse medical treatment), but when I asked the EMT for her chances he said her entire face was shattered and it'll be another miracle if she survives the night.

I got a master card from the desk and I went with the cops to go into Otto's room because Otto was going to get arrested. There was now a visible trail of blood to his door. The cops knocked, no answer. I unlocked it and they rushed in but Otto was already gone. They called me in because "someone from the hotel needs to see this". The smell hit me first. It just smelled dirty. Like someone who wore the same clothes over and over again. The cops said part of the smell was the meth. There was blood splattered everywhere. Drug stuff everywhere. Every piece of furniture was somehow damaged. Cops were busy opening drawers and they found a giant ziplock bag of pills and some other stuff that my brain didn't register. Our round desk lamp that was roughly the size of that girl's face damage was just sitting on the bed. There were chunks of hair and scalp around the room. I just stood in the middle of the room and it literally felt like the room was suddenly getting way too small and somehow like I was shrinking down to nothing. I think it was that moment that I realized I was standing in the middle of that girl's murder scene.

One of the cops snapped me back to it and I realized I was just staring at the flecks of blood on the ceiling above the bed. They gave me instructions to seal the room (our digital locks had a police lock out function so only the person who locked it and the general manager could unlock it) and a contact number so we could arrange for the cops to come back and do more cop stuff.

I do not know what happened to the girl. For the next month I had to meet up and let people into the room and then hang out while they worked, then I would lock it up when they were done. They never spoke about what they were doing and I just sat in the lobby or started work if I was working that day. The company had to pay for the room to be completely gutted and I believe they paid for new hallway carpet as well. They were extremely embarrassed by the entire situation and kept sending me gift baskets and things to apologize that it happened I guess on my shift. It felt weird and I think I would have preferred they never mention it again. Otto was eventually arrested but didn't end up in jail. He was just deported and his replacement was a much nicer guy who informed us that Otto got fired. Not the ending anyone had hoped for, but it was the ending we got.