Recalibrating Mia

Prompt: Your character believes his or her spouse is having an affair. But when s/he follows and spies on them, the truth is much different and darker than he or she possibly could have imagined.

Mia Worthington probed a small, soft bump at the base of her skull just right of her spine.  She pushed the pimple's sack up and down wondering if she should just pop it.  Amazed at her own annoyance tolerance, she left it alone.

"Have you seen my wallet?" Her husband, Calvin, searched frenetically through their bedroom.

"Check your pants in the hamper."

"Thanx.  Found it."  He entered the bathroom, placed his arm around her shoulder and drew her in.

"Do you really have to work tonight, again?."

"It's the nature of startups.  Lots of work up front, tons of payoff after it succeeds."

"Wouldn't you rather spend the night with me?"

"We've almost all of our savings sunk into this venture.  If it doesn't work, we'll spend all our nights together ... on skid row.  Brrrr."

"I wouldn't mind as long as I have you."  Mia faced him.

"Yes you would.  You can't stand the cold."  

"Yeah, right."

"So what are you doing tonight?"

"Goin' out with the girls.  If I'm not here when you get home, don't wait up for me."

"If you're not here when I get home, I'm going to accuse you of having an affair."  Calvin pressed his lips on Mia's forehead then headed door wards.

Mia tightened the towel wrapped around her slender body and regarded herself in the mirror.  I'm a beautiful woman.  There was a time when people thought Calvin was more attractive, but look at me now.  In the two years after Trinity BioTech offshored Calvin's computer programming job,  Mia found joy in exercise and ingenuity stretching limited grocery money into healthy meals.  She let slip her towel.  How can any red-blooded man keep his hands off this.  She counted the times she and Calvin cavorted carnally this year:  less than once a month.  He claimed the startup's zapping his energy, but, when he was employed, they used to do it five or six times a week, and he often put in sixty to eighty hour weeks.  Frequency and creativity increased after the layoff.  Apparently, he utilized his free time thinking about sex. 

She applied makeup, dressed in faded black jeans, slinky black shoulder-less top and a black sweater.  She fished a business card from her purse,  Geoffrey Cantwell, Private Investigations and Retribution.  

On the back, Geoff wrote an address where he set up a "duck blind."  Geoff's first report quelled Mia's fears.  Her husband drove straight to the office, stayed for hours, then returned home.  Never can tell what happens at the office  Geoff's words jolted her mind.  Most affairs start in offices.  With this recession, plenty empty office space.  Rent's cheap.  Slap a plaque on the door, use it for rendezvous.  Geoff took the day shift, and Mia agreed to man the blind at night.

Mia pulled her car past the building's parking lot and parked half a block away.  The building looked different at night.  Both her husband's office and the "duck blind" occupied Winkel Medical Center's second story.  Vince Winkel became her doctor shortly after he and Calvin founded NanoBotics, their start up company.

In his mid fifties, Vince's short, pudgy frame supported a balding head.  Sharp, pointy features erupted from a jowly face.  Mia thought his beady eyes contributed to a rat-like countenance.  He leered.  Her arm muscles tightened whenever he looked at her.  She wanted to flee or fight, but she endured her examinations, and, surprisingly, came to accept him even though she caught him leering at his medical assistants.  She and Calvin agreed, he'd fit in with pimply hackers lurking in their college's computer lab.  The only naked women he'd ever see were patients and prostitutes.  Still, he cashed in a favor with a plastic surgeon to cover surgical removal of her flab, and a few other touch-ups.  He told her he considered Calvin family, and he had no other family on which to utilize medical service swaps.  

Mia watched Vince exit the first floor clinic, his arm wrapped around an attractive brunette adorning a shiny, vertically striped blouse and a black skirt cut just above her knee, typical office attire.  Vince walked her to a car.  They kissed, long, deep kisses.  Vince's palm pressed into the small of her back; his pudgy fingers caressed her butt.  Good for Vince.  Found himself a gold digger Mia thought then slapped her hand on her mouth as if she vocalized her thought and tried to stifle it.  Or perhaps love she corrected herself.

She waited till Vince entered his clinic.  She crossed the parking lot, climbed the external stairs, paused at the NanoBotics plaque on her husband's office door, and used the key Geoff gave her on the next door.

Geoff left a spartan set up.  A flat panel TV cabled to a DVR hooked up to a fiber optic camera high up the wall.  A kitchen step ladder accommodated access to a pistol grip which could redirect the camera angle.  Geoff advised against moving the camera while anyone occupied the next door room.  Even subtle noises compromise "blinds."  

Mia sat, cross legged, before the TV, donned a pair of head phones and detached a yellow sticky note.

Not much happened on the day shift.  Coffee pot in the bathroom.  Be quiet in this room. 

Good Luck.

The monitor revealed Calvin sitting before a bench, a keyboard directly in front of him, a mouse to his right.  From his head movements, Mia deduced he actively scanned several, perhaps twenty computer monitors mounted on the wall.  At home he used five:  two mounted on the wall and three forming a cockpit on his desk.  He double tapped a monitor to his right, grabbed his mouse dragging a specific window to a screen directly in front of him and typed on the key board.  Vince appeared and took a chair next to Calvin.

"Sampling the product?" Calvin asked.

Mia snatched the earphones from her head.  Geoff must be deaf.  She placed one speaker to her ear and searched for a volume control.

"Best benefit of this venture,"  Vince laughed.

"Well it sure ain't financial.  At least not yet."

"What do you have in mind?"

"Consider this the alpha phase of our business.  It's time to announce beta."

"Go on."

"Let our clients know we are changing the pricing structure.  We'll do it gradually.  First, limit each client to five dates a month, that's the average, then, in increments, raise the fee to two thousand a month with optional extra dates for five hundred each."

"How will that impact revenue?  We're starting to show profits."

"We have sixty some clients.  I hacked their bank accounts.  All can easily afford three or four thousand a month.  Two k shouldn't scare them off.  It might make attracting new clients difficult."

"We could keep one k as an introductory price."  Vince pointed to the wall.  "Christ just look at Eileen.  She's positively a freak!"

"We've definitely created an oversexed librarian.  I actually have to tone down her pleasure centers during sex and dial down her libido during the day."

Mia's initial shock at her husband's discussion of another woman's sexuality subsumed to curiosity. What are they up to?

"That gets me thinking.  Why not adapt a more traditional business model?  We should let Eileen turn pro.  We'd make way more money off her."

Are they talking about ...

"We've been over this.  It introduces too many risk factors."

"But look at the profit potential.  Let's say she turns ten tricks a day ..."

Oh my ...

"... at two hundred dollars each  That's two thousand a day.  Thirty days a month and that's sixty k a month.  It's what we make monthly off our entire inventory.  Seems simple to me." Vince concluded.

"OK, pimp daddy.  Let's look at the real costs.  Eileen quits her job and turns pro.  She now has to pay her own rent, food, car, clothes and all out of our profit.  It's about five k."

"Still leaves fifty-five k."

"But that's not all.  You remember our conversation about clients.  What's to stop a few of them from refusing to pay?  Nothing.  What if they decide to rob her, or someone follows her to a trick and robs her afterwards.  There goes more of our profits.  So lets have her hire someone for protection, perhaps a bouncer from a local nightclub.  Maybe she pays him ten k a month."

"So, we're at forty-five."

"Now consider risk factors.  Even with her bouncer, Eileen will still suffer some blows.  She can't work with a bruised face.  She still needs to pay her protector.  Soon, either he gets greedy or she gets further in debt while she heals.  Now she works for him.  Let's say he's like us, and he samples the product.  It's good for a awhile, but he wants more variety.  He sells her to a pimp."

"He can't sell her!"

"Happens all the time.  Our bouncer says he's lined up a client for her.  Drops her off in a room.  The pimp says, 'I just bought you.  Now you work for me until you pay off your debt.'"

"So she says she's not for sale."

"Then he beats her down."

"She wont be able to work."

"Doesn't matter.  He owns her.  He's got time, and, odds are, he has clients who enjoy beating women."

"I know the type.  I've treated their wives and girlfriends for years."

"So now Eileen is a beaten down w***e, broke, working for a pimp.  We get no profits."  Calvin raises his hands chest high, palms up.  "Why would you want to do that to her?  Why would you want to do that to us?"

Where did Calvin learn about pimps and w****s

"We could be her protection."

"Do you know the difference between criminals and us?"

"A rap sheet?"

"Criminals are comfortable using violence.  They like it.  They accept the consequences.  I am not comfortable using violence, and I'm definitely not comfortable finding myself in intensive care or prison.  Are you?"

"We could send Geoff.  He's tough."

My Geoff?  What's he got to do with this?

"Geoff is smart tough.  He's bring an AK-47 to a knife fight tough."

"Really."

"Yeah, remember where he got all those scars?"

"Lost too many knife fights.  I treated him after each one."

"Exactly.  Geoff is a find.  He really is.  But the direct prostitution model is not for us, and I really don't think it is best for our product."

"So what we're doing is legal?"

"Let's look at it from an outside perspective."

Just like Calvin to change perspective to win arguments.

"Okay."

"We run an internet based subscription dating service.  That's legal. Right?"

"Right."

"We add value through intensive investigation of both clients and their dates."

"We do?"

"On paper, that's what we pay Geoff and Sean for."

"Really?"

"Really.  Next, we charge clients a thousand or two a month to date pre-screened, beautiful eligible women."

"You forgot sexually willing."

"That, according to our web site, is strictly between our clients and their dates."

"But they're still prostitutes."

"Do clients pay them?"

"No."

"Do we pay them?"

"No."

"Then our product ain't prostitutes."

"Okay.  So we run a legal enterprise."

"As long as no-one investigates our recruitment process."

"You mean dangling Sean in front of eligible women, a little rohypnol, a quick visit to my clinic..."

"Where you drill a small hole in her skull, inject a million or so of my nanites into their brain while I hack their cell phone."

Mia reached behind her neck and rubbed her pimple.  Calvin taped a couple of keys on his keyboard.  Mia refocused on the conversation.

"What are the charges?"

"So far, sixty some counts of kidnapping, false imprisonment and battery.  Geoff's dart and snatch method might be assault and battery."

"That's all?"

"Conspiracy, perhaps.  I don't think the law has caught up with our technology."

"No laws on mind control?"

"But it's not mind control.  My nanites invade their limbic systems centering on the amygdala; pain and pleasure centers and, starting with the eighth generation, the audio and visual cortices.  Mostly, we monitor their activities and adjust their emotions.  It's not mind control, just subtle manipulation.  Your medical research helped make all this possible."

"Nothing in my research addresses erasing memories.  I'm still surprised these girls forget their transitional phase.  It seems foolproof."

"It ain't.  It's a trick.  The limbic system is next to associative memory areas, you remember, the areas that allow us to cry at movies because we associate our own experiences with what we see on screen, reproduce old emotions."

"Yeah."

"Put the right amount of negative emotions on memories, and the mind compartmentalizes them into dark recesses and hides the key.  Women are more apt to act on subtle emotional manipulation and, voila, memory block."

"Hehe, solves the women-remembering-what-happened problem."

You think you are so clever, you guys, just you wait.

"Introduces our third business model risk."

"Frontal lobe override."

"FLO, exactly."

"The brain loves its rational self.  Once the frontal lobe takes over, it can accomplish almost anything:  Overcome almost anything,  ignore pain, mind over matter stuff and even solve the universes mysteries."

"Look at my wife." Calvin tapped a monitor to his right, twice, and dragged an image to his immediate display.  "Her emotions tell her to trust me.  I've given her enough information to explain my nights here, but her frontal lobe keeps telling her I'm having an affair instead of monitoring our product."

If you don't pay attention to me, you control freak, you must be paying it to someone else.  Mia's face flushed warm.  Her legs twitched.  She stood up.  Stretching the headphones cord, she ascended the step stool.  Calm down, calm.  She nudged the camera's pistol grip so it centered on the wall, not Calvin.

"You sample enough of our product to justify her hunch."

"True, and Carla Giancambo is coming in tonight.  I'm going test the new programming.  You've shouldn't have to make any adjustments."

See!  Mia returned to her TV.  Sixty or more monitors lined Calvin's wall.  About a third of the images showed dates from a woman's point of view.  Many of the dates were in an advanced, sexual, phase.  Next to those images were brain maps with vibrant colors for each area.  Mia's stomach cramped.  She bent over before regaining control.  She studied the monitors. Redder colors must indicated high activity; bluer colors less activity.  To the far left,  Calvin devoted monitors to pornography.  

"Have fun, but I'm not married.  You can always 'test' Mia. That's why you married her."

"No, I married her out of love."

Oh ... That's my Cal.  Mia rested her head on her hand.  Analysis ceased.  She closed her eyes concentrating on his voice.

"Love of?"

"Love of her."

"Yeah, right.  You must have had a reason to love her.  She's a babe now, but I've seen your wedding pictures."

Hey, watch it, Vince

"You can't love someone for a reason."

"Can't?"

"It's axiomatic.  Love's always irrational.  If you love someone for a reason, then you love the reason not the person.  She has money; you love her wealth.  She's physically attractive; you love the admiration of your friends, the boost in self esteem.  You love sex with her; you love her willingness to please you, but you love her no more than you love a good w***e and you may just love not paying for sex.  Name a reason to love someone, and you name what you love more than your special someone."

"So what happened?"

"The third risk factor, again.  Sooner or later the frontal lobe takes over.  Rational thinking nudges you out of love.  In our society, there are few, if any, reasons to remain in long term relationships.  Less for contractual ones, like marriage."

"Raising a family."

"Do you want to raise children?"

"No, I'd rather enjoy life."

"Same here."

You said it's because the world already has too many people.  A*****e!  
Calvin tapped a few keys; Mia calmed down.

"But, I wouldn't mind enjoying Mia."

"I'm sure you will."

"You mean your'e going to ..."

"Yep,  I think we should bring our prototype in and do some testing.  You up for that?"

"If the tests are successful?"

"I think the divorce will give our business a necessary forensic test.  She'll keep the house and all her investments.  I keep my share of Nanobotics. Glenda handles divorces, we can monitor her reaction to her forensic accountant's reports."

"We have a lawyer in inventory but no whatd'ya call it?"

"Forensic accountant.  No."

"We could lose Glenda."

"We could lose the whole company, but we may endure more investigations.  Let's give our books a test run."

"So I'll have Geoff bring her in."

"And I'll monitor things from here."

Vince found his cell phone, typed a text message and pressed, "Send."

Mia felt a tap on her shoulder.  Geoff offered his hand.  Mia reevaluated his full sleeve tattoos.  Her past disregard faded into admiration.  Along with his scarred face, they told the story of his life: fights won and lost; loves won and lost; his family's poverty, his escape from gangs to running his own business.

"Dr. Winkle will see you now."

Mia removed the headphones, accepted Geoff's hand and allowed him to pull her to her feet.  Sudden movement rushed blood to her brain.  She swooned forward.  Geoff caught her in his arms.  She raised her heels, leaned into Geoff and rested her head on his shoulder.  His arms wrapped tighter.

"Are you feeling all right?"

Mia looked around.  The room did not look usual.  Waiting rooms should have chairs and a receptionist's station. It must be an after hours thing.  She reached her arm back, brushing hair from her neck.  Her fingers registered a soft lump. 

"It's good I came in.  I need to see a doctor."

Geoff led her, by the arm, though a second story hallway, down an internal stairwell through an access door and into an examination room. 

"The Doctor would like you to disrobe."

Mia grabbed her sweater's hem and pulled if over her head and off.  Geoff reached out a hand, and she relinquished it.

"Do you mind?"

"Not at all."

Mia's smile reflected Geoff's.  I can do a harmless striptease  She slipped off her sneakers, swayed her hips, unbuttoned her jeans, hooked her thumbs inside belt loops and pulled down swaying her hips and bending her knees.  Once her jeans sagged about her ankles, she found it difficult to escape them gracefully.  After a few tries, she slid her hand down her right leg, tugged them free, used her foot to hold them down and jerked her left foot loose.  She kicked her jeans to Geoff, resumed her dance and removed her blouse.

Geoff nodded his head to the side.

"Really?" She felt embarrassed.

"Really."

If I'm going to do this I'm going to do this right.  Mia turned away from Geoff, alternately tightening her left and right butt cheeks while slowly pulling her panties down to her ankles before stepping out of them.  She tried exploiting their elasticity to shoot them to Geoff, but they fell short.  She bent down to pick them up.  Geoff already folded her garments and placed them in a stack.  He added her panties.

"Socks."

His voice feigned a clinical tone.  Mia abandoned her striptease, hopped onto the examination table, pulled off her socks and flung them.

"Don't I look attractive to you?"

"Very sexy, Mrs. Worthington.  I'm gonna dream about you tonight."

Geoff's head turned toward knocking on the door.  Vince entered.

"How are you feeling, Mia?"

"A little exposed."  Mia leaned back resting on both hands and drew her knee over her other knee.

"You seem comfortable about it," Vince observed.  "Thank you for bringing her in, Geoff, I'll take it from here."

Vince approached, placed a stethoscope over Mia's heart and paused.  Mia liked the warmth of his hand compared the stethoscope's cold metal.

"Your heart rate is high.  Have you noticed this at home or work?"

"Doctor, I haven't ... but, there's something on my neck."  Mia pulled her hair to one side.

"This won't do at all."  Vince pulled a pre-wrapped kit from a drawer.  He scraped away infected skin, swabbed it with disinfectant and smeared it with antiseptic gel.

"When we're done, you let your hair cover your neck, but don't pat it down.  We wouldn't want gel messing up your hair.  You have beautiful hair, by the way."

"Thanks, doc."

"Now lay down on your stomach and pull your hair away from your neck again.  I need to give you a local anesthesia."

"Like this?"

"That's good, now your head's going to feel numb."

Mia felt the needles pinch, but it subsided.  A quick, painless incision and small, vacuum cleaner sounds.  She heard a drill's hum.  Vince held her head steady while her skull rumbled a slow, barely perceptible vibration.  A moment later, it stopped, and she nearly napped.

"One quick injection, and we're almost done."

A few tugs, as Vince added three sutures, woke her.  He applied more antiseptic gel.

"You're back."

"Yes?"

Vince slid his hand down her back before caressing her buttocks.  "Is beautiful."

"Thank you."

"You are comfortable with me touching you."

"You are my doctor."

"Is that all."

"I'd be more comfortable if either you disrobed or I put on my clothes." An impish smile graced her mouth as an impish notions filled her mind.

Vince pulled off his white smock, kicked of his shoes and yanked off his blue scrubs.

Mia sat up and regarded her pudgy, rat-faced doctor.  

"Is that all."

Vince pulled his boxers to his ankles.

"Socks!"

Vince raised his leg to remove his boxers and a sock.  Teetering on foot, he lost his balance, spun and caught himself on the examination table.  Using it as a brace, he managed to pull off his sock.

Mia reached across his chest and turned him toward her.

Vince placed his hand on her neck, tilted her head up and inspected her imperceptible jowls.

"Dr. Alberman does good work."

"I came out quite well, don't you think."

He cupped Mia's breast with his other hand.  Mia's heart raced faster.

"I can't feel any scars."

"I never thanked you for all the plastic surgery, at least not properly."

*****  Aftermath    ******

"It's a pretty good settlement," Glenda said.

"Feels wrong, though." Mia stared at her unsigned divorce papers.

"You keep the house and what's left of the savings and pensions."

"But Calvin gets all of NanoBotics.  I paid the bills for years while he set that up.  I suffered for it every bit as much as he did.  It' just starting to make money.  I feel like I may be losing out on something big."

"If it weren't for those tapes, you might have kept your stake, but, what were you thinking?"

"Starting an affair with his business partner?"

"Yeah."

"Not my best decision."

"Look on the bright side.  By releasing the tapes, or, as they claim, not preventing the release of their security system video, we wrangled you a good deal.  Five thousand a month for fifty years.  Three million.  Are you going to keep the annuity or cash out, lump sum, at one point two mill?"

"What do you recommend?"

"Cash out.  You can pay off the mortgage, pay your legal fees, thank you very much, and invest the rest."

"Can I invest in NanoBotics?"

"Not yet.  Calvin's keeping the company private.  He holds on to the books tight.  My accountant said getting Nano's numbers was like prying barnacles off a whale."

"Sounds like Cal."

"So are you happy?"

"I will be.  I started dating again.  I found a web site which sets me up with quality men."

"Anything serious?"

"I don't think I'm ready for that yet, but most of the dates went well." Mia smiled. "Very well."

"I think I'm on the same site."

"Anything serious?"

"Oh, I turned down a few marriage proposals. I guess I'm just too picky to settle on just one of them.  Enjoyed them all, but I keep waiting for the right one."

"I feel much the same."

"You have to kiss a lot of princes before you find your Prince Charming, right?"

"Right!"

Word Cound: 4049

If you liked this story, or even if you didn't, you should check out my new novel now available on Kindle:
Justin Theret's Guide to a Better Life: a novel despite its title 
https://www.amazon.com/Justin-Ther%C3%A9ts-Guide-Better-Life-ebook/dp/B01HAFHGZY...

Author's notes:


The prompt:

Your character believes his or her spouse/sibling/coworker/friend 
is having an affair. But when your character follows and spies on them, 
the truth is much different and darker than he or she possibly could have imagined...

invites darkness.  What could be darker than discovering your unemployed husband spent all his savings starting up an on-line prostitution ring.  Perhaps the cold business-like manner in which he addresses his business plan and risk management.  Perhaps his use of medical nanorobots to manipulate women into servicing his clients.  Surely discovering you were the prototype for his manipulation method would have you turning him over to the police, FBI, FDA or whoever would listen, but, no, you are his prototype, and, in many ways, under his control.  You wont tell anyone.

Major concepts:

The four major risk factors.
1.  The mob muscles in, takes over.  Discussion of how pimps corrupt prostitution.  Discussion of use of violence.  The history of the Samurai from tax collector's protectors to the ruling class - Minamoto/Tokugawa Shogunate.
2.  Venereal disease.  There was AIDS long before there was a test for AIDS.  A new STD could wipe out both product and client base.
3.  Epidemiologist.  Someone might detect a pattern in the product and track down Calvin and Vince.
4.  Although Calvin uses emotional associations to force memory compartmentalization.  He's afraid one woman's frontal lobe will break through and access those memories.  FLIs - Frontal Lobe Inhibitors have proved ineffective.

Method of manipulation:
A gentle approach works.  Overloading women with emotions does not produce desired behaviors.
Also stimulate pain/pleasure centers.
Use emotional control to isolate women from friends and family.  It's ok to "recruit" married women.  Through manipulation, they will be legally separated by the time they are ready for clients.
Need to tap visual and auditory cortices to know when manipulate their emotions,away from friends and family.
Computer interpretation of visual cortex activity yields low/standard resolution images.  Failure of FEMPOV pornsite (reason 1.  reason 2 "It's all about the girl").
AVW, A Voice Within works.  Women do not consciously hear what a controller says, but it works subliminally.  "Take of your clothes,"  would confuse the subject while "Too hot for this blouse," usually leads to nakedness.

Business models:
Direct Prostitution Vince's preference.  
Advantages:  Women work 12 hours a day with average of $200 hour or $2400 a day, a big payback.  
Disadvantages:  Gathering the cash would lead either mob or police directly to Calvin.  Cash needs to be laundered to be useful.  Estimated spillage - 35 percent.  Women may get stiffed, so to speak, estimated spillage - 10 percent.  Women may get beaten lessening their earning potential.  Need to buy protection.  Estimated cost - 20 percent.  Protectors could try to take over the business, big risk factor.  Women vulnerable to STD's lessons women to average 7 years productivity.  Need to pay women so they can be fed, sheltered, clothed, etc.  Savings in group storage like movie Eden.  Disposal plan, even damaged women could be sold to pimps, but contact with pimps adds to risk factor.

Escort Agency/ Call Girl.  
Advantages:  Agencies could electronic payment, but that would be tracked by banks.  Women get pay for service.  Nightly Average - $5000 (1 All night date or up to ten one hour full service dates).  A bigger payback.  Agencies can operate as legitimate business, no need to launder money.  
Disadvantages:Agency businesses are, can be, watched by law enforcement.  Usually model includes bribery.  Estimated cost - 20 percent.  Women still collect money from clients which means all the protection costs and risks apply.  Elliot Spitzer paid Ashley Duprey $4300 for a night of sex outside Manhattan.  Spitzer lost his political career, Duprey enjoyed and profited from her fifteen minutes of fame, but the owner of her escort agency (aka The Manhattan Madam) was arrested, convicted and served time.  Health risks may be reduced, but are still prevalent.  In reality, most high end call girls are controlled by pimps, though the percent of independents are slightly higher.  Agencies just take a cut (National Geographic documentary Sex In America: Call Girls).

Subscription Dating Service Model/Calvin's model: 
Advantages:  Women are completely self maintaining.  Technology replaces pimps role of controlling women.  Direct payment to company through credit/debit cards.  Credit card fees 2-3 percent.  Women not beaten for money.  Clients screened and monitored.  Women's visual cortex serves as security camera.  Signals are processed through cell phone.  Cell phone calls 911.  Calvin has access to their finances.  Sherryl was beaten, he charged $100k.  Threatened lawsuit if charge challenged.  Client dismissed.  Clients must submit results of STD tests on regular basis (More business for Vince's lab subsidiary).  No need for protection services reducing Calvin's fear of being muscled out.
Disadvantages:  High R/D cost.  Nanite flush rate.  Technology may fail. A woman may remember details of her transformation.  Biggest Disadvantage:  Need to constantly monitor women's situation and adjust emotions, pain and pleasure brain activity.  To free up women's time for dates, the need to isolate women from friends and family,replacing women's need for social activity with dates.  Need to block marriage impulse, though marriage is a good disposal mechanism.  Long product to market time.  Women need months of conditioning before dating.  High production costs, though cost of manufacturing nanites can be brought down.  High flush rate, women need new nanites every few months. 
Extra Advantages: Combining Vince's medical connection with Calvin's technology is a winning combination.  Women do not need to be knockouts to start.  Weight control and plastic surgery make mediocre women very attractive.  With many of prostitution's health risks under control (women use Norplant to prevent pregnancy), they will retain attractiveness longer, even into their forties and fifties.  Sexual desirability of older women (MILFs and Cougars) mean that some of the women will date for thirty years.

Pornography:
Additional model to all other business models.  Most pimps in the sex industry have little to no respect for their girls.  They try to make money off them any way they can.  Calvin and Vince fall victim to this impulse.  With access to visual and audio cortices, they try FEMPOV, pornography from the female point of view.  Vince blames low resolution images; Calvin thinks porn is all about seeing naked women engage in sex (men are just props).  Women looking at men just isn't arroussing, not even to women.  They send their clients gifts with hidden cameras to get footage.  Also they set up date rooms (hotels, office building suites) where their clients can pay a little more, but date rooms have multiple cameras.  Vince wants to use male porn models and make real porn.  Risk factor:  Porn actors need to be registered and tested for STDs.  Someone might notice a pattern.  Persistent risk factor:  Women might be recognized (either form) and suffer consequence (lose employment, neighbor protests).

Technology Notes:  Most nanites are biological not mechanical, so this story relies on future state technology.  Calvin employs ant design - simple machines which work together,  Namely, small multi-contact computer circuitry (they combine to form computer sensors, logic and electronic pulses), a small battery rechargeable from brains electric pulses and a twitch membrane for mobility (saw a documentary about drones, one was a butterfly drone.  Instead of motor and gears, they used an artificial material which contracted under a small electric charge.  By controlling the contractions and expansions, they achieved flight.)  Calvin's first breakthrough was when he got nanites to combine into a bluetooth transceiver inside a petri dish.  Later he simply uses cell phones data connectivity.

Author's Note

Partially complete story written for a contest. I ran out of time and rushed to an ending, hence the extensive author's notes section at the end.