and they said she was working.'
'You really think I'm goin' in there?' Dom asked.
'I bought you dinner, didn't I? A deal's a deal.'
'Nothin but grief,' Dom said. Then they paid their ten-dollar cover charge and went inside.
They found themselves in a rowdy country-western bar, dimly lit, so loud it was almost impossible to talk. There were tables scattered around and two bars, one at either end of the room. One of the bars had a platform extending from it, as if there would be some live entertainment. A waiter led them to a table after Jack slipped him ten bucks and they sat and ordered beer. It took a minute, Jack was waiting for it, and then Dom said, 'You notice somethin' a little strange about this place?'
Jack nodded. Then he started to laugh.
'There's no fuckin' women in here,' Dom said.
As strange as Jack found it, too, he couldn't help it, the laughter just burst out of him. He couldn't imagine what Kid had been doing in this place, there was something vaguely disturbing about it, and he was not all that comfortable, he had to admit, but in his entire life he had never seen an expression on anyone's face like the one on Dom's right now. Jack hadn't been expecting this, that's for sure. He was probably just as shocked as Dom, he just didn't show it, but here they were, so they might as well finish what they came to do. He tried to explain to Dom, to say the words 'We're in a gay bar,' but the music came up and it was too loud, there was no way to hear or to talk. And then, over a loudspeaker system, a DJ's voice boomed out:
'Ladies and gentlemen… and there are a few gentlemen here, aren't there?…'
The crowd whooped and hollered loudly in response.
'… the Golden Saddle is proud to present, direct from Texas… where everything is soooo biiiigggg…'
The crowd screamed its delight now.
'… the lovely, the sensuous, the provocative… Kim!!!!'
The lights went down in the room and the spotlight came up on the stage protruding from the bar. By now, Jack wasn't too surprised – he should have expected it, he realized that – but still just a little stunned at his surroundings. There was no denying it. The sexy stripper dressed in full cowboy regalia – boots, chaps, vest, and gun belt with two pistols – was the person they were looking for. This was Kim.
And Kim was not a woman.
– '-'-'THE ACT LASTED about ten minutes. Kim pranced and kicked and ultimately stripped down to the gun belt to the pounding of loud rock and roll. Every so often, Jack would glance over at Dom, just to make sure the old man wasn't having a heart attack. When Kim was finished dancing, Jack stood up, stepped into the crowd to find their waiter, whispered something in his ear, and then a few minutes after that, Kim was sitting at their table, the Western outfit back in place.
Jack did his best to explain what they were doing there, what they were looking for. Kim seemed to accept their explanation without needing to know many more details. They learned that Kid and Kim were, in fact, in the same MBA graduate program and that Kim also did some personal training. He said he was less weight-oriented than Kid, that he specialized more in stretching and yoga. At some point, he glanced at Dom, then said to Jack, 'Your friend looks like he's in kind of a state of shock.' Kim's thick Brooklyn accent was a bit jarring, it didn't exactly go with the cowboy outfit, but Jack figured that his outfit – and his home state – probably changed every night, depending on the club manager's whim.
'Well,' Jack told him, 'Kid never told us that he did this.'
'He hadn't done it for a while. And never all that often. Just when he really needed money. It ain't a bad little living. A hunnert a night plus tips and the tips add up. Especially with Kid. That boy had a body to die for and he could shake his ass.' He smiled sweetly at Dom.
'I'm trying to find some of Kid's clients,' Jack said now. 'The people he used to train.'
'Can't help you there. We don't share names in this business. Too cutthroat. You wouldn't believe how many so-called friends of mine try to steal my customers.' His lips took on a quick pout. 'Not to mention other things.'
'How about some of the women he went out with? There was one he called the Entertainer. She's a dancer-' Jack stopped suddenly. 'Wait a second – was that you?'
'Don't I wish,' Kim said. 'But that's a big no, no, no. Kid was as straight as they come. This was just a job for him. Lotta straight guys, the bodybuilders, do it 'cause it's safe – it's a lotta lookin' but no touching. But you know what? I think I know who youse mean. This Entertainer. Kid used to leave here and go to another club' – he looked at Dom again – 'one your friend will appreciate a little bit more. It's called Lace. Over on the East Side. Kid used to hang out there a lot. I got the feeling he went through a lot of dancers, but there was one girl in particular he used to talk about. She sounded amazing. He almost had me interested.'
'Did he tell you anything specific about her? Anything you remember that'll help me find her?'
Kim made a clicking noise with his tongue, trying to remember something. 'Oh, God… what did he tell me about her? Something weird. She was from someplace totally outrageous… Ohio! That's what it was. Can you imagine coming from Ohio? Anyway, I don't know her name but she's a dancer there. At Lace. And maybe she won't be so hard to find 'cause Kid always said she was to die for. Oh. Sorry. Maybe that's a bad choice of words.'
'You think she'd be working tonight?'
'Friday? All the good ones work on the weekends, honey. She'll be there.'
'Thanks,' Jack said. 'I really appreciate it.' He pulled some money out of his pocket and tried to hand it to Kim.
'No, no,' the stripper said. 'You're friends of Kid. No money, please.' He smiled. 'Use it to buy the old guy some oxygen.'
Before Dom could say anything, Kim stood and slithered away.
'Now can we go?' Dom asked, draining his second beer. It was the first thing he'd said in forty-five minutes.
'Yeah,' Jack told him. 'Now we can go.'
'You know,' Dom said as they were almost out the door. 'I gotta admit that guy had a pretty fuckin' good ass. And that's the last thing I'm ever gonna say about it.'
– '-'-'LACE WAS JUST a block north of the Golden Saddle, on Twenty-fourth Street, but it was all the way across town, between Park and Broadway. They took a cab.
There was a bouncer wearing an ill-fitting tuxedo outside the door, talking to a doorman who wore a similar tuxedo that had a slightly better fit. The front of the club was a bit more subdued than the Saddle. No neon. And the customers stepping inside as Jack and Dom's cab pulled up were wearing suits and ties. The cover charge this time was twenty dollars apiece, which Jack paid. Then they stepped through a curtain, into a kaleidoscope of flashing lights and bare flesh – and into a fantasy world that Jack did not have any idea existed.
They were in an enormous, elegant nightclub. There were four small stages in different corners of the room and chairs were set up around each of the stages. Chairs were also set up on either side of one long runway that crossed the length of the room. Poles came down from the ceiling every ten feet or so, reaching the runway floor. There were booths built into some of the walls and more chairs and small round tables in the center of the floor. Music was blaring, popular rock songs that all seemed slightly out of date – a Madonna hit that had come and gone, then something from the Stones' disco era. On each of the four stages, a different woman, nude except for a G- string, danced and gyrated and shook. The men who had seats on the edge of the stage would reach up and slip bills into the G-strings. In exchange for that, they would get a very large pair of tits or an incredibly firm ass waved very close to their faces.
At most of the tables and booths, women were table dancing. Their clothes would slip off and they would dance around their chosen transfixed customer. The men would sit very still and stiff; the women would straddle them in their chairs, run their hands slowly through their hair, thrust their perfect body parts close and then closer. Their lips would pout and their legs and hips would twitch back and forth. Sometimes, when the dance was over, they would sit on a customer's lap, their arms wrapped around his neck, their breasts poking against his shirt or jacket. Every so often, a man's hand would start to reach or caress and a muscle-bound, tuxedo-clad bouncer would instantly appear.
'Christ,' Dom said. 'There's enough silicone in this place to raise the Titanic. You're never gonna find her.'
'I'm sure as hell going to try. You game?'
'What the hell, why not? I ain't done nothin' like this in years.'
