On my way out, I stopped off in the wardrobe room. The bare bones of a plan were starting to take shape in my mind. I ditched my dirty jeans and wiggled into a g-string bikini with easy-off plastic clasps. Over the bikini I pulled on a shiny black stretch vinyl minidress. There was a plastic toolbox filled with Wet N Wild 99-cent make-up. I quickly slapped on a thick layer of war paint and topped it off with a cherry red Bettie Page-style wig. I jammed my feet into sky-high stripper heels and then covered it all up with Vukasin’s leather trench coat. The coat still smelled like him. It made me feel completely the opposite of the way wearing Malloy’s coat had made me feel.
As I turned to go, I found myself facing a full-length mirror. Looking in that mirror, I suddenly knew my plan would work. I understood exactly what I had been doing wrong. All this time I’d been trying to be some kind of action movie tough guy. I’d tried to be Malloy with tits and look where it got me. There was only one way I was going to get Ridgeway. It was the only way I knew. A girl’s gotta use her natural skills.
31.
Sneaky Pete’s is to Eye Candy what your local taco truck is to Spago. Cheap, nasty and lowbrow. Full nude and no holds barred. I never danced there; frankly, you can hardly call what the girls do there “dancing.”
As I pulled into the lot beside the sleazy little edifice, I checked my new face in the rearview mirror. I straightened the glossy red wig on my head, touched up my black cherry lips and pressed down my the corners of my false eyelashes. There was no time to spare. Only twenty minutes till closing.
I went inside and asked to see the manager. There was a familiar stink inside of sweat and baby oil and dead-end lives. The men clustered in the shadows, nursing overpriced soft drinks and pretending not to notice one another. A tiny, flat-chested girl worked the single stage. She was a brunette with big eyes, hardly more than a child. Her hipbones were so sharp they looked painful. She wore nothing but a silver g-string and moved her skinny limbs with a slow, spacey grace, like she was underwater. Van Halen’s “Little Dreamer” crackled through the cheap speakers.
“Yeah?” the manager said, appearing suddenly at my elbow. “You looking for work?”
He was a burly biker right out of central casting. Beard. Ponytail. Beer gut. Tattoos. He looked like one of the first three guys the hero has to fight before he can get to the real bad guy.
“I know it’s late,” I said, making my voice and posture all submissive and needy. “But I was hoping you’d let me audition tonight and then if you like me...” I gave a shy little smile and fingered a strand of red synthetic hair. “Maybe you can give me some shifts this weekend.”
“No problem, sugar,” he said with a gap-toothed grin. “You’re up next. It’s g-strings on the stage but you go full nude in the champagne rooms. Extras are up to you.” He winked and gestured toward the DJ booth. “Go tell Lenny your name and what song you want to dance to.”
I headed over to the DJ booth and that’s when I saw Ridgeway, sitting along the rail on the far right flanked by two men. One was the messy-haired thug who had carried me into the dungeon and the other a guy I’d never seen. Shaved head, goatee, bad tattoos. I didn’t care. I only had eyes for Ridgeway.
I felt that cold rush, that jittery crush-like feeling in my belly, and part of me wanted to bolt. Maybe I was crazy to think I could do this. But I’d never be able to live with myself if I didn’t try. I stared at the back of Ridgeway’s head like hate alone was enough to kill him. He didn’t notice me.
“Hey,” a voice said. “How you doing, beautiful?”
I turned toward the voice. It was the DJ, who, by some bizarre coincidence turned out to be the lanky hotdog with the braids who had come to help Thick Vic get Roxette out of Taylor’s bathroom. I wondered if the eviction had been successful, or if Roxette was still in there digging into her leg with the bloody toothbrush. He clearly did not recognize me.
“Um, hi,” I said, fooling with the belt on the trench coat.
“What’s your name, little sister?” he asked.
I looked over at the back of Ridgeway’s head. He put a bill on the stage at the dancer’s feet and his men quickly followed suit. She smiled in a vague sort of way, like a ticket taker in a movie theater.
“Vendetta,” I said. “My name’s Vendetta.”
“Okay, Vendetta,” the DJ said with a grin. “What’s your favorite song? I got both kinds of music, rock and roll.”
I flipped through the CD wallet he handed me until I spotted a disk of Highway To Hell by AC/DC. I pointed to the track I wanted to dance to and headed over to the edge of the stage.
The tiny girl finished up in an awkward split and then gathered up her sweaty, rumpled bills and discarded bits of spandex.
“Let’s hear it for Missy!” the DJ said over the crackly PA system. “Show Missy some love, boys.”
The modest crowd clapped listlessly and a few threw in a bill or two.
“And remember, if you’d like to get to know Missy a little better, you can take this beautiful lady into one of our private champagne rooms for an unforgettable couch dance. Remember, you gotta to show the greenery if you want to see the scenery.”
An unkempt, dandruffy older man immediately nabbed Missy and dragged her off to one of the private rooms in the back. It looked like there were four rooms back there. Two were currently unoccupied, judging by the open curtains.
“Now boys,” the DJ announced. “Before you call it an evening, I’ve got a very special treat that’s gonna send you off with a bang. We’ve got a smokin hot new entertainer here at Sneaky Pete’s tonight. Gentlemen, I give you the luscious, the vivacious, VENDETTA!”
My music started and I did what I could to calm my crazy speeding heart. Then I climbed up onto the stage.
Funny how old habits never really die. Just like riding a bicycle. I grabbed the roll of paper towels and antibacterial cleanser thoughtfully provided by the management and quickly wiped down the length of the brass pole. Then I went to work.
I slithered slowly out of Vukasin’s leather trench coat to the familiar hoots and whistles of masculine approval. I made sure to set the coat down carefully and not let the pistol in the right pocket clunk loudly against the stage. As I shook my moneymaker, grinding against the pole as if I’d never quit, I realized that Angel Dare wasn’t dead after all. She was alive and well, and she was pissed.
I peeled off the dress and thrust my gyrating ass into the eager faces around me, working my way toward Ridgeway. The marks ate it up with two forks.
“If you want blood,” Bon Scott’s distinctive rusty-hinge howl bellowed through the cheap speakers, “you got it!”
By the time I made my way over to the corner of the stage in front of Ridgeway and his cronies, I was down to my g-string. There was a green snowdrift of dollar bills and fives around my clunky plastic heels.
I got down on my hands and knees and rolled my spine, undulating my ass inches from the bastard’s nose. I watched him in the mirror on the back wall. He was staring, mesmerized, right between my cheeks, almost like if he stared hard enough, he’d see through the leopard-print spandex barrier between him and the good stuff. After everything he’d put me through, and everything I’d gone through to get here, it was kind of shocking to discover that the big bad boss was just a man like any other. I had been worried that he would recognize me, but it was clear that he was paying no attention whatsoever to anything above my tits. The two goons were equally preoccupied, but they didn’t matter. It was as if Ridgeway and I were alone. Like there was no one else on the planet. I’ve never felt so intense a hunger for someone. Not even Jesse.