“So, what happened?” Ace asks.
“Every Wednesday, my buddy at the Hard Rock texts me when the chief gets there and then again when he leaves. Seems the chief has a love of roulette. No sweat.”
“Sounds easy enough,” I add.
“Except last Wednesday while me and the wife are screwing each other’s brains out, the chief comes barreling through the bedroom door.”
“Ohhhh, shit!” Shady bellows. “What the fuck happened?”
“Seems the chief had too much free booze at the tables, and, being an upstanding citizen, he didn’t wanna drive home drunk, so he called an Uber. He never got his car, so my friend never saw him leave.”
“In a way, it was his fault for getting his drink on and coming home early,” Ace reasons.
“Don’t you know, that’s just what the wife said?” Fist shakes his head.
“I gotta hear this.”
“There I am, balls deep, snorting blow off the bitch’s ass, which, I might add, is one of those bubble asses.” He makes agesture with his hands and huffs out a breath. “And while the chief is screaming his damn head off, the wife is running around the room buck-ass naked. Meanwhile, I’m throwing my clothes on thinking I gotta get the fuck out.”
“Did he try to arrest you?”
“He tried, but he was too damn drunk, so we made a deal. He’d forget about the blow and me bangin’ the shit outta his wife, and I’d keep quiet about it. Apparently, he didn’t want any bad publicity in an election year. He also wanted me to leave the Hard Rock. He said it would be too upsetting to see me every Wednesday night.” Fist shrugs. “It was a dumb-ass job anyway.”
“You ever see the wife again?” Ace asks.
“Yeah, we get together on Thursdays now. It’s his poker night at a buddy’s house, and the wife calls when the chief leaves.”
“You are fuckin’ unbelievable.” I pour us all another shot, and we toast to Fist and his crazy-ass stories.
“This place has really gone downhill.” Ace looks around the seedy strip club with its stained carpet and toxic combination of stale smoke and sickeningly sweet perfume. “Even Sinners looked better than this the other night.”
“When we ran the place, it was bangin’,” Ace adds. “Now it looks like a last stop for aged-out strippers and guys who can only get aged-out strippers.”
“Hard to believe it got so bad in five years.” I wanted to come here just to check it out, but it looks like it’s in even worse shape than I expected.
“Another fuck you from the DEA.” Speed shifts his glance to me. “I ain’t sayin’ that to blame you, just sayin’ the fuckin’ feds ripped everything away from us, then sold it to the lowest bidder just to dump it.”
“You see the guy with the golf shirt and khakis?” Shady motions to the front door. “I did some asking around at Sinners, and he manages the place for some realty company.”
“In other words, the place is owned and being run by people who have no idea how to run a strip club.” I state the obvious. “He sure don’t look happy.”
“He looks like he belongs on the first tee at Seaview.” Shady rolls his eyes. “And what’s with the bouncers? They don’t look like they could break up a fight at a kid’s birthday party.”
I laugh, then add, “There’s no fuckin’ way they’re making any money.”
On a Saturday night, there were more empty tables than full, and he hadn’t seen anybody paying for lap dances or heading for the private rooms where all the money was made. Not that I blame the guys with the sorry selection. In truth, the guys in this place looked as sorry as the women.
“Let’s just say I wouldn’t want to see this place with all the lights on.”
“Fuckin’ truth.” Ace and I tap fists.
“Shit, when we owned it and I ran it, this place was spotless, and it didn’t smell like piss and cum.”
I curl my lip at his description, but Scratch is right. When he managed this place for the Kings, we had top-notch dancers, filtered air and a sound system that didn’t keep cutting out.
Cheap perfume surrounds me, and I turn to a lined, haggard face squeezed into a skimpy dress two sizes too small.
“You look like you could use some company.” She runs her freakishly long, chipped nails over my cut, and I worry about her scratching the leather.
