The Art of Sin (4 page)

     “See you later.” Doug turned down the hall. 

     As Grady climbed the steps, he watched the impressive figure of Doug Larson slip inside his apartment door. Directing his attention up the stairs, his mind once again returned to the image of Al’s slender hips sashaying suggestively up the steps. He grinned as he thought of her petite figure and wondered how it would feel having her beneath him in bed.

     He had always yearned to be with a tiny woman with slim hips and a supple body. The closest he had come was a nameless face he had encountered one night during a show in Phoenix. She had been a pretty brunette—barely a size two—but the allure of bedding the hapless fan was nothing in comparison to his sudden desire for Al. He did not know what intrigued him more, her sharp wit, her demure little girl looks, or her damned eyes. Whatever it was, Grady figured it would make for an interesting few months together.

     Once inside his austere living room, he tossed the bag of strawberries to the round coffee table and then plopped down on the brown sofa. He wistfully glanced around the room as an overbearing sense of sadness engulfed him.

     “Another town, another empty room,” he mumbled. “How many more years are you going to do this to yourself?”

     The silence in the room was a deafening reminder of his plight. Disgusted with his mood, he grabbed for the bag of strawberries and went to the kitchen. At least, he reasoned, there was something different in New Orleans for him to look forward to. He would be counting the hours until he saw the elusive Allison Wagner again. Only next time, he was going to be a little bolder and get her to commit to a cup of coffee or a drink.

     A wry smile crossed his lips as he thought of her reply.

     “She’ll hate me for asking, but she’ll go. Damn woman is just as interested in me as I am in her. She just doesn’t know it … yet.”
 

Chapter 3

     The Flesh Factory was located on Bourbon and St. Ann Streets, in the heart of the French Quarter. Once Grady entered the establishment, the heavy cigarette smoke and smell of stale beer hit his nose. Sitting just inside the doorway was a burly bouncer with bored brown eyes, a face like a pit bull, and the body of an NFL defensive lineman.

     “Ladies only, man,” he said in a voice reminiscent of a ship’s foghorn.

     “I’m one of the new dancers. Grady Paulson.”

     The bouncer thumbed a thick red leather door to his right. “Matt Harrison is the manager. Go to the bar and ask for him. They’ll point him out for you.”

     As soon as Grady pulled the red leather door open, the thumping beat of dance music pounded against his body, and the high-pitched screams of a room filled with turned on, drunken women accosted his ears.

     After heading inside, it took a few minutes for his eyes to adjust to the low light. Then, he saw the brightly lit stage located behind a row of round white columns. He stepped from the darkness behind the columns and looked across the room filled with candlelit tables and packed with women.

     On the stage, a well-cut dancer, wearing a lab coat and white G-string, was grinding against the hips of some unsuspecting doe from the audience. The woman was gushing and blushing, while the dancer went through his routine of rubbing everything he had against her to elicit that desired “Oh my God” response, or as the dancers affectionately called it … the orgasm. It was what every male dancer went for when he pulled a woman onto the stage.

     Grady watched the woman scream with exhilaration when the dancer rubbed his cock against her face. It was all part of the show. It also helped a performer connect with his audience. Grady always tried to spot the most innocent-looking woman in the crowd to bring on the stage when he went for his orgasm every night.

     Each dancer had a type they searched for in the pit—what the dancers in the business affectionately called the area before the stage where the women gathered. Some guys went for the refined women, others the excited ones, and the newer guys always went for the pretty ones, hoping to get lucky. With experience, Grady had learned that the prettiest girls in the audience were not the best to bring on stage. Time had taught him that finding a woman other women could relate to made a show a hell of a lot more successful.

     At the bar to his left, an array of beefy bartenders were standing around, wearing only skimpy silver shorts and silver bow ties. He stayed along the outskirts of the room, wanting not to be seen by the customers. Grady knew entering the pit, when women were in the throws of being entertained, was as good as handing yourself over to an out-of-control mob.

     One of the servers saw him waiting by the bar and came over. A bartender with black curly hair and black mustache inspected Grady’s thick arms, chest, and shoulders.

     “You looking for Matt?”

     “Grady Paulson. New dancer.”

     The bartender held out his hand. “I’m Nick Davies. Matt is backstage.” He motioned to a door at the end of the bar with the word Private embossed in gold across it. “Go through that door. It will take you to the backstage area.”

     Before Grady slipped behind the backstage door, he explored the faces of the women in the pit. There were all kinds gathered there. The old, young, pretty and not so pretty, but all the faces had the same frenzied look he had seen a million times from the stage. It had always reminded him of his days at the New York Stock Exchange. The screaming women waving their hands about resembled the buyers and sellers on the floor of the Stock Exchange. He thought it curious how the hunger for sex and money appeared exactly the same on the human face, making it hard sometimes to determine which one was more important.

     Behind the door, the thud of the dance music and screams of the women were not as pronounced. Grady welcomed the respite. The backstage area was compact, stuffed with scenery and props set against the back wall with ropes tied off to a pin rail. Above, a batten that housed several stage or trooper lights hung along with extra rigging for background scenery. A few men, scantily dressed in G-strings with oiled bodies and shiny silver boots, were standing about on the dusty hardwood floor drinking from white paper cups or talking on their cell phones.

     There was an almost bored look on many of the faces of the toned and buff men waiting backstage. All the chaos out front dramatically contrasted against the almost relaxed atmosphere behind the scenes.

     Not looking where he was going, Grady accidently ran into a well-built man apart from the group. He was wearing a snug gladiator costume and waving his wooden sword about.

     “Hey, watch it,” he grumbled at Grady.

     The haughty look in the man’s green eyes seem to challenge Grady. There was something about him that made Grady uncomfortable, as if he sensed the guy was trouble. 

     “You lost, buddy?”

     Grady held up his hands. “Sorry. You know where I can find Matt Harrison?”

     The gladiator looked him over, his eyes filled with disdain. “Who’s asking?”

     Grady bit back his curt reply and simply smiled.
No need to make enemies on the first day.

     “I’m Grady Paulson, the guest dancer.”

     The man’s uncanny eyes softened a bit. “Colin Caffranelli. I’m one of the headliners here.”

     Grady wanted to groan out loud. He hated headliners. In every club he had worked, from Philadelphia to Portland, the headliners always treated the travel dancers like shit. Just because they had a long-term gig in one club, they thought they were better than the guys who had to constantly move from club to club.

     “Do you know where can I find Matt?” Grady asked, anxious to get away from the rude man. 

     Colin tilted his head to his right. “Matt’s at his desk.”      

     Grady followed his eyes to a wooden desk located against a red-bricked wall in the corner of the backstage area.

     “Ah, thanks,” he said to Colin, before turning away.

     Sitting behind the desk, talking on a phone and waving his hand furiously about, was a scrawny man, dressed in a tailored gray suit, with a pockmarked, pasty face, gray-streaked, wiry black hair, and coal black eyes. He had a wide mouth, and his crooked nose appeared as if it had been broken more than once. 

     When he spotted Grady eyeing him from across the backstage area, he beckoned to him and instantly ended his call.

     “Are you Paulson?” he asked, in a craggily sounding smoker’s voice.  
     Grady nodded and held out his hand. “Mr. Harrison?”

     “Matt,” Matt Harrison corrected. He stood and took Grady’s hand. “Burt said you were a real showstopper.” He waved down Grady’s body. “I can see he was right. The all-American, California look is big with these women.” He put his cell phone in his jacket pocket and nodded to a door to his left. “Let me show you the dressing rooms and we can get you settled.”

     Grady followed Matt as he led him to the plain wooden door set into the red-bricked wall. After stepping into a dimly lit, yellow-tiled hallway, Matt shut the door with a bang.

     “Damn, that’s better,” he said, taking in the almost peaceful stillness of the hallway. “I swear, I hear screaming women in my sleep.”

     “I know what you mean,” Grady concurred.

     “My wife told me I was an idiot for opening this place, but she stopped saying that after I bought her a new Mercedes last week.” Matt came to a wooden door to his right with an A sloppily painted on it. “Ed, who is out on stage right now, shares this with Colin. They’re assholes, so steer clear of them.

     Grady smirked. “Yeah, I just met Colin.”

     “Just keep your distance. He’s got a short fuse and a mean right hook.”

     “I’ll keep that in mind.” 

     Matt moved ahead to the other door, further down the hall. “I’m going to put you in the smaller dressing room with Lewis. He’s my other traveling dancer.”        

     Grady followed him down the hall. “Burt told me six days a week, two shows a night.”

     “That’s right,” Matt affirmed. “Tips off the stage are yours. Whether you want to share that with the waitstaff, I leave up to the dancers … though most guys do.” He paused before the last door in the austere hallway. “I pay for your drinks, as long as it ain’t call brands or champagne.” Matt rolled his eyes. “I had a French guy here, a few weeks back, who insisted on champagne every night before a show. Needless to say, he didn’t last long. Damn champagne cost me more than his show brought in.” He pushed the door open.

     After stepping inside, he hit a light switch to the left, bathing the room in a dull, yellow glow.

     Grady took in the four bare red-bricked walls, two wooden chairs, and a dressing table complete with one slightly cracked mirror. Above, a ceiling fan with three light bulbs behind an amber bowl illuminated the room.

     “It ain’t much, but what else do you guys need?” Matt Harrison told him with a raspy chuckle. “I ran women’s strip clubs for years. The demands they had for dressing room décor and furniture almost drove me as batty as their backstage catfights. You guys have been an absolute dream compared to the women.”

     Grady entered the room and caught sight of the bare hooks on the wall and the dust-covered dressing table. “I know some owners that wouldn’t agree with you.”

     Matt put his hands in the pockets of his black trousers. “The women out front are a big pain in the ass. The screaming and carrying on gets to me. With women strippers all the drama is backstage, but with the men the drama is in the pit.”

     “Wherever the women are, there goes the drama,” Grady professed.

     Matt shrugged his narrow shoulders. “Yeah, but such is the art of sin.”

     “The art of sin?”

     “Years ago, in a club I ran on Bourbon, a stripper named Mary Hightower called stripping the art of sin. She said, ‘Anybody can take off their clothes, but only a stripper could turn such a sin into an art.’” He shook his head. “So many guys I see going out on the stage just bump and grind, flash their washboard abs, and think it’s enough. In the old days, those women could have taught you boys a thing or two about the art.”

     “‘Illusion is the first of all pleasures,’” Grady mused.

     Matt furrowed his brow at him. “I don’t get it.”

     “It’s a quote from Oscar Wilde.” Grady contemplated Matt’s uneven skin, the deep lines on his forehead, and the dark circles beneath his eyes. “How long have you been in this business, Matt?”

     “Thirty-four years. Got into it when I was nineteen, working as a bartender for a joint a few blocks down from here. Worked my way up through management, and opened my first club twenty-six years ago.  Even met my wife in my club. She was a dancer, but quit when we got married.”

     Grady appreciated the warmth in Matt’s eyes when he spoke of his wife. “How long have you been married?”

     “Twelve years. I got a four-year-old son and a ten-year-old daughter. She’s just like her mother when it comes to wanting the best of everything.” He nodded to Grady. “You married?”

     He shook his head. “Divorced. No kids, but I’m still hopeful.”

     “At least you’re not gay. The gay guys in this business give me the creeps.”

     “Not a lot of them. The women figure it out, and they never last long on stage.”

     “I had to find that out the hard way with the French guy.” Matt removed his hands from his pockets and clapped them together. “You’ve got a good place to stay in the city? If not, I can recommend a few spots I know in the Quarter.”

     “Thanks, but I got a nice place a short walk from here.”

     Matt glimpsed the gold Rolex on his wrist. “Good. I’ve got you scheduled to start tomorrow night. First show is at eight, second at eleven. When we have private gigs, it’s a one-show night, but we don’t get those too often. We only do one show on Sunday at eight. You’ll be off on Mondays. If you need off for family, plastic surgery, or whatever else, try and give me a little notice so I can get someone to cover for you. Burt said you were real dependable.”

     “I don’t like to miss a show,” Grady admitted.

     Matt smiled, showing off a row of yellow teeth. “Good boy. Get here by seven to oil up for the eight o’clock show. What costumes you got?”

     “A black leather cowboy, tuxedo, and a flashy silver-sequined number.”

     Matt shook his head. “I’ve got enough cowboys in the show. Bring the tuxedo and that silver number. You can run those two for your routines.”

     Grady nodded. “Got it.” 

     “I don’t have a lot of rules. Just be on time, sober, and no girls backstage,” Matt insisted. “I’ve got enough problems with the women out front. I don’t want them starting shit back here.”

     “I understand.”

     Matt stepped through the dressing room door and back into the hallway. “Why don’t you get out and enjoy a night in the French Quarter? Check out the sights before the club takes up all of your time. It’s a hell of a town.”

     “Thanks, I think I’ll do that.” Grady stepped back out into the hallway, and Matt shut the dressing room door behind him.