Death, Taxes, and Hot Pink Leg Warmers (7 page)

There was just so!

Much!

Boob!

The dancers were pleasant enough, but quickly dismissed me to resume their debate about how best to combat G-string chafing. One insisted a dab of petroleum jelly between the butt cheeks would do the trick, while the other preferred baby oil. At the IRS we debated the merits of mechanical pencils versus yellow number 2s.

I wondered whether either of these dancers might be involved in the drug ring. Someone was bringing drugs into the club and someone was taking them out. Problem was, we had no idea whether it was an employee or someone from the outside. Everyone was a potential suspect, even Merle.

“You can have locker sixteen,” he said, gesturing to a bank of tall lockers along a wall next to the bathroom. “You’ll need to bring your own lock. Don’t bring your purse or wallet into the cash room from now on. Only bar funds go in and out of that room. If you buy a drink or food, use a debit or credit card. Mr. Geils will toss you out on the street if you break the rules. Understand?”

I nodded. The rules were likely designed to prevent embezzlement, but they were nonetheless good accounting controls for a place that handled a lot of cash. I found it interesting, though. With Geils having such a tight rein on the money, did that mean the drug funds were being funneled through the cash office along with the other receipts? If so, my role here would be critical in identifying the source of the drugs and the dealers. Numbers could be very revealing and numbers don’t lie.

Merle led me back out of the dressing room. The Vanity 6 classic “Nasty Girl” blared from the speakers as we walked past a door in the back corner. The door was the only one in the place with an old-fashioned key lock. If I had to hazard a guess, I’d bet Geils was the only one with a key to the room.

“What’s in there?” I asked, speaking loudly to be heard over the music. Could that be the notorious VIP room?

An expression of distaste and resignation passed over Merle’s face. “It’s an exclusive room for…” He seemed to be carefully choosing his words, finally settling on “big spenders.”

Yep, it was the VIP room, all right. No security guards were posted at the door today. It must not be currently in use.

Rather than walk all the way around the elongated stage, Merle led me up three steps to the elevated platform and we made our way across it to the other side. Just before stepping down the far side, I glanced out at the few men in the audience. While some picked at the food on their plates, others sat enraptured, looking up at the dancer onstage with a look of lust and desire and longing on their faces. Okay, maybe I could understand a little why these girls did what they did. Who didn’t crave a little attention? Still, the only person I wanted looking at me like that was Nick Pratt. Of course if Nick wasn’t available I’d settle for Ryan Gosling or Bradley Cooper. No sense being totally inflexible, right?

On the other side of the stage was a hallway that led to the back of the club. Merle gestured in the general direction of the hall but didn’t take me back there. “That’s the kitchen and storage areas.”

Merle led me down the other side of the room, past the stainless steel buffet, to the bar. Aaron Menger stood behind it, his back to us, drying glasses with a white towel. His gaze met mine in the mirror behind the bar, his face illuminated by the green neon glow from a beer sign.

“Eric,” Merle said. “Come meet Sara Galloway. She’ll be our new bookkeeping assistant.”

Eric slid the glass onto a shelf down below, turned to us, and tossed the towel back over the other shoulder. His hands now free, he stepped over to the bar, extending his hand across it. “Sara, right?”

“Yeah.” I took his hand. “I’ll be working the late shift.”

“Eric’s new, too,” Merle said. “Been on the job about a week now.”

“I make a mean mojito,” Eric said. “Let me know if you ever want to try one.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

The girl who’d been performing a table dance earlier took the stage now, crooked one leg and arm around a pole, and twirled absentmindedly while inspecting her manicure. Three singles stuck out of the back of her silver sequined G-string. Looked like the lunch crowd were cheapskates. I suppose that’s the type of crowd drawn in by a $4.99 all-you-can-eat buffet.

Merle led me back to the cash office, where we completed my employment paperwork with my falsified documentation. When we finished, he walked me to the front door. “See you tomorrow at six.”

I passed Tarzan on my way out.

“You get the job?” he asked.

“Yep. I start tomorrow. See ya.”

As I left, Christina came up the walk wearing skintight jeans, a low-cut blouse, and a pair of ridiculously high stilettos. We passed each other without acknowledgment.

“So,” I heard Tarzan ask Christina as I walked away. “You like the ladies, too?”

chapter eight

Y is for Yikes

On my way to the YMCA that afternoon, I stopped at a sporting goods store. Nick had recently bought a bass boat and spent every spare second fishing on one or another of the area lakes. His scratched and scarred hands told tales of sharp scales, burns from the fishing line, errant hooks that had sunk their barbs into his flesh. While Nick seemed somewhat oblivious to the pain, it hurt me to see his hands torn to pieces. Besides, I hoped to have those hands on me soon, and the last thing I wanted to be reminded of when Nick was touching me was a gaping wide-mouthed bass.

I made a beeline for the fishing section of the store and bought a forty-five-dollar pair of professional-quality half-finger fishing gloves for Nick. They looked like something Michael Jackson would have worn if he’d been a redneck with a fishing boat rather than a singer with a private amusement park.

I wouldn’t be able to give the gloves to Nick until tomorrow. He’d be working another late shift at Guys & Dolls tonight. Rats.

I arrived at the Y before Lu and went inside. I’d just finished changing into a pair of gym shorts and a T-shirt when Lu walked into the ladies’ locker room, a bright yellow gym bag in her hand.

“Hi, Lu,” I said. “I’m going to head on out and start stretching.”

She dropped her bag onto one of the wooden benches. “I’ll be out in minute.”

I moseyed out of the locker room, grabbing a white towel from the shelf on my way.

The downtown Y was primarily a man’s world, most women preferring a female-only gym that catered more to their needs, with saunas, tanning beds, massages, and cucumber-infused water decanters. I would’ve loved those things, too, but such luxuries came with a much more expensive price tag than the relatively spartan but fully functional Y.

The machines were occupied by men in various stages of perspiration production. I’d learned to wipe a dab of Vicks under my nose to combat the scent of sweaty male. Hey, maybe I should suggest Vicks to Chloe and Ashlynn. Not only would the rub combat their G-string chafing, the mentholatum would invigorate their butt crack and leave it minty fresh.

I made my way to the free-weight area, sitting down on the floor in an open space to warm up. I performed a series of stretches to prepare my quads, hamstrings, and calves for my workout. A man nearby worked a sizable hand weight, grunting and grimacing as he pulled the weight up in another bicep curl.

Thunk!
The weight fell to the floor at his feet. I might have thought his muscles simply gave out if not for the fact that he was gaping like the aforementioned wide-mouthed bass.

I followed his line of vision.

Holy.

Crap.

Lu headed our way decked head to toe in eighties
Flashdance
glory. A bright orange headband cut a swath across her strawberry-blond hair. A gray sweatshirt with the neck hole cut out lay cockeyed across Lu’s expansive chest, revealing a pasty shoulder and the strap of a purple leotard. Underneath she wore black tights. The pinnacle of her attire had to be the hot pink leg warmers that graced her meaty calves.

The room, normally filled with the clink of weight stacks and the sounds of men straining, grew totally silent as Lu passed through. She had more eyes on her than the girls at the topless bar.

Lu stepped up to me. “I don’t know what I was so worried about. I bought these clothes thirty years ago and look, they still fit.”

She turned in a circle and the man who’d dropped the weight gasped. The bottom of her leotard was a thin piece of fabric that covered only an inch or two of butt cheek. Heck, the G-strings at Guys & Dolls had been less revealing. Thank God Lu had the tights on, too.

“Is that a
thong
leotard?” I asked.

“No.” Lu frowned and looked over her shoulder like she’d done yesterday. “Oh. Huh. I didn’t realize what was going on back there.” She shrugged. “I’m going to warm up.”

Lu launched into a series of jumping jacks followed by windmill toe touches, the thin panel of material creeping farther and farther up her backside as she bent over. A man passed by, gawking as he walked. Not a good idea. He ran smack-dab into the plastic shelves where the Pilates balls were stored. The balls fell to the floor, bouncing and scattering, thump-thump-thumping across the floor as the man scrambled to round them up.

Lu glanced over at the man. “What a klutz.” Turning back to me, she asked, “Where should we start?”

With her changing her outfit before one of these men hurts himself?
But I couldn’t very well tell her that, could I? It would kill her confidence. “How about some cardio?”

Lu and I climbed onto adjacent treadmills. I showed her how to work the controls, suggesting she start with one of the less rigorous programs. Given that I had an abundance of pent-up sexual frustration, I opted for the mountain-climb program today. There I was, back to the
yodel ay hee-hoo!
I wondered when I’d get to see Nick’s
hee-hoo
.

After a half hour on the treadmills, we set a course for the weight machines.

Lu’s eyes scanned the equipment. “Which one of these will shrink my glutes? That’s my problem area.”

Her glutes were
everyone’s
problem area.

I pointed to a machine nearby. “Try the leg press. Start with thirty pounds.” A paltry weight, but the woman hadn’t worked out since Jane Fonda had produced her first workout video back in the eighties. No sense pushing herself too hard and risking a muscle tear or stroke.

Lu plunked down in the seat, moved the pin in the weight stack, and pushed. The press went back easily. “This is nothing,” Lu said. “I’m going to try fifty.”

While I worked my deltoids, Lu continued to add weight to the stack, eventually settling on seventy pounds. Not bad at all for an out-of-shape woman who’d just completed chemo. Then again, maybe carrying around those extra pounds for all these years had been a workout in itself.

Encouraged by Lu’s success, I pushed myself especially hard that day, leaving the gym tired and sore but with much of my sexual frustration relieved.

Lu and I parted ways in the parking lot. She waved the class schedule she’d picked up at the front desk. “The Zumba class sounds like fun. Let’s try that tomorrow.”

“Anything you say, boss.”

*   *   *

Since Nick was working at Guys & Dolls tonight, I spent the evening at my kitchen table, reviewing the financial information in the file Agent Ackerman had given me. My cat Annie napped in my lap, occasionally digging a claw or two into my thigh as she repositioned herself.

GSM’s bank statements provided a wealth of information, showing the sources of funds coming into the account and detailing where those funds had gone. I determined how much money had been distributed to each of the four Tennis Racketeers and compared the data not only to GSM’s corporate tax returns, but also to the Racketeers’ individual forms. I traced the amounts to the printouts from GSM’s accounting records, too.

The bulk of the distributions had been improperly classified to the corporation’s expense accounts and wrongfully deducted under the guise of rent, depreciation, and maintenance costs. Only a small amount had been reported to the Racketeers as taxable wages and dividends. The Racketeers had also run a multitude of personal expenses through the corporate account, all of which had likewise been improperly classified as business operating costs.

By my calculations, GSM and the Tennis Racketeers had understated their federal income tax liabilities by at least two million dollars. Add penalties and interest and the frauds owed Uncle Sam a cool three mil.

The mortgage fraud was bad enough, but these bastards had treaded on my turf now. They better watch out. IRS Special Agent Tara Holloway was on her way to collect.

chapter nine

Bank on This

The following morning, I stepped into Nick’s office. He’d worked late at Guys & Dolls again last night so we hadn’t been able to spend the evening together as I’d hoped. Luckily, he’d be at the club when I arrived for my first shift tonight. Having him nearby would be nice, even if we’d have to pretend not to know each other.

Nick sat in his chair, a silver belt buckle featuring the Dallas skyline gleaming atop the navy pants and white dress shirt that concealed his six-pack abs.

“I’ve got a little something for you,” I said.

He slid me that chipped-tooth smile that never failed to make me swoon. “If that little something is what I hope it is, close the door, take off your clothes, and give it to me right now.”

“It’s not
that.
” Too bad, huh? I held up the bag from the sporting goods store. “But it is something you can slip a body part into.”

He arched a curious brow and took the bag from me, reaching inside and pulling out the gloves. He slid them on, wiggling his fingers to test them. “They’re perfect. I could land Jaws with these. Maybe even Shamu.”

“Glad you like them.”

He cocked his head. “Nooky would have been better, but for now I’ll settle for the gloves.” He gestured for me to close the door. “Come here. I’ve got some sugar for you.”