“Don’t get involved with the clients,” she said.

Our eyes met in the mirror, and I smiled. “You’re going to do just fine, baby.”

The rules of stripping were flexible, and every dancer had her own list, but the first rule was always the same: don’t get attached.

My list went something like this:

Rule 1: don’t get involved with the clients.

Rule 2: don’t get involved with the clients.

Rule 3: do not, under any circumstances, get involved with the clients.

Some of them didn’t make it easy. They were rich, charming, handsome—everything a girl could ask for. But we were just bodies to them, and forgetting that was a quick road to heartbreak and sucking at your job. Better to stay detached, and make them keep it in their pants.

We finished doing our faces, and then I opened one of the cabinets under the counter and took out my wig.

Sasha Kilgore had boring hair: dark brown, straight, nothing to write home about.

Sassy Belle had hair like Marilyn Monroe: perfectly blond, perfectly curled and styled. The clients loved it. I had spent a lot of money on that wig, and it was worth every penny. Most of the dancers had lean, athletic bodies, but not me. I had the breasts and hips of a ‘50s pinup model, and there was no use in fighting it. Go big or go home.

Fresh Meat watched as I settled the wig on my head and tugged it into place. “Don’t you worry about it falling off?”

“Maybe if someone grabs it and yanks,” I said. “Otherwise it’s not going anywhere.”

“Hmm,” she said.

“You don’t need one, your hair looks great,” I said. Wig in place, I applied my lipstick, and then sat back and examined myself. Perfect.

Fresh Meat looked pretty good, too. I was always dubious about the new girls, but Germaine was no fool. She wouldn’t hire anyone who wasn’t up to snuff.

“Should I change clothes, too?” she asked.

I shook my head. “Nah. You don’t even need the makeup, I just wanted to see how you would do it. We’re going to put you at a table in the back with one of the busboys and the two of you can pretend you’re on a hot date.”

“Thanks a lot,” she said. “Now I’m all dressed up with no place to go.”

I winked at her. “Live and learn.” I glanced at the clock. Still half an hour to opening. “Come on, I’ll show you around the club.”

We left the seraglio and I gave her a brief tour of the club: the bathrooms for the waitresses and clients, the storeroom and kitchen, the locker room where the other employees kept their things; and finally, the series of private rooms where clients could enjoy the more… intimate attentions of a dancer of their choice. For a price, of course.

There were two types of private rooms. The first kind, the ones that opened off the main room of the club, were designed for private parties, and had sofas and tables. Some of our clients liked to entertain friends and business associates, and I had been to plenty of totally innocent parties where the clients drank and talked about stocks and didn’t touch me at all.

The other kind of room lined a corridor running back into the recesses of the building, and those rooms were blatantly about sex. They had beds and enormous soaking tubs and were designed to be private, intimate, and luxurious.

That was the secret of the Silver Cross Club: wealthy men, if they passed the application process, could have anything they desired, and be assured of absolute discretion.

I took Fresh Meat into one of those rooms and watched as she looked around. I couldn’t read her expression. “You don’t have to do any of this, you know,” I said. “The sex. There are plenty of dancers who only dance and never go into the private rooms at all.”

“I know,” she said. “But the money’s good, right?”

“Yeah,” I said, and shrugged. None of us would be doing this if it weren’t for the money.

We went back to the seraglio. It was almost time for the club to open, and most of the dancers were hanging around in the dressing room, gossiping and putting the final touches on their makeup. I cleared my throat loudly, and when that didn’t work, clapped my hands together. Everyone turned and looked at us.

“Ladies, we have fresh meat,” I said into the sudden silence. “This is Tempest.”

“Hi, Tempest,” they chorused obediently.

“She’s going to be watching tonight,” I said. “And then—”

That was as far as I got before I was interrupted by Poppy, who appeared at my shoulder like a specter of impending doom. She tossed her hair over her shoulder and said, “WHY are you all still SITTING AROUND when The Owner is going to be here ANY MINUTE!”

I cringed away from her and fought the impulse to cover my ears. I could never figure out why Poppy had to be so loud.

“We aren’t open yet,” Xanadu called from the back of the room, and I smirked. She and Poppy got along like two cats in a bag.

“We’re almost open,” Poppy said. “Germaine wants EVERYONE to be on her BEST BEHAVIOR tonight. We wouldn’t want The Owner to be disappointed!”

She always said that like it was a title. The President. The Dalai Lama. The Owner.

“Poppy, calm down,” I said. “It’s not like this is the first time he’s ever been here. Everything’s going to be fine.”

“You just jinxed it!” she shrieked.

That was it. “I’m out,” I said to Tempest, and bailed. I had just hit my Dealing With Poppy limit, and it wasn’t even 4:00.

I really needed a Coke.

2

It turned out that Poppy had totally rearranged the schedule and I wouldn’t go on stage that night until 5:30, which meant that I had plenty of time to sit around in my robe, paint my toenails, and listen to Scarlet talk about the hot grad student she had just started dating. He studied plasma physics, whatever that was. It sounded complicated.

“Does he wear one of those jackets with the elbow patches?” I asked.

Scarlet grinned. “That’s a stereotype.”

“Stereotypes exist for a reason,” I said. “You should bring him by.”

“Absolutely not. He thinks I’m a nurse,” Scarlet said. “I work nights in the NICU.”

“Baby girl, you should quit lying to your boyfriends,” I said.

“He’s not a boyfriend, so who cares? I’ll get sick of him in a few weeks and then I’ll never see him again,” she said. “It’s a white lie. I don’t have to explain my job to him, and he doesn’t have to get all worked up about other men looking at me. And at least I’m not a nun, like some people.”