The offices to "The Frisky Vixen" were located in a small room at the back of the club. It had been a busy night out front, and a good one for the young women who made their living alternately hustling expensive drinks and dancing on stage, but the owner of the club was not happy. He picked up the telephone and dialed a familiar number. "Jimmy," he said, "Get a couple of the boys and get over to the Vixen right away. Come in the back door and don't make a big deal about it. Call me from the bar extension and lie low until I give you the signal. If I call you back, pick it up and do what I tell you."
"Got it, Boss, we'll be there in twenty minutes."
Then, opening the door to the hallway, he signaled for the bouncer, whose duties included watching over the office while the night's cash was being counted after closing, to come closer.
"Manny, tell Kiki, Doreen, and Lisa that I need to see them when they're done removing their make-up."
"Will do, Boss," said Manny as he left to deliver his message to the three dancers. "You gonna be OK with the cash?"
"Yeah, I'll be OK," said the boss as he waved his hand down the hall and shut the door.
In the dressing room the three dancers sat at their make-up mirrors, removing the make-up which had transformed them from good-looking women to "exotic dancers." The door cracked open and a disembodied voice said, "Ladies, the boss wants to see you in his office as soon as you're decent."
Doreen said, "Well, that's the first time he's ever wanted to see us 'decent' huh girls? They chuckled their agreement as Doreen said, "Got it, Manny. Thanks."
Once the door closed, Doreen turned to the other dancers and spoke in a hushed voice. "Well, girls, this is it. We need to be strong and stick together." The other two dancers nodded agreement and silently went about their business.
"The Vixen," like all of the strip clubs in this part of the tri-state area, was a mob-owned business. Its proprietor was Harry "The Blade" Torelli, a former mob enforcer and made man who had earned his "bones" removing opposition mobsters for the current crime family. He had done his job so well that the family decided to reward him with his two favorite things, money and tits, by making him "owner" of "The Frisky Vixen." All he had to do was give the family its monthly cut, and he was free to lead his life in retirement more or less any way he wanted.
The phone on Harry's desk lit up. It was Jimmy, calling from the bar. "All set, Boss," said the voice on the other end.
Harry said, "Tell Manny to go get the girls. Once they enter my office, you and the boys just stand around the bar until I give you the word. Nobody leaves my office unless I say so. Got it?"
"Got it, Boss."
After a few minutes, Jimmy saw the three dancers, who were in their "civvies" and carrying their pocketbooks, pass by the deserted bar and stroll down the hallway towards the boss's office. He strained to lean off the barstool as he watched the strippers' asses move back and forth as they headed down the hallway and paused to knock on Harry's office door. The door opened and the three women walked in. Manny closed the heavy steel door behind them. Jimmy signaled to his companions that it was time to assume their watch per the boss's instructions.
Harry looked up from his desk, smiling. "Come in ladies and have a seat. I'm just finishing up tonight's cut." The three women each took a seat in front of his desk. He put three envelopes, each with cash, flat on the desk which separated owner from employees. The girls reached out for their pay, but Harry spoke before they could actually get their hands on the envelopes. "Not quite yet, girls. I'm instituting a new "cash out" policy starting tonight. Put your pocketbooks up here on the desk."
Almost in unison the strippers said "What?"
"You heard me ladies. Put 'em right here." The three girls looked at each other, with shocked eyes. "NOW," Harry said as he brought down his massive right hand, slapping the desk with a "Thwak!"
Instantly, Harry's face went from welcoming and jovial to stern and menacing as he put on his "game face" from his days as an everyday enforcer. He stood up and tapped the desk again. "Right fuckin' here, girls." Doreen started to rise in response. "Sit the fuck down!" he bellowed. Doreen sat.
"Hey, Harry," Doreen said indignantly, "what's the deal?"
"We're about to find out, you bitch. Now put your pocketbook right here. Do it!" Doreen reached down and did as she was told. "Open it and then dump it out."
"Harry, what is going on?" she asked as she drew the zipper open. "What are you looking for?" the now-shaking stripper asked.
"A fuckin' tampon. Dump it." Doreen inverted her bag and her life spilled out all over the desk. Her wallet, two different compacts, breath mints, Kleenex, keys and a hundred other feminine doo-dads lay in a pile. "Give me the fuckin' bag and you open the wallet." Harry reached out for the leather handbag with his left hand and with a broad sweep of his right forearm blasted the lipsticks and everything else off the desk. "Dump the wallet," he said, "everything out on the desk."
Doreen said, "Sure, Harry," as she emptied a few credit cards and thirty-one dollars, no change, on the desk. "That's everything. Now, can I have my pocketbook back, pick my shit up off this disgusting floor, get my money and get the fuck out of here?"
"Tell you what, Doreen, how about you sit the fuck back down and don't say a fuckin' word until I tell you to? That gonna work for you?" Doreen sat down. The two girls flanking Doreen said nothing and stared straight ahead. Kiki, a diminutive Japanese-American woman who specialized in schoolgirl outfits, was shivering in fear and Lisa, a big-titted, dark haired, twenty-five-year-old whose on-stage preference was see-through lingerie, was clenching every muscle in her body to keep herself from following suit. Harry put the black leather pocketbook on the desk and reached inside. After thirty seconds he withdrew a black plastic strip, perfectly shaped to the bag's footprint and tossed it on the desk. Next came the money in fives, tens, and twenties, a hundred and fifty bucks worth.
Doreen moved to speak, but Harry gave her the full stop hand signal followed by a single, pointing finger. He turned to the two shivering strippers and spoke calmly, his voice dripping with malice, "Thirty seconds you two. Go!" Twenty seconds later the table contained over three hundred dollars and all three women sat silently with their heads bowed and sobbing.
"Look up, ladies," Harry said as he pushed a button on his phone and held up his finger in the "shhhh" sign. "Jimmy," he said into the receiver, "this is Harry. It's getting late. Better make that pizza 'to go.' Yeah, we want an extra-large." He turned to the three cowering women. "Now, what am I going to do with you three?"
"Harry," Doreen said, "we're sorry. It won't happen again. We'll pay you back."
Before Harry could speak there was a quick knock on the door. "That must be the pizza guy. You guys are buyin'." He swiped up a couple of twenties from the pile on his desk and went to open the door. In walked Jimmy and two of his men. Each carried a medium sized satchel. Manny kept watch outside. "Jimmy," he said, "Wrap these three slices 'to go.' Try not to damage the goods."
The girls were frozen in terror and incapable of any kind of defense against the men assigned to kidnap them. They were, well, strippers, thin by design, flyweights against accomplished, experienced heavyweights. The gags went on first, snug and efficient. Then, each of the girls had their wrists and ankles tied. They weren't walking out of this office or hopping for that matter. As the three thieves stood facing Harry for a final time, he took a moment to look his former employees in the eyes, eyes that were wide open in a mixture of terror, horror, and deep grief. He spoke in earnest. "Nobody steals from Harry the Blade, especially not strippers." He spat on the floor. "Tits are two for a dime, a dozen pairs for a buck."
"Manny, take Jimmy's 'dream date' here out to the stretch limo for him. I want to talk to him for a second." Manny and the other two goons each hoisted one of the girls over a shoulder as they followed their orders and set about preparing the terrified strippers for transport to the garage where an old, dented F-350 white panel van sat waiting, their "stretch limo" for the evening. In a minute or two the girls were secured, masked and lying on the mat-covered steel floor next to a cot. Jimmy emerged, opened the creaking driver's side door, slammed it shut, and started the motor. Putting the van into drive, he left through the garage door, which Manny closed behind the departing truck. It was 1:30 in the morning.
Once underway, Jimmy spoke. "It's two hours to the Barrens and another four until daylight. You two get your pick, for an hour each. One at a time. The other watches and stands guard. If any of them gives you any shit, feel free to slap them around, but don't kill them. The boss was very specific about that."
Wait until I get on the interstate, but you can decide who gets first choice. No fighting. There's three to choose from, all of them equally nice.
