It was after eleven; the night was very dark, and the rain had shut down visibility almost completely. She stepped into the entrance of an all-night pharmacy. If she smoked, she would have lit a cigarette. Instead, she popped a square of teeth-whitening gum into her mouth and crunched down on it.

Several moments went by when nothing happened. The only thing moving seemed to be the rain. Then a man materialized out of the gloom. He wore a tan suit, rain-darkened at the shoulders and cuffs. She felt her muscles readying themselves as he approached her. Passing very close, he went into the pharmacy. Ten minutes later, he reappeared, paused in the entryway, stared out at the night. He did not look at her. No one entered or exited the pharmacy.

“Filthy weather,” he said in a neutral tone. He might have been talking to himself. Charlie made no reply.

“I know a place that’s warmer and drier.” His tone was the one men used when they were trying to pick up girls in bars or clubs.

“Are you looking to dance with me or fuck me?” Charlie said in her least affable voice.

His head turned so quickly she could hear his vertebrae crack. He wasn’t a bad-looking dude, she thought. She had half a mind to take him up on his offer, but at the moment she had more important matters to settle. Another time, another place.

“Did you really—”

“Get out of here,” she said, and he did, hurrying out into the wet and the dark. Part of her actually felt sorry for him. Then she got back to work.

All the while their little encounter was unfolding her eyes had been moving, as she scoured the immediate environment for an anomaly. Now, having found it, she smiled to herself, and stepped out into the rain.

* * *

Julie Regan had prepared herself for the blare of music and the colored strobe lights, but she was startled by the prevailing smell inside The Doll House, especially up close to the circular stages. The stench of nearly naked human bodies was palpable. Perfume, hairspray, theatrical makeup was more or less completely overwhelmed by it. Julie’s experience with strip clubs began and ended with The Sopranos. The world itself, in the flesh, reminded her of nothing less than Dante’s Inferno. How men could get turned on by gyrating women who clearly had no interest in being there, let alone in them, was a mystery to her. She was far from a prude, but there were things in life she simply could not fathom. She liked sex well enough, she thought, though the missionary position was just fine by her, and she had never enjoyed the taste of a man in her mouth, though with King, through sheer force of will, she managed it without gagging.

However, sitting in the third row, watching the dancer named Sydny slide up and down the polished metal pole using just her strong, well-formed legs was a revelation to her. Sydny could have been an acrobat in the circus, but, she supposed, no circus could ever pay as well as the tips she made here at The Doll House.