Jake had spoken to the accountant, and everything he had said made sense. Taking a commission off the dancers would pay their wages; charging an entry fee on the door would pay towards the cost of the bills. This was an opportunity to go forward, but he could sense Tony’s reluctance, for obvious reasons.

Sharon started looking into things. She found out where some of the pubs were that had dancers, and visited them. She had never been in that kind of atmosphere before, and although some thought it was strange, a woman going in and keeping her clothes on, some men just presumed she would be auditioning.

Sharon could see why Tony was reluctant to turn his new glamorous club into a dive, like some of the ones she had seen up to now. That said, the atmosphere was good, and the men seemed to be having a good time, laughing and joking with the girls, so she could see what the accountant meant, too. There was serious money to be made.

She had looked towards Soho, known by everyone and arguably London’s premier red-light district. The main thing she noticed was there was nowhere like the accountant had suggested. Nowhere with style and class, like the famous Playboy Club in Mayfair, with its world-renowned bunny girls.

‘I’ll do it,’ she announced to Tony and Jake, ‘on the condition that I call all the shots. I know I can do this; I have the vision and the sight to see it through. You two only see it from a man’s point of view; I see it from a woman’s. Is that a deal?’ Like Jake, she was a bookkeeper and accountant, so she could look at things from a business perspective. She felt she could prove herself to them and make this work.

Tony and Jake looked at each other and smiled; this was going to be a sight to behold. What would Sharon come up with?

‘Deal,’ they both said in unison. The curiosity alone made Tony want to try it, and after all, if it didn’t work, it would be down to Sharon and the accountant. As he’d been told, he was the showman in charge of the club.

3

STRIPTEASE

A few months passed. The club nights were doing well and, even though it had been announced that there was an entry fee of a hundred pounds, a lot of people still came in. There were a few that couldn’t afford it and stopped coming, but the accountant had been right. Those who moved in the right circles, the people with the money, felt it was nothing to pay to have some fun, rub shoulders with this famous gangland boss, and pursue the beautiful models that Tony still let in for free, as long as they brought their champagne-buying sugar daddies.

The stage and its spotlights gave the place a different look. Six large poles were installed, and there were long pink curtains at either side. Over the last couple of months, Tony had handed the budget for that part of the business over to Sharon.