5

A WINK OF AN EYE

The years rolled on and the money rolled in. Tony and Jake were now in their early thirties, and known as the ‘kings of the underworld’. It seemed as though, as time had passed, they had taken over everything. The club, which was now run by Sharon almost entirely, was known as the most famous nightclub in the West End of London. The weekly striptease revues had a reputation for being very stylish and classy.

Sharon thought it was quite funny, in a way, because some of the businessmen who came regularly to see the dancers and chat them up were also the same respectable men that would come on the weekend club nights, with their wives or girlfriends, and pretend not to know her.

Discretion was everything; under no circumstances were the bar staff to be familiar in any way to these men, or act as though they knew them. Everything was dealt with in a professional manner. Famous male celebrities would make a point of coming in, and felt safe in the knowledge that everyone there was under a strict code of silence. They could be at their ease and have some fun, away from their wives or girlfriends.

The private VIP booths seemed to have developed their own rules, although there was a grey area no one knew quite what to do about. Everyone knew the booths had CCTV cameras in them. The girls who were providing more intimate stripteases on a one-to-one basis would stand on a small stage and dance more provocatively. Although the golden rule was that there were to be no sexual exchanges between the stripper and the customer, Sharon couldn’t dispute that there were times when the customer would be touching himself! When she spoke to Tony and Jake about it, neither of them were sure how to handle it.

The girls were not breaking the rules and neither were the men, but it was a very grey area. Tony felt that since they knew they were on CCTV, they obviously trusted him to keep quiet about what went on in private. On the other hand, he also felt that they had been fairly warned about the cameras by the notices on the doors and so their behaviour might just represent a golden opportunity. Some of these men were high-ranking police inspectors and MPs, and one day he might need a favour in exchange for the recording they would so badly want to destroy. Blackmail, Tony felt, was an ugly word; it would be more an exchange of gifts. They would each have something that the other wanted, and there was no better way to get around that than to sit, discuss and exchange.

Tony couldn’t believe how time had passed so quickly. He had paid Miriam, his long lost grandmother from Italy, every penny she had once given him. In recent years, he had been a regular visitor to Italy and the vineyard and it felt like a good place to relax and be himself. She had spent most of her life searching for her grandson, she was the only blood relative he had and for the first time in his life he had roots and an identity.