The Millionaires' Death Club Page 8

  ‘Listen up,’ the DJ announced, ‘we’ve had a special request. Normally I would have told this guy to fuck right off but I took one look at him and, I swear, in my whole life I’ve never seen such a dead ringer. You have to check this guy out to believe it. We’re going to put a spotlight on him so you can see what I mean.’

  As the DJ spoke, a spotlight tracked along the balcony. When it reached Sam, he threw back his hoodie, raised both of his hands and waved at the crowd.

  ‘After three,’ the DJ said, ‘who does that guy look like? One, two, three…’

  ‘Sam Lincoln,’ the crowd roared.

  The DJ chuckled. ‘You won’t believe the nerve of this guy. He actually said he was better looking than Sam, and he said it in an American accent that I swear was identical to Sam’s.’ He pointed at Sam. ‘Hey, man, you have to get yourself a job as a Sam Lincoln impersonator. It’s what you were born for.’

  It was obvious Sam was finding the whole thing hilarious. I couldn’t help giggling too.

  ‘So, could all of the boys please leave the dancefloor,’ the DJ said. ‘This is a girls-only event.’ He told the girls to arrange themselves into ten parallel lines taking up the whole length of the dancefloor. ‘Link arms,’ he said. ‘When the music starts, I promise you’ll have no difficulty knowing what you have to do. I want you all to look at our Sam Lincoln look-alike and feel yourselves getting moist. Hey, I fancy him too and I’m a bloke!’

  That prompted a huge jeer from the watching boys, but the opening bars of an extremely familiar tune – the cancan – cut off the booing. The girls let out a whoop and, with their arms tightly linked, started high kicking. The men alternately wolf-whistled, cheered and clapped along.

  I watched in amazement as hundreds of girls kept their high-energy dance going for a good couple of minutes. At the end, all of them turned round, bent over and lifted up their skirts. Most of them were wearing thongs, but many had nothing on at all. The lecherous roar from the boys had to be heard to be believed, a kind of primal sexual howl.

  ‘Wow,’ the DJ shouted, ‘was that something special, or what? I think I’m going to make that a regular event. We have one person to thank, of course – Mr not-quite Sam Lincoln.’

  Sam, picked out once again by the spotlight, gave a bow.

  The DJ put on Madonna’s Hollywood.

  Sam turned away and aggressively pulled up his hoodie again. ‘Jesus, just by pretending to be me, I can get these people to do anything. It’s fucking pathetic.’

  Talk about mood swings! For the rest of the night he stayed in the same bad temper. Jez wasn’t much better. As for Mencken, he had vanished completely.

  I hung around all night, buying drinks, making inane jokes that neither actor laughed at, and tried to fill the frequent long silences with small talk. The men were clearly bored stiff. I contemplated trying out the singing vaginas anecdote on them, but all my energy had drained away. I felt pathetic, the least appropriate person on earth to be an entertainment consultant.

  We carried on that way until 3 o’clock in the morning. We were all leaning against the balcony, trying to stifle yawns. Just as the last dance began, a group of people dressed as City Slickers appeared from nowhere and barged their way onto the dancefloor, where they grabbed partners for the slow dance. In dark trousers, blue pinstriped shirts and red braces, with slicked-back hair, they all looked like men but, as I peered hard, I realized some were women. There was one particular woman causing a lot of commotion. Men were surging around the figure, gawping. From up here in the balcony, I imagined I was watching people being sucked into a whirlpool. All the men in the room seemed to be trying to ogle this person. Their tongues were practically hanging out.

  I couldn’t get a good look. The woman had her back turned to me the whole time and all I could see was the feverish reaction of the men around her. If my eyes weren’t tricking me, she had a gold-tipped swagger stick and was jabbing it into her admirers’ genitals if they got too frisky. She was like the queen bee in the centre of a hive, surrounded by slavering drones.

  When I glanced at Sam, he was leaning right over, staring even more intently than I was.

  ‘I have to check this out.’ He headed for the staircase and seconds later he appeared on the edge of the dancefloor and tried to push his way through the throng to get near the woman, but he didn’t make any headway.

  The last song ended and the house lights came on. All of the City Slickers broke off from their partners and headed for the exit. In seconds, they were gone. I was oddly impressed. They had been and gone in about five minutes flat, causing complete mayhem.

  Sam, looking up at me from the dancefloor, obviously wasn’t happy. What had he been expecting – for that gorgeous woman to see him and just leap into his arms? She and her City Slickers had certainly put on quite a show. What had it all been about? Maybe they were blowing off steam after getting their annual mega bonus.

  I noticed someone standing behind Sam. The man was gazing hard at the back of Sam’s head. He seemed to become aware of me and looked up in my direction. Startled, I stepped backwards. After a couple of moments, I sneaked back to the balcony and had another peek. The man was still there. I was certain I recognised him – the blond Elvis from the lap-dancing club.

  He caught my eye and slowly, with a slight smile on his face, drew his finger straight across his throat in an unmistakable gesture.

  Chapter 10: Das Hexenhaus

  When I dragged myself out of bed the next morning, I was haunted by a bad dream – with those strange City Slickers playing the starring role. In the dream I was stark naked and the Slickers had formed a circle around me and kept pushing me from one to another, laughing at me and pointing out all my faults. Their queen, with her gold swagger stick, kept her back to me the whole time. I had a terrible fear that if I ever glimpsed her face it would be my dead sister.

  Someone else featured prominently in my dream – Elvis. Was he a stalker? A journalist? Why did he make that terrifying cutthroat gesture? Maybe I’d misinterpreted, or my eyes had played a trick. I’d become so edgy lately.

  I made a strong black coffee then went through the address book on my BlackBerry. I phoned every friend and business contact I thought might be able to help me with NexS. No one had heard of either it or the Oxford students Mencken had mentioned.

  Jane phoned and I gave her my carefully concocted cover story that the mystery man I’d met at The Gherkin was a reclusive financier and I’d be keeping a low profile for the next few days as I took care of his requirements. Miraculously, I managed to keep to my story and avoid blurting out a single thing about what was really going on.

  At least I didn’t have to make any enquiries about Alphabet Love. The rules were simple. You had to sleep with twenty-six partners, starting with someone whose name began with ‘A’ and making your way through the alphabet in the right order until you got to someone with a name starting with ‘Z’. Strictly speaking, you weren’t supposed to have sex with anyone who wasn’t part of the game, but that rule was often conveniently ignored. I actually had a few male acquaintances playing it, though they’d probably be searching for compliant Annes, Alices and Annabelles for decades to come.

  In the afternoon, there was nothing more I could do, so to relax myself I watched my well-worn DVD of Dr Zhivago for the umpteenth time. It was my all-time favourite romantic movie. The Machiavellian character played by Rod Steiger reminded me of Mencken, but I couldn’t find any role for Sam. To me, he’d never be anyone but Jay Gatsby.

  For going out that night, I changed into my outfit that guaranteed maximum male attention. It consisted of a white whalebone basque, a black satin skirt and thigh-high black Gucci suede boots with the zip on the outside of the leg. With six-inch heels, the boots weren’t designed for walking much further than the bedroom. So, totally fit for purpose, as Jane always liked to tell me.

  I collected Sam and Jez in reception at the Sargasso. They were wearing similar gear to what they’d h
ad on last night. Just as we were getting into a cab. Jez said, ‘Not too many Eyes, right?’

  ‘Excuse me?’ I remembered that Sam had used the same expression in Sin 6.

  ‘You don’t know, do you?’ Jez glanced at Sam. ‘Eyes are, uh…’

  ‘Fans,’ Sam intervened.

  ‘Yeah, fans,’ Jez repeated, with a snigger.

  ‘Of course,’ I said, nodding. In my line of business, the illusion of deep understanding of my clients is essential. Usually it works, but every now and again…

  Sam gave me a sly look. ‘You don’t have a clue what we’re talking about, do you? You’re winging it.’ His voice was unpleasantly aggressive. ‘Come on, Sophie, tell us why we call fans Eyes.’

  He was dead right. I was clueless. Eyes? Hollywood freak talk as far as I was concerned.

  ‘We’re waiting,’ Sam persisted.

  I realised he intended to push it all the way. ‘One of my other Hollywood clients told me,’ I said eventually, pretending I frequently dealt with A-listers. The words flowed after that, bullshit mixed with concentrated blag. ‘He said that when he arrived at the Oscars ceremony, all he saw was a sea of eyes gawping at him. “Eyes,” he said, “that’s all fans mean to me.”’

  I had no idea if I was talking crap or digging gold.

  Sam exchanged a glance with Jez. ‘Let’s get going,’ he said.

  I’d passed the test, I think. But why had Sam got so ratty in the first place? It wasn’t a good sign. He was such a hard guy to figure – switching between nice and nasty in a heartbeat.

  I hoped things would improve once I took the actors to my favourite bar. Maybe its spooky history would jolt a positive response from them. Local legend had it that two German witches once lived on the site, so the present-day owner called it Das Hexenhaus – The Witch House. The bar was gothic, everything in matt black and gloss red. Even the toilet rolls in the black marble toilets were black, and quilted for extra comfort. As for the staff, they wore fashionable black uniforms with bellboy-style red caps.

  The bar’s quirky style had made it one of the trendiest spots in London, at least at weekends. But tonight was a quiet Wednesday, so few trendies were here. Instead, it was populated by a sad cast of C-listers and worse: ‘mortgage’ actors stuck in the same West End shows for years, soap-opera stars whose shows had long since submerged beneath the foamy bubbles, one-hit pop stars, comics who’d told their last gags years ago. Some of them were even less famous than I was. Nevertheless, I liked to tell Japanese, European and American clients that they were mingling with the biggest and best of Britain’s showbiz stars. It seemed to keep them happy.

  The Brit ‘stars’ mostly stayed in the VIP Room, though some preferred slumming it in the public bar. I wasn’t sure which bar was riskier. Would VIPs be more likely to recognise Sam and Jez than ordinary punters? I couldn’t decide.

  I eventually chose the VIP bar, simply because it was visually more appealing. I found three luxury red leather seats for us near the horseshoe bar. I wondered if the actors liked the bar’s red-painted oak panelling or the reproductions of Goya’s paintings of witches. It was impossible to tell. They sat in silence with their legs wide open, vaguely staring at each other. They were so statue-like, I wondered if they were having another of their bets: a thousand dollars for who could do the best impression of a showroom dummy.

  I asked if they fancied some Cristal and they both nodded stiffly. I signalled to one of the roving barstaff – Gary – one of my network of contacts. I once jokingly promised to put ice cubes in my mouth and suck him off for the coolest, or coldest, sexual experience of his life if he made sure my clients were always treated like royalty. He never gave up trying to get me to make good on that particular promise.

  ‘Who are the dudes?’ Gary whispered. When I smiled in a particular way, he responded with a knowing nod. ‘So, full tongues?’

  ‘In whatever orifice they prefer,’ I replied, winking.

  ‘Oh, by the way – bitch alert. Teri and Tamsin are round the corner with a group of Danish businessmen, spending shitloads.’

  Christ, as if I didn’t have enough to worry about.

  ‘Thanks for the tip-off,’ I said. ‘Two bottles of Cristal and bring those new fluted glasses, please.’

  ‘On your account?’

  I nodded. ‘Make sure you’re taken care of.’

  ‘Pay me tomorrow.’ Pushing his finger into the side of his mouth, Gary made a disgusting plucking sound. ‘In full, of course.’ He smiled lecherously. ‘On the rocks, just like we agreed.’ Luckily, I could tell he was being only thirty-three percent serious.

  I did the honours of opening the first bottle. It was almost a sexual pleasure to undo that translucent gold wrapping and slide out the elegant bottle. Jane never tired of pointing out that Cristal was once the champagne of choice for Russian tsars. Of course, American rappers were its top patrons these days. They ain’t sippin’ if it ain’t Cristal, right? I popped the cork, skilfully avoiding too much spray, and poured the champagne. Then I held up my glass for a toast.

  ‘To ultimate pleasure, right?’

  ‘Ultimate pleasure,’ the actors grunted, raising their glasses.

  The champagne was as delicious as ever. For a moment, I forgot everything and just sat back and surrendered to the taste. But as I looked around the bar and watched Sam and Jez sulkily sipping their drinks, I started to panic at my list of duties and the ticking clock of the timescales involved. The Holy Grail was NexS, but where would I find it? As for Alphabet Love, I didn’t know any woman whose name began with a Y, apart from Yvonne whom I hadn’t seen since Roedean. Z? – forget it. I’d heard of a Zelda, a Zoe and a Zadie, but I’d certainly never met one.

  I finished my Cristal and was busy pouring a fresh glass when Teri and Tamsin appeared. I thought I smelt sulphur, but it was just their ghastly Inferno perfume. They were dressed identically in trainers, jeans, and waistcoats that didn’t cover their tummies. Most ludicrously of all, they were sporting silver gaucho hats. Their plastic smiles were so deeply ingrained it would probably take an elite demolition team to remove them. They spotted me and slithered over. I could see them studying Sam and Jez, trying to work out who they were. Sam’s hood was drawn right over his head now, while Jez’s baseball cap was firmly pulled down.

  ‘Hi, Sophie,’ they chirped in unison.

  ‘Hi, Teri and Tamsin.’ The usual fake bonhomie. Why did we bother?

  ‘Aren’t you going to introduce us to your mysterious friends?’ Teri said.

  There wasn’t so much as a flicker from Sam and Jez.

  ‘They don’t want to be disturbed.’

  I could see that Teri and Tamsin were intrigued. Only A-listers behaved as eccentrically as this.

  Teri leaned over and said, ‘Did you know that because of last year’s heat wave, the French think that this season will yield only twenty percent of the normal amount of truffles. The price has already gone up to two thousand pounds a kilo.’ Her eyes glinted. ‘They’re more expensive than opium.’

  Tamsin joined in. ‘Did you know that the truffles of Perigord are known as black diamonds because of their value and scarcity?’ She shot a flirtatious look at Jez. ‘Believe me, there’s nothing quite like rooting around for black diamonds, and using your tongue to polish them.’

  Teri nudged her friend. ‘Yes, but the most elusive and expensive truffle of all is the white truffle of Italy.’ Then a long, lingering stare at Sam.

  I couldn’t believe it. The bitches were trying to steal my guys right in front of me.

  ‘Truffles aren’t our thing,’ I said dismissively, relishing my moment of triumph. Teri and Tamsin were the ones who once told a reporter that I had a tattoo of ‘I luv Essex’ on my bum, just because I was born in Billericay. Very bloody funny. It’s actually a picture of the Japanese rising sun on my left buttock, and it’s absolutely not tacky.

  The two Ts scowled and went on their way to the loo, glancing over their shoulders to see if th
e boys were checking out their bums. Thankfully, they weren’t. I was delighted to note that the BFI – the Body Fascism Index – was beginning to catch up with the two women now that they’d almost entered their thirties. Some feminist once said that every woman must beware the ‘male gaze’. I chuckled, thinking the male gaze might soon be the last thing these two had to worry about. OK, I was being a bitch, but they deserved it.

  ‘You were wrong by the way,’ Sam said as we moved onto the second bottle of Cristal. ‘We call fans Eyes because they can look but never touch.’

  ‘Yeah, but your version was much better,’ Jez laughed.

  The smile I rustled up was so weak it barely registered. I’d got away with it, just. The two Ts would be burnishing their broomsticks and throwing a toad in the pot for extra flavour if they could see how shaky things were for me.

  ‘So, where’s the off-road fun Mencken said you’d give us?’ Sam asked.

  Fact was, no inspiration had come to me. I couldn’t think of a solitary thing that was weird or imaginative. I mean these guys were just so huge and had done so many spectacular things. I felt totally inferior. My sense of humour was vanishing too. Normally I filled silences with anecdotes and jokes, but I felt about as funny as the Orthodox Jewish comedian at the Hamas convention, as a broadsheet journalist once said about me. I was a comedy vacuum.

  I’d begun to dread that a spotlight would pick me out and a sneering voice would say, ‘She thought she could entertain the brightest stars with her hick operation, thought she could fool the Hollywood Gods but, Sophie York, it’s time for your news flash: Sam and Jez knew all along that you were a low-class loser and now they’re going to walk out on you and tell the whole world what a fraud you are.’

  As I sank deeper into my seat, laughter erupted from the public bar. Instantly, I wanted to be there, surrounded by people capable of having normal fun. ‘Come on,’ I said.

  When we went into the other bar, a man in a black top hat, frock coat and an elegant cape lined with red silk was standing in front of two tall companions dressed as butlers, each holding a tray heaped with delicious-looking cream cakes in Harrods’ wrappers: strawberry tarts, raspberry pavlovas, pineapple and peach cakes, profiteroles, slices of black forest gateau, cream slices, chocolate éclairs, custard tarts, fruit flan, creamy chocolate meringues.