by Kailin Gow
Terrence and Jaymie burst into hysterical laughter – not titters but hearty guffaws, before catching sight of me in the doorway and stopping. Terrence is giving me a look of wry amusement.
“Your future bride wants to talk to you,” I say with difficulty, handing Terrence the phone.
I don't think he even notices how hard it is for me as he grabs the phone with nonchalant lightness, stepping out into the hallway – sauntering, even. What can I say? Terrence has won. He's won, and I've lost, and I suppose if I were in his shoes I'd be over the moon, too, just as he is.
Now it's just me and Jaymie, staring at each other. She's still at the tail end of her hysterics: her laughter silent now but still visible in the moonshine glow of her red rosy cheeks, the sparkle in her eyes – she has such happy eyes, I think, for a woman who must have seen and known some of the worst degradation humanity had to offer. Just looking at the glorious joyful intensity in those eyes makes me stop breathing for a second. Her eyes reminded me so much of Marina's. Sparkling, witty, effervescent, full of vital life. Except for their color, they are identical. Marina's had beautiful soulful brown eyes, but Jaymie's were of a bright green so striking they were almost emerald.
“Um...what was so funny?” I ask. I feel like a high school dweeb who's missing out on the popular kids' joke – a feeling I never even had back in high school.
“I was just telling your little-boy nephew over there...' Jaymie laughs-- we both know Terrence is old enough to pass as my brother, and is hardly a kid at all “about the weirdest request I'd ever gotten at a club. Clearly Terrence isn't easily shocked – he's seen quite a bit in his few days on earth, that one. But I finally got him stumped. Even he didn't realize how truly weird dudes can be...at the crucial moment. I finally got him laughing at something he's never heard before.”
“That must have been quite the challenge,” I say icily. I don't meant to be curt with Jaymie, but I'm still smarting from my conversation with Staci. “After all, Terrence certainly saw – and did – everything. Until Staci got to him, that is. She tamed that playboy – so you're seeing the side of him that she's supposedly reformed.”
“Well that's certainly good for her,” Jaymie smiles, rolling her eyes only ever so slightly. “I only talked to him for a few minutes and even I could tell he's all about Staci now – and no one else.” She cocks her head at me. “And what about you?” she says.
“What about me?”
“Are you all about Staci...too?” She says it so playfully, but I detect a genuine curiosity in her eye.
I gulp. I'm unsure of what to say. Sure, I'm hurting, but I have no interest in discussing the deep dark vaults of my soul with a perfect stranger.
“Oh, I see,” Jaymie doesn't sound too sympathetic. “Not quite over her. Oh well. You'll live. We all do. It takes time. One day, maybe, I'll tell you my own sob story of lost love – but not here. Not now. It's a long story, and I'm not interested in mawkishness. Anyway, you'll live. That's the important part.”
“I bet you have a lot of stories to tell,” I say to her.
Jaymie flashes me a surreptitious smile. “Oh, believe me, I do,” she says. “But let's get back on track, shall we. I need time to infiltrate the Blue Girls clique and find my way to the system proper. So why don't we set things up so I can start immediately – what do you say?”
I have to smile at Jaymie's assertiveness. Staci had always been so careful, so delicate, but Jaymie is brash, experienced. She knows exactly what she wants and how to get it. I can't help but wonder if she knows what she wants in all regards. But before I can let my mind travel down that garden path, Terrence reappears in the doorway, followed by Danny. Danny is dressed in his usual tight black jeans and black t-shirt attire along with rugged combat boots, which made his black hair blacker and blue eyes even bluer. He was the rock star in the family, and he has just come from a morning practice with his band, The Never Knights, who is now part of Blue Records, a company Danny established and manage when The Never Knights was sabotaged by Danny’s jealous stepmother Veronica Taylor in the music industry.
“Well, Terrence,” I say, “And Danny – I assume Terrence has filled you in about our little – ah – situation.”
Danny nods.
“Can you get started tomorrow?”
Danny looks Jaymie over. “She'll fit right in,” he says. “I'm sure Mrs. Walters will be thrilled to have someone share the overload – we're low on girls right now, and Mrs. Walters is so careful about new recruits. Doesn't want our standards to slip. But I don't think she'll have to worry too much about you – it shouldn't be too hard to get you into tip top Blue Girl shape. Especially with your pedigree – the places you worked in Vegas are really top-notch. Plus, Staci sent along some of your info and resume. And a referral from Staci Atussi is as good as you get in this business. If Staci recommends Jaymie highly, that's good enough for me. You even look like her a little, you know...”
“In a way,” Terrence cuts in. “Something about your...shape. But you're different enough to attract a different clientele. And now that I'm back on the board and in a management position, I'll see to it that everything Jaymie needs to get started is ready and waiting for her, including one of our finest suites.
Jaymie claps her hands, a grin spreading over her face. “Good,” she trills. “Thank God. I can't wait to start and get this frickin' case cracked wide open so that all you fine folks can go along and live your merry little pimp lives in peace.” She grins at Terrence, who grins straight back at her.
Terrence straightens his back. “Jaymie, we’ll need to give you our Blue Girls contract of employment, if you decide to take your undercover investigation work beyond investigations. We’ll do everything to help you look the part of a Blue Girl, and to help you fit in without suspicion, but you are under no obligation to truly perform any sexual acts with any patrons. It is up to you, as you will see in our Blue Girl contract that we do not state this is what Blue Girls do. We are in the business of creating the illusion of fantasies come true, and to provide escort and entertainment services for our guests. It is up to each Blue Girl how far they wish to go to fulfill that. This is not a brothel. This is not like any place you’ve ever worked before. Are you sure you want to sign up as a Blue Girl while performing your investigation duties?”
Jaymie nods and grins with excitement. She’s almost giddy with it. “I'm ready for my room now. My suitcase is downstairs in the lobby – send it up and let's get on the way.”
“Come on,” says Terrence. “We'll put you in Room 1252. I've texted Mrs. Walters to meet us there.”
We follow Terrence up to the 12th floor on the hotel side, into 1252. He's spared no expense: it's one of the most beautiful suites in the hotel, with floor-to-ceiling glass windows that look out all over LA. Clearly we're setting up Jaymie as one of our top girls.
“Welcome!” A female voice trills as we enter. Mrs. Walters, in a lilac silk dressing gown and Chanel pajamas, but still perfectly made-up and coiffed, comes towards us. “I'm so happy to see our new girl, Miss...”
She furrows her brow and falls silent as she takes in Jaymie. There's a strange look on her face. I've never seen anything like this before. In all my time at the Blue Room, I've never once seen Mrs. Walters flustered. But here she looks pale, chalk-like, with dark red lips and horror seeping through her pores.
“What is it, Josie?” asks Terrence.
“I...” she shakes her head. “Nothing. Nothing. Welcome, Miss...”
“Wakely,” Jaymie sticks out a hand. “Jaymie Wakely.”
Mrs. Walters shakes Jaymie's hand.
“I see you're quite prepared already,” she says. Her voice is curt and clipped and cold. “Physically you're mostly there, but your manner of dress...” her voice trails off. “I'm afraid we do things far more subtly than you're used to in the Blue Room, Ms. Wakely. Loud prints and tight dresses just won't do. We go for tailored over tight, craftsmanship over...flaunting one's assets.” She pun
ches in something on her phone. “I've texted my wardrobe assistant to come over. She'll measure your size and we'll tailor some of the outfits we have on hand, if that would please you?”
“It would...please me...” Jaymie says slowly, sounding confused. “Okay....”
“I've put you in the system already,” says Mrs. Walters. “Your daily schedule – including your first assignment – will be under your door in a few short hours. If that is acceptable to you.”
Terrence and I look at each other. Does Mrs. Walters have something against our new charge? That was something neither of us expected.
But that's the life-long lesson of the Blue Room, isn't it? Don't start expecting anything. Don't get too attached. Here in the Blue Room, nothing is ever what it seems. Don't trust anyone. Not even Josephine Walters.
But can we trust Jaymie Wakely? Terrence and I trade a significant glance. Only time will tell. And if Jaymie turns out to be someone we can't rely on...well, the Blue Room might be in more danger than ever before.
Chapter 4
Jaymie
So, this is the Blue Room. Not that I have much opportunity to explore it. The second Xander and Terrence show me to my new room, I am caught up in a whirlwind of obligations and obsessions. I am being made over into something between a child's fantasy of a pretty pretty princess and a man's fantasy of the perfect whore. They don't cut corners here: that much I learn early on that morning. Every single element of a Blue Girl's life is curated carefully to ensure that she isn't just a good illusionist – she genuinely is perfect. Anyone who said hooking was an easy way to make money is lying. In fact, I don't think I get a single moment of rest or relaxation all day. 5-6 am I'm in the hotel salon getting a blow-out and my highlights redone, my brassy red hair transformed into a warmer strawberry gold that better resembles the hair of several of last season's most popular socialites. At 6 I'm at the spa, being pampered and massaged with enough mud and hot stones to fill an entire quarry, dead skin being scraped off of me, my face and body new and shiny once again. A makeup artist tries different looks on me between 7 and 8, deciding on the products she thinks most optimize my “natural look – experienced and in control” and leaves me with twenty boxes of each in my room. At 9:00 am sharp – after a miserable breakfast of egg whites and steamed broccolli – the tailor comes to adjust the outfits Mrs. Walters has picked out for me, turning loose, baggy silk tunics into perfectly fitted, but never overly tight or vulgar, outfits: fit for a queen.
I can't deny it, I think, as I plunge into a spicy bath: hot and steaming with cardamom, cinnamon, clove, and Moroccan oils. Good enough to taste. But it's true. No doubt there. The Blue Room really is the sina qua non of gentlemen’s clubs.
All run by the perfectly precise, polished, clipped and cold Mrs. Josephine Walters.
Or, as I used to know her, Jenny.
Because that face may be older, now – if not lined (her plastic surgery is too subtly perfect for that) than nevertheless altered. Her clothing might be far more expensive – tailored the way mine are, although designed to give off an impression of power rather than sensuality – and she might have dyed her hair and cut it, but I still recognize that face from one of my earliest private investigation work. I will never forget it.
She was a substitute English teacher who had taught briefly at the College for Women I was investigating for allegations of a student who was killed by fellow students in a horrendous case of bullying. I was an undercover student. She taught me a real love for literature, a passion for words, and a life-long obsession with The Sound and the Fury and the American Gothic more broadly. She was sweet, even a little shy; she had trouble controlling some of the more raucous girls in her class.
Could that same Miss Jenny Simmons be Mrs. Josephine Walters? It seems too ridiculous to believe. What is Jenny Simmons, a college English teacher, doing working as a terrifying all-powerful madam at the most exclusive, most expensive escort service in the entire country, if not the entire world? What on earth brought her here?
Is it even her? I mean, she seemed nervous when she saw me, but maybe it was just that she noticed I was looking at her funny and wondered why. Memory plays tricks on us, after all – maybe memory was playing a trick on me? Making me believe that I was seeing Jenny Simmons instead of the elegant and well-coiffed woman I saw before me?
No. I shake my head. That can't be right.
But she has to be someone else, a look-a-like, a doppelganger. It's too weird, too totally crazy, to be true.
But deep down, I know the truth. Josephine Walters is Jenny Simmons.
Did she recognize me? I'm not sure. She seemed suspicious at first, and a little confused. Could she have wondered if I was that college student she had taught Faulker too years ago?
I feel a twinge of sympathy for the woman. She has a lot of responsibility, I know – being in charge of the whole Blues Girls operations, including coordinating their schedules and booking them for their patrons. Which means that right now she's in the lead when it comes to my list of prime suspects of who would be masterminding the whole double-booking operation. But why would Mrs. Walters, who was so strict about Blue Girls' qualities and attributes, be letting “lesser” girls into the operation? The whole thing just didn't make any sense.
I have to keep my eye on Mrs. Walters. But for starters, I think, I should start by investigating the Blue Girls. I know that the best place to find them is the employees' cafeteria – a strangely casual place considering the luxury of the Blue Room overall. I hear the employees like it that way – that's what Terrence says. It's the only place they can just chill out and be casual instead of putting on the mask of the perfect women. It's a place they can show up in sweatpants and eat fried chicken with their fingers and just...relax.
I head for lunch to the cafeteria. It's busy at this hour – tons of the most beautiful women I have ever seen milling around with one another. They may be dressed down, but their hair and makeup – not to mention their natural features – are perfect. My stomach gives a little jolt. I'm not prone to nerves, but even I am wondering if I really “count” as one of them.
I get my food – a seafood risotto that despite the family-style down-home presentation is one of the most delicious things I have ever tasted – and sit down in one of the only empty seats in the cafeteria, next to a small girl with long blue hair. At first I think she's wearing a wig, but upon closer inspection I realize her hair is dyed that color.
“Nice hair,” I say. It's not the wittiest opener even dreamed up but it'll do.
I bite into my lunch. Damn, that's good.
“Thanks,” the girl smiles back at me. “I call it my mermaid look.”
“It suits you,” I say. “Especially with those aquamarine eyes of yours.”
She softens further. It's true what they say. Flattery will get you everywhere.
“It gets me noticed,” says the girl. “That's got to be good enough. In this business you set yourself apart from the competition any way you can – and it's not like I can compete on features alone with girls like that...”
She motions over to a small round table in the center of the room, where four of the most stunning women I have ever seen in my entire life are gathered.
“No?”
“They're constantly getting booked – it's crazy. They're always getting tons of presents from their patrons, always in demand. They act like queens – like they reign over this place. And maybe they do. Everyone thinks the Blues are in charge, but really it's the girls.”
“How so?”
The girl looks alarmed for a second.
“I don't know,” she says. “They just do.”
“And why are you here?” I ask. “And not over there, sitting with them. Ruling with them, even.”
The mermaid girl sighs. “It's because...I suspect...I'm too honest.”
“Too honest?”
“Look,” she leans her elbows on the table. “I shouldn't be telling you this, but...”
Mermaid Girl stops talking and looks up. One of the girls from the Queen Bee table has come over and is standing there in front of me and Mermaid. She's got her arms crossed and her foot is tapping out an irritated patter. I give her an expectant smile.
“Can I help you?”
“Hi,” she stretches out her hand for me to shake. She ignores Mermaid Girl. “You must be the new girl. I haven't seen you around here before. Now that that stuck-up bitch Staci is gone, you must have taken her place. Glad to see you here. I'm Julie.”
“I'm Jaymie,” I say in reply.
A gaggle of girls has appeared behind Julie's back. They all introduce themselves – Ceylon, Serena, Natasha – and shake my hand with perfectly manicured nails. Then they head back to their tables with cruel smiles on their lips and inscrutable expressions on their eyes. They're talking wildly, laughing even.
“Are they talking about me?” I ask Mermaid Girl.
“Most likely,” Mermaid Girl replies. “Those girls just love to gossip. I'm Sky, by the way. I know, I know. I've heard it all before.”
“What?”
“Sky blue. The color of my hair.”
“I'd say you're more of an indigo girl, personally.”
She laughs a little.
“Nice to meet you, Sky,” I add.
Sky leans in to whisper into my ears. “I've been here almost a year and I still haven't been able to infiltrate that world. I want to be part of Julie and her clique so badly...I just have to work a little harder, make it in. They'll let me in soon enough, I hope. I have a good feeling about this time.”
“Why do you want to be part of this clique anyway,” I ask.
“Because,” she says, like it's the most obvious thing in the world. “They're the ones who get you in on all kinds of ways to work this goldmine of a place. We may act dumb to our patrons, but in reality, we're the ones in control.”