Luke - Sex, Violence and Vice in Sin City

by Aaron Cohen

  It takes about 30 seconds for three microphones to be thrust into the DA’s smiling face.

  Jennifer stands back and watches.

  “Don’t you want to at least listen in?” Chuck asks, a cameraman without a camera, or at least a working one.

  “Whatever this is, this staged crap is not the story,” she says. “The real story is somewhere else.”

  “Where?”

  “Wherever Ben Two-Cans is.”

  ***

  Luke sits in the back of the RV on a stained, plaid couch that smells of pot and cigarettes. He feels his body being pulled into the cushion, G-forces pulling his head backward.

  “This thing really is fast,” he says to himself.

  ***

  Meanwhile, somewhere out in the Nevada desert, making their way to Arizona and then to Mexico, Beri and Owen are doing 80 miles an hour in a Toyota Prius, which Owen bought with his company credit card just before the dealership closed for the night. They left the stolen police cruiser behind at a 7-11 with the keys in the glove box. Beri, ever the polite one, suggested they leave a thank you note, but Owen vetoed that as he wiped their fingerprints from the steering wheel and door handles.

  He hates the black Prius. It looks like the bastard child of a cheese wedge and a tennis shoe, but the thing gets amazing gas mileage and he doesn’t want to make many stops until they are safely out of the country. He hopes Luke is all right. He plans to call as soon as they get to a proper pay phone. Did they even have those anymore?

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  David’s boardroom, normally funereal in its formality, now features a buffet table covered with lobster tails, shrimp cocktail, petite filet mignons, bottles of Dom Perignon, and an ice carving of a naked woman with lust in her eyes and porn-star sized breasts. In her icy hands she holds big bowls of Russian caviar.

  The room is filled with 20 men and women in business suits, the top tier of Empire Resorts management, the people who would be more than happy to kiss David’s ring, or ass, or any other body part of his choosing. It is 11:13 p.m. and there isn’t a loosened tie in the room. David’s rule: In the boardroom, it is business, and you will dress like it.

  A giant TV shows the 11 p.m. local newscast. The weather is wrapping up and they are about to cut to the big news event, a live report from a reporter in the field.

  David and Tarlik both hold glasses of champagne. Tarlik offers a thin, conspiratorial smile. David gives a slight nod in return.

  At 11:14 p.m., David turns to the crowd, presses pause on the DVR freezing the weatherman mid-word, clears his throat, and says, “Ladies and gentleman. Attention please.”

  Immediately, there is silence.

  “Months of work, your work, is about to pay off,” David says. “Years ago, an idea became a plan, the plan became a strategy, and thanks to all your work, that strategy will become a reality. Tonight, our enemies – and our friends, few as they may be – will see the power of Empire.”

  With that, he presses play, and turns up the volume on the TV. The scene is in front of The Booby Hatch where a handsome man with an oddly large jaw is about to give a statement in front of an impressive bouquet of microphones.

  ***

  District Attorney Hans Squelling stands in front of The Booby Hatch’s golden front doors. To his sides are police officers in helmets, gloves, and Kevlar vests. They hold black batons and clear plastic shields.

  Hans juts out his square confident jaw into the microphones in front of him. He gives his speech:

  “Today, the citizens of Las Vegas begin taking back their city. We are getting rid of the some of the sin in Sin City. The so-called ‘gentlemen’s clubs’ of Las Vegas for too long have ignored our laws, have allowed sexual interactions to happen under the guise of ‘lap dancing’ or ‘table dancing,’ and don’t even get me started on the ‘champagne room.’ Do you know what’s available in the champagne room?”

  “Champagne?” shouts out someone in the crowd of reporters.

  Hans looks to the back, but can’t see due to all the lights in his face. He’s lost his train of thought. He needs to get back on track. Where was he? Oh yeah.

  “What’s available in these clubs is prostitution plain and simple,” Hans says. “After a six month investigation, we have hours of video tape and eye witness interviews that prove that nightclubs like The Booby Hatch are nothing but illegal brothels. And tonight, we are shutting this one down, but it won’t be the last one. Officers…”

  He looks around at the police surrounding him. He wants to sound like a general leading his soldiers into battle, a holy battle against the blackest of evil.

  “…Let’s go once more into this breach and shut it down, so make it so!” he says, thinking it sounds Shakespearean, while also being a salute to Star Trek: The Next Generation, his favorite TV show of all time.

  The police officers do an about face and head for the front doors, shiny black with heavy bronze handles.

  The cops storm inside. They fan out, yelling, “This establishment is closed! Please leave in an orderly fashion!”

  One cop heads to the vacated DJ booth and looks for the master light switch. He finds it, flips it on and the house lights bathe the place in white light. It’s like a sun exploded into existence right above the dance floor.

  Everything once hidden in darkness is now obvious. The carpet is covered in stains and cigarette burns. The chrome and Formica furniture is chipped and scratched. There are dust bunnies in the corners. Cobwebs hang from the ceiling and from the dozens and dozens of colored spotlights.

  And the girls, oh, the girls. Their makeup now seems garish, clownish. Eyelids too blue, lips too red, faces unnaturally orange from too much foundation makeup. When the lights were dimmed, every female figure seemed perfect, every inch of skin smooth and touchable. But in this stark white light, imperfections abound, wrinkly necks, wobbly cellulite thighs, moustaches, pockmarks, bruises, stretch marks, unfortunate tattoos and moles. Their humanity revealed, their imperfections laid bare, the girls skitter on their clear heels to the dressing room in the back.

  The surprised and disappointed customers head to the front door. Some look back at the now well-lighted girls and think almost the same thought all at once, Oh my god. That’s what they really look like. And, wow, it’s weird, but they are even sexier. They seem, I don’t know, more accessible, easier to approach. They look getable. Lovable.

  The men exit through the front door and are greeted by the press and their cameras, microphones and questions.

  “Did you have sex in there?”

  “Are you sad about The Booby Hatch being closed?’

  “What goes on in the champagne room?”

  The men don’t bother to answer, and quite a few hold their hands in front of their faces until clear of the cameras. They don’t want to be seen on TV leaving a strip joint.

  The exception is a construction worker who is single and whose favorite place in the world on a Friday night is The Booby Hatch. He is pissed. He wants to tell someone. He stands proud and tall in front of the crowd of press and gives them all a long hard look. Microphones are thrust into his face. The cameras turn toward him. Five minutes ago, he was a nobody slipping dollar bills into a stripper’s G-string. Now, he is the spokesperson for strip club patrons all over the world.

  “Have you all lost your minds?” he asks the press, the cops, and the world. “Have the police run out of real criminals to chase? You can buy meth on any corner in this town, and the cops are worried about me getting a lap dance? This is how our tax money is spent? It’s stupid, just plain stupid.”

  “Did you have sex in there?” asks a female reporter.

  “Hell no,” he says. “If you sit in my lap, are we having sex?”

  “No.”

  “Then no. Next stupid question.”

  “What goes on in the Champagne Room?”

  “Same thing that happens outside the Champagne Room, except it costs twice as much.”

&nb
sp; “Are you sad about The Booby Hatch closing?”

  “I’m sad that in this day and age a man can’t go to a strip club on a Friday night and motorboat some tits without some dumbass politician deciding he needs to do something about it. Why someone cares if my dick is hard is beyond me, but it is what it is. Good night.”

  His speech beams all over Las Vegas, carried live on four different channels, reaching about 2 million people. Some of those people nod their heads in agreement. Some of them are wives who ask their husbands, “Have you ever been to a strip club?” The most common answer to that question is a lie: “No, honey. Well, not for a long, long time, just once, with some guys from work, I hated it, ugh, never went back. Can we change the channel?”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  The Stork barrels through the dusty back streets of Las Vegas, headed toward The Dark Star.

  Hank drives, wondering what the hell he’s got himself into, thinking about calling it a night, kicking these guys out and heading to Mexico where he and Charlie could live like kings. The only downside to that idea is the potential of Joe-Joe tracking them down and taking payment in limbs. Guys living like kings typically aren’t hard to find.

  To hell with it, this job seems easy enough. The Dark Star is a resort, not a fortress. Easy money.

  He reminds himself that there is no such thing.

  Behind him sitting in cushy captain’s chairs are Ben and Luke. Hank doesn’t know everything going on with the kid, but he can tell this is Luke’s first run on the wrong side of the law. Hank has seen the look before, nervous and trying hard not to look nervous, the look of someone in the middle of doing something terrifyingly stupid yet lacking the ability to stop himself. The difference is that with Luke, the motivation isn’t money, it’s something else. Hank wants to know what.

  Ben fiddles with a remote control to the TV mounted above the RV’s living space. Ben looks cool and calm. In fact, the old guy has a twinkle in his eye, a little smile on his lips. The guy is having fun. Hank can understand that. A retirement filled with bocce ball and early bird dinners probably isn’t a satisfying way to cap off a life of criminal adventure. Ben cracks open a can of peanuts he found in the pantry and settles into his chair, watching the TV.

  Further in the back, past the microwave oven, refrigerator, and sink, on a couple of couches around a coffee table sit Charlie, Cecil and Artie. On the coffee table is Charlie’s chessboard, made for traveling as all the pieces have pegs that fit into holes within each space.

  Charlie loves chess, and loves finding new players even more, as Hank isn’t good at it and thus a boring opponent. Charlie is incredibly good at it, which makes him the perfect chess hustler. At 350 pounds, sometimes floating up to 400, with most of it being muscle, with a wardrobe consisting of tank tops and sweat pants, and with hair past his shoulders, Charlie doesn’t look the part of a chess master. In reality, he is a Samoan Bobby Fischer and rules three different internet chess clubs. He has developed a mythical status among online players as “The Bear.” Rumor has it that The Bear has that name because he is Russian, not because he is about the size of one.

  Artie is going to be Charlie’s first victim. Hank can see them in his rear view mirror. Artie takes white and moves first. Hank smiles.

  Off he drives them, his fun new friends, to a night of danger, to rescue a hot brothel owner from the clutches of a corporate villain. Life could be worse. He could be missing a finger and in an emergency room hoping they can sew it back on.

  ***

  Ben fiddles with the TV until he finds the local news. He and Luke watch the DA’s speech, then the riot police barging into The Booby Hatch.

  “Everything just changed,” Ben says. “This is now war. You can almost hear thousands of strippers and millions of men scream out in pain.”

  Luke sits there, fidgeting, looking nervous, skittish. Ben doesn’t like it. He doesn’t want Luke doing something stupid, getting himself or anyone else hurt. For Ben to pull off what he wants to pull off, which is nothing short of saving the world (his world anyway), he needs Luke to calm down and treat this like a job.

  Ben picks out a peanut and tosses it at Luke’s head. It bounces off a sun-bleached blond lock and drops to the ground. Luke eyes flicker for a moment and he goes back to his stewing.

  Ben tosses another peanut at Luke, this one careening off of his ear.

  Luke snaps.

  “What the fuck!” Luke yells and turns to face Ben. His eyes are on fire. He springs out of his chair and looks ready to start throwing punches.

  “You pissed?” Ben asks nonchalantly. “You want to let all that rage loose on somebody?”

  Ben throws another peanut at Luke. It doinks off the tip of his nose.

  “Stop throwing peanuts at me,” Luke says.

  “A few peanuts bothering you?” Ben asks. “How are you going to feel when bullets start flying?”

  Ben throws a peanut. Luke tries to swat it away and misses. It bounces off of his chest.

  “You going to take a run at me kid?” Ben asks. “You that hot-headed?”

  Ben pings Luke directly in the forehead with a peanut.

  “You that stupid?” Ben asks.

  He nails Luke in forehead again, right between two angry eyes.

  “Cut it out,” Luke says.

  Ben calmly puts the lid back on the peanuts. He shakes the can which issues a hollow rattle.

  He throws the can high into the air and Luke watches it go up. When it’s at its apex, Ben shoots out of his chair and smashes Luke in the stomach with his left fist. The air leaves Luke’s lungs with a WHOOSH. Ben slips behind Luke, grabs his right arm, twists it up behind his back. At the same time, he pushes his left knee into the back of Luke’s right knee, which instantly causes Luke to drop the floor.

  As if by magic, brass knuckles appear on Ben’s hand. He pushes Luke’s face into the stained carpet of the RV and punches the ground with the knucks, making a muffled CRACK that sounds like a bone being broken. Luke’s eyes stare at the fist even while he sucks in air, trying to refill his lungs.

  Ben, on top of Luke, keeping the kid’s arm bent behind him, leans over and whispers into his ear: “You want to know about The Code? Keep your fucking cool. That’s in The Code. You’re angry? You’re sad? You’re emotional? Stay at home until your period is over. You lose your temper on a job, you’ll do something stupid. Get yourself killed. Maybe someone else.”

  Ben gets up. The knucks disappear and Ben eases back into the captain’s chair.

  “Don’t let your anger use you. Use your anger,” Ben says. “That’s what The Code says.”

  Luke gets up, glares at Ben, and falls back into his chair.

  “My aunt and uncle,” Luke says with so much sadness it breaks Ben’s heart.

  “Revenge is a job like any other,” Ben says. “You treat it like a professional, like a man who knows what he wants, like a guy with a plan and the means to execute it. Save the tears for the funeral. You want to go into this thing with clear eyes and a calm mind.”

  Luke sits in his chair and breathes. He looks calmer, having been relieved of some of the energy he had been building up. Good, Ben thinks.

  “The Code is a lot of old Mafia horseshit,” Hank says. “Just gangsters trying to make themselves sound noble, like something better than thugs on the make.”

  “Says the dope smuggler and gambling addict,” says Ben. “The Code kept us in charge and rich for almost a century. And those who live by The Code still do well to this day.”

  “Is there a secret handshake too?” Hank asks.

  “Yes, as a matter of fact there is,” Ben says and pulls a peanut out of the can. He tosses it at Luke. Luke, without even looking, catches it and eats it.

  “This is the foundation of The Code,” Ben says. “Where men are weak, you are strong. When others lose control, you gain control. No fear. No anger. No ego. No greed. These make you stupid, these make you weak. You get me?”

  “Yeah,” Luk
e says. “Yeah, I think I do.”

  “Fantastic,” Hank says. “We’ll all have a group hug later.”

  Chapter Thirty

  Despite the commotion up front, Artie is focused on his chess game. Things are going well. He is up three pawns and a knight. He is dominating the center of the board and ready to bring his queen out to start laying waste to Charlie’s front lines.

  Charlie seems a nice enough guy, quiet. He doesn’t look like a chess player, but Artie, who thinks of himself as a bit of a chess hustler, having perfected his skills at several New York City street games, doesn’t either.

  “You know, Art,” Cecil says quietly. “Charlie could dip you into a cheese fondue and eat you as a snack. Maybe you should let him win.”

  Artie doesn’t look up from the chessboard. He is plotting an aggressive strike with his queen. He doesn’t want to bring her out this early in the match, but the opportunity for a quick mate is there.

  “He’s not deaf, you idiot,” Artie says. “He just can’t speak.”

  Cecil looks concerned.

  “Is that true?” Cecil asks the giant man. “I meant no offense.”

  “It’s true,” Charlie says, but it comes out a garbled mess.

  “He says it’s true so shut the fuck up, you annoying fuck,” Hank shouts from up front.

  “So helpful you are, thank you,” Cecil says.

  Artie moves his queen out to the middle of the board, ready to finish this game.

  Charlie moves a pawn up one space, and threatens one of Artie’s pawns. Artie thinks through the next few moves. He thinks them through again. Then again. He can’t believe what he’s seeing. He has fallen into a trap. It’s seven moves away, but his queen is dead, which will be followed in three more moves by his king. Artie looks up at the man mountain, who is now smiling.

  “How did you do that?” Artie asks.

  “What?” Cecil asks. “What am I not seeing?”

  “He’s won,” Artie says.

  “No he hasn’t,” Cecil says. “Your well ahead and your queen is about to take that pawn which will put him into check, and then he’ll have to…wait, if he…hmmmm”