Luke - Sex, Violence and Vice in Sin City

by Aaron Cohen

  “I…um…I don’t know what to say to that.”

  “I figured out something. You are who you pretend to be. In college, I pretended I was the most popular guy in high school, a guy who had the world by the balls, a guy who could get any girl he wanted. Pretty soon, I was that guy. And that guy got a degree in political science, an MBA at Stanford, and an internship with a Senator who might be president one day.”

  “Wow! Good for you. And now you’re in politics?”

  “It’s where the power is, but enough about me. What have you been up to? What are you doing? I want to hear all your stories.”

  Mowing lawns. Pulling weeds. Living in my uncle’s pool house.

  “Shouldn’t you be going?” Luke asked. “You’ve got a county commissioner to schmooze.”

  “Come with me,” Bobby says. “You must have some crazy tales to tell.”

  Oh yeah, I can tune up a lawn mower in under 5 minutes, and I once got poison oak on my balls because I tripped after taking a piss on a bush.

  “I’m not dressed for it. We’ll catch up some other time”

  “Nonsense! I’ve got three spare suits in my office and we’ve got a shower right next to the gym. Come on! It will be fun.”

  “Yeah, okay. Thanks Bobby. I would like to see this through.”

  ***

  Deke Jenkins loads up three school busses with 240 of his true believers.

  He’s spent the last six months signing up righteous, God-fearing people who want to see a big hunk of the sin taken out of Sin City. A lot of them are old ladies grown weary of seeing the golden brown buttocks of strippers adorning every billboard and taxi cab in town. Some of them are bitter old men who have long believed titillation is bad and sex is dirty (unless between a man and his wife performing in the missionary position for the purpose of procreation and experiencing as little pleasure as possible).

  Deke spent the last five days making signs for them, his marchers for God, having the kids from the youth group paint slogans on poster board.

  The signs read things like:

  “Poles are for firemen, not dancing!”

  “Lap Dancing is a pair of pants away from prostitution.”

  “Breasts are for babies and husbands!”

  Personally, Deke has nothing against strip clubs. In fact, he is a frequent customer and has favorite dancers and preferences for champagne rooms (the more privacy the better, bouncers who kept to themselves after being tipped, charged per time instead of per song). But religion paid well, really well, and that’s why he is in the God business: to make money, not because of a ridiculous faith in an invisible man in the sky.

  When he started out, his plan was to build up a small church, get a radio show, build a following, get a local TV show and take in lots of donation money to finance his good works, and his stripper addiction.

  He was good on stage, great with a sermon, and fairly handsome, in a pretty kind of way (his plump lips and high cheekbones gave him the look of a mannish woman). He did okay financially, had a small group of poor people who came every Sunday for a show, some music, some words about God being on their side. But they were poor, dirt poor. The tithing plate came back to him with more coins than bills. Religion was a tough racket to break into.

  And then came David.

  “Do this for me, and I will give you $100,000 now, and $100,000 if you accomplish the goal,” David had told Zeke. “And when we open, we will see about you getting a large charitable donation to help you build a proper church. Do we have an agreement?”

  “Yes we do,” Zeke said, without having to think about it for more than a microsecond.

  “God bless you,” David said and walked out of the church.

  Finally, after months of phone calls, meetings and rallies, the Army of Purity is ready. They sit on the busses and chat pleasantly, their walkers and canes tucked away in the storage spaces above their heads, their oxygen bottles stowed in the seats in the back.

  “Let’s head out!” Zeke tells the bus driver of Bus 1.

  A weak cheer goes up from the gray-headed passengers who seem pleased to be heading out for a little hell raising and a free lunch.

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  Leanne has watched Joe for almost 20 minutes now. He has asked a few questions, but mostly he has been staring at his laptop ever since she gave him the thumb drive.

  As he reads, he alternately looks surprised, then confused, then thoughtful, then surprised again.

  On occasion, he utters phrases like…

  “Oh my god.”

  “Holy fuck.”

  “Jesus Christ.”

  “Motherfucker.”

  Leanne begins to share the reporter’s excitement. This is a big deal. Once this information goes public, the world will change, the trajectory of many people’s lives will be altered, some will be destroyed. A billion dollar business could disappear. Her own business, her brothel, her whorehouse, will be saved. She might have done it. She might have saved herself and her employees and friends.

  “You know the deal I have with Willard, right?” Joe asks. “This is my story, my exclusive, you don’t talk to any reporter but me after it breaks.”

  “That’s the deal.”

  “And there are no copies of this data stick anywhere else. I have the only one.”

  “It all yours. We are relying on you to tell the story.

  “I’m going to have to confirm all this. It’s going to take time.”

  “We don’t have time. The vote is in an hour. 10 a.m.”

  “We have time. Your man Biggs is there in her office. When he calls, I’ll tell him the story is a go and the vote will never happen. Can I ask you a few questions?”

  “Like what?”

  “What’s your relationship to David?”

  “What does that have to do with anything?”

  “You just gave me a billion dollars’ worth of evidence against him. I’d like to know why.”

  “You have what you need. You don’t need to know about me.”

  “I do. This story is going to be big. It could make my career, or get me fired. I need to know why my one source wants this so much.”

  Leanne sits down, looks at the greasy haired little man. He has his big story. Now he wants more. Fine. Whatever it takes. She will tell him the story.

  “Off the record?”

  “Sure. If I need to use any of it, I’ll clear it with you first.”

  “David used to be a kind of father to me. I worked for him as an escort a long time ago, in DC.”

  “A prostitute.”

  “An escort.”

  “What’s the difference?”

  “About $10,000 a week. But it doesn’t matter. Here is what matters; David betrayed me, betrayed his friends, and oh yeah, killed a lot of people so he could get rich.”

  Joe’s eyes grow wide with surprise. The story just got juicier and now he is practically salivating.

  “What was that? He killed people? Tell me.”

  “This is off the record. Understand? Way off the don’t-fucking-print-this-or-I-will-kill-you record.”

  “Off the record. I mean it when I say it. I will go to jail before revealing a source. Ask Willard.”

  Willard told me not to trust you, but I don’t care. You want to print this? Then print it, just don’t quote me, or seriously, I will kill you.

  “When we came to Nevada, he made me the manager of a legal brothel out in Pahrump. He knew I’d be a good madam, and I was. With all the money I was making him, he invested in strip bars in Vegas and Reno. Sometimes he had trouble buying into a place. Right around then, from 1992 to 1999, club owners started finding ways to get dead. They started having heart attacks, getting into car accidents, one guy committed suicide by jumping off the Stratosphere Tower.”

  “They were murdered. Are you sure? Do you have proof?”

  “I didn’t realize what David was doing until it was too late. I don’t have evidence that he murdered all those guys,
but I think it’s kind of obvious. David gets what he wants.”

  “Go on.”

  “The guys he killed, his business partners, his friends, they were all part of The Organization. They all lived by The Code. They made money, got along, lived well. They were not angels, but they respected each other. No mobster had been killed in Vegas since the 80s when the gangster wars were winding down and corporations started taking over the town.”

  “He was rich. Life should have been good. So what happened?”

  “He wasn’t rich enough. He saw the corporations build huge resorts. Billions of dollars flowed into The Strip and Downtown. He saw stock prices rise. He saw guys like Steve Wynn become billionaires from doing what the mob had been doing for decades. ‘Running card and craps games,’ is what he called it.”

  “He wanted a piece of the action.”

  “He wanted more than a piece. He wanted the entire thing. He took his idea for a super-brothel-mega-casino to The Organization. He told them about corporations and how much money they could make by going public. It was a grand vision. He had me convinced.”

  “He told you about it?”

  “He practiced and practiced his speech, learned how to make a PowerPoint presentation. ‘Just like those MBA fucks,’ he used to tell me.”

  “What happened?”

  “He gave his presentation, and they all laughed at him.”

  “Hurt his feelings?”

  “Then they started shooting at him.”

  “What?”

  “All that killing he had done, some of those guys had friends pretty high up in The Organization. Someone had figured out that David had been behind it all. They were going to kill him that day, after laughing in his face.”

  “How did he escape?”

  “I don’t know. He’s a tough guy to kill. He took a bullet through his right lung, one through his stomach and one in the chest that nicked his heart. They shot his dick. I have no idea what he has down there, but I was told there isn’t much. They left him in a pool of his own blood, barely breathing.”

  “They didn’t finish him off?”

  “They wanted him to suffer. This was in a foreclosed house out in the middle of the desert. They set it on fire, wanting to roast him alive.”

  “How did he get out of there?”

  “I don’t know. Once the shooting started, I didn’t know what to do. I froze. When the guys walked out the front door, smiling, laughing, I thought David was dead. The house went up in flames and they watched, laughing it up. I drove off. I think David thinks I betrayed him.”

  “And now he is about to take over Las Vegas, and put you and your father and your friends out of business.”

  “All I want is my business left alone and my friends left alone. After he was gone, everything got good again. Legal brothels in Pahrump, strip clubs in Vegas, lots of money from horny guys, everyone was happy. Then David shows up out of nowhere a few years ago with an army of lawyers and suitcases full of money. He thinks he’s taking over. Fuck him. He murdered his friends. He stole their businesses, and now he wants to steal mine. Fuck him with an ice pick.”

  “All right then. Let’s see if we can make that happen.”

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  It is 9:15 a.m. The vote is set to happen at 10. Luke and Bobby sit in the reception area outside of the office of the honorable Exa Porter.

  Vases of silk pink roses stand in each corner. The wallpaper is flowered, the carpet a dusty rose. Polished bronze gas lamps rest on polished wood end tables. The chair he sits in has a rose pattern that matches the wall paper. The coffee table in front of him offers the latest issues of Cosmopolitan, Redbook and Vogue.

  The receptionist, a pretty girl in a tight black pencil skirt and red satin blouse, sits behind a big desk typing in the contents of a notepad. The girl is lost in her work. She is a fast typist, even with her long pink nails. Luke wonders what those nails would feel like gently scratching his…

  “This is good,” Bobby says. “Not being kicked out is good. We are going to get a chance to see her.”

  “So what is the game plan?” Luke asks Bobby, keeping his voice low, not wanting the receptionist to hear. “How are you going to get her to vote your way?”

  “I’m going to present evidence that a vote for this bill is a vote against jobs, against mothers being able to feed their children, against the best interests of the people she represents.”

  “Will that work?”

  “It will after a reporter from The Las Vegas Times asks her about the evidence he just acquired, evidence that show multiple felonies have been committed in an effort to get The Dark Star open.”

  “That should do the trick.”

  “Also, The Speech Freedom PAC, otherwise known as the strip club owners who hired us, they just made a sizeable donation to her reelection fund.”

  “So you’re bribing her?”

  “Me? No. I’m just talking to her. I have nothing to do with donations, favors, free dinners at Las Vegas’ finest restaurants, nor tickets to the best shows in town. I just talk. Someone else handles the rest of it. We wouldn’t want people to get the wrong idea.”

  “And just like that, you get her vote?”

  “It’s not so easy. Who knows what the other side is giving her? If we get outbid, then boom, we lose.”

  “It’s a bribery contest.”

  “Oh no. Bribery is illegal.”

  “Why, hello Bobby,” says a smoky feminine voice. She sounds like she just finished two post-sex cigarettes. “So nice to see you!”

  Bobby rises to his feet and gives a polite hug and peck to the cheek of a handsome woman in her mid-50s. She is older than anyone Luke has ever bedded, but she is sexy as hell.

  Luke gets to his feet, feeling a little awkward, as the hug between Exa and Bobby goes on about three beats too long. Finally she notices him standing there.

  “Why Bobby, who is your friend?” she asks.

  Her eyes take in all of Luke, and he feels vaguely violated.

  “Exa, meet Luke,” Bobby says, sounding gracious. “Luke, this is the honorable Exa Porter.”

  “So nice to meet you,” Luke says and extends his hand.

  She slides hers into his, a firm, feminine grasp, confident, knowing, and skilled. Luke instantly knows what it would be like to make love to this woman, and it would be spectacular.

  “And quite nice to meet you,” Exa says. “But I suppose Bobby and I need to talk shop. Going to be a busy morning. Shall we go into my office?”

  “Absolutely,” Bobby says. “I know you’ve got a big vote this morning.”

  They enter her office. She winks at Luke just before she shuts the door.

  “She likes you,” the receptionist says without so much as looking up from her typing.

  “You think?”

  “She likes lots of men, sometimes several at the same time.”

  Interesting.

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  Joe sits in his car, the air conditioning on high, jets of cool air hitting his face. Despite the AC blasting, drops of sweat roll down his forehead and drip off the end of his nose. Vegas summers are brutal. Every indoor space is air conditioned to the point of refrigeration, but as soon as you go outside the blazing sun makes pit stains blossom and lips chap.

  He hates Las Vegas, especially its heat, but more so its soullessness. It sometimes pretends to be a city, but its lame museums, mediocre university and derivative music scene are just a façade hiding a place whose sole purpose is to take money away from stupid people.

  Joe drives for about ten minutes, to the place where his life will change.

  He writes the lead to the story in his head, the best story in his short journalism career…

  The Dark Star Resort and Casino rises from the desert, a sparkling black tower that cost a billion dollars to build.

  It is scheduled to open in just one month, but its doors might remain shut forever.

  Evidence gathered by The Las
Vegas Times shows that the resort was built on a foundation of bribes, corruption, media manipulation, and even murder.

  Yes, that would do the trick, Joe thinks. That could easily be the lead of a Pulitzer winning story. It could lead to national stories, and he would be on the nightly news, explaining how the whole plan was supposed to work.

  Joe pictures himself talking to the handsome Brian Williams (a longtime man-crush for Joe) during a prime time special on network TV…

  “Well, Brian, this was the plan,” Joe says. “Empire gaming knew they couldn’t monopolize casino gambling. The competition was too stiff. Battling huge corporations with unlimited war chests wasn’t a good bet. However, they decided there was a good bet to be made. They bet on sex…”

  Joe explains the plot, getting into the juicy details, making a few jokes, completely charming Brian, who is developing a bit of a man crush himself.

  “Wow,” Williams says. “The way you pieced this plot together is impressive. Tell me more.”

  “What The Dark Star would be is the largest, fanciest, most expensive brothel every built in the history of the world. It would literally be a sex palace, where high rollers could pay to sleep with super models for a million dollars or more, and the average construction worker could also be serviced for a few hundred dollars.”

  “So if that law had passed, Empire would have had a monopoly on sex,” Williams says. “Wow. You certainly deserver that Pulitzer you won.”

  “You are kind to say so,” says Joe. “It was a team effort. We…”

  Joe’s daydream fades away as he pulls into the empty parking garage of an abandoned condominium complex. It had never opened, a victim of the housing bust of 2008.

  He sees the black SUV, drives toward it, parks.

  “Goodbye, Brian,” he says. “It was great talking with you.”

  He gets out of his car, walks toward the SUV.

  David gets out of the driver’s side of the SUV. The huge man ambles toward Joe, a slight limp to his step. He looks grumpy.

  “You have it?” David asks.