“Well, high school, mostly,” Mary Ann said. “But I was next in line to become one of the Adorables at the Chez Paree, right before they closed the place.”
“An Adorable?”
“Yes, that’s what they called the chorus line dancers,” Mary Ann said. “They’re world famous.”
“So you’ve never stripped before?” the man said.
“Stripped? God, no!” Mary Ann said. “Is that—?”
“What kind of dancing did you think girls were doing in a place like this, sugar? The fox trot? The Charleston maybe? Look around, sugar—see those poles over there? That’s where the dancing goes on in here.”
“Oh,” Mary Ann said, realizing just how far away from the farm she really was. “I don’t suppose you’ve got any jobs that don’t involve dancing?”
“All the girls who work here dance, sugar,” the man said, walking over to Mary Ann. “And when they aren’t swinging naked from one of those poles, they’re out on the floor serving drinks and flirting for tips. That’s the way it works, no exceptions.”
“Sorry for the mistake,” Mary Ann said.
The man looked Mary Ann up and down. “You’d do good here, girl. Here, take this,” the man said, sliding from the stool and handing Mary Ann a business card.
“Rocky’s Pins & Poles Club for Men,” Mary Ann read aloud. “Rocky Dredge, proprietor.”
“Yeah, I’m Rocky. My number is on the card,” Rocky said. “You know, in case anything changes.”
“Thanks, but nothing’s going to change,” she said and turned to leave.
Rocky checked Mary Ann out from behind as she walked away. He had to admit, she was one fine-looking woman, the type he hated to see walk out of the place. “What about the bowling alley?” Rocky called out.
When Rocky Dredge bought the business from the previous owner, the place was a sixteen-lane bowling alley, with a small bar and lunch counter. Rocky was sure he could make a go of it, but it didn’t take long to understand why the previous owner was unloading the place.
No one was bowling anymore, at least not in that part of town. And no one brought the kids down to this part of town, not anymore. There were even rumors the Riverview Amusement Park might close because the neighborhood around West Belmont had gone downhill.
Rocky Dredge was losing money faster than you could say seven-ten split. But, two weeks before Rocky was going to close the place down for good, one of the few regulars offhandedly remarked, “Probably a good decision to shut her down, Rocky. Only thing that could save this place would be naked girls.”
A week later, Rocky Dredge took out four of the sixteen lanes and put in a stage with two poles. As the crowds grew, he turned the lunch counter into a bar, removed four more lanes to accommodate additional tables and chairs, and renamed the place Rocky’s Pin & Poles Club.
Pins & Poles was down to just four lanes now, which were seldom rented. Rocky wondered if he shouldn’t just scrap the bowling lanes all together.
“The bowling alley?” Mary Ann asked.
“Yeah, how about running the bowling alley?”
“How much does it pay?” Mary Ann asked.
Rocky Dredge smiled. It was just a matter of time and he’d have her on the pole, he was sure of it.
Chapter Twenty
Orlando, Florida
July 30, 2010
“See, I told you this would help you relax,” Mika said from her position on top of Koda in his giant bed. “I’m always right, aren’t I? Doesn’t Mika always know best?”
Koda did not answer.
Koda’s thoughts were miles away, thinking of a hundred different things, none of them being Mika’s desire to achieve an orgasm. He wasn’t even sure why he and Mika were together, other than the fact that Mika kept showing up at his door—and for some inexplicable reason, he kept letting her in.
Koda’s therapist insisted many of his poor choices were due to being abandoned by his mother when he was six, coupled with his fear of being alone in a quiet room only to discover he didn’t like the company. Which is why he left the TV on in every room of his penthouse apartment twenty-four hours a day.
Looking up at Mika, Koda’s mind suddenly focused on the sound of the TV in the background.
“Our next guests are considered to be two of the preeminent experts on the paranormal, which is interesting since one of the two does not believe in ghosts! Their show, Believer And Not! airs on A&E Thursday nights at 9:00 p.m. Eastern. Please help me welcome, true believer Nathaniel Cryer and supernatural skeptic Olympia Fudge.”
“Mika, turn that up,” Koda said.
“Faster?” Mika said. “Okay.”
“No, not you,” Koda said. “Where’s the remote?”
“Oh, God, you’re watching television?” Mika said, her grinding coming to a sudden halt. “You’re kidding, right?”
“No,” Koda said. “I want to hear this.”
Mika pushed herself off Koda and slid off the bed. “You want the remote? Here,” she said, grabbing the device off the bureau and tossing it on the bed. “It’s a hell of a lot longer and harder than you are.”
Koda did not acknowledge the insult, having already tuned Mika out and Jay Leno in.
“First, let’s start by talking about the most interesting thing about either of you—Olympia’s hair,” Leno said as Koda turned the volume up. “I mean, that is one big mop you’ve got up there. Can I touch it?”
“Sure, Jay, as long as I can touch your chin,” Olympia said.
Leno reached over and ran his fingers through the black woman’s giant afro. “Wow, it’s kind of like chocolate cotton candy.” Then Leno leaned forward and let Olympia rub his chin.
Koda could see that Nathaniel Cryer was clearly annoyed with all the attention Leno was paying to his female sidekick.
“Now, let me get this straight,” Leno said. “Nathaniel, you believe in ghosts, and Olympia, you do not. So how does that work?”
“Like all good entertainment, there needs to be some kind of conflict,” Nathaniel said. “Otherwise, it gets very boring for the audience.”
“Nathaniel’s right, Jay,” Olympia said. “And let me tell you, there’s plenty of tension between us all the time.”
“You mean like catfights?” Leno asked.
“We came to talk about our upcoming show, not personal issues,” Nathaniel said.
“Wrarrrr!” Leno said, scratching the air with his hand as if it were a claw.
“No, I was only kidding, Jay,” Olympia said. “Nathaniel and I get along great, like peanut butter and jelly—and, no, I’m not going to tell you which one of us is which.”
“Okay, so tell us about this big, live broadcast you’re planning to air next Thursday,” Leno said, setting up Nathaniel to finally plug their show.
“Well, it’s very exciting,” Nathaniel said. “Believer And Not! has been granted overnight access by the state of Missouri to spend the night in one of the most haunted buildings in America, the Our Lady of the Open Arms Orphanage.”
“Shit,” Koda said aloud, putting on his shorts and taking a seat at the edge of the bed.
“And you say the place is haunted?” Leno repeated.
“Not just haunted, Jay,” Olympia said, rolling her eyes. “Very haunted.”
“Joke if you want, Olympia,” Nathaniel said. “But during its years of operation, children in this orphanage were known to have suffered terrible beatings at the hands of Catholic nuns, as well as other documented forms of physical, mental, and even sexual abuse.”
“But, as the legend goes,” Olympia said—exactly the way she and Nathaniel had choreographed it earlier that afternoon—“the children fought back and started a campaign against their captors.”
“What, they shot spit balls at the nuns and the priests?” Leno quipped.
“No, Jay,” Nathaniel said in a serious tone. “They started killing them off.”
“No kidding?” Leno said.
“The place is set to be
demolished in three weeks,” Olympia said. “So, Nathaniel and I will be the last people to ever spend a night in the place, and—as usual—nothing will happen.”
“Well, that doesn’t make for very good TV, does it?” Leno said. “Reminds me of your last live broadcast from Savannah, wasn’t it? The ghost piano that didn’t play?”
“One of the more interesting stories related to the Open Arms Orphanage happened in 1938,” Nathaniel said, ignoring Leno’s comment. “Two boys and a priest went missing on a day trip to St. Louis for the premiere of the movie Boys Town. One week later, a nun went missing as well.”
“To make the story even creepier, Jay,” Olympia said, picking up the story per their script, “the priest who went missing—Father Colin Fanning—had been accused of repeated instances of sexual molestation.”
“What priest hasn’t?” Leno quipped to the delight of the Tonight Show audience.
“But here’s where even I have to admit the story gets interesting,” Olympia said. “The boys who went missing? You’ll never guess what we found.”
“A skeleton?” Leno asked.
“We were able to obtain documents that identify who the two boys were who went missing. Take a look at this, Jay,” Nathaniel said.
“Let’s put this up on the screen,” Leno said.
An old police report appeared on the screen.
“What does that say, Jay?” Nathaniel asked.
“It says the missing boys were identified as Thomas Bilazzo and Declan Mulvaney.”
Oh, no, Koda thought.
“Declan Mulvaney, the billionaire?” Leno asked.
“One and the same,” Nathaniel said. “The same Declan Mulvaney who recently purchased the Open Arm Orphanage with plans to have the place torn down.”
“Which does make even a skeptic like me ask, what secrets are buried at the Open Arms?” Olympia said. “What is Declan Mulvaney trying to hide?”
As much as Koda wanted to discount what he’d just heard as a desperate attempt for ratings, the chances that a priest and two boys would go missing on the same day were quite slim.
This is a story his grandfather had never mentioned, at least not to him. Did his father know about this? Koda feared that when his grandfather found out, he was going to go berserk.
Meanwhile, Mika stood in the bedroom doorway, totally naked, smoking a cigarette, and watching Koda sit there with his face glued to the television.
God, I must be losing my touch. Is this how women feel when they get old and their husbands start having affairs with their secretaries and strange women in coffee shops?
Something had to be done.
Butt cheek implants?
No, something bigger.
A boob job? No, she’d already done that.
No, this time it needed to be something drastic.
Chapter Twenty-One
Crimson Cove, Oregon
Christmas Night, 1937
Claudia arrived at the edge of the clearing and hid among the spruce trees across from the lighthouse, unsure what to do now that she was there. She couldn’t just go knock on the door. Or could she? According to Ulrich, Onyx was bedridden.
Just then the door to the caretaker’s house opened and a woman stepped outside. Claudia couldn’t believe her eyes—it was Onyx! My God, Claudia thought, Onyx is up and moving around. Ulrich had obviously lied to her.
Where was he? Claudia wondered.
And what was Onyx doing?
Claudia watched as Onyx walked back and forth, carrying what appeared to be paintings from the caretaker’s house to the lighthouse.
Finally, Onyx exited the caretaker’s house with a large brass can. Claudia watched as Onyx placed the can beneath the spout of what looked to be an oil tank and filled the can.
Onyx started toward the caretaker’s house, the heavy brass can in her hand by her side. Claudia could tell it was full by the way Onyx struggled to carry it.
Then Onyx disappeared inside again. What was the bitch up to? Claudia wondered.
Claudia wouldn’t have very long to wait to find out.
With her paintings having been moved to the safety of the lighthouse, Onyx went to the spare bathroom down the hall from where Ulrich lay dead. She turned on the water.
As the tub filled with water, Onyx picked up the brass can and brought it into the bedroom where Ulrich lay dead.
Onyx was surprised at the amount of energy she had, the can feeling remarkably light in her hand. While she didn’t understand why or how, there was no denying it—whenever she immersed herself in her dancing, singing or painting, she felt renewed, reenergized... reborn.
Doing what she loved not only made Onyx feel alive—it had kept her alive—even with Ulrich poisoning her.
The irony was that, even as he was trying to poison her, Ulrich had unwittingly brought her the antidote in the form of paint and brushes and canvasses.
Once Onyx had started painting and getting some strength back, she decided to play along with Ulrich’s game. When he slept, she found all the poisons. What a fool she had been for so long.
Katherine Keane had warned Onyx when she’d been at the Open Arms Orphanage, but she’d refused to listen. Sara Winchester had warned her as well. She’d had enough of being a victim. Her life was finally turning around, having found the home of her dreams at the lighthouse, and Ulrich would not steal it from her.
What Onyx needed to do now was cover her tracks, and the best way was to set fire to the cottage. After all, Ulrich was known to have one last cigarette in bed before turning in for the night. Then, once she’d set the fire, Onyx reasoned she could race down the hall and quickly rinse herself in the bath, removing any possible traces of oil from her body before the fire had a chance to engulf the entire building.
Onyx approached the bed and lifted the heavy can, then tipped it over and poured a liberal amount of the thick black liquid directly onto Ulrich. Then, for good measure, she poured the balance of the kerosene on the wooden floor around the bed.
Onyx placed the oil can next to the door, and then grabbed Ulrich’s cigarettes and a box of matches from the nightstand.
Onyx removed a single cigarette from the pack, put it in her mouth, and lit it.
She inhaled, watching the tip of the cigarette glow red, and blew a long blue stream of smoke in the air. Then she tossed the cigarette on the bed, which burst into flames.
Then, to Onyx’s shock and horror, Ulrich’s eyes snapped open and he sat upright.
Dear God, Ulrich wasn’t dead.
Engulfed in flames, Ulrich rose from the bed and stumbled across the room, collapsing in Onyx’s arms.
Onyx felt searing heat on the right side of her face and down her right arm and pushed Ulrich away. Ulrich released an ear-piercing scream and stumbled toward the door and collapsed again.
Onyx slapped at the flames on her arm and face, but only made it worse. She needed to get to the tub. But she couldn’t get out of the room—Ulrich had collapsed at the base of the door, blocking her only means of escape. Was this the place she would die? Had Ulrich succeeded in killing her after all?
Then Onyx heard a woman’s voice just outside the door.
“Ulrich!” Claudia screamed, slamming her body against the door. “Ulrich!”
On the other side of the door—inside the bedroom so thick with smoke now that she could barely see—Onyx grabbed the knob and pulled with all her might. Finally, with Onyx pulling and Claudia pushing from the other side, the door cracked open enough for Onyx to slide through.
Onyx pushed past the woman, down the hallway—her face and right arm still covered in flames—and threw herself into the tub of cool water with a crackling sizzle.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chicago, Illinois
March 2, 1964
Sal Tombo was sitting in his regular spot in the rear booth at The Purple Pig, eating a big bowl of fettuccine with shrimp, yellow squash, and artichokes. Because of his extreme hypertension, the doctor ha
d him on a special low-fat, low-salt diet. The food tasted bland without the salt, but it was better than being six-feet under.
Chuckie Bags was standing in his usual spot, against the wall where he could keep his eye on the door. Phil Spilatro sat in the booth next to Fat Sal, reading the newspaper.
“Anybody seen Tommy?” Fat Sal asked.
“He ain’t feelin’ good, got the flu or something,” Phil said as the front door to The Purple Pig swung open and light poured into the room.
“Look, if it isn’t the black James Bond,” Chuckie Bags said. “You better have Sal’s money.”
Rocky Dredge slid into the booth next to Sal Tombo and eyed the food on Fat Sal’s plate. “That looks good.”
“It’s low fat and low salt,” Fat Sal said. “You want I can get the kitchen to make you a plate.”
“Nah,” Rocky said. “I just had a McDonald’s burger.”
Fat Sal looked up and said, “Should have gotten a franchise when I had the chance. They got like five hundred locations. Too late now.”
“Speaking of money,” Phil Spilatro said.
Rocky Dredge nodded and pulled an envelope from the pocket of his tuxedo jacket. He slid it across the table toward Fat Sal, but Phil reached over and intercepted it, opened the envelope and started counting the bills.
“Still don’t trust me?” Rocky said. “After all these years?”
“It’s all there,” Phil said.
“Did I ever tell you ‘bout the time I ran into Sean Connery?” Fat Sal said.
“Really?” Rocky said. “Where was this?”
“Lobby of the Fontainebleau Hotel in Miami Beach,” Fat Sal said. “Got to shake his hand, and you know what? He’s bald.”
“Bullshit,” Rocky said. “Double oh seven ain’t bald.”
“I shit you not,” Fat Sal said.
Rocky shook his head. “Thinning, maybe…”
“Nope, the man’s bald,” Fat Sal said. “In the movies, they got him wearing a rug so you don’t know, but you get up close like I did and you can tell the man’s as bald as a cue ball.”
Onyx Webb: Book Three Page 9