Next was the tanga. She bent away from him as she slowly eased it down, then swivelled around and perched herself back on the stool opposite. Leaning back, she scissored her legs high and wide apart and slowly traced her hands from her ankles down. She paused as her hands came within an inch of meeting, as if to make sure Roman’s attention was fully on what her hands were framing, before slowly pulling her lips apart to give Roman a glimpse of her pink moistness. Tantalisingly, she slid a single finger inside.
Roman shuddered and closed his eyes. A natural.
But as he opened them again, he noticed Viana’s previous customer looking over from the bar, his steel-rimmed glasses glinting with the mirrored lights; he seemed vaguely perturbed that Viana was giving someone else such a good show, as if her nine dances with him somehow gave him proprietary rights. He looked like a yuppie banker or accountant, and suddenly Roman was reminded of Donatiens: of how he’d gained strong favour with Jean-Paul so quickly, leaving him on the sidelines of the main thrust and flow of business. Practically out in the cold. He glared back at steel-rimmed: I’ll show you who is in control.
The track changed to ‘I’m Every Woman’, and Viana turned and leant away from him, bending almost double and reaching back to spread her butt cheeks as she wriggled at him.
‘Yeah, that’s it, doll… spread that smile for me.’ But Roman was smiling challengingly towards steel-rimmed as he reached out and started stroking Viana’s thighs.
She didn’t protest at first — the club rule was no touching — only a slight frown crossed her face. But as Roman’s stroking became more insistent, with one hand raising to lazily trace a finger up the cleft of her butt, she flinched and pulled away.
‘Not here, Romy… not here.’
‘You got that right. At my place you ride my dick like it was going out of style.’ Roman said it loud enough to be heard at the bar. Steel-rimmed looked away uncomfortably towards the bottles ahead. Azy too looked perturbed; he’d long suspected they had something going on, but Viana looked distraught at it being broadcast so openly and gauchely. Though Azy knew better than to intervene. He kept his head down, studiously cleaning and stacking glasses.
Roman reached out and brusquely grabbed her thigh, pulling her close. ‘Come on, stop being so prissy.’
She wriggled and tried to break free. ‘No, Roman, no… not here.’ This time her tone was firmer.
Roman clutched tighter with both hands, keeping his grip. He shook her hard. ‘Look. I own this fucking club, and I own you. Now just be a good girl and do what you’re told… bend for me like you did before.’ Roman glared icily at her, a smile slowly easing as she hesitatingly complied. He could feel her shaking in his grip, which only added to his excitement. The feeling of control.
Viana’s writhing was now more stilted, staccato, as the first clouds of worry crossed her face. This was a different Roman: a fiery, dangerously bubbling mood she’d seen a couple of times before, but never directed at her.
Roman smiled contemptuously at steel-rimmed, who was looking over again. See. I’ll show you who is in control. Who’s boss. You, Donatiens… the lot of you. I’ll get back what’s rightfully mine. He felt the effects of the brandy washing through, making his senses float pleasantly. ‘Come on, babe. Spread again,’ he murmured dreamily. ‘… Wide.’
Viana slowly, reluctantly moved her legs further apart, and he ran one finger lazily along her cleft, feeling the warmth and moistness there. Yeah. He’d be back where he should be soon… with everything at his fingertips. The sudden sensation that everything around moved in time to his touch: Viana’s swaying body, the room and lights around swirling gently, the music pumping almost in rhythm with his own quickening pulse and Viana’s trembling. He slipped one finger slowly inside, her heat so feverish it almost burnt.
‘Please, Romy… please!’ Her eyes welled with tears of fear and humiliation.
But her tensing against his finger, increasing the constriction, only heightened his excitement. He pushed more forcefully, working the finger around. Roman glanced over at his audience: Steel-rimmed had already looked away in disgust, but Azy was looking over more keenly and agitatedly, though quickly averted his gaze.
‘Come on, doll, you know you like it, you…’ The thought hit him suddenly, caught him mid-breath: Donatiens being taken into custody could be just what he was looking for to break golden boy’s favour with Jean-Paul! Particularly if Donatiens chose not to tell Jean-Paul. All trust would immediately go to the wind. Roman continued working the finger distractedly as his thoughts gelled.
‘Please, Romy! …’ Viana’s body shuddered and quaked as her tears flowed freely.
Azy threw down his bar towel and came over. He shrugged and proffered one palm out towards Viana: a plea for reason. ‘Come on, Bossman — not like this. The lady’s getting upset.’
‘What?’ Roman tried to rip his thoughts back. If Donatiens intended to tell Jean-Paul, the first sign would be with Simone. If he told her, he’d likely tell Jean-Paul. If not…
‘In private, it’s okay.’ Azy held both hands out. ‘But if you do it here, then the customers start to get ideas. They think they can get away with that sort o’ thing with all the girls.’ Azy injected heavy reason into his voice, but nerves and tension sweated from every pore, his jaw jutting tight as he waited for Roman’s fireball temper to spit back at him.
Roman’s eyes jumped agitatedly between Azy, Viana and the club around — but then he merely nodded and pulled his hands away, raising them in apology. ‘You’re right… you’re absolutely right. Sorry.’ He glanced hastily at his watch: 10.14 pm. Funicelli would have had the tape running for over two hours now. There could be something on it already. Perhaps even some indication of what Donatiens had spilled to Chenouda. ‘Gotta go now. See a friend.’ He stood up and slapped a fifty dollar note on the table for Viana. ‘Keep that pussy warm for me, babe. I’ll catch you later.’ And left a bemused Azy and Viana staring at his back as he scurried out of the club.
Viana dabbed at her tear-stained make-up and thanked Azy for stepping in. And while she sat out the next few songs at the bar, Azy seized the opportunity, with a double-shot of vodka put in her coke to soothe her nerves and ease her tongue, of finding out more about her relationship with Roman.
Azy couldn’t make the call until he left the club at almost 2.30 am, from a phone booth halfway home.
‘I’m sorry to call so late — but you said you wanted to know if I saw Roman.’
‘Yeah… sure.’ Quick throat clearing from the other end as Michel Chenouda sat up in bed, suddenly more alert. ‘Go ahead.’
‘Well, he came by the club first of all just past nine-thirty…’ Azy related Roman’s disturbed mood: the heavy drinking, his rough-handling one of the girls. ‘In the end I had to intervene. With the mood he was in, I was expecting trouble, I can tell you. But then he suddenly does a turn-turtle and rushes off, saying he had to see a friend and would be back later.’
A part of Michel relaxed: if Roman was edgy and troubled when he walked in the club, then very likely Venegas still presented a problem. If he’d hid Venegas away somewhere, he wouldn’t have been so troubled. ‘We know Roman showed later, because that’s the one and only sighting we got of him.’
‘That’s right. About an hour and a half ago.’
‘And what was he like then?’
‘All smiles, relaxed, happy — completely different mood. And drinking moderately this time. He made up with the girl he gave a hard time to earlier, and stayed on to do the take.’
Michel amended his thoughts: perhaps Roman’s earlier edginess was because he was waiting on news on Venegas, which only came in later into the night. But it was all purely supposition: the first sighting of Roman had been just after twelve-thirty when he arrived by cab to collect his car from Frank Massenat’s, who had picked it up earlier from the garage. Then he’d headed back to the club. But for the rest of the day, except for Azy seeing him at the club, he’d been invisible — which was obviously what he had intended. He could have had Venegas holed away practically anywhere by now. They’d had a car constantly parked down the road from Venegas’s apartment building, but nothing. All they could do was watch Roman closely the next few days and keep an all-points alert out for Venegas, and hope something broke.