Annika swallowed, then bent forward and did up the ridiculously high stilettos. “What kinds of men come here?”
Patricia brushed her eyelashes upward. “All kinds. But they all have money. I check out the credit cards, for fun mostly. They’re lawyers, car dealers, company directors, politicians, police officers, guys that work in the laundry business, real estate, advertising, the media…”
Annika stiffened. Jesus, what if someone she knew turned up? She licked her lips. “A lot of celebrities?”
Patricia handed her the bag with makeup. “Here. Put lots on. Yes, some celebrities. We’ve got one TV guy who’s a regular. He’s always dressed in women’s clothes and pays for two girls to come into a private room. Joachim checked last week— so far the guy had spent two hundred sixty thousand kronor over twenty or so visits this year.”
Annika raised her eyebrows, recalling Creepy Calls. “How can he afford it?”
“Do you think he’s paying for it himself?”
Patricia picked up a bunch of keys from the vanity table. “Joachim will come in later. Hurry up and I’ll show you around and explain the prices before the other girls arrive. You’ll have to talk to Joachim about the roulette.”
Patricia waited for Annika in the doorway, a commanding air about her. Annika quickly put on a thick layer of dark green eye shadow, blush, and eyeliner. On her way out of the locker room, she caught sight of herself in a full-length mirror. She looked like a Las Vegas hooker.
“Admission is six hundred kronor.” Patricia patted the reception desk. “The customer can pay for a private room straightaway; that costs twelve thousand kronor and then we waive the admission. He can choose any girl he wants in the bar.”
“Do you mean this is a brothel?”
Patricia gave a laugh. “Course not! The girls can touch the customer, massage him and stuff, but they must never touch his dick. The guys can satisfy themselves while the girl has to stay at least six feet away.”
“Why the hell would somebody shell out twelve thousand to jerk off?” Annika said in disbelief.
Patricia shrugged. “Don’t ask me. I don’t care. I’ve got my hands full at the bar. Here’s the office.”
Patricia unlocked the door with one of the keys on the bunch. The room was the same size as the locker room, furnished with plain office furniture, a photocopier, and a safe.
“I’ll leave the door unlocked,” Patricia said. “I’ve got to enter the bar takings for August. Joachim will only keep the books here until Saturday.”
They came into the main room, and in spite of herself Annika held her breath. The walls and the ceiling were black, and the floor had dark red, wall-to-wall carpeting. The furniture was black and chrome and smacked of cheap eighties styling. All along the left wall was a long bar; on the right were black-painted doors leading to the private rooms. Straight ahead was a small stage with a chrome pole from floor to ceiling. The room had no windows, and the low ceiling was supported by black concrete pillars, which intensified the sensation that you were in a bunker.
“What was this place originally? A parking garage?”
“I think so.” Patricia walked behind the bar. “Plus a car wash and repair shop. Joachim put a Jacuzzi in the inspection pit.” She put some bottles on the bar. “Check this out. Nonalcoholic champagne at sixteen hundred a bottle. The girls get to keep twenty-five percent on the first two bottles they sell; the third one they get fifty.”
Annika blinked with her stiff eyelashes. “Unbelievable.”
Patricia looked at the stage. “Jossie was great at selling. She was the most beautiful of all the girls. She would drink with the johns all night but she never went into a private room. The guys would keep paying, she was so pretty.” Patricia’s eyes were moist with emotion. She quickly removed the bottles.
“Josefin must have made a lot of money.”
“Not really. Joachim took her money to pay for the breast job. That’s why she worked here. And she was only here on the weekends, she did her schoolwork during the week.”
“Does Joachim take the other girls’ money as well?”
“No. Everyone’s here for the money. They make a packet, around ten thousand a night, tax free.”
Annika’s eyes narrowed. “What do the authorities think of that?”
Patricia let out a sigh. “No idea. Joachim and Sanna handle the accounts.”
“But if you’re entering the bar takings in the accounts, you’ll have to pay tax on it.”
Patricia got annoyed. “They keep two sets of books. Come on, let’s go out to the roulette table.”
Annika hesitated. “What about me? How much will I get?”
Patricia frowned and walked off into the foyer. “I don’t know what Joachim has in mind.”
Annika turned her back on the horrible, dark room. She wobbled on her high heels, which sank dangerously into the carpet.
The roulette table was worn, and the green baize was marked with cigarette burns and covered in ash. The table layout with its familiar figures and squares dispelled slightly her feelings of insecurity.
“It needs a good brush,” Annika said.
While Patricia was finding the equipment, Annika let her hand slide along the edge of the table. She’d be all right, it wasn’t so bad. She wouldn’t be in a booth, and this foyer wasn’t so different from the hotel lobby in Katrineholm.
Patricia showed Annika where the equipment was kept. Then Annika brushed the table and took out the chips.
“Why are there different colors?” Patricia asked.
“To separate the players.” Annika put the chips in stacks around the wheel, twenty in each pile. “Where’s the ball?”
“There are two, a small one and a big one.” Patricia took out a box. “I don’t know which one’s the right one.”
Annika smiled and weighed the balls in her hand. It was a familiar feeling as well. “They have different spinning times. I prefer the big ones.”
She started the wheel spinning counterclockwise, took the big ball between her middle finger and thumb, held it against the inside rim of the wheel, and shot it off clockwise.
Patricia was impressed. “How did you do that?”
“It’s in the wrist. The ball has to do at least seven turns around the wheel or the spin is invalid. I used to average eleven.”
The ball slowed down and fell into number 19. Annika leaned over the wheel. “Next time I spin the ball, I have to start on the number I last picked it up from.”
“Why?”
“So you can’t cheat.”
“How do you calculate the winnings?”
Annika gave a brief account of what en plein, à cheval, transversale pleine, sixain, en carré, simple, and all the other bets stood for. All the different bets gave different payoffs.
Patricia shook her head despairingly. “How on earth can you calculate all that?”
“It’s quite simple once you’ve figured it out. It helps at first if you’re good at mental arithmetic, but you soon learn the different combinations.”
Annika demonstrated how she calculated the winnings— twenty chips in each stack, halve them and let your fingers slide along the edge so the rest of the chips followed.
Patricia watched Annika’s nimble movements with fascination. “That’s so neat. Maybe roulette is for me after all.”
Annika laughed and spun the ball.
At that moment the other girls turned up.
*
Sanna, the hostess, was standing stark naked next to the reception desk when the men started arriving. She smiled and teased, flirted and coaxed, telling the guys what a good time they were going to have. Annika recognized Sanna’s voice from the answering machine. When Sanna had got the men to part with their money, they would turn their gazes toward Annika. Their stares bore into her like steel arrows, making her feel as if the bra were shrinking, baring more of each of her breasts. She averted her eyes and stared at the burns on the table. She had to force herself not to co
ver herself with her hands. Nobody was interested in the roulette.
“You’ve got to flirt with them,” Sanna said coldly when a group of Italian businessmen had disappeared inside the strip bar. “Be sexy, girl.”
Annika swallowed self-consciously. “I’m not very good at it,” she said in a far too high-pitched voice.
“You’ve got to learn. There’s no point in your being there if you don’t bring in any money.”
Annika’s eyes flashed. “The table’s here,” she said, raising her voice. “Does it hurt you if I’m standing here? Or do you want me to pay you for the air that I’m using?”
A man’s big burst of laughter emanating from the spiral staircase shut them up. “Sounds like we’ve got two wildcats in a cage down here.”
Annika knew immediately that this was the famous Joachim. He had long blond hair and expensive, fashionable clothes. A thick gold chain dangled on his chest. This was the guy Josefin had had her breasts done for.
She walked up to him and introduced herself. “I’m Annika. It’s nice to be here.”
Sanna pursed her lips.
Joachim looked Annika up and down, giving an approving nod when he reached her chest. “You’d look good onstage. If you want, you can go on tonight.”
No one has asked for my surname, Annika thought, and tried hard to give him a natural smile. “Thanks, but I think I’ll try the roulette first.”
“You know, Sanna is right. You have to bring in your share of dough, or you’re gone.”
Annika’s smile died. “I’ll try.” She looked down.
“Maybe you should start in the bar with the other girls for a few nights, have them show you the ropes.”
The man stood a bit too close for comfort; Annika could feel his electricity. He was a looker, she had to admit that.
She closed her eyes for a moment before looking up and meeting his gaze. “Yeah, that’s a good idea. But I’d like to try and see if I can make some of the customers stay here on their way out.”
At that very moment, two half-drunk men in business suits staggered out of the strip bar. Their brows were damp and their clothes were rumpled.
Annika walked up to them, pushed her tits in their faces, and put her arms around them. “Hi, guys. You’ve just fallen in love, right? But if the night’s going to be really good, you need to try your luck with me.”
She smiled her most playful smile, her knees shaking. Joachim now had his thigh pressed against her behind, and she just wanted to scream out loud.
“Nah,” one of them said.
Annika took a step forward to escape Joachim and gave the other guy a hug. “What about you? You look like a lucky guy, a real gentleman. Why don’t you come and play with me?”
The man grinned. “What do I win? You?”
Annika managed a laugh. “Who knows? Maybe you’ll win enough to buy any girl you want.”
“Okay,” the man said, and pulled out his wallet. His friend reluctantly followed suit.
The first man put a hundred on the table.
Annika smiled a troubled smile. The guy had just shelled out several thousand to drink sparkling apple juice and to look at naked girls, and now he was going to make her sweat for a hundred kronor.
“That won’t even spin the ball,” she said sweetly. “We play for high stakes here, handsome. High stakes, high winnings. It’s a thousand for twenty chips.”
The man was wavering, and Annika made a sweeping movement with her hand over the table. “A corner bet pays five thousand, a street, six thousand eight hundred. That’s nearly seven thousand. Fifteen seconds, boys. You could win back all the money you’ve spent here tonight.”
A light came on simultaneously in both men’s eyes. She was right…
They bought chips for a thousand each on their credit cards and placed streets on numbers 11 and 16, their bets worth twelve hundred in all. Annika spun the wheel and launched the ball fast and hard. It rolled almost thirteen turns before it started slowing down.
“No more bets,” she said, remembering how it went.
The ball dropped on slot number 3. With practiced movements she cleared the table and stacked the chips.
“Place your bets,” she said, glancing at the men’s disappointed faces. They were more careful this time, only doing corner bets and changing to numbers 9 and 18. New spin, no more bets, number 16. One of the guys won ten chips.
“Here you go.” Annika pushed the small pile over to him. “Five hundred kronor. Didn’t I say you were a lucky guy?”
The man lit up like a sun, and Annika knew she had them right where she wanted them. Both men spent another three thousand each before they paid Sanna with their credit card and slunk away. Annika saw that Sanna wrote “food and drink” on the receipt.
Joachim had been watching her from behind the reception desk.
“You know what you’re doing,” he said, and came closer. “Where did you learn to spin the wheel?”
“At the hotel in… Piteå.” She smiled and swallowed hard.
“Then you must know Peter Holmberg?” He flashed a smile.
Annika felt her own smile quiver in the corners of her mouth. Shit, she thought, he’ll catch me out before I even get started.
“No, but I know Roger Sundström on Solandergatan. Do you know him? Or Hans on Oli-Jansgatan out in Pitholm?”
Joachim dropped the subject. “You’re charging too much for the chips, by the way. That’s illegal. The stakes are too high.”
“I can adjust the price according to the players. Nobody knows what anybody else pays for their chips, it doesn’t say on them. I’m following the rules.”
“You’ll risk breaking the bank.”
Annika stopped smiling. “There’s only one way for a gambler to win at roulette, and that’s to win straightaway, stop at once, and keep the winnings. And nobody who starts winning does that. It’s a snap being a croupier. All you need to do is keep the people playing until they’ve lost all they’ve won.”
Joachim smiled subtly. “I think we’ll get along, you and me.” He let his hand slide down her arm.
He went into his office. Annika turned around, feeling Sanna’s eyes bore into her back. They’re an item, she realized. Joachim and Sanna are a couple.
The sound of high heels coming down the spiral staircase made Annika look up. She couldn’t believe her eyes. The TV presenter Patricia had told her about was teetering down the stairs of Studio 69 dressed in a miniskirt, stockings, and a see-through blouse showing the bra underneath.
“Hello, my friends,” said the man in a squeaky voice.
“Welcome, madam,” Sanna said, and flashed a flirtatious smile at him. “What little goodies can we tempt you with tonight?”
As the man named a few of the girls, Annika realized she was staring at him. She used to watch his show, irreverent panel debates with politicians and celebrities. She knew the man had a family.
He maneuvered himself into the strip bar with Sanna. Annika heaved a weary sigh. The shoes hurt her feet. For a moment, she contemplated taking them off; nobody would notice the difference behind the table, but at that moment some Italian guys showed up. Annika went up to them and talked to them in English. It didn’t work. She tried French, no luck, but Spanish was okay.
They gambled away thirteen thousand, and Sanna’s face got darker and darker the more the men lost.
She doesn’t like me, Annika thought. She knows I’m Patricia’s friend, and she sees me as a continuation of Josefin. Maybe it’s not so strange.
She glanced down at her minimal sequined, sky-blue bikini, Josefin’s work clothes.
The evening dragged and faded into intangible night. Down in the old garage it was always nighttime. Annika sat with her eyes closed in the bluish light of the locker room, feeling the tears burn inside her eyelids.
What am I doing here? she thought. Is there any chance I might slowly slip into this world and get comfortable? I could make more money modeling in the private rooms. Will
I do that? What I’m doing with the price of the chips is illegal. I could go to jail if I get caught.
She put on more makeup. Her face looked pale without it.
Patricia came into the locker room and smiled encouragingly. “You’re doing well, I hear.”
Annika nodded. “Not bad.”
Patricia looked proud. “I knew you were good.”
Annika closed her eyes, I mustn’t take it in, she thought, mustn’t listen to it. I mustn’t find my new affirmation here. I’m not going to make my career in a strip joint. I deserve better. Patricia deserves better.
She touched up her lipstick and went out.
*
In the small hours, Sanna disappeared into a private room with an older man.
“He’s a regular,” the hostess whispered as she left with the guy. “There are hardly any customers left. You get the money from them when they leave— the checks are on the desk.”
Confused, Annika stood in front of the roulette table, not knowing the procedure. If she tried to get people to play roulette, then who would take the money if someone was leaving?
She made a quick decision to skip the roulette, and just then the TV guy appeared in the foyer.
“Where’s Sanna?” Annika recognized the man’s voice from the show.
“She’s busy,” Annika said, smiling. “Can I help you?”
The man put his card on the reception desk, and Annika anxiously licked her lips. She walked over to the desk and searched among the papers on it. There, she found the man’s check.
She put the card in the machine and made out the credit card slip. She knew Sanna would get the cut on the sum; her code was logged in. The man signed the slip.
“Sweetie, are you leaving already?” a girl in the doorway squeaked. She was naked, with her pubes shaved off. She had pigtails and painted-on freckles.
“Oh, my little baby,” TV man said, and gave her a bear hug.
“Just one moment, please,” Annika said, and stole into the office. The room was empty. She put the credit card slip in the photocopier, shut her eyes, and prayed.
Dear God, please don’t let it be noisy, don’t let it be slow, let there be paper in the tray.
Rapidly and without a sound, the selenium-coated aluminum drum got to work underneath the glass; paper was released and fed into the machine; was sprayed with ink particles; then fixed and fed out again. She breathed out, but where the hell was she going to put the copy?
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