Everyone Worth Knowing (62 page)

place, preparing themselves for the onslaught of grabby men and

jealous women.

"Nothing, nothing. I think we're actually ready, don't you?"

"Word."

"Is there anything you can think of that I'm missing?"

He downed his third beer in five minutes. "Nope." He belched.

I looked around and was pleased with what I saw. The club

had been transformed to the perfect space for celebrating fifty

years of centerfolds. We had two entrances set up, one for VIPs

and one for everyone else, each shrouded in a black tent with

plenty of red carpet and logos. The security guys would all be

wearing suits and subtle earpieces so as to remain as inconspicuous

as possible. After entering an outside tent, each guest would

be admitted to a long hallway shrouded in black, which culminated

in a sweeping staircase adorned with filmy black curtains.

Upon climbing the stairs and stepping through the curtains, they'd

find themselves on a raised stage of sorts, a platform where everyone

could watch as they descended the stairs into the main room.

An eighty-five-foot bar occupied the left side of the room, where

thirty-five female bartenders in hot pants, bikini tops, and bunny

ears would be mixing drinks all night long. The wall behind the

bar was covered in a floor-to-ceiling collage of
Playboy
centerfolds

from the last fifty years: each was in full color and blown up to

double poster size, and they were stuck together in no apparent

pattern (save for the abundance of pre-bikini wax shots). We'd

placed the VIP area on the far right side, a roped-off section of

black velour banquettes and
RESERVED
signs resting next to the bottle

chillers on each glass table. Gleaming from the exact center of

the room was a circular stage shaped like a massive, multitiered

cake. The bottom two tiers would provide dancing space for the

Bunnies at the midnight performance, and the top level would be

uncovered to reveal our surprise guest. A huge, 360-degree dance

floor wrapped around the cake-shaped stage and was adorned

with low velour benches around its perimeter.

"Hey, how is everything?" Kelly asked, twirling to show off her

ultra-tight, ultra-short, barely opaque wrap dress. "You like it?"

"You look amazing," I said and meant it.

"Bette, I'd like you to meet Henry. Henry, this is one of my

brightest stars, Bette."

A pleasant-looking but entirely nondescript man of about

forty—medium height, average build, brown hair—reached out his

hand and revealed one of the warmest smiles I'd ever seen. "So

nice to meet you, Bette. Kelly's told me a lot about you."

"All good, I hope," I said without an ounce of creativity. "Having

fun, I hope? Things should really get going soon."

They both laughed and looked at each other with such enthusiastic

affection that it was impossible not to hate them.

By ten o'clock the party was fully under way. Hef took up the

two most prominent VIP tables with his six girlfriends and drank

Jack Rabbits, some combination of Jack Daniel's and Diet Coke.

Scattered at tables around him were assorted celebs and their entourages:

James Gandolfini, Dr. Ruth, Pamela Anderson, Helen

Gurley Brown, Kid Rock, Ivanka Trump, and Ja Rule all appeared

content enough with the unlimited drinks and the platters of

bunny-shaped chocolates and strawberries that we'd provided for

them. The commoners were just starting to hit that point where

they'd had a few drinks and were ready to dance, and the Bunnies

were in full circulation, brushing up against every guy and most of

the girls in the room. They were captivating to watch. Nearly two

hundred of them in bunny ears, black satin bustiers, and thongs

pulsated through the room, shaking their bottoms to emphasize

their bunny tails and pushing their pelvises forward to show off the

little horse-race ribbons that announced their names and hometowns.

What the men didn't realize was that the real party was in

the downstairs ladies' room, where the Bunnies gathered to smoke,

chat, and make fun of the gaping men. They had to unzip their

bustier outfits and completely climb out of them in order to pee,

and they weren't able to get dressed again without help. I leaned

against a wall, staring, waiting for a stall to open, as one blond girl

reached out and cupped another Bunny's huge, pillow-like breasts

with two hands. She admired them for a few seconds before asking—

boobs still in hand—"Real or created?"

The fondled one giggled and gave a little shimmy. "Girlfriend,

these are entirely store-bought." Then she squatted, leaned forward,

and mashed her breasts as tight as they'd go against her

chest while motioning for the fondler to zip her up. When she

straightened up again, the black satin barely covered her nipples,

and she looked like she might just topple forward from the weight

imbalance. They finished their sneaked cosmos, left the empty

glasses on the sink, and half-ran, half-hopped back upstairs to rejoin

the party.

When I made it back myself, I did another cursory check over

the headphones with everyone to see that all was progressing as

planned, and there were blessedly few emergencies: a fallen disco

ball that hadn't hit anyone, a couple of minor fights that Sammy

and his crew had already dismantled, and a shortage of maraschino

cherries due to hungry Bunnies who were reportedly grabbing

them from behind the bar by the fistful. Elisa seemed to be sober

and in control of the VIP lounge, while Leo had managed to keep

his pants on long enough to patrol the bar and dance floor. There

was only an hour to go until the midnight surprise and it was time

for me to focus on that.

The surprise midnight performance had been my baby, something

I'd been working on especially hard since returning from

Turkey, and I was desperate for it to go well. At that moment, only

Kelly, the head PR person from
Playboy,
and Hef himself knew

what to expect, and I couldn't wait to see everyone's reactions. I

was just getting ready to triple-check with Sammy and his staff at

the door that they knew to refuse admission to Abby if she tried to

get in when I heard his voice crackle on the headset.

"Bette? Sammy here. Jessica and Ashlee just pulled up."

"Copy, I'll be there in a second." I grabbed a gin and tonic

from the main bar to bribe Philip with, but I couldn't find him anywhere.

Not wanting the sisters to go unescorted, I sent the announcement

out over the headset for anyone who saw Philip to

meet me at the front door, then dashed there just as they were

stepping out of the Bentley we had sent to fetch them.

"Hi, guys," I said, rather ungracefully. "We're all so glad you

could make it. Come on in, and I'll show you around." I guided

them down the red carpet, squinting through the flashbulbs.

They posed like pros for their required fifteen minutes, jutting

out their hips and putting their arms around each other and walk-

ing jauntily in their matching five-inch silver heels before following

me past Sammy (who winked) and straight to the VIP section. I

beckoned to the gorgeous guy we'd hired to attend to their every

need and bolted off to find Philip, who had, as of yet, remained

elusive.

Although I radioed out numerous SOS messages and patrolled

the room myself a number of times, I couldn't seem to find him

anywhere. I was just getting ready to send someone into the men's

room to see if he was inside doing God knows what when I

glanced at my watch. It was five minutes to twelve, and the show

would be starting any minute. I raced upstairs and signaled the DJ,

who cut off "Dancing Queen" halfway through and played an electronic

drumroll. This was the signal. Hef extricated himself from his

gaggle of girlfriends and climbed slowly to the second tier of the

stage, tapping once on the microphone before booming, "Thank

you all for coming." He was cut off by the frantic, screaming

cheers of the crowd, who clapped and yelled and chanted, "Hef,

Hef, Hef!"

"Yes, thank you. Thank you all so much for coming to celebrate

with me and my crew"—he paused briefly to wink at the

crowd, which invited all-out hooting—"fifty years of important stories,

celebrated writers, and, of course, beautiful girls!" The crowd

continued to holler throughout the speech, reaching an almost

deafening level when he thanked everyone for a final time and

made his way back to the front-and-center tables where his

women awaited. A few people thought it was over and started to

head back to the bar or the dance floor, but they froze in place

when the DJ began to play "Happy Birthday to You." Before anyone

realized what was happening, a tiny, circular stage—just big

enough for one person to stand on—began to rise from the center

of the cake. It moved upward until the shadow of a woman could

be seen behind the sheer curtain that covered it as everyone stood,

rooted to the floor, their necks craning toward the ceiling. When

the mini-platform stopped about three stories above the crowd, the

gauzy white material simply melted away and standing there in a

tight, shimmering, beaded purple evening gown with a fur boa was

Ashanti, looking ravishing. She proceeded to sing in a low, throaty

voice the sexiest rendition of "Happy Birthday to You" I'd ever

heard. It was an obvious tribute to Marilyn Monroe's famous performance

for JFK, only Ashanti dedicated her performance to Hef,

calling him "the president of pussyland," and when she finished,

the room went wild. Gold glitter confetti rained down while the

crowd cheered and every Bunny in the room—all eighty-five of

them—kicked chorus line-style around the lower level of the

stage. The DJ immediately segued into "Always on Time" and the

dancing immediately escalated from excited to frenzied. I heard

a guy behind me scream into his cell phone, "Dude, this is the

party of the fucking century!" and more than a few newly formed

couples began making out on the dance floor. Except for the "pussyland"

comment, everything had gone exactly as I'd planned—

probably even better.

Elisa and Leo and Sammy had already reported into the headsets

that it was a huge hit; even Kelly had managed to grab a headset

and shriek her approval into it. The euphoria lasted another

whole seven or ten minutes, until everything started barreling

downhill at warp speed, threatening to take me with it. I was

roaming through the VIP lounge looking for Philip when, tucked

away in the darkest corners of the roped-off section, I spotted a

very familiar blond head bobbing between a pair of Bunny-like

breasts. I looked around frantically for a camera, hoping, praying

that one would snap a picture of Philip nibbling this girl's cleavage

and plaster it across every paper in the city so I could finally, blessedly,