Lovers and Gamblers (21 page)

‘You must be hungry. We’ll lunch on the terrace. Fifteen minutes all right with everyone?’

‘Fine with me,’ agreed Al. ‘It doesn’t take me fifteen minutes to take a piss.’

Paul and Linda exchanged looks. Dana appeared not to have heard.

‘What a house!’ exclaimed Linda.

‘Yes,’ said Paul wistfully, ‘makes my place in England look like a shack.’

They were given a room with an old oak four-poster bed and a sea view.

‘This is lovely,’ enthused Linda, ‘veree romantic – you think so?’

‘I think,’ said Paul slowly, ‘that we are the beards and that Al knew all along old man Kurlnik wouldn’t be here.’

‘I did want to meet him. Dallas never mentions him. I think she was more upset than everyone supposes.’

Paul grinned. ‘I think Al wants to get his own back through the daughters.’

Linda started to undress. ‘Judging from the one we’ve seen, I think she would welcome any getting his own back Al cares to give her.’

‘Linda, why are you almost naked?’

‘All the better to make love to you. After all, we have got fifteen minutes before lunch. Why waste them?’

* * *

Cara Kurlnik appeared for lunch. Blonde, like her sister, and equally cool.

Linda couldn’t help reflecting how old they both seemed to be. Not in looks, they were certainly good-looking enough. It was just their demeanour, sort of a weary, glacial, seen-it-all, done-it-all attitude. And of course they probably had. Being the daughters of one of the richest men in America probably did not lead to a quiet and sheltered life. Their conversation was peppered with famous names and places.

Lunch was delicious. A mixture of seafoods and salads laid out invitingly on silver dishes.

Al gorged himself, swigging back the champagne the girls had thoughtfully provided. For dessert there were bowls of strawberries with thick cream ladled on top.

‘Here goes my diet,’ remarked Al.

‘Do you have to diet?’ questioned Cara. ‘How boring.’

‘Only when I’m working,’ said Al quickly, ‘I like to keep in shape, like a boxer.’

‘Oh, you mean training. I would have thought it was only your voice you had to worry about.’ Dana stared at him as she spoke. A cold, grey-eyed stare.

‘Al uses a great deal of physical energy,’ Paul joined in. ‘He’s like a wet rag when he comes off that stage.’

‘Does training include no sex?’ inquired Cara.

‘Are you kidding?’ laughed Al.

Linda had been fiddling with her cameras. ‘Anyone mind if I take some photographs?’ she asked.

‘Go right ahead,’ replied Dana. ‘Would you like us to pose for you?’

‘That won’t be necessary – I don’t work like that. Just carry on doing whatever you’re doing.’

‘I thought we might go skiing,’ said Cara. ‘The boat’s all ready. You do ski, don’t you, Al?’

‘Yeah, I ski.’ He had learned in the South of France, his first holiday after success had started to creep up on him. He had known it would come in useful one day. Edna had never learned. She had sat on the beach and complained that it was a dangerous, stupid sport. She had been quite surprised when after three abortive attempts he was up up and away. Perhaps if Edna had been the kind of woman who had learned to water-ski their marriage might not be on the rocks today. And it was on the rocks. He knew there was no going home after this trip.

With all his success he had nothing, no one. Plenty of everything. But what did that mean when you were alone in bed at night. And whoever it was that shared his bed, he still ended up alone.

He envied Paul. He had Linda. A strong, ballsy woman who obviously loved him very much. And what did Al get? He got the stags, didn’t he? The star fucks and groupies. The ball-breakers like Marjorie Carter and the nymphos like the Kurlnik twins. He could smell a nympho a mile off, however much money she had. And he would accommodate them, if he was able. And he would probably enjoy it, on a momentary basis. And they would say – ‘Wow – what a stud Al King is.’ And that was his life. Superstud. Superfuck. There must be something better somewhere.

‘Are you going to change?’ asked Dana.

‘What for?’ responded Al. ‘It’s private here, isn’t it?’

‘Yes, of course,’ said Dana.

‘In that case it’s everyone in the raw.’

‘I’d love to photograph the event, but I think Paul and I will sit this one out. Is it all right if we use the swimming pool?’ Linda took Paul’s hand and pulled him up. ‘OK with you?’

‘Yes, sure,’ Paul replied, almost reluctantly. There had once been a time, in the early days, when identical twins would have meant a good time for both of them. Al had always been the puller but Paul had never been averse to joining in. Until he grew up. Al never grew up.

‘Well, girls,’ announced Al expansively, ‘lead me to your boat, and if you’re good girls you can put on a ski each.’

‘Don’t you mono ski?’ asked Cara in patronizing tones.

‘The hell with the fancy stuff. I like to keep it simple.’

‘Naturally,’ drawled Dana.

She
would be the first to get it, Al decided. Stuck-up rich little snob.

Cara drove the Riva while Dana and Al skied. Both girls were wearing bikinis under their tennis whites. Al had ended up in his Y-fronts feeling slightly foolish. Dana, of course, only needed one ski, whilst Al, next to her, felt clumsy and inadequate on two.

Cara zoomed the speedboat expertly across the sea until at last she cut the engine, and Al and Dana subsided into the water. Dana slipped easily out of her ski and had swum to the boat long before Al came struggling aboard, trailing his skis behind him.

As he climbed into the Riva he noticed both girls had discarded the tops of their bikinis. It didn’t make much difference as they were both built like boys. Four indifferent, identical tits. He grinned, thought – what the hell – and slid out of his ridiculous wet Y-fronts.

Dana was busy rolling a joint. ‘Hey – hey—’ she exclaimed, ‘the legend lives!’

Cara turned to stare, running a small pink tongue nervously across her lips.

The boat rocked gently in the waves. The sun had cut through the mist, and Cara started to lay out striped mattresses on the back of the boat.

‘What have we got to drink?’ Al asked.

‘Champagne, of course,’ replied Dana, ‘isn’t that your favourite? In the ice box at the front.’

He got out the champagne, popped the cork, found some glasses, and took it all to the back of the boat.

They lay out on the mattresses, with him in the middle. Cara produced a tape recorder, and the sound of Al singing joined them. Dana passed the joint around. He declined.

‘I thought all musicians smoked,’ said Dana in surprise.

‘He’s not a musician,’ replied Cara dismissively. ‘Anyway, most of the over thirty-fives prefer to drink.’

‘Don’t talk about me as if I’m not here,’ interrupted Al. ‘Grass doesn’t do anything for me, why the hell should it?’

‘Nobody’s forcing you. How about some coke? Believe me, skiing when you’re out of it on coke is a beautiful experience.’ So saying, Dana reached into a bag and produced a glass phial of white powder. She was wearing a small gold spoon on a chain around her neck, and she took off the chain, removed the spoon, filled it with white powder and snorted the stuff delicately and expertly into each nostril. ‘Here,’ she offered it to Al, ‘it’s the best.’

Al fingered some cocaine from the spoon, snorted just a little. Why not? He had been working hard, he deserved some relaxation.

Cara leaned across him to reach for the joint. He felt her nipples brush his chest. He looked down and watched himself harden. They all watched.

‘Random Love’ played loudly on the tape recorder.

Nobody seemed in any kind of hurry. Al snorted a little more coke, took a drag on the joint. He was starting to feel really good.

Cara took her glass and slowly tipped the champagne from it over his chest. He felt his nipples come erect, and Cara bent to lick the liquid off him. Dana joined in from the other side. He closed his eyes to the burning sun, sealing off the identical faces that were now administering to him from both sides.

‘Jesus!’ he muttered.

‘Good, isn’t it?’

Their heads were travelling down in perfect unison, licking, biting, kissing. Then they were attending to his balls with feathery, identical tongues. It was an incredible sensation, so incredible that he could hardly bear it. He needed to screw, to jam it in. But which one first? Lazily he rolled towards Dana, but she shoved him away.

They continued to work on him, slowly, methodically. It was sensational – but – ‘I’m going to come,’ he warned. He turned to reach Cara, but they held him down, and as he came, spurting all over himself, one of them snapped an amyl nitrate under his nose.

His orgasm seemed to go on for ever as he jerked and thrust up into nothingness. It was amazing, but it was frustrating. All the times he couldn’t be bothered to screw, and now, when he wanted to, it was denied him. Still, he couldn’t complain. Although it was a strange sensation to come into nothingness.

Slowly he opened his eyes. Cara and Dana watched him expectantly. ‘Good?’ they chorused.

‘Bloody good,’ he agreed.

‘Why don’t you wash off in the sea?’ Cara suggested.

‘Yes.’ He was covered in his own sperm. ‘There’s no sharks around here, are there?’

‘Only the human ones – inland,’ replied Dana coolly.

He slipped over the side. The water was invigoratingly cold. He swam away from the boat. It felt good swimming in the raw, it always had, even when he was a kid and stripped off to swim in the canals. He did a strong crawl, dived under the water, couldn’t see much. Pity they didn’t have diving gear aboard – although they probably did – they seemed to carry everything else.

He surfaced. The boat appeared to have drifted some distance away.

‘Hey!’ he yelled. But he couldn’t see the twins. What if there
were
sharks? He felt a small stab of panic. Rapidly he started to swim towards the boat. He felt tired, a bit muddled. It was all the champagne, the joint, the coke, the ammi. Jesus, he could
collapse
out here. What the fuck were they doing?

He felt the sudden stab of cramp in his right side. It slowed him up. The boat was getting further away, the cramp was getting worse. Was it his imagination or was the sea getting rougher?

‘Hey!’ he screamed out. But nobody appeared to hear him.

Dallas stood in the doorway of Lew Margolis’s office staring at the man who had the power to create a marvellous new career for her.

She pictured him not behind his marble desk, but at the door of his magnificent house in Bel Air, wearing nothing but a smile and an orange-coloured bathrobe.

* * *

A year ago. Lew Margolis. She had known him only as ‘Dukey’. Bobbie called all their clients ‘Dukey’. ‘Makes ’em feel wanted – kinda special,’ Bobbie explained. ‘Cancels out the hooker-dude relationship.’

Who was she kidding?

Dallas was nervous and edgy that evening. Things had already started with Ed Kurlnik, and if he ever found out what she really did… To protect herself on professional engagements, she tried to look as different as possible.

Tonight she had tucked her long hair out of sight under a red afro wig. And she wore much more make-up than usual, and raunchy, hooker-type clothes.

‘Come in, ladies.’ Lew Margolis ushered them into a huge white living room.

‘She-e-et man, this is nice,’ approved Bobbie, already stoned out of her head. ‘Any other comers or is this just a cosy sweet stuff threesome?’

‘Just the three of us,’ replied Lew pleasantly. He was a man of about sixty with abundant dark hair and a prominent nose. He wore steel-rimmed glasses and walked with a limp.

Dallas took in her surroundings quickly. Nice house. The guy obviously had bread. He wasn’t completely unattractive, so what did he need with them? She noticed two photo frames placed face down on a corner table. How many times had she seen that done. Mustn’t let the family watch.

‘So, Dukey, babe,’ trilled Bobbie, ‘give me the action, and we’re on.’

‘You two cunts get your clothes off.’ The pleasant tone had vanished from his voice.

Bobbie smiled. ‘Money first, honey second. Three hundred for an hour. Fine with you, Dukey babe?’

He reached in his bathrobe pocket, extracted a stack of notes, counted off three hundred, and handed it to Bobbie.

She checked it through, stuffed it into her purse. ‘Seems cool to little ’ole me. Clothes off, girl.’

Whilst Bobbie stripped provocatively and elaborately, Dallas peeled her clothes off quickly. Each time it became more difficult. She remained impassive and unsmiling, leaving the jokes and fun up to Bobbie.

When they were both naked, his attention focused on Dallas.

‘Well?’ questioned Bobbie, hands on hips, legs astride. ‘What we gonna play? You wanna little show? Or maybe a massage? What’s it to be, man?’

‘Upstairs,’ he said thickly.

He led them up to a beautiful bedroom, dominated by a king-size bed. On the wall there was a portrait of the film actress Doris Andrews, noted for her portrayal of ‘good girl’ parts.

Lew flung open a closet of women’s clothes. ‘Dress yourselves,’ he commanded. ‘Everything. Tights. Panties. Bras. An outfit. It doesn’t matter if they fit or not.’

It was a peculiar request. But Dallas was used to peculiar requests. She sorted through the shelves; drew on some black tights, found a pair of black lace knickers. Whoever the clothes belonged to had expensive taste. She chose a black silk bra, and it fitted her perfectly. Over the top she slipped on an Yves Saint Laurent suit.

The clothes were much too big for Bobbie, and by the time she was dressed she looked ridiculous.

Lew Margolis watched silently until they were both finished. Then he handed them two identical wigs, and told them to put them on. The wigs matched the hairstyle of the woman in the portrait exactly.

‘We’re going to play pretend,’ Lew said.