S.E.C.R.E.T.: An Erotic Novel (27 page)

“All righty, then,” said Angela, extending her hand to help me up from where I was
crouched next to Kit. “Upstairs with you, missy. We have some new steps to learn.”

“But … your bracelets? Are you two—?”

“There’ll be lots of time for questions later. Now we dance!” she said, snapping her
fingers like a flamenco dancer.

“Speaking of which, where’s
your
bracelet?” Kit asked, brushing the dirt off her skin. She was still in her strapless
bra and underwear, causing a few stray pedestrians to stop and peer into the front
window of Café Rose.

“In my purse,” I said.

“Well, that’s the first thing you’re putting on. My costume is second.”

I gulped.

Angela turned me around and launched me back upstairs. When she announced to the rest
of the girls that I would be taking Kit’s place in the Revue, I expected disappointment
or impatience. After all, I would bring the quality of the choreography to a grinding
halt. Instead they all clapped and whistled, and positioned me in a line, then helpfully
and slowly modeled the first few steps of the routine. Kit, her back miraculously
healed, became the ad hoc choreographer, snapping and counting in her bra and underwear.
It was like the sleepover I had never been invited to, but with
lingerie. When I messed up, no one scolded; they all laughed and made me feel like
being an amateur would endear me to the crowd regardless of whether I would hinder
their performance. Truth was, their generosity, genuine support and encouragement
for this terrifying thing I was about to do brought tears to my eyes, which I was
careful to stanch lest I smear my six layers of mascara Angela eventually applied.
It took away some of the terror. Some.

Two hours later, one spent learning the group’s routine and the other spent with Angela
helping me come up with my own, I was backstage at the Blue Nile as the crowd of mostly
men streamed in and gathered around the tippy tables in front. Between bouts of practicing,
and deeply panicking, I got help from one of the girls in applying the final touches,
pressing on a fake mole, adjusting my stay-up fishnets. Finally, Angela stood before
me, Kit’s burlesque outfit, white lace on black, draping from her fingers, the long
pink ties trailing to the floor.

“Okay, babe. One leg, then the other,” she said, as she shimmied the tight suit over
my thighs. “Turn around, I’ll lace you up.”

I turned, keeping one hand on my churning gut. I watched as the tighter Angela tied
the ties, the higher my breasts swelled over the top of the scalloped bodice. That’s
when Matilda ducked backstage, the sight of her taking the
rest of the air out of my lungs. She smiled at Angela and threw open her arms.

“You’re a champ, Angela!” she said, leaning in to whisper to her, “I think you’re
almost ready to guide. Leave us alone for a bit, my dear.”

Angela left, beaming. So she would be a S.E.C.R.E.T. guide soon. I wondered what that
felt like.

“Cassie, look at you!” said Matilda.

“I feel like a sausage. I’m not sure this is such a good idea.”

“Nonsense.” Matilda tugged me completely out of earshot of the other girls to give
me some last-minute instructions.

“Tonight, you’ll have your pick, Cassie.”

“Pick of what?”

“Of men.”

“Which men?”

“Men from your fantasies. The ones you’ve thought the most about over this past year.
The ones who’ve vexed you, and who’ve left you with lingering thoughts of them. Those
men.”

“Who? Which ones?
They’re here?
” I almost yelled.

Matilda clapped a hand over my mouth. The cold dread pooling in my gut was quickly
replaced by nausea.

She gave me a look. “Well, obviously you know who one of them is.”

“Pierre?”

My heart leapt at his name. Matilda nodded, a little too somberly, I thought.

“Who else?”

“Who else had you swooning?”

I flashed back to tattooed flesh, a white tank top lifted to expose a rippled stomach … the
way he laid me across that metal table … I closed my eyes and swallowed.

“Jesse.”

I was sure I’d never see either of them again, hence my ability to behave with such
abandon. Knowing they’d be in the audience, I was certain I’d freeze.

“But do Pierre and Jesse know about each other? And am I supposed to pick one of them
and reject the other? I don’t know if I’m comfortable with this, Matilda. In fact,
I
know
I’m not. I can’t go through with this. I can’t.”

“Listen to me. They don’t know about each other. All they know is they’ve been invited
to a legendary burlesque show along with the rest of the community. They have no idea
you’re performing. And they won’t know it’s you onstage.”

“How are they
not
going to know it’s me?”

She reached into her purse and pulled out a Veronica Lake–style platinum blond wig.
She spun it around on her fist.

“First, you’re going to be wearing this,” she said. Reaching back into the bag, she
added, “And one of these.” She pulled out a sleek, black cat’s-eye Mardi Gras mask.

“Remember, Cassie. You’re playing a part,” she said, speaking slowly and deliberately
while expertly fastening the wig over my hair. “You can be nervous up there. The old
Cassie might have thought she’s not worthy of the attention, or that she’s not beautiful
or sexy enough to pull it off. But the woman wearing this wig and this mask would
never think
that. And the men watching her would never believe it. Because she knows not only
that she can captivate a man, but also that she’s got the whole room in the palm of
her hand. There,” she said, carefully placing the mask over my eyes and stretching
the elastic around the back of my head and releasing it.

“Gorgeous. Now, go be this woman!”

What woman was she talking about? I wondered—until moments later I smacked into her
in the backstage mirror.

The girls were gathered in front of it, making last-minute adjustments to their costumes,
hair and makeup. I stood among them, equal to them, I thought, no better or worse,
just someone taking joy in my body. Just then, Steamboat Betty muscled her way to
the front of the pack to aggressively adjust her breasts in her bodice.

“The girls are restless tonight,” she said, probably not referring to Les Filles de
Frenchmen.

Kit and Angela beamed at me like proud mothers. Then they raised their braceleted
wrists at me and gave them a shake. I shook my charms back at them, the collective
tinkling like music to my ears.

The band started up. I could hear the MC announce this year’s Les Filles de Frenchmen
Revue, reminding the men to “give generously” but to “behave respectfully or you’re
out on your ass.”

Angela yelled, “Hurry, Cassie, we’re on!”

I took one last deep breath and looked around at my fellow performers, all of us beautiful
in our own way, with our wigs and moles and falsies. Each of us was playing a
version of ourselves, an exaggerated, alternative and riskier version. Maybe that’s
what all women do, from time to time. Beneath our everyday costumes, we’re all filled
with the same fears and anxieties. Angela must have them, and Kit too. But looking
at them now, I couldn’t picture them hesitating at the red door of the coach house,
frozen in fear. The feeling flooding my heart at this moment was gratitude, and some
hope that if they were able to step through their fears, I could do it too. I just
had to believe I could.

I took my first steps. I found the tempo, counting out the beats audibly, until the
line forward-kicked in unison out of the wings and onto the stage, shaking our gloved
hands like Fosse dancers. The crowd, darkened behind the bright floodlights, went
crazy, which injected us with a kind of performance adrenaline that transferred from
one girl to the next, hitting me full force.

“See?” whispered Angela. “I told you they’d love you!”

The first few minutes of the dance were a blur as I adjusted my eyes to the lights
and continued to remind myself that no one knew it was me, mousy Cassie from Café
Rose. We broke off in our dance pairings onstage, my disguise making it easier to
turn my back to the crowd and slowly bump back and forth, following Angela’s lead,
as the snare drum beat in time to our choreographed gyrations. She was my partner
and it was so thrilling to be boldly in tune with the raunchy music and the beautiful
Angela Rejean that I began to relax into my body and improvise a little. At one point
I was shaking my butt so fast it caused
Angela to throw her head back and let out a whoop. When Angela turned and pranced
off the stage right into the crowd, I followed her without thinking, mimicking the
way she’d grab a tie and fling it behind a man’s head, or mess up his hair, and maybe
his wife’s too. The women in the audience were having as much fun as the men, our
exuberance inspiring them to stand and deliver their own shimmy to the enthusiastic
crowd. Some of them were tourists, lucky to stumble upon this local celebration. But
I recognized a lot of Café regulars, the musicians, shopkeepers and eccentrics out
to cheer on this little pocket of beauty in our bruised and troubled city.

Angela and I performed our choreographed kick-step for the crowd. Then she winked
and whispered, “Go along with me, Cass,” before she spun, tossed her pink boa around
my neck and yanked me into a full-on kiss.

An explosion of clapping and yelling followed as Angela’s mouth lingered on mine,
and then she finished the kiss with a flourish, nudging me back to my own space. My
knees quivering, I tried to continue my choreographed two-step, showing off the garters
high on my thighs, but her kiss had thrown me off, bringing the crazed crowd to their
feet. I spotted Kit and Matilda sitting together near the bar, clapping and whistling
like proud dance moms.

When I turned to blow a kiss to the audience, my eyes rested on a familiar gaze. It
was Jesse, occupying a prime table near the front, with a grin on his face that would
melt an iceberg.

“Well, hello,” he said, leaning back into the chair, taking in the full length of
me with a tilt of his head.

How had I forgotten how sexy this man was? This time he wore a snug plaid shirt and
jeans, a white undershirt peeking underneath.
That undershirt. His lean concave stomach, his casual hand resting on the hair that
leads to
 … “Oh my God,” I said, standing in front of his table. His confused expression reminded
me he didn’t know who was beneath the wig and mask. I glanced nervously around the
room. All eyes were on us. I smiled at Jesse again and froze. Angela took my arm and
turned me around for our dual butt-shimmy move. I glanced over my shoulder at him.
He was clearly thrilled to be on the edge of the spotlight, a front-row spectator.
When we’d finished our little number, he and everyone else in the room erupted into
hoots and hollers.

Emboldened by my anonymity, I turned around and leaned forward, placing both hands
on his shoulders, and giving him a good long look at the impressive cleavage my dress
had enhanced. To any onlooker, it would have seemed we knew each other and were exchanging
pleasantries, but when I leaned in, I whispered, “The things I’d like to do to you.”

“Whoa, right back at you, baby,” he whispered, his hot breath in my ear.

So this is how it works
, I thought, taking a finger and placing it under Jesse’s stubbled chin. When I brought
his eyes to meet mine, I thought I saw a flash of recognition cross his face. I pulled
away quickly, and he threw his head back, laughing, loving the flirty attention. Who
was this bold
woman doing these bold things? This wasn’t me. But it was me! And Jesse had had a
hand in liberating me.

By this point, all the girls had made their way down from the stage and were working
the crowd into a frenzy. Two were now hovering directly over Jesse, who had an expression
of pained pleasure on his gorgeous face. Suddenly the girl with the corkscrew curls
threw her boa around his neck. I watched her tug him to his feet. While the crowd
screamed, he willingly trailed behind her and out the door, the whole time wearing
the grin of the luckiest guy in the room. I had had my chance and I hadn’t picked
him. I smiled and said a silent, wistful goodbye to my lovely intruder.

I followed my duet partner, Angela, farther into the audience. When she moved behind
a wide post, I lost sight of her, and moments later locked eyes with another ardent
audience member, Pierre Castille, who was leaning cross-armed against the wall, regarding
me with a bemused expression, his bodyguard next to him. Here was my choice.
What power you have when you’re fully in command of your own body
, I thought. With my hands on my hips, my chin lowered and my shoulders thrust forward,
I strutted towards Pierre in rhythm with the drummer’s beat. I closed the distance
between us, reminding myself I was the girl in the platinum wig and black mask. I
could see his Adam’s apple bob. At three feet away, I placed a gloved finger between
my teeth and pulled off my glove with one tug. I tossed it over my shoulder as the
crowd behind me erupted. Then I pulled off the other glove, this time spinning it
in my hand. Inches
from Pierre, who was now grinning, I reached out and gently slapped him with it, once,
twice.