Chapter 1
John Carrol leaned back in his swivel chair, and looked over his desk at the tall, full-fleshed stripper who was slowly coming to her feet. Her green eyes challenged him in a way to leave little unsaid in describing the spectacle of her act before the patrons of the Jay-Cee Club-or her appetites, off-stage.
Long, flowing blonde hair cascaded over her broad shoulders, shining with golden high-lights as she tossed her head. Her full lips, stretching in an ample smile over white, even teeth, were teasing, provocative with their promise of generosity. She stood, now, to her full height ... just a shade short of six feet.
The magnificent, thrusting bosoms struggled against the tight confinement of the cream nylon blouse, in turn prisoned at the woman's tiny waist by a wide, leather belt. Carrol, thought she looked entirely the personfication of the stage name she used: Goddess Golda; however, she'd asked him to call her Frankie, when she introduced herself.
"I'll show you," she said, the husky, intimate quality of her decidedly bedroom voice which had instantly snagged his attention coming into his office, producing another sympathetic reaction along his nerves. "I'll show you how I make the marks come in for more-and still more of the Goddess. There's nothing I don't do to please the customers!"
"Moonlighting with the customers isn't allowed, here," Carrol said, more coldly than he felt. It just wasn't possible to look at Goddess Golda without some sort of automatic, physical reaction. Hers was the sort of body which made a strip act highly profitable for John Carrol's type of club ... if he were lucky enough to find bodies like hers possessed by girls who could use them in a show.
Several years in the business had taught John how to judge a female the moment she walked into the office. When his secretary, Norma Blake, had ushered Frankie in, John had already made the decision to hire her. But, the formalities were necessary; though John could see with half an eye that every movement this girl made was shrewdly calculated to generate a highly-charged aura of sex.
At the words concerning going with the customers, Frankie shook her beautiful, blonde head, without rancor. "I don't play footsies with the customers, Mr. Carrol, except on stage."
"Oh?" he responded, ears quick to catch the emphasis on the word 'customers.' It wasn't subtle he knew, but he also knew that nothing about this girl was. She came on full-bore. Nor was the idea an original one. Many a stripper had offered some fun and games on the side to the boss. But John (who, with his wry sense of humor, always thought of himself as a 'straight man' in a shift of meaning for the term) had never been remotely tempted, until now.
Now-with the heat of the argument he'd had with Alice (his wife) earlier still rankling inside him ... the lithe body of the beautifully-endowed female before him blurred in focus....
When he approached the subject with Alice, John had been careful to choose his words. It was one thing to hear rumors about your wife and another man ... but quite another thing to consider, having no proof. For three days he'd tried to convince himself that his wife would not turn to another, but the more he'd thought, the more logical the idea became. Owning a night-club occupied his evening hours. Since the other man happened to be a playboy and a former friend of his wife's, these facts implied much insofar as opportunity was concerned. Then, being fully aware of his wife's jealous nature ... there was just no way John could avoid asking the question.
He'd been up most of the night. The drinks he'd taken in the closing hours of his 'duty' tour at the club had lulled him to sleep when he crept into bed. Impulse had urged him to wake Alice and demand an answer, there and then. However, being married to a woman for five years had educated him. So, he waited.
At breakfast, close to noon, John asked his question, casually, looking across the table at the slender, brown-haired woman who shared his bed. He believed he loved her-at the time of their marriage-although the basic motivation for their wedding was her contention that she was pregnant by him. This had turned out to be untrue. She wasn't pregnant by him or anyone else. However, time had glossed over the error and their marriage, considering everything, John felt, had been pretty good. Five years of it.
"I hear you're seeing Carl Denver," His eyes watched closely for Alice's reaction.
Her look stabbed toward him as the light-brown eyes read his question back to her. She frowned, then replaced the expression with a smile, quickly. Too quickly for John's peace of mind.
"Oh-he's an old friend, Johnny," she said, as if that explained everything. To John, it missed by a country mile.
"I hear that you're seeing a lot of him," John persisted, quietly, continuing to check her reactions closely.
"What are you suggesting?" Alice asked, angrily, her body stiffening and the knuckles of her slim hands suddenly white as they grasped the edge of the table.
"Why? Why, Alice?" he continued, quietly. He knew now that the rumor was correct. She had been seeing a lot of Carl Denver-she was having an affair with him. It was strange, he recalled, he could feel nothing at the knowledge. He felt-detached.
Alice's body held its rigidity for a long moment then, suddenly, tears began to streak her cheeks. "I-I don't know how it happened, Johnny. I don't, really, know. Just-well, you continually at the club-always with girls-I never see you ... Well, Carl came back and I-well...." Her voice trailed off and quickly a change of expression went over her features. They seemed to sharpen and the heat of anger and pain flared in her eyes. "Damn it all! I know about you and that Blake woman! And-and about all those other girls ... why am I on the witness stand? I don't question you, do I? What gives you the right ... so, I had an affair? What difference does it make?"
Still detached, John rose and moved to the front door. Alice leaped after him, running into his arms.
"John-John, please forgive me!" Her arms strained frenziedly about his neck, her eyes were pleading behind the tears which fell from them.
"Alice! For God's sake. I don't know what's gotten into you, but this ... this is just too much! Our marriage hasn't been the best, right from the beginning. It started with a lie. How do I know how many other men there were?"
She jerked back as though he'd slapped her. "John-you have no right. I said I was sorry. I'll never do it again-it was finished a couple of days ago!"
John had merely shrugged, the detached feeling persisting. He was conscious of experiencing no emotion. The drinks the night before, the long hours of sitting, wondering if the rumors were true and, now finding that they were ... It was difficult to feel anything for the woman he faced. His wife.
And yet-there were five years of marriage between them....
"I've never touched another woman since our marriage, Alice," he said, quietly. "I've told you this-time and time again. What you did is unforgivable, to me!"
It was then Alice flew into a rage and, before John could get through the front door, she hurled a book at his head, frenziedly. He quickly slipped out the door and traversed the stone path to his car.
A couple of jolts of whiskey under his belt had smoothed out the irritating jangles in his nerves when he arrived at the club....
... John's eyes brought the tall, blonde stripper back into focus before him. He had the odd impression he'd been sitting, thinking for a long time, but a glance told him it couldn't have been long. Perhaps a minute to scan, mentally, an important moment in his life. One moment which might wreck five years....
Frankie Robbins moved, then, and the action captured John's complete attention. It was a swift movement of hands, arms and nylon as the blouse slipped gracefully away from her magnificent breasts, over her head.
Then it was she rolled her mobile hips, uttered the characteristic stripper's cry to urge on excitement, and snapped a hard bump at him, her breasts trembling with impatience as they fought against the restraint of her bra.
Lowering her blouse to a chair, Frankie teasingly, challenged him with her great, green eyes, hot with suggestion as she dropped her fingers with exaggerated slowness to the zipper of her skirt. He could almost hear the music in time with the rotation of the smooth, roundness of her hips, the while the skirt slowly made its way down over all the rounded shapes until the pink panties, snug and enticing, emerged. Kicking away the skirt, her arms went overhead as her routine of bumps and grinds went into high gear. Lips parted and shining, tongue flashing constantly across the scarlet surfaces and eyes sparklingly enticing, she was-in an instant-a lewd goddess, dancing a pagan, jungle rite.
For a moment, John sat, fascinated by the artistry which the tall Frankie unleashed with just a few, basic motions of her spectacular body. Strippers, he knew, were rare who were true artistes and could provide spectators with the real, animal sex excitement the true artiste could evoke. Strippers were a dime a dozen who peeled with the professional air of having done it for a thousand and one nights ... because they had to get undressed to go to bed, anyhow. They were a glut on the market-usually frustrated dancers who couldn't make it and turned to stripping as a last resort.
Frankie Robbins-Goddess Golda-wasn't one of these.
Her hands slipped up to the cups of her bra and it looked, even to John's experienced eye, as though it were the touch of a thousand masculine hands-hands which enjoyed every titillating moment of the contact. The lush, wide-mouthed lips blew a moist, scarlet kiss in his direction and John wished it were the real thing.
Despite himself, the girl was inducing a growing reaction in him. He attempted to crowd it down as being unprofessional. He always had ... he prided himself on being nothing if not professional and business-like. He never used the club as a playhouse; never turned auditions into sex parties and, among the performers who knew the Jay-Cee Club, his name was good as gold. No girl ever got into his club on her back; no performer every stayed on his bill who didn't please the customers. John looked at a lot of bad performers, true, but most all the good ones made a bee-line for his place when they came into town.
Frankie was not alone in the ability to generate sex like a dynamo creates electricity. He had seen many, despite the low percentage in the overall classification of stripper. John had never allowed himself the privilege of violating the show-business discipline ... never look at an audition with a smile or with an expression that was anything other than coldly business-like. With John, it was a business-and a good one. It was his aim to keep it like that.
Suddenly another thought crossed his mind. What difference did it make if this magnificent broad did turn him on. His own loving wife had invited another man to share her urge for sex....
John suddenly watched those beautiful, voluptuous hips as they moved to the music, playing in Frankie's head. And with each suggestive bump, grind and jerk, he felt the erotic appeal of her grow along with the excitement which was throbbing within him.
Frankie, with a motion that was so graceful it hardly seemed to have happened, released the catch at the back of her bra and it slipped from the beautiful, huge globes as though of its own volition. The nipples were bright cherries, riding on tight mounds of pink which jerked and twitched with every motion, fascinating, hypnotizing. Her hands slid beneath them lovingly, to cup and lift them, offering them as though to the kiss of a lover.
John's imagination, coupled with his surrender to Frankie's magic had grown to painful proportions and he fought against the urge to move for comfort's sake. He also crowded down the equally urgent desire to move around the desk and take advantage of the situation. Frankie's actions in stripping before him with no request for an audition, left little room for doubt as to the outcome of any advance he might make.
Now, she was uttering little grunts and moans as her great bosoms rose and fell as if in the grip of irresistible passion. The savage goddess was caught up in her own frenzied spell and the rite was moving to its climax.
Despite himself, John moistened his lips with his tongue, wanting to look away, but not daring to move. It was then that Frankie began her move to round his desk with a grinding action of the flashing hips calculated to drive men to a peak of desire. Both arms flew upward as she let out a wild yell and then she was standing but a foot away from him, motionless, hands on the fantastic hips and looking down at him, calmly, her expression quizzical.
"Well, Mr. Carrol, what do you think of the sample?" she asked.
"Better than most," he grunted, ungraciously, fearful his voice would betray the state of his emotions if he tried to say more.
"That's all?" Frankie asked, big eyes widening in irritation.
"No!" John managed a small laugh, although he had no wish nor reason to laugh. "You'll do. Report to Miss Blake, tell her to assign you to a spot on the bill tonight. And, if there's anyone else waiting, have her send them in, would you please?"
The girl looked at him for another moment and then shrugged, the little motion making her bosoms dance invitingly.
"If you ever want a private show, just let me know," Frankie said, beginning to get back into her clothing. "It bugs me, not being able to get a rise out of a man...."
"What makes you think you didn't?" John asked, his eyes meeting hers.
"Oh ... then I did get to you?"
"Let's just say 'yes' ... and let it go at that," he chuckled, now feeling like laughing at himself. "And let's say you did a very good job."
"Now, I'm glad," she smiled, easily, blowing him a kiss. "You know, everybody I've talked to says you're alright, Mr. Carrol...."
"Just make it Johnny," he cut her off in friendly fashion. "We don't go too much for formality around the club. Makes the customers feel more at home-if you want to call it that!" John felt safe in standing now as Goddess Golda resumed her blouse and skirt, still exhibiting a totally innate grace as she finished restoring her clothing to its original chic appearance. As she draped her light sweater across the wide shoulders, John suddenly felt a little shaky. It would have been no problem at all to make a pass at Frankie Robbins and she'd certainly have run with the ball. She confirmed this as she picked up her bag and leaned one luscious thigh against the edge of his desk.
"Well, John," she said, arranging the drape of the sweater beneath her long, golden hair, "if you ever want me to do something-special-keep in mind I have nothing against it." John wondered how many times he'd heard the offer and in how many different choices of words. He sighed, relieved, as Frankie left with her inviting smile; her invitation still floating on the almost imperceptible suggestion of her perfume....
Norma Blake, John's secretary, came into his office and John found his eyes travelling the lines of her lissome figure with a heightened appreciation; noting the high thrust of her breasts in the always-proper business dress which flowed so easily around her body. Norma was an extremely attractive woman, a widow for eight years, and a good friend. Norma was the sort of woman he could talk to....
"Just one more," she said, easily, "a singer by name Terry Anson." Norma brushed back a lock of black hair from her forehead as rhe stopped by the desk. "Nice-looking, redhead, about five feet five of spectacular figure. If she sings as good as she looks, she ought to be a smash and-what's the problem?" Norma broke her thought as she picked up the existence of John's disturbance.
Her percipience never failed to shake him-and please him-and he experienced the mixed emotions as he looked up into her frowning eyes. He shrugged.
"It's-it's a personal thing maybe I'd like to talk about, later. Don't quite know. Alice and me. Would you get me a bottle of Scotch from the bar, Norma?"
She nodded, smiling warmly and the lights in her eyes spelled out more than friendship. John had known for some time that Norma loved him. He felt she was the kind of woman a man could love-the right man, at the right time.
In a characteristically swift and graceful motion, she spun on one spike heel to head for the door, the full skirt swirling up to reveal the smooth columns of exceptional legs. While not the sex-bomb Frankie Rob-bins was, Norma had something that few strippers ever had-or wanted, for that matter-refinement. It was no asset to a stripper, but to Norma, coupled with her sensitivity, and understanding and her ability to care about people, it was a pleasurable thing, especially to John. He enjoyed it in her to the point of delight.
No sooner had Norma vanished than the door reopened and a bouncy redhead entered, closing the portal behind her. There was something shy, something haunting about her blue eyes and the full-to-pouting sauciness of her mouth but, in the assurance and poise with which she crossed the room, hand outstretched in greeting, there was no shyness; it was the confident act of a true professional.
"I'm Terry Anson, Mr. Carrol," she said, "and I'd like to work for you as a singer." The voice was low and just touched by a faint huskiness. "If you'll give me even a try-out, I'll be more than willing to make it worth your while."
John's breath squeezed in his throat as he rose to shake her hand, tiny in his and, as she leaned across the desk, the pressure of her fingers intimate, he could not escape the smooth swelling of her breasts and the dark, mysterious valley which lay between them. Suddenly John's mouth and throat felt dry and hot.
He had received the message-from where he had no definite idea-that Terry Anson would do anything he asked her, just to secure a spot in his show. What Terry didn't know was that John had just been exposed to a tremendously effective operator in the area of arousing sexual desire in the male animal. A spark would set him off like it would a gas-filled room.
He resumed his seat, waving her to a chair, and tried to think of something other than the total attraction of the woman's provocative body. He also tried to sweep into a dark corner the smoothly-controlled brazenness of her offer; the fire which had sparked deep in the innocence of her blue eyes as she offered whatever he wanted in return for a chance.
John tried, desperately, to think about his wife; instead his errant thoughts went to Frankie Robbins. Then he tried for Norma Blake in a panicky effort at orientation away from the sexuality which pulsed in the room between them-but the image of Terry Anson before him, with her manifest innocence and her subtle promise, wrecked the effort. At that moment, John realized that, if something weren't done with his marriage, he'd go into the arms of Frankie Robbins, of Terry Anson and of Norma Blake with the pent-up frustration of five years of what he recognized (in a flashing instant of perception) was a totally unsatisfactory relationship with Alice. In the backwash of this ebbing realization, he knew he was but a step away from leaving his wife....
Shaking his head in an attempt to order his tumbling thoughts, John was appalled at the change in him. Over the years, he'd had many an offer of sex from women desperate to advance in show business. Until this morning, he'd never realized what a powder-keg he sat on in this office, and a vague understanding that, somehow, Alice had sensed it, came into focus. Maybe, he thought, he should give her a chance to explain further her reasons for her affair with Denver. Perhaps he just didn't realize the tremendous pressure of her provocation-maybe they should begin again....
John never finished the thought. His eyes had begun, once more, to caress Terry's voluptuous figure; a body which, with a deep and painful hunger in his loins, he wanted to see bare before him. He knew he had only to ask. She'd told him so....
But John also knew this was no way to run a business. The most important thing, he thought desperately, closing his eyes for a moment, was that Terry Anson sing-sing well-because, no matter how good she was in bed, it was no recommendation for a spot on the Jay-Cee Club's show. The panic within John convinced him that all he needed was a small push, and he'd fall over the out-of-bounds mark. Even before his marriage, John had never 'played.' A couple of girls-both love affairs-but, never for kicks.
And never anything like this woman, sitting beside his desk; nor nothing like Frankie Robbins ... both of them so packed with sex attraction it surrounded them like a perceptible aura....
"Tell me about yourself, Terry," he heard himself saying, struggling for composure, "and let's see what we can work out." With a tremendous effort, he leaned forward to place his forearms on his desk and smile reassuringly into the innocent and exciting blue eyes ... a tremendous effort which comforted John a little in his agitation. At least he retained some control over himself and, over the surging, pounding turmoil in his loins, he felt a light film of relieved perspiration cool on his forehead....