Plata (2 page)

Chapter 5

The next afternoon was cool and gray, and smelled of acid rain. Enzo escorted Madison along the upscale pedestrian street in the Zona Rosa, passing sushi restaurants, patio bistros, clothing boutiques, and hip bars. Enzo had phoned ahead to arrange the audition. Madison held tight to his arm. She was so nervous, she kept forgetting to breathe until finally her lungs burned and her head began to swim. Even worse, her whole body trembled, as if there were a humming machine inside her. Enzo could feel it, too.

“I know, sweetie,” he said, patting her hand. “But you’ll be great.”

The entrance to The Gentlemen’s Club had grand white columns, and a foyer with expensive floral arrangements, and a huge crystal chandelier. Outside, two serious men in navy blue suits stood guard. Enzo led Madison to an unmarked metal door on the side of the building and knocked. Madison felt as if all of her blood had gone cold until the tips of her fingers and toes were numb. She took in a deep, deliberate breath, as a short man with a wispy moustache opened the door and gestured for Madison to come inside. Enzo gave her a kiss on the cheek and a little pat on the butt.

“I’ll be in the café across the street,” he whispered. “Now go knock ‘em dead!”

With a pit in her stomach, Madison followed the little man down a clean, tiled hallway and up a back staircase to a large room he called the camarino. There were rows of lockers toward the back. A vanity counter ran along the width of each end of the room, with long mirrors and plush stools tucked beneath.

“Do you have a tanga?” the little man asked Madison.

She crinkled her brow. There were few Spanish words she didn’t know, and this was definitely one of them. “What’s a tanga?”

“A thong,” answered a flat, nasally voice in English from somewhere behind her.

Madison turned to find a middle-aged woman with a bouffant hairdo and a gaudy mask of makeup sitting in an elevated, glass-encased kiosk in the middle of the room. Festooned around the windows were velvety dresses, fake rhinestone chokers, and a rainbow assortment of thongs.

The woman gazed out with a sour face, lids heavy under fake lashes. Her eyebrows were wide, arcing pencil marks that gave her a look of surprised disgust.

“If not, I sell you one for a hundred pesos.”

“That’s Beba,” the short man explained. “She’s the house mother.”

Madison gave Beba a sheepish smile. “I don’t have a tanga.”

Beba didn’t smile back. Instead she took down the thong of her choice, stepped through the door, and tossed it at Madison.

“One hundred pesos.”

The little man told Madison to take off everything except the thong, and to wait there. Madison stared at him. She looked back at Beba, who’d returned to the kiosk and was shuffling through a mound of paperwork. This was really happening. She was down the rabbit hole. Convinced this whole scheme was a bad idea from the start, Madison turned toward the exit, ready to flee. Then an image flashed in her mind: her mother curled up on the frozen lawn, out of her mind. Madison closed her eyes and took a breath. I can do this, she told herself. I
have
to do this.

As soon as the little man left, Madison self-consciously disrobed under Beba’s relentless glare. She tried to move slowly and confidently, as if she’d done it a hundred times, carefully folding her clothes and placing them in a little stack on a love seat. She slipped on the thong, realizing with horror that her pubic hair grew well outside the bikini line. This was one detail Enzo had forgotten. Embarrassed, Madison sat down on the love seat and crossed her legs.

She waited for a long time. The room was drafty, which made her all the more aware that she was practically naked. Occasionally, a glamorous looking woman would wander in to freshen up her makeup, or get a piece of gum from her locker. A pale young man with orange-dyed hair arrived with a makeup box, and set up at the end of one of the mirrored counters. One woman rolled into work late. She was beautiful and dark-skinned, with strange wide eyes. She settled onto the stool next to the man. Both of them stared at Madison in the mirror.

Madison had never been naked in front of strangers before, and she couldn’t help feeling that she was having one of those childhood dreams where she’d forgotten to get dressed before going to school. But she tried not to let it show. She leaned into the sofa cushions, constantly crossing and uncrossing her legs. She studied her fingernails and tried to look bored. Occasionally, she even forced a yawn. But she found it was hard to look nonchalant while wearing nothing but a red thong.

Finally, a very poised, middle-aged man whisked into the room. He had dark, receding hair, and wore an expensive suit. Her first instinct was to cover her breasts, but she stopped herself. He approached her with his hand extended, so she stood up.

“Simon,” he said, shaking her hand as if they were in a corporate boardroom. “Manager of operations.”

“Madison.” She felt her cheeks burning. Be confident, she told herself. Confident, confident, confident.

Simon nodded brusquely and took several steps back. He looked Madison up and down. “Turn around,” he commanded.

She turned in a perky little circle, holding her arms out like a bird. He walked around her, studying her body as if it were a used car he was thinking of buying. With another quick nod, he strode out of the room. Madison stood there blinking, unsure of what had just happened.

“Put your clothes on, madre,” Beba’s disdainful voice piped in from the kiosk.

Madison quickly pulled on her clothes right over the uncomfortable thong, desperate to be covered again. Just as she was pulling on her shirt, the short man returned.

“Simon said you looked good. Come at two o’clock tomorrow afternoon. You’ll need at least three dresses. Elegant. Nothing trashy. Be ready to go onto the floor by two thirty.

He turned and bustled toward the door, then remembered something and stopped.

“Oh,” he called across the room. “And he said you need to shave.”

There were titters from the woman and the makeup guy, and Madison went scarlet.

“Do you have a bag?” Beba asked, stepping out of her kiosk with a small black purse dangling from her hand. “One hundred fifty pesos for this.”

“A bag?” Madison asked, dazed.

Beba rolled her eyes. “For the plata, madre,” she said. “For the money.”

Chapter 6

After Madison found Enzo at the café, he took her shopping again. This time, they bought three form-fitting, ankle-length gowns, and a pair of black strap stilettos. Madison held up the shoes and furrowed her brow.

“How am I supposed to walk in these?” she asked, with genuine anxiety.

“You’ll get used to it,” Enzo said with a grin. “Put them on tonight and practice.”

He topped off his Madison renovation with a quick trip to the neighborhood spa for a bikini wax, which she hated almost as much as the audition itself. By the time they were finished, she was exhausted, but Enzo convinced her to join him for a drink at their old hangout, Mama Rumba.

“You simply can’t go to bed looking like that,” he exclaimed. “Let’s take you around the block a couple times.”

Madison and Enzo had spent many evenings at Mama Rumba during her school year in Mexico City. It started out as a little hole in the wall with graffiti-covered walls, a tiny dance floor, and a statue of St. Lazarus on the bar. Old Cuban musicians would line up against one wall and fill every nook of the place with classic salsa, cha cha cha, and rumba, as Madison and Enzo would cram onto the dance floor, squeezed up together until they could barely move. It was so successful, the owners expanded until Mama Rumba was a sprawling, two-story club with a large stage that held a full Cuban orchestra.

The place was packed, but the doorman waved Enzo and Madison past the line. Enzo grabbed her hand and pulled her toward the bar. And just like the old days, Enzo immediately ran into some gorgeous hunk he once screwed or wanted to screw.He would then whisk Enzo off into the crowd, and Madison wouldn’t see him again until the end of the night. This time it was a tall guy with fashionably disheveled black hair and a tight neon green tee shirt. Madison sighed as Enzo flittered an apologetic wave before being swallowed up by the mass of bodies.

Madison pushed her way to the bar, taken aback by how many men stepped aside to let her pass, as if she were the Queen of England. They muttered things at her and begged her to dance, but she just politely shook her head and continued along. When she finally reached the bar, she was relieved to see that Beni was still tending bar. She’d spent so much time in the place back in the day that he began to call her his baby sister. But when he looked her way, there was no recognition in his eyes. Still, he ignored the shouted requests and made a beeline for her.

“What are you drinking, gorgeous?” Beni asked her. He had dark skin and perfectly symmetrical Caribbean features. His hair was close-cropped, which brought even more attention to his glorious face. He knew that most of the women clinging to the bar were simply trying to get his attention.

“Beni, it’s me.” Madison pointed awkwardly at her face. “Madison. As in Madison and Enzo.”

Beni blinked at her for a moment, trying to take it in. Then he let out a bellowing laugh and grabbed both her hands.

“Madison! What the hell? I didn’t know you were back! Look at you! What happened to you? You look like a movie star!”

Madison blushed and squeezed his hands. “It’s really, really nice to see you, Beni.”

“Whatever you’re drinking is on the house,” he shouted, slapping a cocktail napkin down in front of her.

Madison ordered a beer, but Beni made her a vodka tonic instead.

“Beer will give you a paunch,” he quipped with a wink. “You’re too pretty now for a paunch. You’ll thank me later!”

Madison made a face, but accepted the drink. The band launched into a popular song, and a cheer surged up from the crowd. Beni jumped onto the bar and began to dance, making the cluster of women squeal. Madison sipped at her drink, feeling the vodka warm her insides as she watched Beni dance. He held his arms out to the sides as if he were about to launch into flight, and swung his pelvis in wide, loose circles.

“What a showoff,” said a voice behind her.

Madison turned around. She caught her breath, and her heart leapt into her throat. A stunning, dark-haired man stood at the bar with a couple of bills in his hand. Madison recognized him immediately from the Mexican soap opera she used to watch,
La Vida Salvaje
. He’d played the romantic lead, Esteban, a wealthy estate owner whose fiancée is kidnapped by drug lords. It was the only soap opera Madison had ever been hooked on.

She tried to keep her composure, looking up at the spectacle on the bar. “Yeah, Beni has no shame.”

As if on cue, Beni smiled down at her and blew her a kiss. They watched as he swung around and did a few salsa moves on the narrow bar. Then he wiggled his butt, which made the female patrons whoop and yell.

“If we ever get our bartender back,” the actor said, turning his body so that Madison’s shoulder was pressed up against his chest, “can I buy you another drink?”

“Beni never charges me for drinks.” Madison was surprised by the flirtatious lilt in her voice.

The actor’s eyes shamelessly rolled over her body, from top to bottom, and back up again. “Of course he doesn’t.”

She contemplated telling him what a big fan she was, but she knew that would tip the balance in his favor. He came up to me, she told herself.

“Your accent sounds Cuban,” she said.

The actor gave her a broad smile. His teeth were TV perfect. “So am I.” He took the glass from her hand and took a sip. She could tell by his confidence that no woman had ever been offended by this presumptuous move. “And your accent is…well, I have no idea.

“American.”

“Really! Your Spanish is perfect!” He handed back the drink and looked up in desperation at Beni, who had pulled a woman onto the bar to dance beside him. “I’m not getting a drink tonight, am I?”

Madison shoved the vodka tonic back into his hand. “What do you want? I’ll get it.”

“Just a beer, but…”

“Corona?”

“Perfect.”

She slipped through the bodies huddled near the bar and made her way to the end, where she dipped under the counter, just like old times. Beni turned to look at her as he swung his hips and swayed side to side. He gave her a go-for-it smile. She went to the refrigerated cabinet and pulled out two Coronas. Then she popped off the caps and headed back to her actor.

“You are a good girl to know,” he laughed, taking the beer. “I’m Daniel.”

“Madison,” she replied, clinking her bottle against his.

They took a long drink, holding eye contact until they’d finished the first sip, as is customary in Mexico. They were jostled about and the music blared, but even after the long sip they still held the gaze. Madison shivered a little, and butterflies exploded in her stomach.

“Madison,” he said in a low voice that she somehow managed to hear over the din. “You are something else.”

She smiled and took another long sip of beer. It was surreal to see that face, those seductive eyes that had helped his character bed at least four different women on the show in the time Madison was watching. And now they were trying to bed her. It was almost too much to believe. She felt a hand on her arm and someone spun her around. It was Enzo.

“Let’s get out of here,” he said, breathless. “My ex is here and he’s looking for me. Apparently he wants to break my nose. Can you imagine?”

“Why?” Madison asked impatiently. She glanced at Daniel, hoping he wouldn’t take it as a cue to leave.

“You know, stupid rumors. He thinks I slept with his current boyfriend just to get back at him.”

She gave him a look. “Did you?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. Let’s just get out of here.”

Without another word, he pulled her through the crowd. She turned to see Daniel sadly watching her go. Madison gave him a little wave and mouthed “I’m sorry.” He nodded and held his beer in the air to say thank you. The next thing she knew, they were out in the street. It was a cool night and the air smelled of smoke and grilled corn. A group of drunken revelers spilled out of the club singing at the tops of their lungs.

“That was Esteban from
La Vida Salvaje
!” Madison hissed to Enzo. “He wanted to buy me a drink! Can you believe that?”

Enzo pulled Madison close, his arm tight around her shoulder. “I know Daniel.”

Madison gaped in amazement. “My God! How do you know him?”

Enzo shrugged. “I know all the Cubans worth knowing in Mexico City.”

He guided them in the direction of home. Madison was exhausted so she let her head rest against his arm. He kissed the top of her head and sighed.

“Look, doll,” he said, the usual playfulness gone from his voice. “Now that you’re one of the hot chicks, you’ve got to start looking out for the wolves.”