Open log - The Candlelight Club

[una_persson]

Who: Everyone and anyone. Talk to Una, talk amongst yourselves, flirt, bicker—your choice.
What: Just an ordinary night out for the good people of West End.
Where: the Candlelight Club, a small, not-very-skeevy cabaret that (like many, though not all others in town) is a sort of neutral zone for the various law enforcement and criminal operations. (The owner will not take anyone's shit and has been known to throw people out for being jerks.)
When: A night in early fall.

An evening at the Candlelight Club usually started with some kind of a comedy act, or maybe a magician, to warm up the crowd. Then Miss Persson came on and sang; she always finished with "Someone to Watch Over Me". And after her was the act that a lot of the men came for—the fan dancers, Trudie, Suzie, and Lucie. (Una was fairly certain those weren't their real names, but she got along with them reasonably well. Though she never told them she had been a Ziegfeld girl; Lucie's envy in particular would have been too much to bear.)

While the dancers came on and did their burlesque, Miss Persson made her way out into the club to chat, socialize, and charm. If it so happened that people were doing careful sleight-of-hand with flasks under the tables, neither she nor anyone else noticed, or admitted to noticing.

Comments

[una_persson]

She managed to not flinch at the question. "Nothing you'd have heard of," she lied. "I came over from England at the invitation of a cousin in Boston, but once I got there—well, let's just say I didn't realise how hard she and her husband were to get along with these days." A slightly over-theatrical eye-roll. "So I moved to New York, but you know how it is—a tiny, tiny sprat in such a huge pond. So I came here."

Almost none of it was true, but the story was so well-rehearsed that she almost believed it.

[truth_is_cold]

For a moment, it was hit or miss over whether he'd rise to the bait. It wasn't his investigation, and it wasn't his business; or so he'd tell himself. It kept him from getting too invested in a woman that he could tell was a heart-breaker.

But then he went for it, anyway. "New York is a tough sort of town. I can see why you'd want to get out of there."

His fingers itched for his drink, and he kept from going for it. His mouth felt a little dry.

[una_persson]

"It's much quieter here," she agreed, "and for once, I don't mind that one bit. Well, quieter for someone like me, anyway. Not so quiet for you, apparently." A raised eyebrow. Of course, she had him figured for some kind of tough—so many men here, it seemed, were up to no good in one way or another. Gary didn't seem to be one of the truly dangerous ones—just a bit of muscle, maybe. Cleverer than he let on, though, she thought.