Chapter Text
Jeff parked outside the strip club and eyed it dubiously. It was an anonymous brick cube off the highway with a small sign that read “Phantasies”, and even in his clubbing days he had preferred classier joints. But he was here for business, not pleasure, so he locked his car and went inside.
The warmth, perfume, and music hit him all at once; Jeff grabbed a chair near the door, hoping for a breeze. The club was barely occupied in the midafternoon. A couple women performed on stage while a few more chatted or prowled the floor. Some shell-shocked looking frat boys hovered near the buffet, and a businessman sat at the bar, pouring out his troubles to a blond who pretended to listen and a bartender who didn’t bother. No sign of Jeff’s client anywhere.
“No, thank you,” Jeff told the pair of boobs at eye level that approached him invitingly. They didn’t go away, so he ignored them and focused on his phone. I’m here, he texted. Where are you? More firmly, he said, “I don’t need a drink or a dance.” The owner of the boobs still didn’t budge.
“Don’t freak out,” she said quietly.
Jeff looked up. His jaw dropped. “Annie?!”
“That’s right. Annie Oakley!” Annie – Annie Edison, his Annie – posed in front of him, dressed as a cowgirl. A sexy cowgirl in a ten-gallon hat, tiny denim skirt, and a giant belt buckle recursively decorated with another sexy cowgirl. “Did you bring your six-shooter, Buffalo Bill?”
She gave him a warning look. The belt buckle cowgirl had a saucy wink. Jeff blinked. Neither disappeared, so he wasn’t dreaming. He asked blankly, “What are you doing here?”
A spurred and stiletto-heeled cowboy boot slammed onto the edge of the chair between his legs. Jeff jumped. Annie purred, “Looking for the Hole-in-the-Wall gang.” She leaned forward deeply and Jeff tried not to stare right down the barrel of her highly supported, gingham-wrapped cleavage. She got close enough to lick his neck and hissed, “Take out your wallet!”
Numbly, Jeff obeyed. She plucked it from his fingers and rose, winding her hand into his tie. “Private room?” she said loudly. She cast a glance at the bartender, who nodded curtly. “Follow me, cowboy.” She swung her hips and towed him off the main floor.
They turned into a short, dark hallway. When Jeff attempted to speak she gave his tie a swift tug and he coughed instead. Annie keyed in a code, then pulled him into a small cubby-style room containing a single chair, an iPad connected to a speaker, and velvet curtains on every wall. The door swung shut, instantly cancelling the sounds of the club.
Annie pushed Jeff into the chair and straddled his lap without touching him. Her lips buzzing in his ear, she whispered, “Pretend to be into it,” and flicked her eyes to a camera mounted in the corner. She wriggled away from him and tossed her cowboy hat at the camera. It missed. She turned on the music and inevitably, Big & Rich’s Save a Horse began to play.
Jeff’s mouth was desert-dry as Annie slowly unknotted her checked shirt and sent it flying after the hat. Once again, it missed its target. She unbuckled her belt. He balled his hands into fists and converted to five or six different religions simultaneously as she sinuously unwound her wrap skirt and then flung it aside. She stood there in cowboy boots, a black thong, and a bra constructed of complicated crisscrossing straps and geometric lace. Jeff, trying strenuously to seem into it but not too into it, into it the right amount, the amount he could plausibly walk back later, didn’t immediately notice that the small piece of fringed denim had landed squarely over the camera’s eye.
Annie stopped reaching for her bra buckle and was all business in an instant. She put her finger to her lips and pulled aside a curtain to reveal a second door. Jeff followed her through it into a back room, which was seedy in a practical way. There were lockers, task-lit builder-basic mirrors over makeup tables, and sound-muffling carpeting. Annie unzipped her boots and kicked them off. She unlocked a locker and took out a phone in a glittery case and a long coat, which she donned directly over her strappy bra and thong. Jeff caught glimpses of photos taped inside the locker door – Annie smiling, holding a toddler. Annie and a handsome man. She closed the locker and pushed open an exit door.
In a moment they were in the parking lot, and the cold, highway-fumed air felt like a slap in Jeff’s face. He was grateful for it. “What’s going on?”
“Where’s your car?” Annie demanded, ignoring the question.
Jeff led her to the front lot and unlocked his Lexus. Annie hopped into the passenger seat and slid down, getting out of sight. She pulled a second phone from the pocket of her jacket and dialed. “I might have been made. I’m not sure. It’s a go on the contingency plan. Yeah. No, I’m safe. Thanks.” She hung up. Jeff took the driver’s seat, uncertain what to do.
Across the lot, the handsome, burly guy from Annie’s locker unfolded from his car and stormed into the strip club. Annie waited a minute and then made a call on her glitter phone. “Hi! Gary?” she listened. Jeff could hear tinny shouting through the phone’s speaker. “Yeah, that’s my ex. He’s a real jealous piece of shit. I heard him coming and snuck out the back.” Something crashed. “I’m sorry. I’ll make up for it. I have to go make sure my kid is okay.” She listened some more. “What, the private room guy? Yeah, he’s gone too. Don’t worry – he got what he came for.”
She clicked off the call and buckled her seatbelt. “Drive.”
“Where?”
“It doesn’t matter, just go.”
Jeff started the engine and pulled away. Automatically, he turned towards home. “I didn’t know you were back in Greendale.”
“No one was supposed to.” The smell of Annie’s sweat and skin filled the car. Jeff was surprised he could recognize her scent underneath the heavy cocktail of strip club perfumes, but he could.
“So you have a kid now?” he asked.
“A two-year-old? A child I gave birth to two years ago, when you saw me nearly every day? That’s part of my cover.” Annie scowled. “You just wandered into the middle of an FBI operation, obviously!”
“And the other photos. Those were fake too?”
“These are real.” Annie squeezed her boobs through the trench coat. Jeff swallowed. “Why do you think I was the agent in there? Now we have to regroup. God damn it. What were you doing in a strip club, anyway? That’s gross, Jeff.”
“An old client called and said he wanted some off-the-record advice!” Jeff defended himself. “If he wants to write a four-digit check for an hour of my time, I’m not going to argue about the venue.”
Annie sat upright, her eyes burning. “What’s your client’s name?”
“Corby. Jason Corby.”
Annie burst into a tiny, strange, delighted, dance. “That’s our fish!” Annie typed an address into her second phone and put in on the dash. “Drive here. Now.”
Jeff followed the map app’s spoken directions. Annie unceremoniously pulled out her pigtails and wiped off her lipstick with the back of her hand. Jeff leaned across her at a red light, unbuckled the glove compartment, and passed her a packet of Jaxon Lane face wipes. “It’s nice to see you, by the way.” He was unable to resist a quick glance at her bare legs. “Really nice. I missed you.”
Annie barely swallowed a reluctant smile. She covered her blush with a face wipe, and muffled, said, “It’s nice to see you too.”