heat hard on the performers but it kept customers away, too.
Vi hoped it wouldn’t come to that. She had bills to pay, and with the recent uptick in prices thanks to everything a girl might want—like shoes, fabric, coffee, and even bacon—being rationed, she couldn’t afford to miss a single night of work.
A cadre of sequined, giggling dancers careened into her, enveloping her in a cloud of stale sweat and cheap perfume. Vi let them pass, too exhausted and drained by the heat to insist on the courtesy of letting her go first, which was due to her as one of the show’s stars. She huffed a bitter laugh at the thought. Star? Sure . . . Star of a two-bit vaudeville whose claim to fame was naked chorus girls. Oh, how the mighty have fallen. Her younger, more idealistic self would’ve been incensed if she could see Violet now.
Chasing the thought away and wanting nothing more than to get back to the boardinghouse so she could soak her aching feet in Epsom salts, she pulled back the drape to her dressing room and then stopped in alarm.
A burly figure stood by her vanity, idly turning a fedora in his hands. He stared at the scarred surface as if the secret to immortality were scrawled there. Then he glanced up, and Vi’s skin goose pimpled at the lust in his dark eyes.
She swallowed hard, her near nakedness no longer feeling so benign. “Tony, long time no see. What are you doing here? I thought you were working in California these days, keeping those Hollywood director types in line.”
In her more naive days, before she had started working at the Palace, she had thought the repeal of Prohibition some twenty years ago had rendered the Mob irrelevant. She had been wrong. Like a veritable cockroach, it had merely moved on to more hospitable surroundings, namely the entertainment business. And not just the more adult types of entertainment, such as striptease and prostitution. She had soon learned that there was hardly a movie palace or cinema left in America that didn’t answer to the Mob in some fashion or another. Hollywood itself had been forced to fall in line, often paying significant amounts for the “privilege” of having their films screened before a paying public, with an additional fee being collected by the Mob for each ticket bought.
With the war on and citizens desperate for an escape from reality, the venture had turned out far more profitable than bootlegging had ever been.
“I was, but I had some business to attend to here in town, so I thought I’d stop by and see my old friend Lily Lamour.” A slow smile spread across Tony Vecchione’s thick lips as the fedora stilled in his hands. “Look at you, Lil. An angel come down to earth.” His black gaze glittered dangerously as it slid over her body. She barely repressed a shudder. He was dressed flawlessly as always, the starch in his collar points heavy enough to withstand the terrible humidity. But in the incandescent glow of her dressing lights, his olive skin glistened with sweat from the heat. She also noted that, despite the late hour, his jaw lacked its usual dark shadow of beard stubble, which meant he had recently shaved, and likely for her. Nausea built in her stomach at the implication of that.
She forced herself to move forward. “Such pretty words, Tony, but I’m afraid you’re wasting your time if you’re hoping for sex. I only have time for my career these days.”
“So Sal said.”
“Then why are you here?” It took all her acting chops to walk nonchalantly past the Mob hit man, but she managed to pull it off and reach her vanity before her knees gave way. She collapsed onto the small stool and turned toward the mirror.
He laughed. “Who said I was only lookin’ for sex?”
“That’s what you wanted the last time we chatted.” Her fingers trembled as she wiped off her stage makeup.
“Ah, Lily,” he said with another low laugh, using her stage name like everyone else in Chicago. She glanced at him in the mirror, not wanting to make eye contact but also afraid not to. He was the very definition of terrifying. “Is that why you invented that jealous boyfriend to keep me at arm’s length? And yes, I know he was made up. I checked around after I left.”
“It seemed the prudent thing to do.”
“It was also unnecessary, because you misunderstood my intent.”