Mafia Kings: Roberto: Chapter 72

The night was not going well.

A first-time customer had gotten angry when Bai, one of the submissives who worked for me, refused to have sex with him.

Bai had gotten scared and pressed her panic button. I immediately came in with two bouncers.

I explained to the customer that this was an establishment with no sexual contact and that he was required to keep all activities to BDSM practices with no penetration.

Technically, ‘no sexual contact’ was a half-truth. It was up to the sub or dom whether they wanted to have sex with customers – but only off-site. Never inside the club.

I was 99% sure that Lau would keep the cops off my back, but I was still paranoid. After all, I’d nearly lost everything the night After Dark got raided.

I tried explaining Hong Kong’s laws to the customer, but he didn’t want to hear it. He was German and started ranting about prostitution being legal in Germany.

“This isn’t Germany, sir,” I said politely.

At that point, he became verbally abusive towards me –

Which sealed his fate.

I told him he would get a full refund but that he was to leave the premises immediately and never come back.

That made him even angrier –

So I had my security guys subdue him.

I tucked the 40,000 Hong Kong Dollars the German had paid (about $5000 US) into his pants pocket, took a picture of him with my phone as he screamed obscenities at me, then had my bouncers escort him down the elevator and throw him out in the lobby half-naked.

After that, I had my assistant put his name and picture on the club’s digital blacklist.

Incidents like this happened about twice a week. Always with men, never with female customers. And 90% of the time, it was Westerners: Germans, French, British, Italians, Americans.

Never Canadians, though. Canadians were unfailingly polite.

Actually, most of my Western clients were well-behaved. But there seemed to be a very small, very vocal subset who were not. Like the German, they were entitled, demanding, and rude… and usually resorted to anger and physical threats when told ‘no.’

Dealing with those sorts of men was part of the job, but one I could have happily done without.

So I wasn’t in the best mood as I was crossing the main floor of the lounge area…

And he stepped deliberately into my path.

By the looks of him, he was Italian. Taller than most men who came to De Sade. With his expensive suit and dark, slicked-back hair, he looked like a banker or someone in finance.

He was also very handsome.

I was struck by that, even though I wasn’t particularly fond of Westerners at the moment.

“Hello,” he said with a slight smile.

His voice was attractive, too. Deep, but not too deep.

His accent was American rather than British, although it was tinged with a cultured European lilt.

When he stepped in front of me, I stopped in surprise.

“Oh – hello.”

“I had to come over and meet you.” His charming smile deepened as he extended his hand. “My name is Roberto Rosolini.”

I’d guessed right about the Italian part.

The man was a customer, so I needed to be welcoming –

But to be honest, I didn’t exactly have to force a smile.

I shook his hand. “Chan Mei-ling.”

“That’s beautiful… does your name have a meaning?”

I sighed inwardly.

Almost every Western male always asked that.

They must have heard that Chinese names had literal meanings, so they always inquired – and apparently thought that no other man had ever asked.

After the 5000th time, I wished they would just ask me about the weather instead.

“‘Beautiful spirit’ or ‘beautiful bell,’ depending on how you wish to interpret it,” I replied. No matter how handsome he was, the conversation wasn’t off to a scintillating start, and I had to get back to my duties. “Mr. Rosolini, I – ”

“Call me Roberto,” he interrupted. “May I buy you a drink? Say yes.”

I really didn’t have time for this.

“Mr. Rosolini – ”

“Say yes,” he repeated in a different tone.

“I don’t – ”

“Say yes,” he said with a slight smile and a sly look.

His repetition of the phrase triggered a memory.

During my vacation in Thailand – before the final, dramatic night in Bangkok – I visited a mountain city called Chiang Mai.

On the third day there, my boyfriend wandered off to run an errand.

While I waited for him at a roadside café, a little Thai boy no older than six came walking up with ten red carnations.

He was one of hundreds of street urchins I’d seen during my trip: kids who sold flowers and tchotchkes to tourists to help support their families.

At first, I was shocked that children that young weren’t in school, but it became a depressingly familiar sight.

He was dressed in dirty shorts and a grubby t-shirt, but he gave me a movie star smile as he held out a flower. “Ten baht.”

He was only asking for the equivalent of 30 cents, but I had no desire for a carnation.

“No, thank you,” I replied.

He repeated the phrase again, but in a different tone of voice – like, Come ON, it’s a bargain! “Ten baht!”

“No, thank you.”

He tilted his head to the side and said, “Ten baaaaaaht,” like the price was nothing – a mere pittance – so how could I possibly refuse?

By that point, I had started to smile a little. “No.”

“Ten baht!” he said with a shrug, like Who could resist THAT?!

“No,” I said, but now I was laughing.

“Ten… baht.”

Come ON, lady. I’m giving you the deal of the century here.

I kept saying no, and he kept using different tonal variations with slightly different meanings. He never repeated the same one twice.

“Ten baht?” Are you SURE you’re going to pass on such a great deal?

“TEN baht!” Not 20 baht – not 30 baht – it’s only TEN baht!

“Ten BAHT?!” Oh my goodness – can that price even be RIGHT?!

By then, I was snorting with laughter. My resolve was weakening.

He grinned and showed me all his baby teeth.

“Ten BAHT!” You know you want this carnation, lady!

At that point, I broke down and gave him 100 baht – $3 US – and took all ten of the flowers. I also gave him another 100 baht so he could buy some candy or a toy.

The sight of him skipping away down the street was one of my favorite memories of the trip.

That, and his repeated variations of Ten baht?

The Italian’s boyish charm called to mind my tiny salesman from Thailand, and I laughed in spite of myself.

Why the hell not.

A drink would take the edge off of dealing with the German.

“…alright. Just one.”

“What would you like?” he asked.

“Jiangbei knows.”

I looked over at Jiangbei. She gave me a nod as she began to fix my usual.

Then I saw Han by the bar, smirking and looking like his usual assholish self.

Ugh.

I suddenly felt no desire to socialize.

Still, I had already agreed to a drink…

And maybe I had misjudged the Italian. He seemed pleasant enough.

“Why don’t we sit?” he suggested.

“I’d love to,” I said, and led him to one of the booths set into the wall.

I made some small talk, but it soon became apparent that the Italian wasn’t the best conversationalist. He seemed lost as to what to say – like a schoolboy who hadn’t learned how to talk to girls yet. I could see the wheels spinning in his head as he tried to figure out his next sentence.

I felt for him, but I was also a little bit annoyed.

My job required me to make all my customers comfortable. I was the one who always alleviated everyone else’s anxieties upon entering De Sade.

If a man was going to hit on me, the least he could do was not make me carry the conversation – no matter how handsome he was.

Luckily, Jiangbei interrupted the uncomfortable silence when she set down my drink.

“Thank you,” I said in Cantonese. She nodded and walked away.

Now that the Italian had something new to discuss, he seemed relieved. We talked about the cocktail for a moment until I asked, “So – what is it that you do, Roberto?”

He paused. “I’m in finance.”

Just like 75% of our Western clientele.

I forced a polite smile. “We have quite a few customers in that field.”

“So you work here?”

I was the manager and part owner, but I didn’t feel like getting into the details. “In a manner of speaking.”

The Italian opened his mouth – closed it – and then opened it again. “I…”

The tongue-tied schoolboy was back.

I waited for him to figure out what he wanted to say.

Maybe You’re so beautiful.

Which was nice, but after hearing it for the 10,000th time, it became a bit stale.

Or I really love Asians, which always made my skin crawl.

Or the worst of both worlds: You’re so beautiful… for an Asian.

Unfortunately, that was something I heard at least twice a month.

He hit me with something that wasn’t nearly that offensive – although it was offensive, and depressingly common.

“How much would it be to spend the evening with you?”

Which was a Westerner’s way of asking, How much do I have to pay to fuck you?

I kept a smile plastered on my face, although inwardly I was angry. And tired.

I wanted to say, I’m the manager of the club.

I’m not a streetwalker.

You can’t BUY me.

If you want that, go to the red-light district.

But I didn’t.

I did, however, allow myself a tiny little twist of the knife when I answered.

“You don’t have enough money to spend the evening with me, Mr. Rosolini.”

He looked shocked.

Then he got a look in his eyes – the look of a rich man who was accustomed to being able to buy whatever he wanted.

Whomever he wanted.

I recognized it in the eyes of the German I’d just thrown out.

“What about $10,000 per hour of your time?”

I knew he expected the amount to impress me –

Although he was thinking of US dollars.

In Hong Kong dollars, he’d only offered me $1300 US – the base rate for one hour with one of our newest, most inexperienced subs.

Still, $10,000 US an hour was impressive –

If it hadn’t been for the fact that his offer turned my stomach.

His entitlement –

His assumption that I could be bought just because I was in the club (a club I ran and part-owned) –

All I could do was scoff at him.

“No, thank you.”

That seemed to piss him off.

“I don’t understand – you said that you work here, did you not?”

Not as a prostitute, you ASSHOLE.

“You said that,” I replied. “I said, ‘In a manner of speaking.’”

His irritation notched up a couple of levels – just like the German had reacted when I’d walked into the room. “So what does that mean, exactly?”

Prostitution is legal in Deutschland! Vy not here?!

I’d had enough, and I was tired of playing the consummate hostess to powerful men who thought they could have anything they wanted.

“It means I own De Sade, Mr. Rosolini.”

Okay…

Not precisely true.

I was a part owner with only a 10% stake.

But telling him I was a ‘10% owner’ didn’t exactly carry the same rhetorical oomph.

The truth would have made him laugh at me –

And I would have ending up throwing my drink in his face.

So a little white lie was better.

He looked embarrassed.

In fact, his expression made me feel a little bad about how I’d reacted.

“…ah… I apologize. I’m unfamiliar with the club and how things work around here.”

Suddenly I didn’t feel so bad anymore.

Like NOT knowing how things work is an excuse.

Foreigners had to know our traffic laws before they drove in Hong Kong.

Or tried to bring a gun into the country.

Or any of a dozen other things.

But put a rich Westerner in a club like De Sade, and he just assumed everything was for sale – and that it was your responsibility to educate him instead of putting in the effort himself.

“You could have asked,” I said. “Instead of assuming.”

And just like the German, the Italian became irritable.

“Alright, let me ask you this,” he snapped. “You seem to have taken offense that I assumed you work here. But what’s so wrong with that? You own the club; surely you value your employees and their work. What’s so wrong with someone mistaking you for an employee?”

“I assume from your expensive suit and Rolex that you’re very successful in finance, Mr. Rosolini. Am I correct?”

He looked at me warily. “I have the means, and I like to dress this way, so I do.”

“But you are very successful at your profession, are you not?”

“More or less.”

“How would you like it if a visitor mistook you for an entry-level accountant?” I asked.

“It wouldn’t bother me in the slightest.”

BULLSHIT!

No Westerner we’d ever thrown out of De Sade had been so humble.

They always screamed variations on Do you know who I AM?!

Usually it was, Do you know how much I’m WORTH?!

As though money was everything.

“Given the status and wealth you project, I find that hard to believe,” I said.

He gave me an unfriendly smile. “It’s a family business, so it’s not like I’m the CFO of a major corporation. If I were mistaken for one of my very few employees, all of whom are excellent at what they do – as I said, it wouldn’t bother me in the slightest.”

…hm.

Clever answer.

“Let me change the question, then,” I said. “How would you feel if someone asked you to fetch them coffee? Or do some other menial job?”

“So you consider your employees’ work to be menial?”

He was good at arguing, I’d give him that…

But I wasn’t in the mood to be argued with.

Especially after the German.

“No… but when I’m the owner, and since my employees’ work is sexual in nature, I don’t like to be propositioned for whatever it is you think you can buy me for, Mr. Rosolini.”

He looked flustered at my reaction. “I wasn’t – ”

Before he could continue, I stood up abruptly.

“Since this is my club, and since you didn’t actually pay for my drink, I think our time is at an end.” I gave him a fake-as-hell smile. “You’re welcome to ask any of my employees what they’re willing to do, but I would advise you to ASK… rather than assuming you already know. Good evening, Mr. Rosolini.”

And I turned around and stalked off.

My blood was pumping, my adrenaline was up –

And I’d actually said what I wanted to say instead of playing the demure little flower.

I didn’t realize it at the time – it took about ten minutes for me to get over my anger –

But I’d actually sort of enjoyed the interaction.

It was far more interesting than being asked what my name meant or being told I was beautiful.

And he had been quite handsome.

Too bad he was an asshole…

Just like all the rest of them.