Babe tossed and turned her body up to Boyd and Buck as they caressed her big firm breasts and groped between her smooth legs, reaching far up under her skirts. She was their toy for the night and she delighted in being the center of interest between two such strong and handsome men. The dim candlelight flicked shadows across the room as other couples moaned and groaned on the couches. Violent, passionate music drummed out the sounds of the orgy and left each grouping in a confinement of their own lust.
Babe luxuriated in the flowing sensations that fired her blood, she was intoxicated with a craving, a searing need that flashed throughout her silken flesh. After tonight she'd no longer be a virgin college girl, that special freak that had come to Greenwich Village as the new girl. She'd be in, initiated and would belong to the crowd. Boyd's rough hands roamed demandingly over her firm flesh. Buck searched into the intimate depths of her clothing and fingered the moist lips of her young body.
Vi and Vance staggered over to them. They'd been divided for the nights games alphabetically. Vi was a young blonde with a lush figure, she stood unabashedly naked before them, her arm hooked around the broad neck of Vance and her other hand worked freely over his brutishly masculine body. Babe opened her eyes and stared through the dim to the naked couple that weaved over her couch and appraised the lovemaking of the twin brothers.
"Get with her, boys! Break her in nicely," Vance muttered. He and Vi staggered away, their nude flesh glistening in the dim.
Boyd looked at the tortured grimace on the lovely face of his prey. Buck was sucking on Babe's nipples, her dress front lay open for his brother's hot lips. Babe's eyes were screwed up tight in a passionate grip. Boyd pushed open her fleshy thighs and gripped the elastic band of her panties and pulled them off. Her stomach trembled in anticipation, corded and tensed for his exploratory fingering.
Boyd shoved the wrinkled dress up over her soft, round belly and gazed in lustful admiration at her writhing torso. Buck impulsively tore his shirt from his chest and ripped his trousers down. He fell, breathing hard, with his hard muscular, hairy body over her smooth pliant form.
"This is what you've got to take ... " Boyd grumbled as he wrestled with his shorts. He pulled Babe's hand down and stuffed it between his thick thighs. "Feel it!" he cried proudfully.
Babe groped over Boyd's tensed stomach, her grasping, nervous fingers hungrily searching for his passion packed flesh. She bumped into his steeled, blunt masculinity that throbbed in her hands. Fear gripped her, a shiver ran through her as she questioned how this feat could be accomplished. Boyd was so large, larger than a wild stallion, she thought. He'd rip her in two, tear her apart.
Buck's questing, wet lips compulsively sank over her breast and suckled her nipple; he pinched and plucked the free nipple from her shimmering breast. An electric fire prickled throughout her stimulated flesh. She groaned and stretched open her legs for Boyd's swirling, arched lips. Who cares?, she thought. It's got to be good, it's got to be worth it if Vi and all the girls could do it, want to do it. Why shouldn't she?, she questioned herself.
Boyd gripped his savage protuberance and aimed it at Babe's yawning thighs, he stabbed experimentally and then ram rodded himself in deep, ruffling up her fluttering belly. Babe screamed a high, piercing cry and fell back moaning in pain.
"Stop! Stop it!" she sobbed and locked her thighs over his pumping body.
Burning friction tore through her with a painful, searing anguish that doubled her up. Her punished body flamed in torment. Tears ran down her checks as she rained blows upon Boyd's face and shoulders. She scratched out, her nails like talons clawing at his fierce body.
"Hey!" Boyd snarled, dodging her hands.
"Aw! Come on Babe!" Buck growled and held her back by the shoulders, reluctantly leaving her bouncing breasts.
"Let him in again-it won't hurt so bad this time. It'll start feeling good." Vi solaced and gripped Babe's bucking, struggling, hips. "Give it to him!"
Vance pulled her legs unlocked and Boyd slowly inserted into her swampy body again. He grinded in gradually, pressing himself past the gnarled, tight button and soared into the flames of her body. She cried and moaned as he increased his lunges gliding easily into her.
"You like it, hon?" Vi asked, loosening her grip. "Getting good, Babe?"
Babe only moaned and held her breath as the monster power of Boyd mashed up inside her and crashed into the depths of her pain wracked body. Liquid fire shot through her veins at every insertion. She cringed and tensed her body against his frantic, forceful plunges. Vi pulled her other leg out, opening Babe's body to Boyd's attack.
"Relax, hon-make it good for him and you'll get the kicks, too ... " Vi murmured admiring the sleek muscular body of Boyd and his tremendous, tumescent extension.
Babe sank defeated to the bed, giving up her body to their will, to their demands. Her own passion was killed by the first tearing of Boyd's massive, muscled up power slicing into her. Take it all, she thought. Have your fun, it's no good to me. She bounced limply from each of his bombastic blasts into her raw body and moaned, stifling her sobs against Bucks suckling lips. It's no good, no damn fun! she thought as Boyd's insistent body buckled over her and his breathing became heavier.
"Babe! Babe!" Boyd gasped. "It's getting g-o-o-o-od!" his body trembled in the cramp of erupting passion.
"You like it, hon? How's it?" Vi panted, caught up in Boyd's lust. "Work on it for him, hon! Meet him!" Vi cried. Vi nestled up alongside of Babe's body on the couch, she cupped one of Babe's breasts and squeezed it hard, molding the nipple between her sharp nails. "Did it hurt?" she moaned. "Did he hurt you goo-o-od?"
"It hurts ... " Babe sobbed.
"He's so big!" Vi was gleeful. "You're lucky to have that for the first time-any girl would love to have it!"
A hot pain shot deep into Babe's body. She moaned, groaned and cried out from the unbearable agony as Boyd slashed down and fell shattering her body with a shower of staccato stabs. He snarled, his body snapped down and he collapsed shuddering over her; his wet body shaking wet droplets of sweat from his damp muscles.
"She's open now ... " Boyd sighed and fell back.
"Not a virgin anymore ... " Vi muttered. "Oh, hon-I wish I could go through it for the first time once more!"
Buck bounded down between Babe's legs, he settled on his knees in front of her and started to strip. He quickly disposed of his shirt and dropped his trousers. Vi raised up and reached for his bulging shorts. Her hand curled lovingly over Buck's flaming loins. With an anxious snap she tugged the shorts off his thighs and his tremendous, torrid, flesh shot free, flashing with an angry, red lust.
Buck instantaneously fell forward over Babe. Babe curled up in a tight knot, her body shivering in fear, "No! No more! Please!" she cried.
"Give it to me!" Vi threw open her thighs, her breasts jellied to her chest. "She's chicken-I can take it!"
She reached for Buck and tugged him by his stiff projection to her craving body. Buck raised his hips and slashed down with Vi's hands guiding his descent into her willing body. Buck settled deep and rebounded for fast plunges. Vi moaned in gratification and worked her hips, raising her knees, to receive his furious blasts.
"Mm-m! You boys are built the same! O-ah! It's so-o-o good and big-g-g!" she sighed and settled back pulling Babe's face near her. "Tell me, hon ... Tell me how it was the first time. How it felt ... How it hurt ..." Vi whispered fervently in Babe's ear. "Tell me!" she gripped Babe's flushed face to her ear, her face contorted as Babe derisively, in an intoxicated stupor, murmured the vivid details of her first time.
Buck soared into the air and smashed ruthlessly into Vi, she winced and tossed her body back up. The mattress sank with the weight of his pounding body in incessant, fluid drives. Vi moaned, arched her pelvis up for the pleasures of his plummeting body and collapsed with a gasp under him.
Babe drew back and crawled off the couch seeking her clothes. Vance grabbed her and pulled her up against his sweaty body. Babe cringed from his mauling hands and struggled away from him. He followed her and whirled her around to face him. She attempted to tug away.
"Look, Babe-you got no excuses now ..." he pressed his lips on hers, his hands crawled up her arms and latched onto her swaying breasts.
"Please-leave me alone ..." Babe whimpered.
"You're not the little girl virgin anymore," Vance insisted and dropped his lips to hers.
The warmth of passion flowed renewed through her veins, but a shiver of the memory of pain caused her to repulse him. Babe shoved him back to a bed where the disturbed couple cursed in the dark and returned to their copulating. She grabbed her clothes and sauntered into the toilet to dress. As she looked in the mirror she saw that her face was white and strained. She combed her hair and readjusted her dress.
"You don't like men, do you honey?" a dark woman murmured from the door.
Babe appraised the intent face, surly mouth and hostile eyes of the taut, little woman. She was wearing levis and a black turtle neck blouse that fully revealed her hard figure. The woman gave a cold smile and moved over to Babe.
"I-I shouldn't have come ..." Babe muttered. "Maybe-maybe I'm not ready for the Bohemian life," she laughed nervously.
"Maybe you're not ready for Bohemian men," the women emphasized. "The men are all dirty apes ..." she pulled Babe into her arms. "You've been raped. What you need is love-tenderness. You're a passionate woman, ripe, ready ..." the woman's face became flushed, her words fell as hot gasps on Babe's smoldering face. "Let's get out of this den-go somewhere and have coffee. I know a little expresso shop you'd like ... "
Babe allowed her to lead her from the dim room with its gyrating bodies that gleamed with sweaty passions, all lost in their lusts. They tumbled down the rickety stairs and out into the cold. A vicious, breath taking, cold wind blew off the Hudson River and whipped and lashed around the old buildings. Their breathing fogged up in the night, like work horses on the farm back in Maine, thought Babe.
The banks of sooty snow were iced and slippery as they trudged down the cobble stoned alley. Yellow glows illumined the hallways of apartment houses that shadowed the narrow little street. A barren Christmas tree, shredded of needles, but still retaining its tinsel was a frozen skeleton in a pile of garbage in the gutter.
"I'm Fleet ..." the woman stammered through stiff, chilled lips. "Flecia-Fleet, they call me. Martin is the last name ... "
"I'm ..." Babe began to stutter.
"I know," Fleet abruptly replied. "I know all about you. I've been interested since the first day I saw you in the book-store."
Fleet took Babe's arm and pulled her onto a broader, brighter street that winded off towards the park. They stumbled against couples rushing into the wind. With the cold wind at their backs they were pushed into the crowded sidewalk. By a rusty iron railing, Fleet tugged at Babe's arm and they descended into the basement. Under the stoop of the house was a small neon that burned and sputtered the letters spelling MACS MAKESHIFT.
Inside the room there was a cozy warmth radiating from the open pot bellied stove, its sides a flaming, glowing red. A long bar stood at the entrance with a cash register and the gleaming pots of expresso. Lined along one side of the room and crowded in the window nook were tables covered with red and white checked tablecloths. The oiled floor was strewn with dirty sawdust. Music, progressive jazz, blasted from a juke box in the rear that flashed abrupt changing color of lights, casting weird reflections over the gaunt faces of the solemn girls in the room. Babe suddenly was shocked that there were no men in the place at all.
"This is our place ..." Fleet said and sat against the wall. "I hope you'll like it."
Babe noticed that the tensions left Fleet's face as she settled down and glanced around the room. She had a pretty face, tight skinned, dark eyes that now flashed brightly, with high cheekbones and firm chin. Her lips were well shaped but thin for her face; a healthy glow from the cold winds now flushed her complexion.
Fleet smiled to herself as she watched Babe's quizzical eyes roam hesitantly over the room. Babe's long red hair fell to her shoulders, her green eyes seemed dulled and tired, but a small, relaxed smile wrinkled her cheek. Without any make-up on, Babe was a beautiful young woman. Her firm, young body was sheathed in a heavy green tunic length sweater, but the lush breasts protruded temptingly as did the outline of her provocative figure.
"You're a lovely woman-a lady ..." Fleet murmured admiringly. "What were you doing at Vi's party?"
"Why were you there?" Babe countered.
"Because you were to be there-your first time ..." Fleet looked away.
"I-I suppose I was lonely. I didn't fit in-I've tried but ..." she dropped her eyes.
"You're not their type," Fleet blazed. "I was furious at Vi for getting you involved ... "
"Oh, no-it wasn't her fault. I-I wanted to go. To break the ice. I've been missing so much. All the girls at college told me-and-and I had to do it," Babe defended.
"You been missing something-but you didn't get it with those studs!" Fleet reprimanded. "You ought to have known better ... "
"If I'm going to be an actress I've got to have all kinds of experience ..." Babe retorted. "I need experience ... "
"Who sold you that bill of goods?" Fleet queried. "I've seen some of the best actresses-and they didn't have to go to orgies to get experience."
"But, I've never-never ... " Babe stammered.
"Never had sex before? Never felt fully a woman?" Fleet questioned, staring into the frank, wide eyes of Babe.
"Well-no. No, I'd never ..." Babe uncomfortably dropped her eyes to her nervous hands. "I'd never let a man ... "
"What about a woman?" Fleet blurted out.
"Oh, no!" Babe became flustered. "What do you mean?"
"Ever been to bed with a girl-a woman-ever?" Fleet insisted.
"Certainly not! That is perverted!" Babe stammered.
"Look, honey-I'm perverted then. I like them both-men and women. Maybe I prefer women ..." Fleet mused eyeing Babe's beautiful body. "I know that I like you-like you that way. and I was ready to kill those young studs raping you ... "
"It was my fault. Something was wrong ... maybe I wasn't in the mood. Maybe they weren't the right type for me ... " Babe excused with a toss of her head.
"Maybe you're a lesbian ..." Fleet's cold eyes stared at Babe. "Or, like me-you like both sexes ... "
Babe was silent with indignation, her green eyes glared. Fleet scraped her chair back and sauntered over to the counter for two expressos. She moved back to Babe, greeting some of the girls on her way.
"Try this-it'll take the chill out of you," Fleet placed a cup in front of Babe and moved her chair around beside Babe's. She dropped her arm intimately over Babe's chair back, her fingers played up and down on Babe's neck. "Then we can go over to my place and ... "
"I-I better get home. I've got to make the rounds tomorrow-I've got an appointment ... " Babe deferred.
"You're scared. Of me-or, of yourself?" Fleet demanded.
"You're not trying to make me are you? I mean-you're not interested in me sexually?" Babe stammered out, her face hot and flushed, her nervous fingers trailed over the steaming cup of coffee.
"I'm interested in you, Babe ..." Fleet responded tenderly. "It's up to you what happens. I don't like labels-I don't like to be categorized."
"Would you be mad if I-if I didn't go with you?" Babe asked.
"Disappointed. I'd be very disappointed-and frustrated." Fleet leveled. She dropped her hands down to Babe's fingers and held them tight. "You'd be frustrated, too. You're frustrated right now-nervous and ... "
"But, I've-I've had sex ... " Babe protested.
"No you haven't-you've been used. You didn't get a damn thing out of that rape Boyd gave you. I know-I saw ... " Fleet gripped Babe's fingers. "I was the same way the first time."
"You won't understand ..." Babe insisted.
"Yes I do. and if you don't want to come home with me it's all right. I'll understand," she released Babe's hand. "But, if you do-it's up to you. I won't do anything that you don't want me to ... "
"I'd better not ..." Babe raised the cup in her shaking hands and scorched her mouth with the hot brew. "Whew!" tears fell from her eyes. "Oh-h!" her whole body shook as the tension broke and she convulsed in Fleet's arms.
"Oh, you poor baby ..." Fleet sighed and took Babe in her arms.
"I haven't got a friend in the world ..." Babe wailed.
"Yes you have-just don't start feeling sorry for yourself," Fleet admonished.
"You don't really like me-you're after something-you only want to have sex with me!" Babe cried.
"Hush up, Babe!" Fleet whispered fervently.
The girls in the room stopped and turned to watch as Fleet tried to comfort the near hysterical young woman. There was an awkward silence, even the juke box was strangely silent as all eyes turned on Babe. The square, mannish manager strutted over and tapped Fleet on the shoulder.
"I don't want no trouble. Take your pick up out of here-she doesn't belong," the elderly woman grumbled.
"She's not just a trick," Fleet snapped. "But, she's upset ... "
"I'll say she's upset. If she's on dope we can't have that kind of thing in here ... " the elderly woman continued.
Babe felt the room swirl, she was dizzy, her embarrassment grew into a hot, sickening sensation. She gripped onto the table and clutched onto Fleet. Her nerves were shattered, her senses reeled.
"Get her out!" the elderly woman ordered.
"Where you live, Babe?" Fleet held her up. "Where?"
"Anywhere ..." Babe mumbled, she was conscious of the smirks on the faces of the girls in the room. "Any damn where-it doesn't matter ... "
On the outside the chilly blast of cold wind sobered Babe, her mind became clearer, the world straightened out. She clung onto Fleet, the warmth of Fleet's friendly arm around her shoulders was comforting. She didn't mind the stares of passersby. She was sick, sick of being alone, she was sick and in need, in need of love, some loving. She didn't care if it was a lesbian that held her trembling body, she just wanted to be loved ...
CHAPTER TWO
Babe alighted from the taxi and followed Fleet into the lobby of the Artist Court building, a new apartment building on the northern line of the Village off Fourteenth Street at the Hudson River. Its gleaming, cold white brick was a frozen tower out of the blackened snow banks and dirty warehouses alongside the elevated River Drive. Their heels sunk into the carpet and Babe's body melted into the drowsy warmth of the building. Fleet anxiously led her to the elevator, pressed a button, the door snapped shut and they zoomed up to the twelfth floor.
Babe was amazed at the luxurious apartment. It didn't go with Fleet or rather Fleet didn't fit into the apartment dressed in levis. Dim indirect cove lighting illumined the entrance hall. A big fireplace blazed at one end of the living room. The lights of Greenwich Village sparkled brightly up into the night leaving a darkened rectangle at the foot of Fifth Avenue in Washington Square seen through the glass wall that opened onto a snow covered terrace facing east.
Fleet pulled open the fire screen, poked at the logs and dropped to her knees on the soft rug by the fireplace. Babe settled uncomfortably on the huge white couch that faced the fire. She was sorry that she'd come with Fleet and she didn't know how to get out gracefully. The glow of the fire highlighted the angular cheeks, sharp and high cheekbones, of Fleet's face. Fleet's eyes were warmed by the fire and deepened to a dark blue.
Suddenly the door to the left of the fireplace sprung open and in strode a dark, young man. He wore a Japanese Hopi coat tied loosely about his nude body and was barefoot. Fleet jumped up and greeted him with a friendly kiss. She pulled him over to Babe.
"This is my husband-my sometimes husband ... " she murmured. "Lance Martin. Lance, this is Babe Peters ... "
Lance brushed the tousled hair out of his eyes and took Babe's hand with a firm shake. His bright eyes surveyed Babe's body quickly, he smiled open and friendly, "You're the best thing she's ever brought up here, Miss Peters."
"I-I'm glad to meet you, Mr. Martin ... " Babe stammered.
"Lance is his name," Fleet interjected. She turned to her husband, "You got company?"
"Um-m!" he nodded with a wink. "Old college chum, Dr. Woodrow dropped by for a little fraternity. I just popped out to make sure that you weren't burglars invading the ole homestead."
"Well, don't leave your guest alone-that's inhospitable!" Fleet laughed and pushed her husband towards the open door.
"Glad to have met you ..." he beamed and slowly closed his door with a wink at Babe.
"He's a nut-but we get along," Fleet smiled tenderly to Babe. "I guess you would call it an understanding-a marriage of convenience ... "
"He seems nice ..." Babe muttered, studying her hands and not daring to look up at Fleet.
"You're tired-let's hit the sack ..." Fleet offered.
"Hm-m?" Babe's face shot up nervously.
"Get to bed. You said you had early appointments. The young actress must get started ..." Fleet smiled.
"Not-not yet ..." Babe almost pleaded. "If you don't mind."
"What about some coffee-real coffee-and a brandy? It'll make you sleep good ..." Fleet rushed off to the kitchen.
Babe sat in the quiet and searched the room, her eyes lighting upon the wall of paintings: a mixture of nude young men and women. She glanced out at the soft snow, falling gently in the night and looking so clean and pretty from this height; but cold, bone chilling on the outside and she was so far from home and it was so late. A shiver shot through her, she moved nearer the fire and was warmed by the fiery glow from the logs.
Suddenly there was a strange squeaking sound from Lance's ominous door, followed by a mingle of male moans, growls and groans. Babe inched back to her seat on the couch and stared into the flames trying not to hear the disturbing noises. Fleet reappeared with a steaming pot of coffee and brandies.
Babe quickly reached for her cup of coffee and sipped her brandy, hoping that the hot black liquid and the burning clear liquor would calm her nerves. Fleet sat beside her and Babe felt the warmth of her nearness. Fleet placed her arm over the back of the couch and gradually let it slip down so that it rested on Babe's shoulders. Babe allowed herself to relax back and be nestled close to Fleet.
The sounds from Lance's room had subsided, all was quiet in the living room except the popping and snapping of the logs in the fireplace. The snow drifted lazily down outside the window. Fleet reached for Babe's hands and lifted up Babe's face towards hers.
"Let's go to bed, darling"; the older woman spoke softly. "Tomorrow is another day ..." there seemed to be some implication in Fleet's last remark.
"Tomorrow seems to be here ..." Babe demurred.
Fleet pulled Babe to her feet, "Let's go to sleep ... "
Babe fell into the woman's arms and sighed comfortably, "I am-I am so tired ... "
"You've had quite a night," Fleet responded, leading her to the bedroom to the right of the fireplace. "It's been quite a night for us both ... "
Fleet snapped on the lights; her bedroom was flooded with a pink glow by two lamps on either side of her bed. She swung open the bathroom door and glided open her closet. Then she turned to Babe standing shyly in the doorway.
"Come in, honey," Fleet implored. "Pick out a nightie and the bath is in there. You won't be disturbed ... "
Babe reluctantly closed the door, automatically pulled out a sheer nightie from the closet and followed Fleet's directions to the bath. Fleet smiled to herself and crossed to the bed. She sighed wearily, stripped the shirt from her shoulders and tugged her levis down.
Standing in front of her bureau mirror Fleet surveyed her naked body. Her dark hair was boyishly cut, her eyes dark blue and her complexion was dark. She had firm breasts, a tight body, with shapely legs. She tried to imagine Babe again, naked and now in the shower. Her pulse pounded at the mental scene, a vein raised in her forehead and her face became flushed.
Fleet reeled from the mirror, pulled on a chemise and sank back to the bed. Her breath came in nervous, anticipatory pants, her breasts rose and fell on her chest. Her whole body was fired at the thoughts of having Babe in bed with her. Her mouth ran dry, her palms became moist. She raised up and lit a cigarette, watching and waiting for the bath door to open.
Babe stripped in the bath, neatly hanging her clothes on the convenient hanger and stepped into the shower. She loosened the handles and let the water spray over her tired body. In the reflection of the glass shower enclosure she was delighted with her appearance. Her big breasts stood up firm, jellying on her chest in suggestive quivers. The pink of her smooth skin reflected the outline of her voluptuous hips and shapely legs. Babe had always admired her body, she had always feared what a man would do to it, to her. Now, bitterly she thought back to the anguish of the awful party at Vi's.
The warm tingling spray created a sensual sensation flowing through her veins, over her silken flesh and at the same time, brought a relaxing glow to her body. She sudsed her breasts and felt the tingle grow in her nipples, she rubbed the suds over her belly and between her thighs. The suds trickled off her breasts, ran down her stomach and foamed out from between the bronzed bush between her fleshy thighs, running down the curves of her long legs.
Babe stepped exhilarated from the shower and saw her radiant form in the full length mirror. Standing nude she reached for the hair brush and with long lingering strokes, brought a bright glint to her red hair. Lost in reverie she wasn't aware that Fleet stood entranced in the door.
Babe grabbed a large towel and cringed behind it, her eyes flashing defiance, "You shouldn't sneak up!" Babe's breasts pressed against the towel with her heavy breathing.
"There's no need for shame-no need to hide yourself. You are beautiful-and I've seen you naked before ..." Fleet said.
"Don't remind me!" Babe blurted. "Please-I'd almost forgotten."
"It doesn't matter to me-it's a part of your experience. You can put it behind you and forget it. I shall if you like," Fleet offered.
"I wish I could," Babe wailed.
"Do you?" Fleet mused. "Or are you being melodramatic? It looked to me like you'd forgotten while you were looking at yourself and combing your hair."
"I was thinking back-back home-and to college ..." Babe responded. "I used to dream of being in New York, being a model and an actress. and now-here I am. It's not like my dreams," she dropped her head.
"It never is," Fleet raised her head and looked into Babe's bright green eyes. "But, you can find happiness. You can."
Babe dropped her towel and was aware of Fleet's hot eyes caressing her flesh. She slithered into the sheer nightie and tossed her red hair back. Fleet brought her into the bedroom. AH the lights were out and the city was illumined by a cold winter's moon, the skyscrapers were arrayed in icy jewels that gleamed up into the night. The bed was turned back with its white sheets and pillows looking like a snow bank in the silver light of night.
Babe crawled into the bed and pulled the sheets up over her. She stared up at the ceiling as Fleet's weight sunk to the mattress and she felt the warmth generated by the other woman's body. It was comfortable, she felt at ease now, but there was something wrong in this picture. Two women, two adult woman in the same bed for love; it wasn't right as she had seen it, read of it, dreamt of it.
Fleet nestled up to Babe, her eyes searched out Babe's face and she tried to discern the thoughts flying through Babe's mind. Fleet's fingers trailed over the glossy, red hair, to Babe's forehead, down to her sensual lips and she lightly outlined the shape of Babe's mouth. Babe murmured drowsily and closed her heavy eyelids.
The warm, clean smell of Babe's fresh body assailed Fleet's nostrils and she was inflamed with passion for the young woman. Fleet shifted her body closer and felt the outline of Babe's breasts and soft, round belly. A nervous tremor shot through Babe, she parted her moist lips and Fleet fell to them, her mouth a suction on Babe's tongue.
"Oh-h! Babe, Babe-e-e-e-e!" Fleet moaned and pressed her demanding, hard body up against the voluptuous form of Babe.
Babe sank back and let the pillow surround her hot face, luxuriating in the glowing heat that seared through her body. Her nerves, at raw edges, were fiery tingles along her damp flesh. Her stomach cramped into tight knots, her thighs were strained as she opened them for Fleet's exploratory hands.
"Try it! Try anything-I can't stand to be this way!" Babe sorrowfully sighed. "I'm on fire! I need love! Loving!"
Fleet tore the gown from Babe's smooth shoulders and ripped the sheer material from her shimmering breasts. Her hot mouth re-neck to the luscious breasts, their nipples impudently thrust upwards. Fleet clutched onto the free breast and rolled the nipple between her fingers while she sucked the hard bud on the other.
"Beautiful! So-o-o lovely!" Fleet moaned and munched on the tips of Babe's nipple buds.
Babe felt the heat pound in her body, her pulse rose to an unbearable beat. Her nipples expanded in fire and exotic sensations soared through her raw nerves. She whined and tossed her body, her passion was uncontrolled as she gripped Fleet's head to her chest.
"Get on with it-whatever you do-do it!" Babe groaned.
Fleet glanced up at the green eyes sparkling in a demented passion; Babe's beautiful face was framed by her bright red hair. Fleet's eyes caught the intoxicating loveliness of the two shimmering breasts quivering in the dim light. Fleet snatched the gown to shreds from around Babe's voluptuous hips and sank her face into the satiny softness of Babe's thighs. Her seeking tongue strained into the bronzed flesh of Babe's body.
Babe arched her pelvis up, gyrated her hips into the air and clutched onto the nape of Fleet's neck. Fleet's roaming tongue stove past the gnarled button and Babe shot up crying and sighing, tossing her body in wild abandonment. Her eyes were wild, her mouth hung lax and oozed and gasped for breath.
"Do it! Faster! Faster!", Babe groaned, twisting her hips up to the bobbing head of the other woman. "Oh-h-h! Ah-h-h! Don't ever stop doing it!"
A torrential tearing of timorous, tingling, tantalizing sensual sensations soared through her. She gulped in air and clawed out at the bedposts. Her whole being vibrated in electric flashes of fantastic floodings as she collapsed to the bed a shuddering heap. Her long limbs shot out, her arms flailed around, her head rolled off her shoulders and she cried in ecstasy as spasm after spasm erupted within her in thrilling fulfillment.
"Fleet-Fl-lee-eet!" Babe sobbed and hugged the other woman in her arms, rocking Fleet like a child against her convulsing body. "You're so-o-won-der-ful-l-l!"
Stars sparkled in the chilled night and reflected on the happy, slumbering face of Babe curled up in Fleet's arms. The cold moon shot into the window, its frozen rays fell across the bed of the two lovers, who lay tight together, warmed by each other.
Lance turned over and raised up on his elbow, looking at his bed companion, "You had enough?"
The man sighed and stretched his body, "Why? You got more to give?"
"You're the doctor, Dr.," Lance smiled.
"I'm not a Dr. here-not here with you ..." the man smiled languidly. "I've been needing to get with a man for a long time. My wife is ... "
"Is not here," Lance smirked. "You don't have that problem, Bill."
"No, but your problem is me. I got to make up for a whole month of her," Dr. Bill Woodrow groaned. "It's hell living with a woman when you need a man ..."
Lance studied the boyish face of Bill, he was still a young looking man, going soft, greying at the temples. "You had a choice. You didn't have to marry the lab executive's daughter to get ahead ... "
Bill turned suddenly and stared at Lance. He admired Lance's handsome face, the strong chin, thick neck. Bill's eyes dropped to the massive, muscular chest of his friend. He let his hands stroke the wiry hair that curled over Lance's chest. His eyes glided over the taut stomach, the savage tumescence between Lance's thighs. He sighed and sank back to the bed, consumed with an envy, a degrading need to have this man top him and master him.
"No. But, she was my insurance, my assurance that I would be kept on at the lab. I'm not as cocksure as you. I'm not ..." Bill's voice wandered off. "Oh, what the hell? Give it to me again! Make me beg, crawl after you-make me cry for it!" he growled.
"You are going to have to work for it-it's your own therapy. You need this more than I. If you want it, you got to work it up ..." Lance turned a cold eye on Bill.
Bill tossed the bed covers off his own body and fell like a ravenous animal between Lance's hard, thick, hairy legs, "You turn me on-you always have ..."
Lance reached for a cigarette and lit it, glancing casually down at the man suckling onto his flesh. He opened his legs and leaned back in the bed, "You're going to have to do better than that. I'm a little jaded-I've been around since college ... "
Bill dropped from his knees, sprawling before Lance's open thighs and licked the hairs to the corded muscles of his legs. Hungrily his mouth traveled up the strong limbs, his hands gripped onto the sleek muscles of the male animal relaxing back before him in a tempting manner.
Bill's flushed face slammed in between the wide yawn of Lance's body, his straining tongue reached and anxiously searched over the man's body. His hands stroked, fondled, caressed and cupped the growing manhood from Lance's trunk. His lustful grunts and groans emanated from his desperate passion as he mouthed the swelling flesh that soared rigidly before him.
Lance's mind wandered, his subconscious had been disturbed by the timid smile, a flash of white teeth from sensual, red lips. The glint of red hair and bright green eyes were in his thoughts. The seductive female body, shy and cringing; rising and sinking back to the couch; his wife's new lover had made a strange and strong impression. Babe, baby, inexperienced and longing; not like the babyish man that lusted between his legs.
He tossed his pelvis up and Bill fell back gasping and choking, Lance's solid flesh flashed and flamed. Lance drew himself up and stood up by the bed, Bill followed like a lithe snake slipping to the floor at Lance's feet. Bill slithered up Lance's legs, his wet mouth open, his tongue sliding over his red lips. Lance gave him a shove and Bill fell back on his haunches with a surprised look.
"Please, Lance ..." Bill moaned pitifully. "Let me have it!"
"No-not yet ..." Lance shook his head, his thoughts were not involved in the depravity before him; he was preoccupied by the image of the delectable, young red headed woman lying in his wife's bed.
"I'll do anything for it! Anything!" Bill pleaded.
"Crawl, you queer," Lance snarled to Bill's great satisfaction. "Crawl after me!"
Bill dropped to his knees and crawled on the bare floor after the lunging protuberance extended from Lance's body. His tongue reached out and wrapped a slick, wet kiss over the fiery hardness. His slobbering lips stretched open and Lance moved abruptly, leaving Bill to fall off balance from the forward lunge of his head.
"You enticing devil!" Bill cried. "You stud-you're an exciting bull! A stallion! I got to-got to have you!" he simpered, frantically crawling after Lance. "Please!"
Lance settled to the bed and looked askance at Bill as if seeing him for the first time, "Why don't you go home? Give it up as a good try-I've had it tonight. I don't want to do it-not now-not anymore ... "
Lance caught sight of the soft man on his knees in the dressing mirror, Bill's eyes were wide and frantic. Bills hands crawled up over his flesh and Lance winced from the intensity of the man's need. He turned away and pulled his legs up onto the bed.
"I don't know what's the matter," Lance said. "You can always go to the baths ..."
"Oh, no! No, Lance-it's you-you're the only one I've ever been this way with!" Bill whined.
Lance looked back to the trembling, tearful man, lost in his obsessive lust. "Ok, dry it up! Quick! One more time-and that's all!" Lance drew himself up on his knees and arched himself for a plunge.
Bill dropped to the bed, his soft body damp with desire, his buttocks twitching with anticipation. He bumped his haunches and Lance threw a vicious lunge, stabbing out the perversion of his life with each savage thrust into the grunting form that sprawled and sobbed before him. In a wild rage of anger for his manhood, Lance sweated over the sexless form of the body before him, while his inflamed brain flared in passion for the red head in the next room ...
CHAPTER THREE
Lance stood at his window in the early morning light and stared down to the fresh blanket of snow that had fallen over the street and sidewalks during the night. The fire escapes of the warehouse across the way appeared like a series of stairs up to the grey skies outlined by the black of their iron metal. A taxi drew up to the front of the Artists Court building and a bright red head ran out. Looking down from the twelfth floor, about one hundred and twenty five feet down, Lance could sense the warmth of Babe's exciting body, the new baby of his wife. He was strangely attracted to her after only a moment's sight from last night, her green eyes had sunk into his mind and blazed through his veins.
The cold air felt invigorating to Babe, she reached for the chilled metal door handle of the taxi and shivered. She quickly piled inside and slammed the door. As the driver pulled away from the curb she glanced up and thought she caught sight of Lance Martin, Fleet's young husband, standing in the window. The taxi sped through the icy slush to the upper West Side and Babe settled back in the cab to think of the weird and eventful evening she had spent in Greenwich Village.
The city melted away into the foggy mist of her memories and she was once again far away in the clean air and pure white snow banks of Maine. A sad and lonely childhood that had begun on a winter's evening when she heard her mother denounce her father and stride out into the icy blasts that blew off the frosted rocks of the shore. She was tugged by her mother to the railroad station and there, on the cold, open platform, they had waited for the train.
The train had wailed into the darkness and shot through an endless night to her Aunt Bertha's in Portland. There, on the outskirts of town, Babe had been raised with no children to play with and no company but the two women: her mother's old maid sister and her hard, embittered mother. Aunt Bertha had distrusted all men all her life and died a barren, frigid woman. Her mother had closed the door to even the minister at her Aunt's death. Men had been forbidden in Babe's life.
Babe smiled to herself remembering her first pitiful efforts on the stage at the girls school. Because of her size she had always won the male parts in the plays. She had begun in the theatre as an actor not an actress. But, she wanted to act more than anything else in the world. Perhaps it was an escape from the lonely childhood with all its unhappiness. Perhaps she needed to express herself, to find an identity, to find herself.
Her benefactor turned out to be the man she had been taught to hate, to even despise: her father. Her father had died and left Babe a small inheritance, enough to pay her way to independence from her mother's allowance, to pay her way through the university with a comfortable savings account to start her off in New York City. It had been a hard thing to turn her back on her mother and seek out her fortunes in the theatre. But, it was a compulsion, a need stronger than her love for the woman who had sacrificed her all for her child.
Babe stepped from the cab into the crunchy snow and carefully winded her way on the icy pavement up to the stoop of her brown stone apartment. She buzzed her roommate and started the climb back to reality, to the present moment. She would have to face Lori, she would be expected to report to Lori about her first experiences at Vi's party, of her initiation into the group. She shuddered in repulsion at the thoughts of Buck and Boyd, the twin animals. Yet, Babe instinctively knew that she would have to put up a front and certainly should not relate that she had spent the night with a lesbian.
She summoned all her creative ability to act a lie, forcing a bright smile to her lips and a jaunty step to her tired limbs. She stopped by the mirror on the bend of the staircase and glanced in to be reassured that she hadn't changed physically, that there was no obvious taint written on her face. Squaring her shoulders, Babe reached for her apartment door.
Lance sat at breakfast with his wife. He was bitter and ill-tempered. His evening had been a farce with Dr. Bill Woodrow and he envied his wife her pleasures with the young red head. Fleet eyed Lance, noting the scowl written over his face, but her own satisfaction couldn't be hidden. She wanted to blurt out to him about her success, only his surly silence kept her from detailing every ecstasy.
Lance restlessly rose from the table and paced the room. He was anxious for Fleet to communicate with him, he was anxious to know all about this Babe Peters. He flopped onto the white couch where he'd first seen Babe and kicked off his slippers. Fleet followed him with her coffee.
"What's the matter? You had a rough time with that closet queen last night?" Fleet offered lightly.
"Um-m," Lance nestled his head in Fleet's lap. "He had a rough time with me. I don't dig his scene ..." he muttered. "In fact I'm not even sure I dig anything. You don't suppose I'm squaring off to become straight?"
"It must be a full moon!" Fleet dropped her head to look at Lance.
"I'm serious ..." Lane stammered. "I-I don't get anything out of it with men anymore ... "
"You are getting jaded. I wouldn't be surprised at what you'd turn to ..." Fleet smiled. "Just don't compete with me. I'm a hard rival."
"I'm harder-she might like that," Lance implied impulsively.
"What are you talking about?" Fleet pushed Lance off her lap and stared at him.
"I thought you knew ..." he smiled. "I've always liked red heads."
"You dirty ape! Don't try monkeying around with Babe-she's she's already scared to death of sex. And-a man-a man frightens her to death!" Fleet flared.
"Don't get excited. I've never taken anything that didn't want me," Lance rose.
"They usually have to beg for you. It might be amusing to see you beg," Fleet retorted.
"It might be amusing if we both went to bed with Babe ..." Lance tossed over his shoulder as he entered his bedroom.
Fleet stopped and watched him go, a smile spread over her face, "Yes-yes it might. I might like that, too ... "
Babe and Lori carefully tripped down the iced steps of the brown stone and raced to the subway at Seventy-second and Broadway in the bright early morning light. They entered the drafty, smoke filled tunnel and waited for a Downtown train to express them to Forty-second Street. At their destination they worked their way through the pressing crowds of rushing people and climbed the dust covered stairways, past the sickening smells of cotton candies, greasy hot dogs and churning egg creams to Times Square.
As they turned from the subway entrance a blinding ray of sun shot down Forty-second Street. Babe winced and grabbed onto Lori to be led around the corner to Broadway. The wind whipped up their skirts and they hurriedly brushed them down to keep the cold from freezing up their thighs. Lori pulled Babe into the cafeteria. They both gasped for breath, laughed at each other and with flushed frost bitten cheeks, rushed to deposit their dimes for cups of black coffee.
"Did you like Boyd better than Buck-I mean really?" Lori questioned breathlessly.
"I wasn't with Buck-just Boyd," Babe mumbled with embarrassment.
"That's alright. I'm told you can't tell them apart ..." Lori sighed with envy.
"They can tear you apart," Babe spoke before she'd thought.
"What?" Lori's blue eyes flung wide.
"They're so-they're so huge!" Babe forced herself to giggle.
"Sounds wonderful!" Lori gasped with delight. "Can't we have them over-for dinner-sometime soon?"
Babe's face shot up to stare at Lori. Her roommate was a beautiful young blonde with blue eyes, pink cheeks and naturally rosy red lips. She had a wondrous figure, soft and round, with beautifully shaped legs. She was the ing�nue type for the stage, the good and nice girl from across the street. Her face was warm and open with a naive appearance, but she had the soul of a waterfront slut and was always seeking new thrills.
"I-I don't know if I could be so bold as to ask them," Babe demurred.
"They're in your acting studio aren't they?" Lori insisted. "Why not invite them over some night to work on a scene and for-for dinner ..." she giggled.
"I'll see ..." Babe offered weakly and set her mind on the day's schedule, pulling out her appointment book and checking that she had enough photographs and resumes in her briefcase.
The two girls parted to go their separate ways and Babe squared her shoulders, pulled her collar up high about her neck and faced the cold that whipped in around Rockefeller Center. She covered her two morning appointments and then stopped off at TV casting offices to leave her picture and resume, requesting to be seen.
It was a depressing day. The two appointments that had risen Babe's hopes for the day turned out to be only cattle calls for talent: a general, open call. And the few offices where she had left her picture and resume didn't appear to be friendly. The response from the secretaries was as cold as the weather outside. Babe felt an empty, gnawing sensation in the pit of her stomach and listlessly wandered into the crowded drug store in the RCA building.
She recognized several celebrities grabbing a sandwich and coffee in between rehearsals. Frozen faces coldly appraised her as she wedged into the counter and ordered her coffee. Everybody seemed to belong, but her, they returned their interest to their own group and Babe felt alone. In a sea of faces stuffed before a counter, surrounded by living, breathing people, there was no personal contact, no friendliness.
The glass door swung open and Babe followed the automatic sway of faces to see who entered. She gripped onto the counter and dropped her head to her coffee quickly when she recognized Lance Martin, Fleet's husband as he sauntered in. He was greeted by several men in a booth and moved across the aisle to sit with a smiling woman.
Fear, shame, guilt gripped Babe as she huddled into her coat and numbly reached for her check. She clutched her briefcase up to her face and fumbled for change in her purse. She dropped a dime on the counter and stumbled past Lance's booth to the cashier. His deep baritone voice broke into a warm laugh as she passed. She could feel his eyes searching her body and she prayed he wouldn't recognize her, she just wanted to get out.
At the door a young man rushed in and brushed past her knocking her briefcase from her hands. Babe quickly bent to pick it up only to have it retrieved from the floor and placed in front of her eyes. She stared at the case not daring to turn, not daring to follow the line of the man's arm up to his face.
"Do you come here often, Miss Peters?" Lance's voice enveloped her with its husky intimacy.
"Uh, yes-no-that is-sometimes. Whenever I'm in this area ..." Babe stammered.
"Well, I hope you're in this area often. We could have luncheon together ..." Lance smiled and placed the briefcase back in her arms.
"Thank you ..." Babe mumbled and wandered out into the long dim, marble-faced corridor.
Lori rushed into the crowded elevator and was swooped up to the eighth floor of the Lexington Avenue office building. She hurried past the brusque, white collar office personnel to the office of Associated Art Photographers. She burst into the room and was surprised to find herself in a huge studio. The walls were hung with a variety of background rolls, there were scene sets and props galore askew over the floor. Banks of standing lights, ceiling floods and spots brightly illuminated the studio. There was no one at the reception desk so she wandered into the studio.
"You're from the agency? a man's voice suddenly blurted out from nowhere.
"Yes!" Lori responded with delight. "I'm Lori James ... "
"Well, Miss James-take off your clothes ..." the man's voice replied.
Lori glanced around the empty studio and found no one. She followed the ladder up to the ceiling and saw a crew cut blond head leaning down from the rafters. He laughed out and she watched as he stepped on to the ladder and climbed down. First his feet, legs, then his torso and broad chest and finally his head. He looked over his shoulders and appraised her.
"Take off your clothes ..." the blond man spoke easily.
Lori studied his handsome face in disbelief, "What?"
"You're here for the nude shot, aren't you?" he demanded.
"Well-I ..." Lori was flustered. "I was sent to pose ... "
"They didn't tell you it was in the nude?" he smiled patiently.
"No. And-I'm an actress not a-" she stammered.
"Not a what? Not a woman?" he countered.
"I am, a woman!" Lori retorted.
"Then? What? You ashamed you're a woman?" he studied her figure.
"I-I'm not ashamed ..." she muttered in defense. Her blazing eyes took in his strong body covered in a white jump suit and quickly returned to the smiling blue eyes in his virile face. "I'm not ashamed-it's just that ... "
"That I took you by surprise ..." he offered. "Look-I'm Dickinson-Dick Dickinson. I got an account from "Friskee-Frolic" magazine for a nude cover."
"They didn't tell me that," Lori pondered.
"I need a young, vivacious, but innocent type, for the model ..." Dick surveyed her body and face again. "You're perfect-just the type."
"I told you I'm an actress ..." Lori pouted and turned to the door.
"A cover like this has made many an actress famous. The Marilyn nude has become a collector's item ... " he blocked her way. "Besides, it'll be in low key lighting and nobody would recognize your face-only your body-your beautiful body will be highlighted."
Lori turned to him, secretly thrilled at the prospects of thousands of men's eyes covering the photograph of her body. She was excited by the animal magnetism that she felt from Dick and desired more than anything to strip and show him how desirable she was, how alluring she could be. Her cheeks flushed pink at the daring thoughts that flooded her mind, but she forced herself to look him squarely in the eyes.
"Only my body ..." she queried with a murmur.
"And the money's very good-for you I'll get top fees!" he exclaimed.
"Well ..." she sighed, a tremor tingled through her body.
"Only your body ..." his frank eyes settled on her heaving breasts and traveled over her hips and legs. "You're beautiful-just perfect-just the right amount of innocent tease I want."
And you are just what I want, Lori's inflamed mind responded to herself. I'll give you the right amount of teasing, but it won't be innocent, she thought, I'll give you just what you want. She dropped her eyes coyly and moved into the studio, noticing in her peripheral vision that Dick bolted the hall door.
"Where do you want me?" she posed shyly in the center of the bright lights.
"Over-over here ..." Dick indicated a pile of glossy white pillows against a stark white background. "All set up-with some retouching we can make it look like a snow scene." Re laughed, "It'll look like you fell in the snow in your pink birthday suit."
"What do I do?" Lori wondered if batting her eyelashes would be too much innocence, so she dropped her eyes to the floor.
"Strip-take off your clothes-and ..." he shrugged. "I'll do the rest ..." he patted his camera standing pointed down to the pillows.
"Everything?" she feigned hesitation.
"Yes-everything ..." he winked and gave her a broad smile. "I'm a big boy-I know where I came from. I've been there before and I've seen it all before."
Lori tossed her blonde hair out loose, dropped her coat to the floor and moved over to the scene set up. She turned her tantalizingly blue eyes on Dick and unsnapped her dress at the neck, letting it slide off her smooth shoulders, glide off her breasts and drop from her hips to the floor. She modestly stepped out of the crumpled garment and tossed it to a waiting chair.
A network of exciting, glowing fires warmed her flesh. She loosened the straps of her pink bra and let the cups fall from her breasts into her hands. She felt the sway and quiver of her freed breasts, quickly she tore the bra from her body and tossed it to the chair. Her nipples thrusted up impudently and the lights cast a deep shadow between the globular, velvet soft, flesh.
Dick felt his pulse pound, a hot searing fire grew between his legs. She was the innocent, sex kitten; there was a knowing pout on her lips and an experienced knack to her disrobing that disturbed him. He watched with heated eyelids as she plunged her hands down the elastic of her pink panties. Her fingers stretched the flimsy material, then slowly she started to push the last remnant from her hips and belly. The sheer material wrinkled up around her wrists. Lori bent forward and pulled the panties down her legs.
Lori straightened up and with an impertinent flip snapped her pelvis upwards exposing to his view the fact that she was a natural blonde. Her belly curved down to the golden flesh between her long thighs. She moved around and dropped to the pillows with her feet tossed up in the air. With a cry of joy and lustful appreciation, Dick snapped the shutter several times.
"Great! Better than if you'd posed!" he cried.
Lori gloried in his heavy breathing, she noticed the nervous twitch in his hands, the glassy stare in his flushed face. Triumphantly she squirmed on the pillows and collapsed back to the floor, a feeble attempt to rise. Dick raced to her and Lori's eyes caught the stiff projection on his thigh, pressing against his jumpsuit leg. Dick reached for her, his arm muscles trembled in the strain of passion and her weight; Lori completely relaxed back and allowed him to lift her bodily.
She fell against his hard, muscular body, her blonde hair fell cascading around her shoulders. She pressed the full weight of her curves against him and reassured herself by the plunging pressure on his thigh that he was all the man she had first expected and desired. Her breathing became faster; his hands lifted her face and his lips captured hers in a wild, suctioning kiss.
Lori locked her arms about his neck and responded to his hungry kiss with her hot tongue dodging and dueling his. She dropped her hands to his jumper zipper and slowly pulled the metal tab down. Glistening muscles were exposed with a soft down of golden hair over his chest. She shivered and ripped the zipper to the bottom of his crotch.
"You cold"? he mumbled his mouth against her lips.
"The zipper's cold. I'm hot-can't you tell?" she moaned huskily.
"I'm beginning to get the idea ..." his big hands covered her breasts, his fingers rolled and pinched her hard nipples.
With impatient and anxious hands, she reached for the neck of his jumpsuit and pushed it off his shoulders. It fell sagging to his waist, gaping over his swollen loins. Lori's nervous hands reached inside and tugged his rigid passion out and into her nervous palms. With longing and awe she caressed the length of his manhood, she cupped and stroked his throbbing tumescence while he sucked her nipples till her nerves cried out and a soft gurgle bubbled in her throat.
Dick dropped to the floor and pulled Lori on top of him. He stretched out, throwing open his knees and settled her body down on him, his slick projection sliding up her stomach. His hands molded her buttocks, while she gyrated her hips and rubbed her nipples into the hair of his chest. She groaned and moaned under his manipulation.
CHAPTER FOUR
Lance stepped into the elevator and pressed the eighth button. When the doors snapped open at his floor, he sauntered down to his studio, Associated Art Photographers. The door was locked and he smiled to himself, thinking that Dick, his partner, was shooting the nude for Friskee-Frolic magazine. He eased his key into the lock and cautiously turned it. A little vicarious stimulation might inspire him, he thought with glee. There certainly didn't seem to be any encouragement from Babe, who had suddenly become his secret lust.
He was delighted to see Dick, his partner, sprawled out on the pillows on the floor with a young blonde girl cavorting over his naked body. Fast work, thought Lance, the boy gets better and better with practice. The girl looked like a delicious dish, her body was gleaming with the fires of passion. Lance eased himself into the swivel chair by the reception desk and concentrated his attention on the couple's abandoned lovemaking.
"Oh, man, this drives me crazy ..." Lori grappled over Dick's fired projection, her body rolled over his hard body.
"You can't call it rape-if you do it yourself", Dick growled. "Take us off, baby-get some action going."
"Not yet-not right now ..." she moaned. "I'm going to tease you to death!"
"Isn't that what you have been trying to do?" he snapped.
"You knew?" she mumbled, dropping her lips to his.
"You acted too innocent ..." Dick bit her lower lip. "And you knew what you were doing ..." he stabbed her mouth with his bullish tongue.
Dick gripped her hips and lifted her up, placing her bushy apex just over his palpitating protuberance. With a hard shove on her bare buttocks he pressed her down on him and felt himself immersed into the heat of her searing body. Her weighted loins quivered and strained around him as he slashed up into her.
"Oh-h-h! Oh-h-h, man!" she sighed falling fully upon him and squirming her buttocks over him. "That's so-o-o-o good!"
Dick grabbed a handful of swaying breast and pinched their nipples, rolling them roughly between his thumbs and forefingers. The strain of her passion rose to her face, a vein extended and she gyrated her hips, grinding up and down on him, gasping with sobs of gratification. Spurts of spasms worked throughout her quivering body as she plunged her voluptuous flesh upon him. Dick reclined back and watched with growing satisfaction as she expertly worked her hips.
"Getting go-o-od! Good." he sighed, drawing up his thighs and throwing them open for her glides down upon him. "Play ball, baby-hit it home-all the way!"
Lance felt the blood rise in his body, his passion grew to a consuming flame that engulfed his body. His heavy lidded eyes avidly followed their every movement. His breath came in strained, tensed pants as he watched their snapping bodies pound against each other. Lance narrowed his eyes to tight slits and stared at their trunks slapping together, the shimmy of her naked buttocks as she settled deeply on Dick and groaned out with mounting pleasure.
Dick's eyes stared up at the ceiling, he threw his arms out, arching up to meet her lunges. His breathing was deep and nervous, expanding his broad chest. He shot his face up to the valley of her swaying breasts and licked their velvety texture, letting them swing and bang in his face. His anxious hands fell onto her glistening rump and forced her upon him in a fury of wanton passion.
She cried out and fell shuddering to him, collapsing on his desperate body. Dick locked his legs around her thighs, rooting deep and rolled with her till he was on top. As she lay beneath him in spasms of ecstasy he rammed his body into hers in fast, furious arches, flailing down on her vibrating flesh.
"You got me this far-now you're gonna get it-all the way!" Dick gasped, sweat ran down his taut, determined face.
His muscular body shook in a fuming passion, his thick thighs and legs quivered as they propelled his flashing body down. She writhed beneath his steady, insistent drives. Her fleshy legs fell open, Dick paused and quickly threw her thighs up over his shoulders and returned to his compulsive attack.
"Get it! Get it! Oh-h Oh! Get it, goo-o-o-od!" she moaned, her arms locked onto Dick's broad shoulders.
Dick snarled and growled in a husky, grating voice; his body strained, stiffened in a suspension of passionate relief, then he fell bombasting her with fast, punishing stabs. He gritted his teeth and with a loud groan, settled deep, grinding his hips onto the bone of her body. Suddenly his body convulsed and he gasped and moaned, his face falling to her breasts as his legs shot out in complete collapse.
"Ah-h-h Oh-h-h, damit-I didn't want to go!" his mouth suckled around her big nipple and he mumbled in delight. "So-o-o damn good!" A final shudder shot through him, he darted his face up to her dry mouth and fell munching on her lips. "Good stuff!" He reluctantly pulled back and slowly plopped out. "Like I said-you know what you're doing ... "
"She sure as hell does!" Lance exploded. "That should have been recorded on movie film ... "
Dick looked up with surprise and laughed, "Caught in the act! She's the actress ..." he lovingly patted Lori's damp thighs and ran his fingers up to the moist, hairy lips of her body. "Great performance!"
"Good show alright ..." Lance strode over to them, his face an excited crimson flush. "I need some action, too," he gripped the big bulge on his thigh. "A man could go crazy watching that ... "
"This is my boss, Lance Martin ..." Dick extended his hand up to Lance. "He can really give you work-and a good workout if you want it," Dick expanded.
"You feel up to two matinees in one afternoon?" Lance queried in a good natured, teasing tone.
"I'm always ready to perform-repeat performance or not", Lori smiled coyly up into Lance's handsome face, looking squarely and frankly into his dark eyes.
"She sure knows what she's doing-don't let the innocent face fool you ..." Dick interjected.
"I ought to. I started with my two cousins in the cotton field when I was eight-and wore them out. They were fourteen and eighteen ..." she murmured demurely, but her eyes were fired with passion for Lance Martin's body.
"Well, put your bottom back down in that row of pillows and I'll seed your field ..." Lance replied flippantly as he pulled his jacket from his body and loosened his belt.
"Plow deep before you do your planting ..." Lori replied opening her beautiful legs so that her thighs formed a wide yawn to her body.
She relaxed back and eyed Lance as he jerked his tie off and stripped his shirt from his trousers. He dropped beside her, his shirt flapping around his bronzed chest with the mat of black hair running down to his navel. She quickly raised to meet him, her hands pushed the shirt off his chest. He grabbed her to him and felt the pressure of her big breasts flatten against his naked muscles as his lips sank over her ripe, red ones.
She dug her hands between their bodies and zipped his loosened trousers open. Her trembling hands reached inside, working underneath the elastic of his shorts, seeking the flaming rigidity that snapped into her hands. She moaned with deep satisfaction and tried to grip the girth of his masculinity, while his hands fondled her delicious breasts. With teeth and tongue he nipped and licked her face, neck, ears. His questing lips sank over her raw nipples, Lori gyrated her hips up against his lap, tugging his plunging flesh free of his trousers.
She gasped as Lance's long, blunt instrument shot through her small hand, "Oh! You're like a bull!" Her eyes widened with admiration and fright.
Lance felt the tremor run through her frame, he rolled her breasts on her rib cage; leaving them to swing, his lips caught the nipples and he nipped them with his teeth. She rolled her seething body over to him, his hands glided over her back to the curve of her rounded buttocks. He trailed his fingers in a teasing feather touch over her hips to her thighs.
"You're a sexy animal, honey ..." Lance growled. His fingers caressed the moist triangle below her soft belly. "Ready to lock horns with the bull?" he jabbed her with his probing fingers; she squeezed his hardened, slick stiff, projection.
"You got me ready for anything ..." she moaned and slashed her hips up onto his fingers.
Lance crawled to his feet and dropped his trousers. Lori reached up and pulled them off his legs. Her fingers, like talons, clawed the white briefs from his loins. Lance kicked the crumpled garments off his feet. Lori searched up his massive, hairy, thighs to the perpendicular projection plunging out from the trunk of his body. A prickly heat tingled over her flesh; she rose on her knees before him, her red lips parted and her head darted hungrily between his thighs.
"Wow!" Lance groaned. "Lubricate it, honey-get it wet!" He reached downward and pressured his big hands on the nape of her neck, forcing her head to bob over him.
She choked, sobbed and suckled her mouth gluttonously around his huge, throbbing elongation. With an insatiable lust she sucked and licked, her fiery tongue curling around his palpitation. Her frantic fingers cupped around him, squeezed and eased his passion. Her palms glided up over his hairy muscles to the black wiry bush on his stomach; her fingers dug into his strained flesh.
"Oh! I can't stand it!" she cried lost in her compulsion.
"Lay back-lay back and take it." Lance held her face off. He spread his legs and arched his pelvis up to her hot eyes.
"Let me-let me see it some more. Let me see it!" she moaned, tenderly caressing the length of his mammoth, muscled flesh with the tip of her tongue, while her eyes consumed the length of his primed passion.
She strained her face towards him, her fingers dug into his thighs. She gasped and groaned as her inflamed eyes greedily covered him in amazement, disbelief and worshipful delight. Lance impulsively pushed her back by the shoulders, her face showed surprise as she fell with her breasts quivering over her chest. He dropped to his knees, pressed open her fleshy white thighs and massaged her damp, mossy area with the blunt aim of his male projection.
Dick rolled a full length reflecting mirror over to the pile of pillows and adjusted it so that Lori could watch as Lance pile-drove into her with a furious force and continued with a powerful pumping of his body. Lori screamed, drew herself up against his attack, tears ran down her cheeks, but Lance pushed her legs aside and plunged into the swampy heat of her burning inferno.
"Nothing to do-but do it!" Lance muttered hoarsely.
He jack knifed over her trembling form and plummeted down, inserting and sinking up into her convulsing body. She sighed, a deep, mournful release of breath and surrendered herself to his desire. The cramps in her belly tightened, electric fires seared through her veins as she lay limp and open for his goring drives.
Lori cringed as the glowing fires shot up into her pain wracked, passionately yearning, body. She convulsed beneath his thrusts, winced as he withdrew and craved for his return. She sobbed and clutched him back to her, abandoning herself to the tearing tingles of desire that ripped through her scorched flesh.
Lance worked with a fury that filled his body with sensual sensations, bringing searing delights to his palpitating protuberance. He watched her facial grimaces as he lunged down, her breasts shimmied before him, her thighs quivered with pleasure around him. A hot, firebrand of steeled flesh extended from him gouging her, cramming her body, with its demands. He swirled his hips and slashed down, she twisted to watch his glides in the mirror.
"Oh-I'll never walk again-but ... Oh-h! Ah-h! Give it to me again-again!" she strained to see their reflection in the mirror. "You're so-o-o bi-ig! So beaut-ti-ful! And like a bull-l-l!" she gloried in the torturous, timorous thrills that quaked in her wanton body.
Spasms spurted, the tight knot of her belly uncoiled and she fell gasping and. gushing with ecstasy. Her head fell off her shoulders, her eyes glazed over. Lance became a madman, his brain droned with the pounding of his passion, he drilled her to the floor and squashed himself to the hilt. The explosion of spewing fires seared from his body. His tensed body trembled, violently shook and dropped to her wet flesh in wild shivers.
"Hot damnn! Oh-h, babe-bee-e-e!" Lance chortled as his face fell to hers and his mouth surrounded her pouting lips. "Wow!" he shook his head and beads of sweat fell from his forehead.
Lori tossed her head and caught a glimpse of the snow falling from the grey skies through the north skylight. Her arms slipped from Lance's broad shoulders and she giggled. She turned her eyes and surveyed the big, heavy mean whose naked body was warm upon her bare flesh. She squirmed her hips and felt the full projection of his manhood. Dick knelt down beside them, he dropped his body alongside of Lori, his hands cupped her big breasts.
"And to think I envied my roommate last night ..." Lori murmured, her sensual lips spread over even white teeth, her bright blue eyes sparkled with full contentment.
"Who's your roommate?" Lance asked absently as his lips brushed over Lori's and his tongue sought out hers.
"Just a girl-another actress ..." Lori mumbled.
Babe slushed through the snow to Broadway. The icy winds whipped against her body, her ears and nose were icicles frozen onto her stiff face. She turned the corner, away from the blasting breeze and her face broke into a frigid smile of relief. She dashed into the Theatre Bar near Eighth Avenue and crept through the busy hubbub of theatre people gabbing and gushing in groups, crowded into booths and leaning over tables.
"Darling!" Vi's voice rang out over the din in the dim restaurant-bar. "Babe-back here!"
Babe searched the faces in the back, some of them glanced up as she went by and then disinterestedly they returned their concentration to their tables and their own groups. Vi stood up and waved her long, silk scarf, Buck rose and waved both his arms.
"Here-here!" Buck yelled.
Babe nodded to them and wormed her way past the men standing double at the bar. She edged past the waiters and finally reached their booth. Vi was smiling breathlessly, she jumped up and pulled Babe down to the seat.
"I couldn't get rid of him-after last night ..." Vi smirked indicating Buck. "What happened today? Any luck?"
"Nothing." Babe settled back defeatedly.
"You could be in luck with us. We're going over to Vi's place and ..."
"I-I've got some letters to write." Babe threw up her hands hopelessly. "I'm tired-exhausted-and at my wit's end!"
"That's what I want-a little end," Buck giggled.
"You ought to have had enough!" Vi pretended to be offended. She turned to Babe, "He stayed over. Oversexed ..." she tossed her chin up at Buck.
"You liked it, nymph!" Buck retorted.
"It-it is Buck, isn't it?" Babe stammered, trying to recollect which one had initiated her and which one had taken on Vi. "You're identical ... "
"Makes it more fun that way. Guess" he smiled broadly.
"I'd hate to have to ..." Babe responded warmly.
"You missed out on me. I'm Buck ..." he winked. "But, my offer still goes. I enjoy competing with my twin-gives me an extra incentive."
"They try to outdo one another ..." Vi interjected. "Want a drink?" Vi asked quickly.
"I think-martini ... " Babe mused.
"Hey, Joe-make it three more-martinis!" Vi yelled at the waiter as he passed.
Babe felt caught. She was in the trap of her depression and loneliness again. It had been a miserable day, there were no prospects, the cold had chilled her to the bone and she dreaded returning to the apartment with only Lori to be with. She had hoped that some of the acting studio people would be in the bar besides Vi and one of the twins. She wanted to talk, to share her enthusiasm for the theatre with someone more serious minded than Vi, Lori her roommate, or the twin brutes.
The drink seemed long in coming, the giddiness of Vi and Buck were appalling to her, but Babe kept up a smiling face. She was regretting giving in to her weakness and coming to the Theatre Bar at all. There were so many things she had to do at the apartment and now it was going to be awkward avoiding going with Vi and Buck to the Village.
Obviously Buck and Vi had been drinking for some time, Buck's face had a rosy glow and his eyes were getting glassy. He started acting foolish, calling out to people across the room and then gossiping about them in hushed tones. He enjoyed giving the vivid details on who was sleeping with who and what they did in bed. It was his intention to imply that he had firsthand knowledge of every girl in the room, including some of the better known working actresses.
"This boy's been around since he came to town," Vi shared the confidence with Babe. "Course half the women don't know which twin they've been to bed with ..." she giggled.
"You'd know if I went to bed with you, Babe" Buck whispered, leaning over the table, his eyes covered her breasts and then jutted back up to catch her frown and wrinkled brow, "you'd know if I'd had you last night ... "
"The twins are jealous of each other. He's never going to be content until he evens the score with Boyd", Vi offered. "You might as well come over-we can have dinner-and ..." she giggled. "A little group therapy-let him get it out of his system ... "
"I really must study for class tomorrow. I'm not up in my lines in the scene I've got to do. I'd love to, tho ..." Babe protested.
"You're not putting us off, are you?" Vi insisted.
"You're not putting me down, are you?" Buck mumbled, crawling under the table and reappearing in the seat with Babe.
"No. Oh, no-it's just that ... " Babe demurred.
"Did you go home with that Lesbian last night-afterwards ..." Vi demanded, her eyes stared into Babe's.
"Who? What?" Babe tried to feign innocence.
"Flecia Martin-she herself 'Fleet' when she's being butch," Vi retorted. "She plays both sides of the bed-you name it."
"She's a good in-might be a good end, too!" Buck giggled again. "She's the casting agent for Lieb-Pitts Agency-tops!"
"I don't know who you mean ..." Babe put on a wondering expression and looked blank at the two of them. "Which one was she?"
"You'd know her, alright," Vi insinuated.
"Haven't you ever been to Lieb-Pitts?" Buck queried incredulously.
"No. They're too big for me-only handle names I heard," she studied their faces. "Was she at your party?"
"That one!" Buck pointed. "There she is!"
Babe looked up quickly in the direction of his finger; Her heart stood still; moving through the maze of smoke was Fleet Martin, headed straight back to their booth ...
CHAPTER FIVE
Fleet was dressed in a smart suit with a ruffled neckline and a pillbox hat perched on top of her head. She carried a thin-line briefcase. She smiled and spoke to the people at the bar, as she passed by each table and in the booths. Her eyes casually brushed over Babe, she nodded her head at Buck and Vi. The waiter ushered her into a booth and she immediately picked up the menu.
"That's Miss Big in the casting world ..." Buck whispered.
"She can make or break you," Vi asserted. "But she's not going to make me!"
"She could make me-anytime," Buck muttered and glanced over to Fleet. "She is pretty trim-not what you would call a voluptuous babe, but ..." he shrugged his shoulders. "She's living, breathing, warm flesh."
"Let's get out of here. I feel she's competing with me," Vi stated impatiently.
"Then why was she at your party," Babe whispered.
"The Bobbsey twins for one thing. Boyd and Buck thought they'd make out, but ... " Vi stopped short.
"But, we saw you-and you needed us!" Buck gushed with glee. "Besides-how often do you run across a virgin?" He grabbed Babe's hand and stuffed it down between his thighs, "If you liked Boyd, you'd love this!"
"They measured-last night," Vi tossed her hands up. "Wouldn't you know?"
"And I won!" Buck cried joyously.
"I don't see any reason to cook you a dinner if you're only interested in Babe-go to her apartment," Vi pouted to Buck.
"Oh, Vi-don't be that way-he's not interested in me," Babe quickly interjected, pulling her hand away from Buck. "He's just ... "
"Hot! Didn't you feel it?" Buck smirked at her and turned to Vi. "If you're going to feed me, I'll eat-eat everything you got. I'm a hungry stud-I can take on you both at one time ..." he leered down the front of Vi's dress. "That looks mighty appetizing to me right now."
"You two go on," Babe insisted. "I don't want to barge in."
"Aaw-come on," Buck turned to her.
"Maybe she wants to become better acquainted with Fleet, the butch," Vi insinuated to Buck. "After all-when you're new at it-you might as well try everything ... "
"It's not that," Babe protested.
"Then come with us," Buck dropped his arm around her neck. "Remember-last night-when I was working on ..." he licked his lips slowly and let his finger tips touch her sensitive breasts. "... those. Remember? Oh, Babe they're so delicious."
Babe shivered at the thought of his wondrous sucking, her pulse pounded, her blood fired, but the memory of her anguish with his brother caused her to cringe from Buck's touch. He pulled her back in his arm and let his free hand drop to her knee. Babe felt the warmth of his hand as he eased it up, sliding his fingers under her dress onto the bare flesh of her thigh.
"You don't want to let the casting lady think you don't like men," he whispered hotly in her ear. "She might think you're queer for a woman. Not to like men is queer, you know."
With a knowing smile, Fleet sipped her martini. She was in public, the well known and even feared, actors' agent. All eyes were on her, she felt that everybody was aware of her every move and therefore she didn't care to show her interest in Babe. She didn't dare to even let her eyes casually drop over to the booth where Babe was sitting again. There was already too much talk, idle, small gossip, about Geraldine Locke, the German athlete that Fleet had brought to this, country and pushed into stardom.
She wished that she were out of this bar, away, anywhere but here where she was under observation. She wanted so much to speak to Babe, friendly, intimately, to send Babe a drink and invite her to join her for dinner. Instead Fleet sat, alone and desolate, pretending to be self sufficient and independent. Her mind was in a whirlwind about Babe. Why hadn't Babe given her a call like she had promised that morning? Why was she sitting with the "kick kids"; Vi and that grinning lothario, a part of the animal team of Boyd and Buck Fitchett. The Fitchett twins gave Fleet the willies, they were so blatantly base, no finesse in public.
"Let's go!" Buck blurted out. "This is no fun-just sitting here."
"You coming or not?" Vi faced Babe in a challenging manner.
"Well ... If you want me ..." Babe reluctantly agreed. As Buck pulled her from the booth, Babe spoke in a tone for Fleet to hear, "I've got to go to the Village anyway-there's some plays I've got to pick up at the Dramatist Book Shop."
Buck possessively propelled Babe through the crowd to the iced slush and blasting cold on the outside, Vi hurried behind them. The sun was setting and sharp, cold rays of brilliant light flashed across West Forty-fifth Street. The three of them huddled together debating which way to run: to the Eighth Avenue Subway nearby and walk in the village or to Broadway and Seventh Avenue for the IRT and not have so far to walk when they arrived at the West 4th Street stop.
Babe took the initiative and started towards Eighth Avenue, because it would be nearer her bookshop. She tugged at Buck and raced to the corner, Buck and Vi ran after her. They dodged around the building out of the cold wind and scooted down the steep stairs to the dusty underground tunnel that led to the subway. Buck caught up with Baba, he pulled her to one side, his hands cupped her face and his hot eyes searched into hers.
Babe shivered from the cold touch of his fingers. She pushed him back and ran to the subway stile searching her purse for a token. Buck's heavy clomping and Vi's high heels clicking echoed down the tunnel. They inserted their tokens and pushed themselves onto the subway platform. The express train shot down from Fifty-ninth Street spewing a cold gush of dirt and trash up into their eyes as it screeched to a stop at Forty-Second Street.
Fleet hurried her meal, she was abrupt with the waiter when he insisted on dessert and coffee. She grabbed her bill from his hands and stormed out of the Theatre Bar and Restaurant. The crush of late afternoon traffic assailed her as she strode into the blistering cold. She ran to a taxi pulling up and settled inside before the customer had paid his bill. Two men ran over to her cursing, Fleet looked blandly out to their red faces and smiled.
"Dramatist Book Shop," Fleet remarked curtly to the driver. "Eighth and Eighth-Eighth Avenue and Eighth Street."
As the taxi winded its way away from the mid-town area Fleet began to relax. It was almost schizophrenic, she thought in amusement to herself, the nearer she came to the Village the more the tough, business executive was left behind. In the Village she could be herself, get lost in a world that wasn't always "on". In the Village they were not critical of those who sought out their own pleasures; in fact it was expected.
Fleet settled back in the taxi and let her thoughts wander to Babe Peters. She wondered if she was being a fool racing through the early evening to meet Babe or not. Perhaps the words she'd heard about Babe having to pick up plays at the bookshop was not meant as an invitation; it could be embarrassing if Babe had not rid herself of Vi and Buck. Yet, it was a chance to see Babe again and Fleet felt like a young school girl seeking a glimpse of her first crush; no longer was she the assured casting agent for Lieb-Pitts Theatrical Enterprises.
Babe hurried against the cold wind that whipped against her body into the warmth of the shop. Vi and Buck were wrapped up in each other against the chill. They descended breathlessly, gasping down the street and followed Babe into the book store. Babe was already in the play section, searching out the titles of the paperback editions.
"You're really serious about all this study, aren't you?" Buck eyed her and leaned against a bookshelf.
"Uh-hm ..." Babe responded noncommittally.
"I mean-you think all this reading of plays-all this study will make you a star," he insisted.
"It will help me to become an informed actress," Babe asserted, pulling two volumes of play anthologies from the shelf.
"Experience will do as much-and it's not half so boring," Buck retorted.
"Oh, Buck, you got to know theatre-really know it," Babe said as she browsed the list of plays. "There's so much ... "
"There's so much more than wasting your time with books and that scene study class-that acting studio is for the birds!" he twisted his face in scorn. "Boyd and me only go so our mother will send us our allowance regularly." He grabbed a book from her, "This stuff won't help you get a job."
Babe retrieved her book, "No. But, it will help me after I get the job."
"I told you-she's a dedicated Sarah Bernhardt!" Vi tossed her hands up in the air. "You can't tell her anything."
"I can tell you this," Buck snatched the books from Babe. "It's contacts-who you know-and who you sleep with-just plain luck;" he smirked nastily.
"Where'd it get you?" Babe tensed and responded defensively.
"It's gotten plenty of guys-and girls-right up to the top! They can make you anything they want-if they want you. If they don't," he shrugged his shoulders. "You're wasting your time ... "
"Let's leave the dreamer. I'm getting hungry, too ..." Vi offered to Buck.
"Go ahead ..." Babe mumbled.
"Look, Miss Starry-eyes-don't go holier than thou on me. I was with you last night. Don't you remember?" Buck backed Babe up against the shelves.
Babe pushed him back, "I wish I could forget it!"
Buck fell against the bookshelf, Vi caught him by the shoulder, "Let's go. I told you-you're wasting your time with her! She's still the serious college student-her head's in the clouds-not down here with us mortals ... " Vi snickered.
"The hell with her!" Buck growled.
Babe felt relieved as she watched them barge through the store and out into the street. Slowly she turned and looked up into the eyes of Fleet Martin. Her face flushed and she dropped her eyes to her books.
"I heard-what you said just now ... " Fleet beamed. "You make a lot of sense. You got a head on your shoulders."
"I-I was hoping that you heard me-back at the Theatre Bar," Babe stammered.
"I did," Fleet smiled. "I did."
"You don't think me forward-like ..." Babe dared to look up into Fleet's face again.
"I think you should be more forward-particularly when you promise to call someone", Fleet reproved.
"But, I didn't know that you were the Flecia Martin of Lieb-Pitts then", Babe turned awkwardly away. "I didn't want you to think that I-that I ... "
"Let's forget it. And forget that I'm Flecia Martin of Lieb-Pitts", Fleet replied gently. "Let me be your friend-let me be Fleet ... "
"It's going to be hard-next to impossible for me-to think of you only as a friend. You can be so important to me-I need an agent and ..." Babe bit her lip doubtfully. "I don't want you to think I'm just trying to use you."
"Use me!" Fleet demanded. "I find it necessary to be needed, too! Besides with what you just stated to Vi and Buck you've got the right attitude to get ahead-you don't need those would be's."
Babe felt her heart to rise to her throat. She turned her eyes deliberately up to Fleet's, "Will you help me?"
"Oh, Babe I'll do all I can for you," Fleet smiled reassuringly. "And-right now-I've got to go to an Off Broadway play", she glanced at her watch. "You had dinner? Oh never mind, you can eat later at my place. I want you to meet the director and producer of this group. It could be a start ... " She gathered Babe about the shoulders and led her from the bookshop out into the cold, black night.
Fleet and Babe climbed the steep stairs to the top of an old warehouse building and came upon a brightly lit lobby crowded with people. Babe was awed by the milling throng of motley and well dressed people; obviously the audience was a mixture of "uptown" smart set to the "downtown" Greenwich Village beatniks with all variances in between. A gong reverberated the moment they arrived in the lobby. A young usher quickly opened the doors and led Fleet and Babe to their seats down front.
Inside the seats had been built up around three walls and were old movie seats that had been painted orange, red and yellow. The walls were draped with alternating panels of material in the same colors. The thrust stage was dark with dim, shadowy shapes. The audience rushed into the auditorium, bumping into one another in the aisle and stepping over each other in the rows of seats. Babe twisted for the light to read her program as the footlights flashed on and she caught sight of Vi and Buck sitting in the back.
During intermission Babe excused herself and left Fleet in her seat to study the program. She sauntered up the aisle, feeling the envious stares and scornful looks from other young actresses. Vi stepped out in the aisle and grabbed Babe's arms.
"I'm going to talk to you ..." Vi snarled.
"You and that lesbian going together? Vi snapped. "You going to tell her what we said? You going to hurt our chances with the best agency in town?"
"I don't know what you're talking about!" Babe twisted away from her vise like grip. "I'm not going to tell her anything."
"What kind of girl are you?" Buck stepped up. "You really gone queer?"
"No!" Babe turned from him, her face red with indignation and humiliation. "You left me alone in the bookstore and ... "
"And Fleet, the butch comes after you," Vi scowled.
"I couldn't help that she saw me-she recognized me from your party," Babe quickly interjected. "I-had nothing to do and she invited me to see the play. You-you told me-you told me she was important. I knew that I'd better not offend her."
"Seems to me I saw you sneaking out from the party with her," Vi slashed back.
"How could you have seen anything with me on top of you?" Buck snickered.
"Well-she was snooping around Babe all night long," Vi responded. "She smelled virgin territory."
"I couldn't help it. I didn't know anything about it," Babe protested. "You're making a lot of this up-you're taking too much for granted."
"We went back to get you," Buck offered.
"Then Miss Big took you out-we followed," Vi stated.
"Vi's afraid we had shot our mouths off too much," Buck smiled.
"What are friends for if not to put you on the inside track?" Babe mustered up a smile. "You put me wise-I got to watch my step, but ..." Babe shrugged. "Maybe I can do us all some good."
"Would you really? You're a darling. You're getting smart!" Vi exclaimed.
"Just don't let her make you-till you've locked horns with me," Buck murmured. "You're getting under my skin."
Vi took hold of Babe's hand as the gong sounded, "Play it cool, Babe; take care."
Babe was grateful for the gong, she turned from them, "I'll see you."
"You'll see me," Buck asserted. He grabbed Babe's hand and pulled her back, "I got some happiness-way out-pills. You ever had any LSD? Floating away-not caring what happens?"
"I wish I had-many times," Babe gave a nervous, impatient laugh.
"Then come over to Vi's-right after the play-and we'll play."
"I'll try," Babe attempted to pull away. Buck held firm, "Promise."
"I-I promise," Babe replied and tore away from him to return to Fleet.
"We'll wait for you," Buck called "after her.
Hopeless confusion settled over Babe and she sunk into defeat beside Fleet. She didn't see or hear any of the remainder of the play. She was in a fever, caught in a trap and loathing-herself. She felt doomed, there was no out for her with either Buck or Fleet.
As soon as the lights had faded from the stage for the final curtain call, Fleet clutched Babe's hand and pulled her backstage. They sidled through drapes under the EXIT sign beside the stage and climbed over stacked platforms and scenery to a cleared floor area. There were a line of open doors, bright lights shot out into the dimness.
Babe was aware of the musty smells of backstage mingled with the strong aroma of greasepaint. She glanced into the dressing room cubicles, into the little rooms that had only a chair and a mirror circled by bare light bulbs. Her heart was fired with desire to sit in one of those rickety chairs, in front of the dressing table and look into the makeup mirror, to belong to the theatre, to be an actress, to be on the stage.
"I can almost read your thoughts. I feel the vibration," Fleet smiled warmly and looked into Babe's faraway, dreamy eyes. "I used to feel that way about the theatre."
"I'd give anything to belong-to be a part of it. To be an actress!" Babe sighed.
"You will, my dear-you will," Fleet responded stoutly. "Come meet Bill Dietz-Dietz is the director."
Babe found herself looking into the frank eyes of a young man about twenty-four. He wore a sweat shirt and levis, with dirty sneakers on his feet. He smiled down from his six foot two to Babe's open face. His expert eyes covered her lush body, noting in detail the full breasts, trim waist and rounded hips. He nodded to Fleet and returned his eyes to study Babe's pretty face.
"She's lovely-but can she act?" Bill Dietz asked Fleet.
"I am a good actress," Babe was quick to respond.
"There's your answer," Fleet beamed. "When do you want us? I think she'll be right for your next play."
"She looks right. But, I don't want 'us'-I want her here tomorrow morning, nine o'clock sharp," Bill replied turning to Fleet. "There's no bargaining for salary-it's set. There's no need for selling-she's got to sell herself to me. You-you might put her off. You understand," he patted Fleet on the shoulder good-naturedly and turned to Babe. "Nine o'clock," he repeated and turned to help strike the set from the stage.
"Well-that's it," Fleet smiled over to a bewildered Babe. "I think you're in."
"But just like that-just like that?" Babe looked quizzical. "Because of you?"
Fleet laughed, "No. I wish I could say it was. But, we're downtown and I got no pull with Bill Dietz except to introduce you."
"But ..." Babe stammered in disbelief.
"But, you haven't got the part yet. This is Off Broadway and they're good. Conceited, arrogant, independent characters but good," Fleet laughed. "He liked you-liked what he saw. Like I did when ... "
"But nine o'clock ..." Babe murmured as a glimmer of escape seeped into her befuddled brain. "I'd better go-get home ... "
"Whoa! You're on your way, but you haven't gotten there. There's so much for me to tell you," Fleet grabbed onto Babe.
"I'll call-I'll call you-right after the audition-tomorrow-tomorrow morning ..." Babe called out as she started down the steep stairs.
"Be sure you do!" Fleet yelled after her. "Be sure."
Babe reached the door and flew into the bitter coldness of the night to Vi's to save her reputation. She ran recklessly into the blackness and was lost in the night ...
CHAPTER SIX
Babe felt very good, momentarily elated. She was delighted that she had gotten away from Fleet with no intimacy. She was overjoyed with the good fortune of a reading for Bill Dietz and the possibility of a part in his new play. But, she stopped in her tracks, she was running from the fire into the flames with Buck and Vi. She was faced with the dilemma of keeping face with them. It suddenly struck her that she was running hot and cold of late, her emotions were running rampant at extremes.
The cold tingled on her cheeks and stung her nose and ears. Babe started to move, slowly, dragging her feet in the slush. She crossed Washington Square Park. The snow was piled onto the tree limbs, a highlight of white on the branches that glistened in the night under the park lights. The benches, in a row along the paths, were blanketed deep with the downy, white crystals. She breathed in deeply and picked up her stride, she had to face her fate, she had to seek the answer to the question that burned within. She had to find out if she liked men or if, if she was a lesbian.
Vi's apartment was the basement in an old brown stone. The hall was lit by a small yellow bulb that turned the dusky darkness into a dim, golden glow. Each door to the hallway was painted a different color, according to the temperament and taste of the inhabitants. Vi's door was cracked with many layers of paint, the top coat being a vivid Chinese red.
Babe knocked timidly and waited for an answer. After a moment of silence, she tried the door handle and found the door unlocked. She eased open the garish door and found the apartment in darkness. A cold, silver light seeped in through a crack in the draperies and cast an eerie illumination over the room.
Suddenly a bright floodlight shot across the room and fell on the bed where Buck lay naked giggling. His bronzed body was stretched out on the white sheets, a silly grin froze on his handsome features. He raised his thick arms in an open invitation to Babe standing wide eyed in the doorway. His strong, hairy legs shot up and he bounded up, resting on his elbows.
"I waited for you," Buck beamed, his bright teeth glistened against the dark skin of his face. "It's all here for you," he raised an arm, let his hands trail over his wide, hairy chest and nestle between his legs.
"Isn't this silly!" Vi laughed, the bullet lamp shook in her hands. "Buck wanted to be theatrical."
Buck hopped up, straddle legged in the bed, flinging his pelvis forward, his tumescent flesh flashed rigidly upright, "All the world's a stage-but I'll take a bed anytime!"
"And go out of this world-every time!" Vi exclaimed, she snapped on the room lights and hooked the bullet lamp over her desk. She looked back up to Babe, "Well? Come on in-don't stand there in the doorway."
Buck hopped back to the bed, "Hurry up-let's get with it! I want to be sent out of this world tonight!"
"Buck wanted a happening!" Vi cried.
"Something wild!" Buck responded.
Babe felt her heart pounding with a strange excitement, with fear and trepidation. She reluctantly closed the door, her eyes avoided the naked, masculine flesh of Buck as much as possible. Vi hurried to the door and locked it. Babe felt the lock turn down to her very nerve core; she was caught again.
"But, aren't we going to have dinner?" Babe looked askance at the empty kitchenette. "I'm just about starved!"
"We decided that LSD over food was no good-we're going to give our bodies and souls a fulfillment," Buck sighed with elation and rolled on the bed.
"Buck's already had one pill," Vi confided. "Now that you're in we can turn down the lights ... "
"And let it happen!" Buck cried.
Babe watched every move that Vi made as she went around the room busily turning out the lights. The room dropped into darkness except for the cold sliver of moonlight that fell through the slit in the drapes. Vi motioned to Babe and started to take off her clothes.
"Back to nature-to the purest truth!" Vi called out. "Come on, Babe-get out of those confining clothes."
Buck hopped off the bed, he took two pills from the plate on the cocktail table and held them out to Babe and Vi, "Down th' hatch-this is dinner!"
Vi divested herself of her last garment and accepted the pill, plopping it into her mouth and gulping down red wine from the decanter, "Wine as a chaser!"
Babe dodged taking her pill, she struggled with her dress caught over her head. Buck moved over to her and raised her hand containing the pill to her mouth. He grabbed the decanter of wine and held it up to Babe's lips. Babe fearfully tongued the pill and swallowed the wine. As she pulled the dress up over her head she spat out the pill into her clothes. Buck's hands fell intimately onto her buttocks. His hot breath panted in her face. His palms slid up her body to the bra that held her full breasts.
With an impulsive snap, Buck flung the bra aside and Babe felt his demanding, hot lips surround her nipple while her other breast was immediately fondled by his nervous hands. Babe felt the searing fires reach throughout her body, racing through her veins; the same wanton passion that had surged within her before when he had touched her at the party. She winced under his rough hands and sharp teeth, but she arched her body up to his will.
Buck pushed down the half slip and stove his hands deep inside her panties. With both flimsy under garments wrinkled up under his wrists, he stripped her bare and stood back to penetrate the darkness to her shimmering, naked flesh. He whistled low and approached her again with his eyes screwed up tight in a narrow, searching gaze. His hot hands roamed intimately over her soft, round belly to the burnished flax that thrust out between her fleshy thighs.
"Wow! You're something else again-and more!" he cried almost as if in pain and gathered her up in his arms. "Oh, Babe-give it all to me! I'm a hungry fool for loving!" Babe couldn't restrain the moans that emanated from her strained lips. Buck gripped her to him and rubbed his hard body over her soft curves. "I'm the devil-wild and wicked-and we're all going to hell tonight!" he groaned, his lips mounted over her parted mouth.
Babe felt her body's heat flow in prickly tingles over her naked flesh. She was suddenly lifted in the darkness, held tight in Buck's massive arms and laid gently on the bed. Her passion soared, she clawed at his body, pulling his slick muscles down on top of her. The darkness hid her shame of lust, the crazy, insistent demands that urged her on to complete abandonment.
"The devil horse is going to ride tonight!" Buck snarled, arching his body over Babe's.
Vi dropped down beside Babe and cupped her swaying breasts. It was Vi's hands that pushed Babe's thighs apart and reached up to guide Buck's glide to its target. Babe screamed as he tore into her, a savage slash and nestled down deeply grinding his hips. Buck sprawled out full length, rammed into his prey.
"You got it all, Babe-get used to it-get used to it ..." he panted, gasping for breath.
"How's it feel, honey?" Vi whispered. "Tell me-tell me how it is to you."
"It's only your second time-you got to get used to the big ones. Get used to it-get th' feel of it ..." Buck gasped.
Buck started to move, to withdraw and Babe moaned mournfully. Buck jerked back and slammed himself in again, slowly working his hips in a twist as he settled down. Vi's eyes avidly watched Babe's face wince and tighten with pain, she massaged Babe's breasts and rubbed her nipples till they were swollen in between her fingers.
"How's that?" Vi whispered insistently in Babe's ear. "How's that now?"
Babe felt the demands in her craving body grow beyond the anguish of his huge tumescence that rigidly rammed into her. She dropped back, relaxed under his weight and felt his working slowly up and slowly down; little by little he continued up and out and little by little he nestled down deeper and deeper. Up and down., in and out, until he was a flashing fire that consumed her and she found her hips working to meet his insertions, instinctively, almost against her will.
"G-o-o-od! Oh-h-h-h!", Babe sighed as the cramped passion rippled through her tensed body. "Oh! Oh! Ah-h-h-h-h!"
"Tell me!" Vi's voice rasped, her ear fell over Babe's mouth.
Babe mumbled and moaned in glowing, vivid terms, in endearments and common profanities, about the fiery sensations Buck was creating in the very depths of her body. Vi chuckled, glued her ear closer to Babe's lips, her hot face smothered Babe's face. In inaudible gasps Babe mumbled in an insane, passionate narrative as her body took the onslaught of his savage force.
"I can't stand it!" Vi cried out.
Vi tossed her body up to Buck, she doubled up in passion and pulled Buck's face down to her open thighs. Sweating and pounding into Babe, Buck's hungry mouth suctioned onto Vi. He pumped his face over Vi's belly and seesawed himself into Babe; stabbing Babe with his tremendous protuberance and stabbing Vi's moist triangle with his bullish tongue.
"Harlots of hell ..." he mumbled in a foggy state of lust. "I can take you all-all of you!"
He dove his face in between Vi's white thighs, she wrapped her legs over his wide shoulders. He munched and mumbled in greedy gasping gobbles while his body flailed into the air and plowed into the anxious lips of Babe's body below. The two women were beside themselves, tossing and turning their bodies to his mouth and loins, seeking the elusive, timorous fulfillment: enjoying, luxuriating in the sensual sensations that he produced within them.
"Eat, monster! Satyr devil-eat me up! Keep coming!" Vi begged.
"Give it to me! Faster! Faster!" Babe simpered and cried, her frantic hips bounced up to sock against the bone of his flesh on each of his wild lunges.
"Wild and wicked! Wicked and wanton-tell me!" Buck pulled back from both of them panting. "Tell me-tell me-in no uncertain terms ..." he gasped air into his pounding chest " ... tell me what you want from the devil man!"
In unison the two depraved women yelled out their desires in basest language, in vulgar expressions, in wild pleadings, crying and sobbing, groveling before the stud animal of their primitive passions. Babe wrapped her yearning, quivering body around his and swayed her hips onto his brute extension. Vi moaned and tossed her hips up to his flushed and sweaty face, straining up to his teasingly extended tongue. They fell together in a wet heap of flesh, copulating, growling and snarling like beasts in a barnyard.
"Flying-we're flying!" Buck called out. "Here comes heaven! The hell cats and the devil are going to make a hell of heaven!" Buck groaned and plunged to the hilt, throbbing and pulsating, then his shiver grew to a wild shuddering. "There goes the first blast of joy!"
Babe winced at the impact, her body convulsed, tensions broke in a sparkling, deafening glow of spasms. She locked her legs and gyrated her buttocks as the spewing, spendings shot throughout her delighted body in a culminative crest of pleasure. Buck settled down, his moans blubbered from between Vi's thighs.
"Devil, eat-don't stop!" Vi cried in panic.
Babe twisted free and lay in a glowing sweat of fulfillment watching as Buck stuffed his face up between Vi's legs and gored her with his thick tongue. It was like Fleet had done; a flush of remembered passion quivered in Babe's body. What was wrong if Buck did it? Why was it wrong if a woman did it to another woman? It looked so good and Vi was in a suspended ecstasy, it couldn't be all wrong, Babe thought.
Buck lay sprawled out, his head bobbing up and down. Vi beat upon his back with her fist, her thighs drew up around his ears, her body tensed, convulsed and her legs shot out. She moaned and groaned, her body vibrated in passionate release. Buck continued, Vi dropped back to the pillows. Buck raised his head and bared his teeth in an angry grimace.
"You want to be eaten? You want me to be a cannibal?" the head stove up her thighs, his teeth closed around her hairy flesh.
"Ow'." Vi screamed. She jerked her body up into a protective knot, "What th' hell's wrong with you?"
"The devil's a cannibal!" Buck gnashed his teeth. "I want some flesh-some bloody, raw flesh!" he lunged. "Raw meat!"
"Get the hell away from me!" Vi recoiled and screamed.
"Hell is where we are-heaven's hell!" Buck snarled.
"He's off!" Vi cried in fear, she struggled and kicked him back. "He's off his nut! The pills! The LSD is driving him out of his mind!"
"Gimme some blood, honey! Let me at-bloody flesh!" Buck growled, his eyes fired with a demented gleam. "I got to-to to have some ... "
Vi snatched the brass lamp from the bed and slammed it down on his menacing head. Buck stopped midair and slithered to the bed sheets, a trickle of blood ran down his face. He sighed, his eyes rolled back into his head and he lay still.
"Oh! My god!" Vi cried, cringing away from Buck's naked physique. "Oh, my god!"
"You've not-you've not killed him? Did you?" Babe queried in a stupefied, numbed voice. "Not killed him!" she cried.
"He was crazy. I had to protect myself! You saw-you saw that ..." Vi mumbled through her tears. "See-see if-if he's alright. See if he's really dead."
Babe mustered herself from shock and timidly bent over his chest. Relief swept over her face, her body felt limp, she was suddenly sick to her stomach. Babe gripped her waist and ran to the toilet. The hot nausea erupted suddenly and she stood weakly crying over the sink. Her face was white in the mirror. Babe quickly recovered, placed cold towels over her face and staggered back into the room with Vi.
"Well?" Vi remained stiff, unmoved, frozen in fear. Her face was a ghostly white in the dim, cold light, "Is he-is he dead?"
"No-o-oh! No!" Babe laughed in hysteria. "But, but he's going to have an awful head when he wakes up. He's just-just knocked unconscious ... "
"He had too many pills," Vi sighed defeatedly. With no other show of emotion, she stared down at Buck's face, "Some people just can't take LSD and enjoy it."
"Heaven's hell-pleasure's pain," Babe mumbled as she gathered her clothes. "I don't understand. I just don't understand at all ... "
Lance left the building and fought through the crowd at the door for a taxi. After an endless battle he snared an empty one and sped across Manhattan, from the east side to the west. The driver was gregarious. Lance gave him an occasional affirmative grunt and let him drone on. The driver pulled the cab around Washington Square and came to a stop for a red light.
Babe walked misty eyed across from the park, the taxi headlights fell sharply upon her. Her bright red hair glinted in the glare, she stumbled onto the sidewalk and stopped. She was filled with indecisive action. She was confused, her mind was occupied with the new found pleasures of sex. Certainly she had enjoyed, even desired her sex with Fleet, but she was afraid of being queer.
Babe had craved and fully enjoyed the animal copulation with Buck tonight. There was a greater fulfillment that still glowed within her, not even diminished by the shock. It had been more than the satisfaction and thrills produced by Fleet. Then she was not a lesbian, she gloated, but it would take some time overcome her fear of encounter with men.
Babe shivered in the cold and pulled her collar up around her neck. Determinedly she headed from the park and to her subway on Seventh Avenue. Passersby huddled together in couples and groups warding off the cold as she bucked the blasts of wind on the cross town street.
"Hey! Babe! Stop!" Lance cried out the window of the cab. "Let me out-here!" he yelled to the driver.
Lance hopped from the taxi, tossing a couple of dollars towards the driver. He ran against the billowing chill after Babe. Two bearded beatniks strode towards him, their collars were pulled up over their necks and they shielded their eyes from the winter's wind with their gloved hands.
Lance inadvertently bumped into their crouched bodies, one slid on the icy pavement and the other tried in vain to hold his buddy up. The sudden collision took Lance by surprise, he skidded and fell on top of the fallen beatnik. The remaining standing one hovered over Lance with curses and balled fists.
"Where th' hell you think you're going, Mister Uptown!" the bearded man spat at Lance. "Come on, fancy pants-get up and fight!"
"Sorry ..." Lance sputtered. "I-I didn't see you."
"That's your mistake, Mister. You fancy pants can't ever see us!" the bearded beatnik jerked Lance up from the pavement. "Maybe next time you'll see us I" he stove his fist into Lance's face and then opened his palm with a stinging knuckle crack over Lance's face.
The sudden and blinding pain stunned Lance, he spun backwards and fell with a howl to the slick, cold pavement. Babe heard the yell and turned to watch as a crowd gathered around the corner watching the two beatniks attack Lance. They ripped his Edwardian cut overcoat off and started kicking him in the ribs.
"Kill him!" a long haired girl called out with glee. She wiped her running, red nose and jeered down at Lance.
Babe pushed through the crowd of aroused young people and cried out, "Stop this! Stop it!"
"Get the little pussycat out of the way!" one of the attacking beatniks panted.
"She's Uptown, too!" the other beatnik sneered, he pulled his foot back, aimed at Lance's head and Babe fell over Lance's prone body.
"You're all no good-a bunch of dirty, no goods!" Babe cried and cradled Lance's head. "Go ahead-show the world how you'd even kick a woman! Go ahead!" she dared.
The crowd growled and mumbled among themselves. They shivered and silently slinked away. The two beatniks turned vicious hoodlums grumbled in grating voices, sneered slurs at Babe, but turned away and were lost in the departing crowd. Babe looked up at the quiet and still with only the cold wind whistling down the empty street. She tried to lift Lance's body. He groaned and sighed, his eyes fluttered open and he looked into her worried face.
"Oh-h! Babe ..." his arms slowly raised and linked around her shoulders.
Babe bent forward to let him clutch onto her. Her face fell very close to his, her hot, indignant tears fell to his bruised and chilled cheeks. He strained, he raised his face and his lips clamped onto hers.
"Oh, Babe ..." he sighed as she led him down the street.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Lance had only been slightly hurt and bruised from the street brawl. Babe had saved him from any really serious physical damage. At the apartment he quickly bathed and Fleet dressed and bandaged his abrasions. Babe watched with worried eyes and bated breath as Fleet administered unto him, giving him brandy and then sending him packing to bed.
"You'll stay over," Fleet insisted. "And-maybe you'll tell me what you were doing walking the street at this hour ... "
"I don't like that term," Babe retorted defensively. "I was just walking-excited and happy and-and I lost the time. Then I saw ... "
"I'm sorry. I'm glad-very glad-you happened along," Fleet softened and placed her arms around the girl. "I'm glad you're here, too."
"I'll never make that audition. I'd better get going ... " Babe impulsively grabbed her coat.
"I said you'll stay over," Fleet's voice commanded.
"But ... " Babe dropped her coat reluctantly. "I've got to be up early."
"You will," Fleet smiled. "I don't want you to miss out with Bill Dietz. This can be your big break-and I'll be standing by to see that you get everything coming to you."
"You'll represent me?" Babe cried happily.
"That's what I've been doing since you met Dietz tonight. You've got to sign a contract with me-with the Lieb-Pitts Agency," Fleet beamed. "We'll have you under exclusive contract-you're going to be a star!" she exclaimed.
Radiating a glow of happiness, Babe let Fleet lead her into the bedroom. Her mind had soared with the phrase, "You're going to be a star!" and it reverberated in her brain and heart. Nothing Fleet could do to her now would bring such excitement to her blood. There was no passion stronger than Babe's desire to be an actress, to be recognized, to prove herself. She faintly heard when Fleet spoke again.
"Of course you'll have to change your name," Fleet offered.
"Of course ... " Babe replied automatically, seeking to please.
"Babe sounds too informal-too affectionate for I legitimate actress. What was your mother's name?" Fleet queried as she stripped the young girl.
"What?" Babe asked absently.
"What was your mother's name?" Fleet stopped and stared into Babe's starry eyes.
"Oh-Barbara ... " Babe replied from afar. "My father called her Babe, that's how I was named."
"Then from now on your Barbara Peters-Miss Barbara Peters. It sounds good. But to me you'll always be Babe," Fleet embraced her and led the entranced Miss Barbara Peters to bed.
Lance tossed and turned, a restless sleep. He was tormented by the sounds emanating from his wife's room; he was tormented by jealousy as well as by the raw spots on his body from the street fight. The grey of night in his room settled into a pitch of turbulent dreams, of nightmares and finally to wishful fancies of holding Babe in his arms.
The rattling of pans in the kitchenette awakened Lance with a start. The painfully bright sun slashed across his face and blinded him. He crept into the shower, feeling the ache in his shoulder and the sting on the side of his face. He stumped his toe on the rug and growled loudly attracting the attention of Babe and Fleet at the breakfast table.
"He's up," Fleet said with a nod of her head. "I hope you don't mind staying with him after your audition. I won't be back until late tonight-got a business dinner." She glanced over to Babe, "You won't forget?"
"Oh!" Babe jumped from her thoughts and looked over to Fleet. "I'll run right back here. Yes."
"You'll get the part. I know it. I have a feeling about things like this. Lance can help you with your lines," Fleet patted Babe's face. "Put him to work-keep him busy-he's going to be a bear. A teddy bear-but a grouch."
"I'll do my best," Babe replied.
As Fleet embraced her Babe caught sight of Lance standing in his bedroom door; his face was livid. Babe suddenly thought of the warm kiss that he'd bestowed upon her on the cold sidewalk. It was stuck somewhere in her subconscious, that kiss, his kiss, a warm kiss on the cold streets. But, it had all been forgotten later when Fleet began to talk to her about her career, about her becoming a star.
"Hurry, dear. Good luck!" Fleet pushed her through the door.
Babe turned with wondering and sauntered down the corridor for the elevator. As she descended to the street level her mind began to focus on the audition, but there was still some part of her left up in the apartment with Lance. Excitedly she faced the cold and hurried to her appointment.
The attic studio was chilly and bare. The broad beams in the ceiling appeared stark against the white and were vividly accentuated by the glare from the skylight. The small group of people sat huddled around a table in the center of the room. Bill Dietz, at the head of the table, was flanked by two girls who wore glasses, dark sweaters and levis and gripped clipboards in their hands. The nervous actors smoked incessantly and silently and watched Dietz confer with his assistants and the playwright.
"It's decided," he declared with finality" and raised his head to look around the table at the anxious actors. "Mr. Welles will play the father. Harriet Von Tass will have the mother's role, Johnny Jameson will play ... "
To Babe his voice droned on, her heart beat at a fantastic pace. He was deliberately casting the smaller roles first and saving the larger parts for the last. She glanced apprehensively at. the girl across the table from her; she had shown more experience in her readings., Babe thought and had projected more emotion. Babe's heart sunk as the rival actress returned her glance with a smug self assured look. Babe strained her face and ears towards Bill Dietz as he neared the part she'd read for.
"Dexter Thomas will have the romantic lead and the ing�nue-the ing�nue lead will go to our playwright's and my choice-Miss Barbara Peters," Bill concluded.
Babe was beside herself, the room was silent and yet electric with emotions of elation and dejection. Miss Barbara Peters, it did sound good, she thought. Miss Barbara Peters has the ing�nue lead; the playwright's and my choice, he had said. Bill stood and led a man over to Babe. She looked up through bleary eyes to the two men hovering over her chair.
"Miss Peters, this is John Cavanaugh-our playwright," Dietz remarked. "And, this is your leading man-you may have seen him in the Savannah Leigh movie-Dexter Thomas."
"Thank you ... Thank you ..." Babe muttered overjoyed. She turned and looked into the dark, handsome face of Dexter Thomas, "Thank you-I mean-I'm glad to meet you."
They all laughed, Dietz stopped suddenly and took Babe's hand. "We've all been confused and excited at a time like this. Rehearsal tomorrow morning at ten," Dietz dropped Babe's hand abruptly. "First act tomorrow," he handed her a thick typed manuscript in a blue cover.
Babe bolted for the door. She glided down the stairs as if they were clouds that she floated and soared over. On the street she braced for the cold and ran happily into the wind to the Artist Court apartment building. She fell against the elevator panel gasping for breath, her frozen finger desperately pressing the twelfth floor button.
As the elevator shot upwards Babe's thoughts returned to Lance. A nervous tremor, a fear settled upon her. She wondered how he would react to her after this morning when he had discovered her in his wife's arms. She stepped cautiously from the elevator and heard angry voices coming from the apartment. Hurriedly she rushed down the carpeted corridor and flung open the door.
There, on his knees, she found a prematurely grey headed man whining and pleading with Lance. The man crawled on his knees after Lance. Lance whirled on him, the man grabbed onto Lance's legs. Lance tried to shake him off. Lance's face was twisted in disgust.
"Look, Bill-it was a mistake. I called you-you checked me out. It was a mistake. I should have called another doctor," Lance twisted away.
"Be mean to me-cuss me out ... " the man panted and gripped onto Lance's pajama legs. His anxious fingers crawled into Lance's crotch, "Please-let me feel you!"
"You're not just a degenerate-you've gone far beyond being queer. You're sick!" Lance retorted and then turned deliberately gentle. "I can't be angry with you anymore. Don't you see? I feel sorry for you," he shrugged his shoulders and sat down.
"You're just jaded-like you said before-the other night," the panting man responded heatedly. "I can make you get excited. I'll do anything!"
"Look, ole buddy-I don't play your infantile games anymore. I grew up-there's nothing in it," Lance crossed his legs with determination. He looked up to the foyer and saw Babe standing there in amazement. "Come on in, Babe. Dr. Wood-row has just finished checking me out."
Bill Woodrow jumped to his feet, his face dropped to complete shock and mortification. He shunned Babe's eyes, nodded in her direction and went searching for his medical bag. Babe moved into the room and Lance rose to meet her. He placed an arm about her waist and pulled her to him.
"This is my wife's new prot�g�. She's a lovely, young lady ..." his last words came deep and throaty as he stared into Babe's open face. Quickly he dropped his arm and moved over to Dr. Woodrow, "She probably saved my life last night."
"That-that was brave-a very brave thing to do ..." Dr. Woodrow muttered and edged towards the door. "Goodbye ..." the door eased closed behind him.
A deathly silence prevailed as Lance appraised her. Babe moved uncomfortably away, fully aware of his scrutiny. She attempted to be casual and sauntered into the kitchenette. His eyes covered her every movement as she prepared coffee. Suddenly she jumped, he was right behind her. His warm, brown eyes searched deeply into hers.
"He's an old friend-he was here the night-the first time I saw you ..." Lance offered.
"You are alright? I mean ..." Babe almost whispered with deep concern.
"Yes," he quickly replied. "Did you get the job?"
"Oh, yes," she almost exclaimed loudly but his face was close to hers. "Yes-yes I did."
"I'm glad ..." he replied.
"Shouldn't you be getting some rest?" Babe turned to the coffee. "Maybe later you can help me learn my lines. I-I've got to study-it would help to be cued ... "
"You got all day-with me. I'll help you," his arms swooped around her and twisted her face up to his. "There's something about you that gets me. I can't help it," his hot, demanding lips fell gently upon hers; his mouth and tongue worked over her lips until she surrendered her body to his hands.
"You're a married man ..." Babe mumbled.
"My wife's married, too-that didn't stop you," Lance retorted in a husky voice. "It's my turn," his lips ran over her face and down her neck.
"You've got to rest," Babe protested weakly.
"Later ..." he worked his hands up under her sweater, over her chest to her free, swaying breasts.
"I've got to study-my lines ..." she moaned.
"Later ..." his eager fingers encircled her budded nipples, the palms of his hands opened and massaged her globular breasts slowly. His face was intense, his breath came short as he raised the sweater up to her neck. His head dropped and she felt his hot lips surround her projected, burning nipples. "Wonderful ... a dream ... a wonderful dream!" he mumbled, suckling onto her fiery nipples.
Babe closed her eyes and felt the surge of passionate desires radiate through her flesh. It was more than the strange stimulation she had received from Fleet. It was far and above the animalistic desires that had been generated by Boyd or Buck. A consuming flame tingled in her body and she gave herself up to the moment of love with a desperation of desire as if it would never be again.
Lance held back, gasping for breath and looked at her lovely face enrapt in a trance of passion. His eyes searched over her body to her wet nipples on the full breasts that glistened from his hot tongue's caresses. Slowly he lifted the sweater from her, pulling it over her face and dropping it to the floor. Babe shivered with the intensity of her passion and nestled her breasts up against his chest.
Babe slipped her arms around his wide shoulders, her fingers sunk into his neck. She dropped her hands, her nervous fingers trembled at each button until the pajama jacket fell off his broad chest. Lance pressed his muscular body up against her quivering breasts, jamming her nipples into the wiry, black hair of his chest.
"Oh, Babe!" he cried, his hands slid down her bare back and fumbled with the belt of her skirt. His skin crawled and tightened, sweat dripped from under his armpits, "Oh, Babe-I'm ready! I could go just looking at you!"
Babe, anxious to be skin tight against his naked body, impulsively ripped the belt from her waist. Lance found the zipper, tore it down and pulled the skirt from her hips. Panting with wild desire, uncontrolled in her abandonment, Babe stepped out of the skirt and pushed down her panties. Lance sucked in air at the sight of her naked body. With a groan of happiness he opened his arms and Babe flung herself towards him. Lance grabbed her breasts and bounced them on his palms. His lips found hers again and with a sob, Babe's rapid tongue stabbed into his mouth.
Hurriedly Lance untied the knot of his pajama trousers and let them slip from his hard hips. As they struggled to get their bodies closer, Lance noticed the ridiculous sight of the light pajama material hung from his rigid projection. Babe, hungry for the sight of his naked flesh, shoved the pajamas off from his flaming protuberance.
"I never felt this way. Never!" she flung her hips up against his extended loins and grinded herself in a tantalizing manner over him. "I feel like a whore and I don't care!" she moaned, glorying in the hard, stubborn feel of his stabbing body. Raw edges of nerves shot fiery tingles through her stimulated flesh at the touch of his steeled flesh.
Lance pulled her towards the bedrooms. Babe automatically started into Fleet's. Lance stalled and watched her hips sway, the shimmering flesh of her thighs and shapely legs. He frowned and followed her to the door. Just as she reached for the door handle, he grabbed her to him.
"In my room. I want you all to myself for now-in my room," he growled huskily and led her to his door.
Babe sank to the mattress, her head fell back into his pillows and the musty, masculine smell of Lance excitingly assailed her nostrils. She was thrilled as she watched his strong body rise in an arch over her, his dark brown eyes smoldering with the raging fire of his passion. His knees wedged in between her thighs and she stretched wide, bowing up for his slashing descent.
He glided through the air and with a slow, powerful insertion, sank deep inside her craving flesh. She struggled and strained her smooth legs around his dark, muscular thighs. Lance nestled deeper resting his bearded face on her luscious mounds, his tongue extended to caress and lick their nipples.
"Oh, Lance! I'll go out of my mind!" she hissed intensely.
"Babe-baby!" he sighed, luxuriating in the steamy heat of her searing flesh.
"Love me! Love me ..." she begged.
"I do. I do love you," he gasped.
Their moment tingled with timorous excitements. Their bodies tensed in the strain of suspended lust. Suddenly Lance sobbed out and started pumping his body furiously. Babe grimaced and grinded her hips up to his lunges. Her eyes dilated, she soared up to meet him instinctively, compulsively.
"Good-it's so-o-o good!" he growled and shook the sweat from his forehead.
"Won-der-ful-l-l-l!" Babe cried, her whole body responding to the fiery love that flowed in her glowing veins.
The heavenly sensations that Lance produced brought tears of fulfillment to Babe's eyes. Her body shook in spasm after spasm, her ecstasy was unbounded. She offered not only her body to him but all her pent up emotions were his as well. It was the most real, the most vividly full moment of love she'd ever had and she gave freely everything to Lance.
The physical pleasures were doubled for Lance; he was a man, with the man's dominance over the woman he loved, he had found the complete masculine fulfillment with Babe. He was charged with a power that he'd never felt before and had, in the past, artificially produced it. But this was real, he didn't want to lose the moment, the pleasure, the power. He fought and clung to each sensation fearing it was the last. He lunged and flung his body down, drawn to the lovely, feminine creature writhing beneath him. Suddenly the blood rushed to his head and the explosion gushed from his body.
"Oh-h-h-h!" he sobbed and plummeted down, holding onto Babe to savor every delicious second of his shuddering ecstasy.
Exhausted, in a flooding of sensations, Babe hugged Lance's neck and locked her body around his keeping him rooted to her. Possessively she clung to the big man as the heady, swimming sensations swooped up to her head and she fell back in a dizzy, satisfied swoon.
Lance stretched on top of her, gasping for breath and gripped her to his damp body. His heart was pounding furiously, it thumped loudly in his chest and echoed throughout her body. His lips fell to hers in a soft, gentle kiss of happiness. He was in a fever of love. Although drained and spent, he felt the surge of real feelings and real passions grow within himself.
"You are wonderful-the most wonderful!" he panted in her ear.
"Rest now-just stay with me, rest-and don't move from me," Babe mumbled in a heavenly haze. Her smooth arms crept around his heated face and she pulled him down to her bosom.
Dexter Thomas pulled away from the whispered discussion with the playwright, John Cavanaugh, to stop Bill Dietz as he left his table at The Punch Bowl Restaurant. Dexter smiled and tapped Bill on the shoulder. Bill turned and pushed the cropped, unruly hair back off his forehead. He noticed that Dexter's eyes were glassy and his cheeks flushed from martinis.
"Looks like Hollywood taught you some bad habits," Bill remarked dryly. "If you want to stay in that part-even if you do drink with the playwright-don't drink before a rehearsal of mine."
"Aw-we haven't started rehearsals," Dexter bantered. "Just a toast to the play-and my getting back to New York City."
"News travels fast, Dexter," Bill added meaningfully. "I got friends out on the coast that thought I was a fool to even think of reading you."
"Hey! That's all in the past-with that washed out career Savannah tried to saddle me with," Dexter ruefully remarked.
"Good," Bill turned and started for the cashier. "See you tomorrow."
"Uh-just a minute," Dexter grabbed his arm laughingly. "I-uh-I wanted to ask you. The new skirt-that ing�nue, Barbara Peters. Is she something to you? I mean ... "
"Say what you mean," Bill responded icily.
"Well, I did," Dexter attempted a smile. "Is she your girl? I don't want to step on any toes getting in bed ... "
"That's not funny to me," Bill stated, turned and walked with determination away from Dexter. "Miss Peters is an actress-under contract to me-to be respected."
CHAPTER EIGHT
Bill Dietz stormed out of The Punch Bowl Restaurant. A warm sun glared through the grey, slate March, sky. The sooty snow was melting and creating black running rivers into the gutters. Spring, thought Bill, spring is coming. He took a deep breath and crossed the street dodging the crusty puddles. He was in a furor of anger over Dexter Thomas's insinuations about the ing�nue, Barbara Peters.
He glanced at the rushing beatniks, shrieking with joy and abandonment, tossing the iced snow balls at each other like irresponsible children. He felt hostile to the world, particularly to Dexter Thomas. Dexter was known as a stud, an expert seducer, and of late, an actor who drank too much. The rumors had grown and spread from the west coast about his exploits in Hollywood.
Dexter had taken up with an ing�nue, the wife of a big time producer. Savannah Leigh, the last of the great star personalities, had abandoned him. His contract had been automatically dropped and he had run the gamut on the Hollywood strip from the old ladies with money to the teen agers looking for a thrill. Still Dexter had the qualities for a fine actor and he had an animal magnetism that still attracted women in the audience.
Bill shivered and pulled his collar up around his neck. He wasn't sure that he was shivering from the cold or trembling from the internal turmoil created by Dexter's remarks about Babe. That red hair, those bright green eyes, the way she could turn her pretty face up with trust had settled deep in his subconscious. Her walk, the unconscious sway of her hips, the bounce of her voluptuous breasts had fired his blood. Dietz walked on, his mind inflamed over Barbara Peters.
Babe curled up at the foot of the bed and languored back, her red hair falling free of the bed. She and Lance had their feet intertwined and caressed each other's bare ankles with their toes. The noon sun shot in across her gleaming tresses and highlighted the sparkle of her green eyes. The sheet was pulled up over her sensual body and she held the script up to her eyes to study.
Lance was half asleep. He was twisted around a pillow, his head lounging back. He opened his warm brown eyes and stared up at the ceiling.
"Barbara Peters ..." Lance mumbled soft and dreamy. "Whoever you are-whoever you become-don't ever leave me." His head shot up and he stared at Babe. "I couldn't do without you now-now that I've found you. You're all that love has meant and never been." He half rose, "You know that? That I love you?"
"I know that I love you," Babe murmured.
"Then never leave me-and always love me," Lance whispered.
"I'll always love you," Babe responded.
"What if-what if Fleet gets you signed out on the West Coast?" Lance insisted.
"Oh!" Babe was startled by the mention of his wife. "I-I've still got this play. I'm signed for this play," she demurred, holding up the blue script.
"Fleet could get you out of it if she wanted to sell you to Hollywood," he rose troubled and stared into Babe's misty eyes. "She's a smart-and hard-business woman ... "
"Please, one thing at a time. You're pushing me to think of things that-that may never happen," Babe fell against him, her arms rushed around his neck. "Oh, Lance!"
"She's also very jealous," he pulled back and searched Babe's face. "We can't go on as if nothing has happened."
"But, I don't want anybody but you. I don't," she declared.
"Then we've got to do something-and fast!" Lance gripped her to him. "You don't know Fleet like I do," they both held their clinch in a breathless silence that was filled with fear and wonderment.
The day went slowly for Fleet. She was impatient with her clients. She had rushed her luncheon and debated about calling the apartment to find out if Babe had really gotten the part with Dietz, but each time her hand had faltered on the phone. She had faced her last appointment with a deep sigh of relief that the day was gone. Now, with growing irritation, she had to acknowledge that the dinner date would keep her from Babe, a delay in being with and holding her beloved young actress.
Fleet hurried from the office to Sardi's for dinner with her date, the producers of Star-Cast, a new television program emanating from the West Coast. As she entered Sardi's she encountered her husband's partner, the blond, crew cut, Dick Dickinson, with a gorgeous young woman. Dick smiled down with an open, frank look into Fleet's eyes.
"My new find-Lori James. She's an actress ..." Dick winked in an exchange of confidence with Fleet. "I told her to see you-you might like her-too ..." he winked meaningfully.
"Oh, yes. In the office-make an appointment," Fleet was brusque as she surveyed the lush curves of the innocent looking blonde girl. "See my secretary."
Fleet rushed into the bar, she had no time for the exciting young blonde, whose innocent eyes spelled danger to anyone. Her thoughts were filled with Babe, but there was something fascinatingly evil about Lori James. Lori's sensual shape, her wide eyes, and the form of an insinuating pout on her red lips were not easily shaken from Fleet's mind. Fleet quickly ordered a Martini and downed the drink before her clients arrived for dinner.
Bill Dietz crawled up the steep stairs to his Off-Broadway theatre. He was despondent and strolled into the musty attic playhouse eyeing the dull, grey silhouettes with a jaundiced eye. This was only a start, a start for him, this was the beginning of a big career as a director. He believed in himself, but right now he hoped that Barbara Peters could believe in him as well.
Barbara Peters was growing into an obsession with Bill, she filled his lonely thoughts and excited his dormant passions to a height that was beyond his control. He turned from the dusky theatre and strolled aimlessly to his pad behind the scenery dock.
Bill slammed the door with an unaccustomed fury. The books high on the shelves shook and one fell crashing to the barren floor. His mind was burning with a torturous, jealous anger; in the dark recesses of his mind was the knowledge that Fleet was a lesbian-bent woman and that Lance, her husband, was known to play the field of eroticism for sexual thrills. Bill suddenly pictured the red head of his dreams caught as a pawn between the two of them.
Bill dropped his tall frame to the bunk bed, he fell back disconsolate and looked at the dark room illumined by the cold stars through the skylight. His long arm reached to his desk, his hand found and pulled towards his face the picture of Barbara Peters. In the dim light his mind vividly colored the black and white glossy photograph. It grew in his mind till the very smell of Babe's body permeated his thoughts. With a groan of anguished passion, he gripped his adulthood and tensed his body, for an adolescent's substituted release of frustration.
Dexter paced his room high in the Taft Hotel. The ice in his bourbon tinkled as he seized his glass and tossed it up to his lips. His eyes stared with a determined glint. He whirled on John Cavanaugh, the playwright, who was laying sprawled on the bed and slammed his fist into his hand.
"I'll get her!" Dexter growled.
"Good heavens," John drawled in a drunken state. "Why?"
"I'm going to have her!" Dexter spat. "You gave her the job-she got the part because ... "
"She got the part because I thought she could do the part. She's a great little actress," John spelled it out slowly.
"Well-wouldn't you like to have her a little bit grateful? Wouldn't you like to have her in bed?" Dexter smirked.
"You've changed since Rockridge, Maine-Hollywood or Savanah's changed you," John appraised the taut figure of the masculine brute stalking before him. "I don't have to have every girl I see. I don't know what it is with you. Ego?" John rose. "Insecurity? Dex, what's got into you?"
"Nothing!" Dexter slashed out. "You're being a dramatist now-leave me alone."
"Even an oversexed maniac wouldn't be this way," John retorted. "Don't you ever get tired?"
"I've got a long time to be tired when I die," Dexter flipped with a grin. But, I won't have a nobody turn down a star! Nobody's going to turn down Dexter Thomas!"
"You're worked up about something. She didn't turn you down-her roommate said she wasn't home," John patiently explained as he struggled into his coat. "She's out. Tomorrow is another day. And-tomorrow I expect you to be ready for rehearsals."
"Tomorrow ..." Dexter almost spoke to himself. "Yeah!" he sighed and glanced up to John. "You going?"
"I got to rewrite the second act's last scene-after I have a couple of good, black coffees," John staggered to the door. "Maybe four coffees!" he laughed. "See you tomorrow ... "
"Yeah ... tomorrow is another day," Dexter sunk to his bed as the door closed. The neons of Broadway spilled over his intense face, he tossed over, his drink splashed over the pillow, the glass fell from his relaxed hand. "Tomorrow ..." he mumbled into the alcohol drenched pillow.
Fleet tore herself away from her business companions on the street in front of Sardi's and hailed a taxi. The hour was good for finding a cruising cab, it was nine thirty in the evening and in between the dinner and the after theatre rush. She was excited over the prospect of being with Babe and she was excited that she'd been able to interest the TV producers to attend Babe's opening night. She sighed to herself and felt it all had been worthwhile.
Leaving the elevator, Fleet felt her feet hurrying to the apartment door. With nervous fingers and anticipatory beatings of her heart, she inserted the key into the lock. Flinging open the door she was astonished to find the place in darkness.
The smell of stale cigarette smoke filled the empty, dark apartment. Quickly Fleet rushed through all the rooms; Lance's bed was mussed, his pillows were on the floor. Fuming to herself her breath in hot pants of despair, she descended to the lobby and raced out into the night calling for a taxi.
Lori jumped up startled by the pounding on her door. She shook the sleeping, nude form of Dick Dickinson. He snapped up half asleep and stared around in a bewildered state. Lori hopped out of bed and grabbed a negligee, she turned askance to Dick.
"Who could it be?" she whispered. "Babe's got her keys."
"Let me-let me get dressed," he stammered. His face was wreathed in anxiety. "My wife-she's followed me before ... "
"I can't get mixed up with bad publicity!" Lori whispered with an intensity near hysterical. "What am I to do?"
"Let me out of here! Just let me get out of here!" he zipped his trousers and clutched his overcoat, searching frantically around the room. "She's trying to catch me for a divorce. Alimony-all she thinks of is alimony!"
"There's no way out-but the door-the front door," Lori stuttered.
"What? Only the front door ... That door?" Dick was aghast. "A window-fire escape?" he asked desperately.
"Over here-it takes you down to the back courtyard," Lori panted, raising the window by the fire escape.
Dick grabbed her by the neck and gave her a quick kiss, his hands trailed down her body in loving admiration, "Tomorrow-at the studio?"
"Yes! Yes!" Lori was impatient and cold by the window. "Yes, I'll see you tomorrow," she promised and slammed the window down, watching his fast descent out in the cold night.
With an anxious, white face, her body trembling in fear of a reprisal from Dick's wife, Lori reached the door. She unlatched it and slowly opened it, making sure that the safety catch was on.
"Yes?" she spoke softly, controlling her voice.
"Let me in!" Fleet demanded.
"Oh!
" Lori sighed with great relief. "Mrs. Martin ..." Lori removed the latch and the door was shoved open. Fleet stood and stared with hostility at the almost naked young woman.
"Where are they?" Fleet snapped, her hard eyes stared into Lori's frightened face.
"Who? Where's who?" Lori stammered, clutching the front of her negligee. "What do you mean? What's the matter?"
"I want Babe and my husband!" Fleet growled hoarsely.
Fleet pushed past the shivering young woman and stormed into the bedroom. She reappeared and stared around the small apartment. Her face relaxed, she dropped her eyes and looked sheepishly back to the door where the startled Lori stood transfixed.
"I guess I jumped to conclusions ..." Fleet sighed defeatedly and settled to the couch. "You haven't seen Babe?"
"No-no, maam," Lori closed the door, keeping her eyes glued to the woman in the living room. "Not today-she didn't came home last night ... "
"I know where she was last night," Fleet abruptly rose. "Did she call you-today?" her hard eyes studied Lori's face.
"No-no, raaam ... " Lori stammered.
"Stop calling me maam!" Fleet commanded. She strode about the room like a caged animal, "You didn't see nor hear from her today?"
"No-uh-no, I didn't," Lori relaxed, her brain was busy fitting pieces of gossip into the maze of the puzzle that involved her inexperienced roommate. Lori let her neckline fall open, she instinctively reacted to Fleet as if Fleet were a man, "I've been out a lot today ... " Lori sighed helplessly, "looking for a job-any job-in the theatre. Then Mr. Dickinson took me to dinner at Sardi's ... "
Fleet eyed the warm, silken flesh of the young woman, she noticed the sway of Lori's big breasts inside the almost transparent gown. The roll of Lori's voluptuous hips was involuntary, the exciting, smooth thighs exposed began at the tantalizing dark v of her body. A pounding began in Fleet's temples, her face became flushed with desire born of frustration.
Lori felt her heavy breasts tingle with excitement, her nipples extended at the thoughts of forbidden lusts. She settled in the chair opposite Fleet and crossed her legs, allowing a huge expanse of naked, pink flesh to be seen as the hem of her negligee fell over her dimpled knees. A burning began and cramped her loins, Lori found it hard to control her hands from trembling with desire. Her suddenly stimulated body yearned for this mannish woman to make an overt pass in her direction.
"I see ... I see ..." Fleet mumbled to herself.
You see a lot, honey, Lori thought. Why don't you take a good look and I'll show it all to you? Lori tantalized herself. She was the lure, the bait. She was in competition with Babe. She was out to make a score. Her body flushed with hot palpitations, wantonly provocative for the perverted passions with a woman. Lori was fired with a demanding curiosity.
"You could stay and wait-Babe seldom stays out. It's not late ..." Lori slowly rose, letting her naked flesh be revealed more. "I'll get you some coffee," she stopped and twisted around so that her hips were accentuated and her breasts fell freely forward. "Or-would you like a drink? Scotch?"
"Scotch. I need a scotch," Fleet replied, aware of the burning dryness in her throat.
Lori opened the cabinet and poured two glasses of scotch. With determination, she turned and quickly feigned a trip on the hem of her gown, deliberately spilling the liquor over her breasts. "Oh-h, golly!" she wailed, feeling the cool liquid trail over her warm, rounded stomach from her globular mounds.
"Oh, hell!" Fleet commented. "Did you spill them both?"
"No-no ..." Lori held out a glass to Fleet and pulled the drenched gown away from her breasts.
"What a waste!" Fleet sighed, her pulse accelerated at the sight of Lori's luscious, swaying breasts. She gulped down half her drink, "Well-get out of that gown before you catch cold-or something ... "
With a coy smile, Lori lifted the gown off from her body and turned with a helpless glance to Fleet as the wet negligee slipped from her white shoulders, "I'd better-find something to put on ... "
With a final gulp of her drink, Fleet reached for her, "You little queer!" Fleet's hot lips fell around the impudently extended nipples and sucked the cool liquid from their warm, rough textured buds.
"Not a waste-umm-m-m-not a waste after all!" Lori moaned in a fire of craving desire.
"Whore! You asked for this!" Fleet panted.
"Don't you like us a little whorey?" Lori gurgled with delight as Fleet's tongue traveled down over her belly and sank into the dripping bush at the apex of her thighs. "Oh, honey-stud me to death!" she groaned. "Make like a man!" Lori gripped Fleet's bobbing head and swayed over Fleet's shoulders. "You're driving me insane!" her body tensed. "Take me off! Take me!" she cried out in shameless lust.
"No!" Fleet rose.
"What?" Lori's eyes rolled in disbelief and raging lust.
"You wanted this more than I-now it's your turn," Fleet asserted. She tossed off her coat, stripped off her jacket and blouse. She glared at Lori in a heated hostility and dropped her skirt. Standing in only her black bra and panties, Fleet commanded, "Now you-get with me!"
"No!" Lori almost swooned with a passionate disgust.
"Yes, honey. Try it out!" Fleet ripped the bra from her hard breasts and slipped the panties down her thighs. She grabbed the girl, "If you don't like it don't let me know it. Let's see how good an actress you can be." Fleet threw her legs out straddle-legged and pushed the girl to her knees.
"No-no-no ..." Lori mumbled, staring hypnotized by the silken bushy black loins of the older woman. "I can't!" she moaned as Fleet bucked her pelvis up and shoved the girl's face against her steaming body.
Lori gulped in air and parted her lips. Her passion soared, her inflamed senses were titillated by the depravity of the act. She stiffened her tongue and worked as she recalled the technique that men and Fleet had used on her. Hungrily she clutched on to Fleet's thighs and ravenously she approached the woman's body again and again.
Fleet groaned and moaned, she fell back to the couch. Lori, lost in her abandonment, followed her on the fall and clung to the older woman as she shuddered spasm after spasm. Gasping for breath, Lori locked her arms about the convulsing body of Fleet and raised her flushed face up to Fleet's tightly screwed eyes.
"I must be crazy-I love it. Loved it!" she sighed.
Babe and Lance mounted the stairs. There was great joy in their hearts. Babe felt a sense of independence and freedom that she hadn't enjoyed for a long time. Lance had found her an apartment near the Village, she was beginning to live, she was beginning a career in the theatre.
Lance was overjoyed that he'd maneuvered Babe into the new apartment. She would be safe from Fleet and he wouldn't have to share her with his wife. She would be all his, he would have his elusive dream of having someone who loved only him. There would be no difficult confrontation with his wife.
Babe opened the door to her old apartment. She and Lance stood in the doorway shocked to find Lori on her knees before Fleet's ecstatic filled body. Fleet jumped to her feet, knocking Lori off balance, her face was filled, with remorse.
"Oh, Babe! It's not what you think-I mean ... " Fleet clutched her clothes around her naked body in despair.
"It doesn't matter," Babe replied in a cold voice and looked with surprise at Lori. "I'm sorry we disturbed you."
"Don't be this way with me. Please!" Fleet cried to Babe.
Lance, taking advantage of the situation, offered to Fleet, "Leave Babe to me. This was a shock for her."
Lori jumped to her feet and put her arms around Fleet, "You're not going to leave me in this disgrace? Not now!"
Lori and Fleet stood in silence as Lance led Babe back down the hall stairs. Fleet shuddered at the finality of the echoing sound of the front hall door closing behind her husband and her lovely red head. Lori pushed the apartment door and stood staring askance at Fleet ...
CHAPTER NINE
Babe ran happily from the rehearsal hall. She was delighted with the arrangement that she and Lance had devised. Only she and Lance knew where she lived. It relieved her of the association with Fleet which she found distasteful and it had an air of drama about it which she found romantic.
Dexter eyed her departure with a frown. The playwright shook his head and patted Dexter on the shoulder. Dexter shook off his hand and followed Babe. He stood in the doorway of the building to spy the direction she took from the theatre. Bill Dietz stood at the top window of the rehearsal hall and surveyed the scene below.
In the two weeks of rehearsals, Bill had been pleased to witness that Babe had cleverly dodged all advances from Dexter. She had maintained an air of professionalism but not fraternalism. Bill was pleased with this although he'd not been able to make any headway with her either. He stayed in the background and observed, yearning and longing for her.
Fleet stepped suddenly from a cab and caught Babe's arm, "Just a minute, young lady."
"Please, Fleet-no scenes," Babe requested.
"No scene. I just want to know where you live. Why you won't tell me-why you've turned on ..." Fleet demanded.
"You know all that," Babe looked down at her script.
"It doesn't all jell-not to me. It's too pat. There's something missing. and mostly it's my husband that's missing," Fleet retorted.
Babe twisted away and started down the street, "Just leave me alone!"
"You'll never be a star in this town without me. I'll have you blacklisted all over the country! You'll never act again-this is your first and last play!" Fleet screamed out.
Babe raced away from the mad woman. She tore around corners and fled down the narrow alleyways of Greenwich Village dodging the vicious woman. Panting, out of breath, her legs gave way and she fell into the doorway of an old carriage house. Fearfully she glanced back and saw that only the bright sun streamed down on the glistening cobblestones. There was no sound, only a chilling silence. Her heart, thumping up to her throat, hit a regular, steady beat. Babe let her head collapse into her hands as hot tears fell from her eyes.
"You need a drink," a familiar voice offered.
Babe looked up into the dark, passionate eyes of Dexter Thomas. His thoughts and intent was transparently clear to her. He bent down and lifted her bodily into his arms. In her emotional and physical exhaustion, she allowed him to pull her up against his hard body.
"After what you've been through with that woman you really need a drink," Dexter continued, his big hands tenderly caressed her body. "I got something for you in my hotel room ... "
"No." Babe mumbled. "I'm alright-now."
"We could take a taxi and be there in no time. Your boy friend wouldn't have to know about it. Besides we could get in some rehearsal of our own," he insisted.
"No," Babe leveled her green eyes on him. "You'd be very disappointed in me."
"Oh, no!" he laughed. "I'd be disappointed in myself if I didn't entertain you-like a woman wants."
"Mr. Thomas-I've got to go. I'm late now," Babe glanced at her watch.
"You don't show much appreciation. I saved you from a jealous wife," Dexter's arms tightened around her. "A woman who can take another woman's husband ought to be able to take on another man-just for the fun of it," he insinuated with an easy laugh.
"Please, you don't understand," Babe protested.
"I understand, honey. I play the same game," his face neared hers, his lips swooped over hers. "You can stop the masquerade with me-just never get caught," his tongue stabbed past her clenched lips into her hot, fuming mouth. His anxious hands slipped inside her coat and eagerly grasped her luscious breasts in a tight vise, "I been wanting to give you some of my-very special-loving ... "
Babe fought him off, she ripped out at his face, her talon claws scraped up skin. Dexter yelped and held his face. His eyes flashed violence as he balled up his fists and hauled back. His big fist came raining down towards her, Babe cringed and tensed for the heavy blows. She head a scuffling of feet and looked up to see Bill Dietz grappling with Dexter. Bill had caught Dexter's wrists and shoved him back against the brick wall.
"You want to fight? Try a man!" Bill shouted.
"Try me! I'd love to give your conceit a workout!"
"Hold it, friend. I'm not fighting my director. I was just defending myself against this hell cat. She came at me with her nails out like a ..." Dexter wiped the blood from his cheek.
"Like any decent woman would if she was attacked by you!" Bill spat. "You can lose your union card over this. You can lose your job!"
"No-no," Babe interjected softly. "Just tell him to leave me alone. I just want to be left alone," she turned and walked slowly away.
Bill watched as Dexter stumbled out of the alleyway, then he followed Babe. She looked up gratefully and they walked in silence to the park. On the greyish brown tree limbs were the first green sprouts of leaves. The dried and yellowed grass had a faint tint of green, a bright, fresh green stabbing up. Babe sat on a bench and stared off at the blue sky.
"You've been awfully nice to me, Bill. I'm grateful for all the help you've given me. But ..." she glanced out at the cars speeding around the park helplessly. "But, I guess it's no use. Mrs. Martin is going to blacklist me."
"Don't worry about Fleet Martin blacklisting anybody," Bill sat beside her. "She's big-but she's not that big in the theatre industry. Besides she's got a lot to worry about to protect herself in this business as an actor's agent. She's not going out on a limb to hurt you-it would reflect on her."
"She's certainly not going to sign me now-she won't represent me-I know ..." Babe sighed.
"There are other agents. It might be just as well that you, a woman ..." his voice dropped.
"I mean-that you're not represented by her."
"Does everybody know-about her?" Babe turned to him.
"Just about," he answered.
"But, I'm not like her. I was ..." Babe studied her hands, " ... I was mixed up. But, I'm not like her."
"I'm sure of that. The very fact that she's angry over you and her husband seems to indicate that." He eyed her sideways, "Are you in love with Lance?"
"I feel like I am-yes." After a moment's study she responded. "But you make me search for truth as an actress in the play, at rehearsals. I feel I can be honest with you," she turned to him. "I'm not sure of anything-except that I love the theatre-the theatre is what I want."
"But, Lance?" he persisted.
"Lance is fun-is life!" she smiled to herself. "He also was an escape from the entanglement that made me a very unhappy woman. He helped me-to find myself-as a woman."
"You're only grateful to him?" Bill queried softly.
"I'm an old fashioned romantic in the modern world of free associations. I'm happy with him-happy in his love," she replied. "For us-Lance and me-when we're together there is only today. But, I do find myself thinking of tomorrow sometimes ... "
"You haven't answered my question fully. You're not really happy having an affair with a married man-are you?" Bill asked.
"You upset me. You probe deeply," Babe dodged. "I've never thought seriously about it."
"Would it upset you to know that I've thought seriously about you?" Bill asked quietly.
"As-as an actress?" Babe was stunned and hesitant.
"It may be the wrong moment to admit it. But, also as a woman-a lovely and desirable woman," Bill stared into her eyes that grew dark green with thought. He rose, "Forget it. I shouldn't have presumed so much."
Babe held her hand up to him, "No. I didn't know. I've been so involved-in this play-and getting myself settled that ... " Her eyes covered his tall physique, she searched into his handsome lean face, "I've been mostly involved with myself. I didn't know that anybody really cared seriously about me but Lance."
Bill straightened up, "You're a fine actress. Don't worry about the future." He looked back to her. "But, if you ever feel the need of a friend-understanding ... " He stopped himself and smiled, "We'll see. I may ask you for a date after this."
"I might just accept," Babe found herself fascinated by the man, there was a sudden strange attraction to him, for him.
"Shall I walk you home?" Bill offered his arm.
"I'd like that," she took his arm and smiled as they strolled from the park.
Lance arrived at the apartment before Babe. He delighted in their hideaway and quickly stripped himself in anticipation for a passionate romp. Naked, he strode into the shower where the warm spray erotically aroused him as the flow of water tingled over his heavy loins. In an excited state of stimulation he stood by the window waiting and lusting for Babe.
The afternoon sun settled and Lance could see his own reflection in the darkened glass window panes. He felt foolish, the aroused male, a dark young man standing ready to pounce on his mate. His heart beat with an electric anxiety, his violent pulse pounded throughout his alive and passionate body. Suddenly the last sun rays of the day shot over the street and caught his beautiful red head as she turned the corner. Then he recognized Bill Dietz, the director, with her. They were walking casually down the street involved with each other.
Lance abruptly stepped back and grabbed his clothes. He stove his muscular thighs into his trousers, donned the shirt, threw on his jacket and stuck his feet into his shoes. In a fuming jealous rage, he buttoned his shirt, zipped his trousers and tied his shoes. Quickly he knotted his tie, grabbed his overcoat and slipped into the darkened hallway.
Babe entered the apartment with a bright smile on her face, her heart was singing. She spotted the burning cigarette in the ashtray by the window, noticed the wet towels in the bath and went racing around the apartment searching for Lance. Disbelieving that he wasn't around playing a joke on her, she retraced her steps. There was a sound in the hall, she ran to the door and found no one. The front hall door slammed and she raced to the window just in time to see Lance's figure descend the stoop. Deeply puzzled she dropped into a chair and dully picked up her script to study.
Lance bristled at the ridiculous figure he had made standing naked waiting for Babe only to see her arrive with another man. Further, he felt betrayed, their private world had been revealed; and it had been revealed to another man. He stormed down the street filled with disruptive thoughts.
Lance sauntered into the corner tavern and ordered a double whiskey. He looked over the silken ladies buzzing around the men at the bar. They were the women of the neighborhood whose husbands were working. They seemed to operate in two shifts: the daytime and the nighttime. Lance noticed with a rising disgust the over anxious manner of the night time women as they entered and surveyed the men around the bar.
A young red head pushed her baby carriage in and sat in the booth nearest to Lance. Her heavy lidded, overly mascaraed, eyelids dropped to Lance's thighs immediately. She sighed audibly and pressed forward, leaning towards him with a big smile. Lance glanced her way, his eyes shot down the deep valley between her velvety breasts. She opened her eyes and he was startled to see that she had bright green eyes like his Babe.
"Match, buster?" her red gummed lips pouted. "I need it bad." She laughed raucously. "The match I mean-I'll have a nicotine fit ... " The baby in the carriage cried out at the mother's loud laughter. "Shuddup! Damnit-shuddup, ya little pest!"
Lance automatically offered her a light, her warm hands cupped his. Lance withdrew his hand quickly as she puffed smoke in his face. The redhead brazenly grabbed his hands back and started pulling him towards her. A hard glint rose in the green of her eyes as she frankly stared at the bulge of his loins with blatant desire. The baby cried out again and continued to bawl.
"Shuddup-you queer m' chances-every time!" she dropped one of Lance's hands and rocked the carriage. Helplessly she looked back up, "Right in the middle of it-I mean-when it's getting to me-getting good for me-the brat horns in and screws up th' works!"
Lance freed his other hand. Repulsed by her leering face and damp, abundant body, he turned away, "See you around ... " He broke through the crowd and headed for the door.
"Stick around, sweetie-you're th' best looking thing I seen since I lost it!" she yelled after him.
Lance turned from the tavern and headed back to the apartment and Babe. He breathed in deeply the clean, fresh air of night and hastened down the quiet street of the village. His thoughts returned to Babe; she was going to be in the public eye, their world could not always be kept a secret and he would have to face competition. Lance squared his shoulders and strode on into the night.
Bill Dietz sat on his pad in the room behind the scenery dock. He was transported with the happiness of having been with Babe and in the discovery that she, too, was a dedicated theatre person. He stretched his long frame back and settled his head in his arms to dream his personal dream of theatre glory and to dream of Babe.
Lance stopped at the apartment door, his hands searched the dark for the lock. The metallic sound of the key inserting into the lock was a satisfying one. He eased the door open and found Babe asleep in the chair by the window. Lance felt a warmth embrace his body at the sight of her, a feeling of belonging settled upon him the moment he entered the room. Babe stirred, shifted her position, the script slipped from her hands and fell to the floor.
"Where'd you go?" Babe mumbled sleepily as his warm lips bent to hers.
"No place-no place at all," Lance declared. "There's no place for me without you," hungrily his arms slipped around her warm body, he lifted her and carried her to bed.
Fleet impatiently paced around Lori James' small apartment up on the West Side. She sank to the couch in the dark and could feel Babe's presence. This was where Babe had lived, this had been Babe's first home in New York City. It was perverse, but it seemed to be the closest that Fleet could get to Babe now.
She envisioned Babe moving around the small rooms, living and breathing in this same air. Her mind became alive with the gorgeous red head stepping timidly nude from the bath. She could picture, in her reveries, Babe's dazzling white flesh, luminous in the dim light as she reached for a towel.
An explosion of passion vibrated throughout Fleet's body. Her flesh was inflamed to a fever pitch; sharp, prickly heat seared her body to a tempestuous fervor of raging excitement. She pulled the blouse from her breasts and tossed it to the chair. She writhed out of her skirt and skinned the panties off her heated loins. She was Babe, reincarnated, the young girl, needing fulfillment. She projected herself into the fantasy of being Babe, the young Miss Barbara Peters.
Lori entered her apartment, the hard light from the naked bulb in the hallway spilled over Fleet's bare body. Lori gasped, Dick Dickinson followed her in. Lori quickly closed the door and moved to the lustful woman laying on the couch with an empty bottle of gin beside her. Lori's eyes took in Fleet's nudity with one glance, her blood boiled at the daring prospects of another encounter to satisfy this demanding woman.
"Come on, honey. I been waiting ..." Fleet slurred. "You too, Dickie boy. Let's all have fun!"
"How'd you get in?" Lori mumbled in a daze, her face flushed, her avid eyes went seeking out the naked femininity before her.
"The landlady ..." Fleet rose and stumbled to the blonde woman. "Get out of those clothes," she jerked the coat off Lori's body. "I told her you were my niece. Nicey-nice-niece!" she giggled and turned to Dick. "It's going to be hard on you."
"That's the way men are built!" he tossed lightly, taking in the situation and amused at Lori's obvious passionate interest in Fleet.
"You ever seen a woman in heat-for another woman?" Fleet asked dryly.
"I've played around. I'll take care of myself ..." he smirked and started removing his clothes. "I'll get in my licks."
"You're not going to duel with me," Fleet stated. She scrutinized Dick's body as he dropped his trousers and threw off his shirt. Her eyes followed his movements as he tore the briefs from his extended loins, "It's a woman's world-two to one-and, you're definitely equipped as a man!" She turned her attention to Lori struggling with her skirt, "Come on, girl-show him!"
Fleet dropped to the couch, throwing her fleshy thighs open. Lori dropped her skirt and moved fascinated, drawn to Fleet's body. Lori's voluptuous white hips undulated as she walked, like a somnambulist, hypnotized to Fleet's yawning flesh. She dropped to her knees in front of the wide spread of Fleet's legs. Lori's big breasts, with their large protruding nipples, swung forward as she compulsively bent her face to the demands of the older woman.
Dick squatted by Lori, his hands immediately covered her smooth breasts, his fingers pinched the knobby nipples, "Make her moan, baby!"
Dick entered into the spirit of play, his flushed, happy face bent over Lori's shoulder, his bright blue eyes were hot with desire. He pressed his stimulated body up against Lori's; gyrating, in his squatting position, against her backside. Lori was lost in her demented lust, her bobbing head bounced down on Fleet's tensed, vibrating body.
"Oh-I'm going ape!" Dick growled and snarled passionately.
"Go, girl! Go-o-o-o!" Fleet sighed and shot her legs up in the air. "Oh-h-h-ah! Oh-h-h-ah!"
Through squinted eyes, her body wracked with a pent up urgency, Fleet watched the girl, her love slave, suctioning around her steaming flesh. It was like she had done with Babe, like she had wanted to do to Babe again and again. She grabbed Lori by a hank of hair and viciously pushed her probing face down.
"Love me-e-e-e!" Fleet's tensed body strained, she bucked herself up.
"Get her!" Dick cried with glee, biting onto Lori's shoulder in his excitement and rolling her nipples between the nails of his fingers. "Get her-good!" he demanded.
Fleet shot up, shivered in the intensity of her shattering release and fell back quivering to the couch. Her mouth was open, but only a hiss of air escaped. Suddenly she gulped and gasped, doubled up and groaned.
Dick stood and pulled Lori around to him, her glazed eyes saw his pulsating protuberance extended in flames of heat. Unhesitatingly she fell towards him, her mouth mounted around him and he collapsed over her furiously lunging head. Lori gripped her nails into the muscles of his thighs and drained him of his loaded passion.
Dick's sensations soared in the eruption as the gush and flow of his lust loomed from him. Lori sank from his loins, he dropped to his knees and fell over her body. Their mouths locked in a panting, wheezing kiss. Fleet slid from the couch and crawled over to them on the floor. Dick's arm shot out and pulled Fleet into the embrace with Lori. He shifted his face to Fleet's and sucked her tongue into his mouth.
"You want to try it?" he panted with devilish glee. "You want to duel after all?" he felt Fleet's hands slide up his hairy thighs. "I might make a woman of you yet ... "
CHAPTER TEN
Fleet read the rave reviews that Barbara Peters garnered from all the critics as she planed to Nevada and a quick divorce from Lance. Her Babe was gone and Miss Barbara Peters, the actress, was on the climb. Dark clouds floated by the plane and off on the horizon accentuated by hot colors flashed from a sinking sun. She tugged her gloves off and glanced around at the passengers. She slipped out of her tailored jacket and turned to toss it over her seat back when she spotted a young, red headed woman with smartly cropped hair sitting behind.
"Care for a drink?" the red headed woman purred, dropping her hands to her bag and pulling out a fifth. "I'm celebrating. I'm going to Reno for a divorce."
Fleet excused herself to the man next to her and quickly moved to the empty seat beside the red head, "I'm in the mood for a drink."
"Oh, I'm in the mood for anything," the woman trilled and crossed her legs so that a wide expanse of smooth thigh was exposed to tantalized Fleet's view. "I'm so tired-I'm looking for a change."
"I like things different, too," Fleet stated and settled back to reappraise her future. It wouldn't be so bad at that. There were going to be plenty of disillusioned and frustrated women in Reno who were out for a fling, gay divorcee on the rebound.
Barbara Peters, the assured and proven actress, stood in the midst of a happy theatre crowd at the Obie Club in Greenwich Village. Lance stood proudly beside her. She had received an ovation as they entered. Dexter sulked in a booth, talking to his agent. It was Dexter's opinion that she had been given special attention by the director because Dietz was in love with her. He turned his back as Babe and Lance moved to the private room for the cast party.
Bill Dietz met and led Babe and Lance to the head of the banquet table. Babe looked out at the celebrating throng crowded around the long table. Vi Dahl was surrounded by both Buck and Boyd Fitchett. Lori James, with a new short hair style, was escorted by Dick Dickinson. The entire cast and crew of the off Broadway play had turned out, plus two well known theatre critics.
Babe's nervous hands clenched her small purse. She could hear the crumpling of the letter inside: a contract that would take her away from this play, away from her friends in Greenwich Village and away from Lance and Bill. She met Bill's eyes and dropped her own quickly, Bill could almost read her very thoughts and she wasn't ready to tell him, to spoil the evening. She slipped her hands into Lance's and reached for a drink.
The drinks flowed, toasts were toasted and re-toasted. The waiters were kept busy racing to and from the bar for refills. After dinner, the tables were broken up and pushed back against the wall making a clearing for a small dance floor and the lights were lowered. The soggy melee of people crushed to the center of the room, bumping and bouncing, gyrating and grinding against each other.
Dexter staggered in to the room and raised his glass, shouting at the top of his voice, "To the whore of all-the theatre! and to her newest bitch-Barbara Peters!"
A silence fell on the room, the blaring music from the record machine blasted out into the stillness of the people. Lance jumped from Babe's arms and grabbed Dexter by the throat. The cries of women shrieked across the room. Hysteria and bedlam took place as the two men scuffled to the floor. Babe and Bill raced to stop the fight.
Dexter punched out at Bill. Bill countered and knocked him back. Dexter fell against Babe. His hands clawed out at her neck, he fell off balance and tore the dress from her body. Her breasts, unadorned by undergarments, jellied free and naked. Someone gave her a table cloth to cover her nude chest.
"Come on! Let 'em see what-cha got. Let them see how you got all that special center staging and extra direction. Let 'em see what you rewarded Bill Dietz with!" Dexter roared drunkenly as blood spurted from the corner of his mouth.
Lance dove from the floor and knocked Dexter to the other side of the room. He sprung at the actor as Dexter crumpled against the wall. Dexter grabbed onto a table cloth and spilled the dishes crashing around him. He groped from the floor and pulled himself up. Like a dazed bull, wild in animal fury, he stalked around Lance.
Lance's fist shot out and landed on Dexter's jaw. The actor whirled and fell against the tables, he snatched an empty champagne bottle and turned on Lance. With lightning speed the bottle splattered over Lance's cranium. The music had stopped, the room was tense in silence as Lance fell with a gushing stream of blood running down his face.
Babe was the first to reach Lance, she turned for help to Bill Dietz. Clutching the cloth to her naked body, assisted by Dietz, Babe held Lance up and stared in disgust at Dexter. He cowed away and sunk into a chair, the people all moved away from him. With tears streaming down her eyes Babe led the way as Dietz held Lance up and followed her from the quieted banquet room.
Bill waited in the dark of her apartment as Babe cleaned Lance's wound again and changed the bandage. He sat where he could see her by the bed tenderly attending to Lance. Babe straightened up, placed Lance's freshly bandaged head on a pillow and moved to the window where her form was silhouetted by the silver moonlight.
Bill eased into the bedroom, "Still asleep?" he whispered.
Babe nodded her head and turned to him, "He's alright." She attempted a smile, "Hard headed ... "
"Let him rest," Bill led her into the living room. He closed the bedroom door and faced her, "You're tired-and very upset."
"It's all been too much-sudden and ..." she stopped and looked over to him. "I don't know what to do now."
"It's been sudden-your success. But, you deserve it," Bill soothed. "It wasn't my direction," he placed his arms around her.
"Lance ..." she turned towards the closed door.
"The hospital wouldn't have let him go if he wasn't alright-fortunately nothing serious. Fortunately for Dexter. Dexter's given his notice ..." Bill added, lifting her head and letting his fingers trail over her cheeks.
"Oh," Babe was silent for a long time. Suddenly she reached for her purse. "I was, too ..." she handed Bill the letter and contract.
Bill was hesitant about reading the letter, he held it up to the light from the window, then he searched her face, "You were?" He came to her, "You should give notice-leave the play. This is great!"
"But, your production? Lance?" she worried.
"The play will go on-and so will Lance," Bill faced her. "We'll both miss you."
"I'll miss you ..." she sighed and settled wearily back in the chair.
"Both?" Bill insisted.
"Yes ..." Babe mumbled almost to herself. "I still feel like I'm in a play-not life-real life. I can't seem to grow up-to make decisions."
"Take this job-go to England. Your career is most important," Bill bent down to her. "I know it's hard-new to you-but it's your life."
"If you were Lance-what would you say, do, feel? Fleet's divorcing him ..." she stated.
"I'd be glad to be rid of her-of her influence. I'd be glad for you. But, I'm not Lance-and, I am glad for you," he caressed the long tresses back from her face. "No matter how much I'll miss you."
Babe grabbed onto his hands, "Lance doesn't know-doesn't suspect-that I've been seeing you. Maybe I shouldn't have ..." she added sadly.
"You've grown up enough to face that-to take my love. We've got love-a special, separate love apart from Lance. You'll have others ..." Babe started to protest, but Bill continued. "Yes you will-it happens-to us-to people like us. It can tear you apart but it's the emotional life we live," he bent nearer and kissed her tenderly. "There are many goodbyes-great sadness to face. The theatre is a strange and lonely life at times," his arms shot around her, he pressed her body up against his. "This is goodbye-isn't it?"
"I-I guess ..." she turned her face up to his, her moist green eyes searched out his lean face.
"You've got so-o-o much love to give!" his hands strayed over her shoulders, he parted her house dress and fondled her soft breasts. His fingers feathered the bushy nest between her thighs, with a cry he crushed her to him, "Oh, I'll miss you."
Bill quickly tossed the house dress back off her shoulders and pulled her to her feet, watching her smooth flesh emerge from the loose garment. His eyes feasted in the wonders of her big breasts, their brown nipples stuck impudently up. He drank in the loveliness of her soft, round belly and the delightful thighs. His hands slowly traveled over the contours of her shapely hips; he gingerly stroked her erogenous areas.
"This will probably be the last time for us ..." Bill mumbled huskily.
"But, Lance ..." Babe protested. "No!"
"He's had enough tranquilizers at the hospital to keep him resting through an earthquake. You can't deny me this-this last time," Bill's hands gripped onto the velvety smoothness of her breasts. Urgently he nestled his head in the deep valley of her breasts and crushed her soft, globular mounds up around his face until he was near delirium with agonizing desire. "Beautiful! Heavenly!" he opened his eager hot mouth and suctioned a nipple, meanwhile nervously massaging the other breast on his palm and squeezing the nipple.
Babe gasped with pleasure as his lips produced a throb to her nipples and a tingling sting from his teeth nips and pinching. Automatically she responded, thrusting her body onto him, rolling her hips over his extended body with craving passion. Their open mouths clamped together in a desperate kiss.
Locked together in the intoxication of feverish desire, they fell to the couch. Bill strained out of his shirt and crushed his naked muscles over her soft flesh. He struggled with his trousers and slid his long, hard body over her sensual curves. He tore the strained briefs from his steaming body and prodded her with his vital rigidity.
"Give it to me good. Make me always remember this-this time!" he cried as she guided his pronged, pulsating body to the gape of her yawning thighs. "Make it last forever!" he cried as her fleshy thighs hooked over his hard buttocks and he sunk deep and grinded himself to full injection. "Oh-h-h!" Bill strained in the tight union and settled down to enjoy the heat of her body.
The pounding grew in Bill to an unbearable beat, his body reacted to hers and he fell upon her in a savage pounding. His body soared and sawed through the air with incessant lunges. He dug his feet into the arm of the sofa and levered his uncontrolled body in a wild arch, slamming down with ferocious flings.
Babe collapsed, allowing the spasms to spend, allowing her body to respond to the jolting demands of his frantic frenzy. Her eyes glazed over, a soft gurgle sounded in her throat as she convulsed with a sudden cry beneath him. It was a sad, hollow cry but filled with fulfillment; it was the end for them.
Dry mouthed, with the ache of tight lungs, Bill snaked his body into hers. Bill's fingers gripped her rounded buttocks, her pulled her body up to meet him on his final blast.
"Hold onto me! Hold tight!" he sobbed frantically in a sweat. "Don't let go!" Bill shot his body deep and glared at her in startled surprise. "It's gone-all gone ..." he panted and sucked air into his lungs.
Bill doggedly climbed down the stoop, reluctantly he moved away from her house, her apartment and her love. He faced the bleak night and directed his feet to his attic studio.
Babe, as he'd learn to call her familiarly, Barbara Peters as the public knew her, was in his blood. Before he turned the corner, Bill glanced up to her window and saw her shadow move into Lance's room. She was a woman of emotion, great emotions and she had a need for love, great love. He looked up to the skies, found a new star sparkling and instinctively made a wish. Then slowly he turned to go his way alone.
Babe strolled from the window back to Lance. She stared down at his sleeping form and felt his need, his love, permeate the room. His chest rose and fell regularly, a warm glow rose over her and beat in her heart as she watched his great hulk sleeping so innocently.
She rearranged the sheets about his body. His big, brawny thigh shot out and she sought to tuck his leg back under the sheet. Her hands accidentally caressed his limp manhood and she shivered from remembrances of their passions. She withdrew her hand. She felt strong as she gazed into Lance's open, sleeping face. He seemed so gullible and relaxed in his slumber that a tear of guilt for her passions with Bill trickled down her cheeks.
She suddenly realized that she needed Lance too, he had always been there. But, now, the decision was hers and she couldn't leave him. He replaced all the men, her father, playmates, boyfriends, that her mother had deprived her. He was her love, he was a part of her life and she couldn't leave him. She couldn't say goodbye to Lance as she had to Bill.
Babe slipped into the bed beside him and pressed her naked body up against his rough, hairy muscles. Her hands moved over his body in admiration, she nuzzled her face in his arm pit and kissed the salty flesh of his body. He was her baby, her responsibility. He was something that was all hers and she hadn't realized it. Lance was her security in this insecure world of theatre and emotions.
Lance turned to face her, pressing himself close. An erotic thrill trembled through her at the feel of his swelling masculinity. Her hands dropped to cup and squeeze him. His vibrant flesh bloomed and shot up in demanding strength in her hands. An aching need to be one and a part of this man, to make up for all the lost time between them, fired through Babe's blood.
Lance groaned as his throbbing increased to a steeled strain. Babe's passion was rekindled and flamed by his obvious ardor; a pulsating excitement coursed through her thick, hot blood. With bated breath she ducked her head under the sheet, crawled down on her knees between his legs and stove her eager face hungrily between his thick thighs.
With anxious hands she held his tremendous tumescence up to her ravenous lips. Lance twisted, his flaming extension quivered rigidly as he thrust himself upwards to the satisfying heat of her mouth. This was the man she wanted, this was the only man, Babe's thoughts pounded in her guilt to consume all of him. She wanted Lance, she wanted all of him, every way, her heart cried out in passionate poundings.
Panting with feverish delight, Babe tossed the sheets off and stared at his naked body, primed and aroused to a consuming need. Her inflamed body rose and settled on top of him. She arched her hips and mounted Lance's thick, pendulous passion. With a gratifying sigh, Lance locked his arms about her.
Slowly she sprung her body back and sank over his bombastic protrusion, receiving the full load of his probing turbulence. Lance's face contorted in craving, his body strained up to hers as she hit a satisfying rhythm and compulsively increased her flailing body down on the sleeping man. She bit her lip and continued as his huge, raging passion ripped into her with a stabbing agony mixed with ecstasy. She sought to prod out of her mind and body Buck and Boyd, Fleet and Bill, to make Lance the only one, a complete union.
Again, more, all the way! she panted to herself as she lost control of her body in the blind, predatory lust. The hot friction of his protuberance goaded her with a satisfying glow, she quivered under the violent spasms that erupted within her churning body.
"Lance-I love you!" she sobbed. "Only you!" she cried softly, as the frenzy of her desire reached its peak.
"Oh-h-h!" he clutched onto her swirling hips and gripped her down to his strained body, they locked in tumultuous shuddering. "Oh-Ba-bee-e-ee!" he moaned as the sputtering showers of fulfillment skyrocketed from his heated, tensed body.
With a final shiver he collapsed and fell back into a deep sleep. Rooted, her arms tight about his broad shoulders. Babe clenched him to her and fell off to sleep. The moon settled over their naked bodies and faded as the bright rays of a rising sun shot into the room.
As the sun slowly rose, Lance woke and looked in wonderment at the brilliant red hair falling across his face. He moved, held his aching head and winced with pain. Staring through squinted eyes he saw Babe's lovely face lying in repose. Shifting, he disjointed their bodies and eyed her naked body. Her breasts were heavy with a deep valley between them. His hands trailed over her firm, round belly, to her gorgeous smooth thighs, her eyes fluttered.
Lance bent his head and let his lips fall to her sensually formed mouth. Almost with a cry he held her in his arms, feeling the warmth radiate from her naked flesh. His lips sank under her chin, her neck, to her luscious breasts. She squirmed in his arms and opened her mouth to his tongue.
"M-m-m!" she murmured. "What a way to wake up!"
"What a way to go to sleep!" Lance responded.
Babe jumped awake and brushing the long, loose hair out of her eyes, asked, "You-you were awake last night?"
"Almost," he smiled. "Like being doped ... "
"All the time?" she queried, freezing the innocent expression on her face.
"Almost ... " he answered. He propped himself up on an elbow and grinned at her, "What are you really trying to find out, Miss Peters?"
"Nothing. Just that I thought you were asleep-all the time ..." she mumbled.
"And, so did Bill Dietz," Lance smiled frankly. His hands moved over her breasts, "I know, Babe. I've known for a long time."
"Wh-what?" she was astonished.
"About you-about you and Bill," he nuzzled her neck and licked her chin. "The important thing was that you always came home-to me," his arms were strong like a vise about her waist, his lips settled over hers in a grating kiss. "The important thing is you-I can't be without you. I tried that."
"Oh, Lance!" she cried. "I didn't mean to hurt you. There'll be nobody else-now I know. I love you-love you!"
"And, I love you, too," his lips sought out her ears, his tongue drenched her eardrums. "That's all that matters."
"I don't know what to say ..." she fell upon him.
"There's only one thing to say," he eyed her impishly.
"What?" she questioned.
"Yes. Say yes to England-and to me. We'll make it our honeymoon," he gloated.
"You know about that, too?" she was incredulous.
"I got you the job. From now on I'll be your personal manager, your own photographer and ..." he crushed her to him.
"My husband-and lover!" she cried joyfully as he crawled on top of her.
Babe and Lance ran happily up the ramp of the plane. She tossed out the flowers and Vi caught them with a look of surprise. Buck and Boyd quickly embraced Vi with a wild whoop and holler. Bill Dietz, the best man, stood to one side with a secret smile on his face; he didn't get to keep the prize, but he had been allowed to play with it for awhile. Babe, the prize and star, turned a dazzling smile on all of them, photographers flashed the picture of her kissing her husband. Lance picked up his bride and carried her into the plane.
Soon the crowd at the airport melted into a dot and then disappeared. Babe turned from the window of the plane and looked at her husband. Lance reached out for her hands as the plane flew off into the bright blue and was lost in a white, snowbank of clouds.
