Paul Marborn thought he was going to have a real swinging weekend with Julie, his evil secretary, in Palm Springs. But what he didn't know was that he was the pigeon for a lust plot, as Frank, Julie's husband, catches Paul at an inopportune moment and tells him what he must do ... or else. All Paul had to do was to provide a house with one-way mirrors in the bedrooms and trap unsuspecting victims into a den of shame and degradation where the wantons would perform while the cameras recorded every pause for posterity and profit. In the meantime, Rhoda Bennett takes Paul for a motel fling that leaves him gasping for release. Then Amy and Paul share forbidden delights in the darkness, under the orchard trees. While Lila and Mary and the three blondes wait their cues....
CHAPTER ONE
Paul Marborn sat at his desk for most of the day dividing his thoughts between the financial hole into which he recently had plunged and the matter of Julie Simmons, who had been his secretary for nearly two weeks and whom he had not as yet taken to bed.
He reached a decision.
Not about the financial hole, because there was nothing to be decided in that regard.
He had done what he would never have advised a client to do-invested practically all his personal capital in a new space-age stock who merits had been touted by a man in a position to know and who was to be trusted. Everything was to be kept quiet until a certain government contract was nailed down, and Paul was to wake up the next morning a very rich man. When Paul's friend learned that there was no contract in the offing, and that his associates had taken advantage of the slight rise in the stock's value which had resulted from the investments he had secured, and had sold off their own holdings at a profit, the man had killed himself. This had left Paul with no prospects other than to make a slow painstaking climb back toward daylight and to hope that his personal credit held out during the ascent.
It was the bleakness of this situation which led him to make a decision concerning Julie.
Now was the time, he told himself. This very night and for the rest of the week end. He would have forty-eight hours of forgetfulness with lush-bodied Julie, which would help him face next week with a clearer mind and the will to work doubly hard to overcome his difficulties.
A new affair would also restore his zest for living, which had been dulled by too many years with Edith. Eight years now. Eight expensive years of fighting and frustration ... and not enough fun for a man of his vigorous inclinations.
Six nights had passed since he had last taken his wife. Each evening she either was tired, had a headache, wanted to watch the late late movie on TV, wasn't in the mood, or was angry with him for some real or imagined slight. The old old story. He got her far less frequently than he wanted and less frequently than he felt he deserved. As a result, he resented her and this fact interfered with his enjoyment on the rare times when they did get together between the sheets.
He had learned, in recent years, that periodic affairs with other women offered his only means of getting off the dismal merry-go-round. The last affair had ended about three months ago. He was more than ready for the next one.
Paul had always been able to keep his extra-marital activities on a casual basis. There was no point in becoming serious with any of the women because he knew Edith would never give him a divorce except at prohibitive cost. Now, of all times, he couldn't afford what she would do to him in the divorce court.
With Julie.
In the past he had been leery of involvments with anyone who worked in the office. He had usually gone after married clients of the firm-women who were as much in need of extra fun as he was and as willing to keep quiet and not become mushy. He also had picked up women on the outside who didn't know who he was.
But Julie, even though she was his secretary, was too good to pass up.
And too willing.
She had made her willingness apparent right from the first day she had started to work for him. An experienced womanizer like Paul could read the signs-the look in her eyes, the way she walked when she was around him, the little things she said which could be taken two ways.
Well, he would give her what she was looking for.
Why not?
He pressed a button on the side of his desk. When he did that and the switch-button on her telephone didn't light, she knew that he wasn't on the intercom line, that he wanted her to come into his office. He waited.
Paul Marborn was thirty-six and of average height. He weighed a hundred and eight-five pounds, which would have made him pudgy were it not for the fact that he was large-boned and had good muscular development. He took gym workouts once or twice a week and usually golfed on Saturdays. He had shining black hair which he combed straight back on top and at the sides. His face had regular features which reflected both sensitivity and strength, and he was smoothly tanned. His teeth gleamed straight and white when he smiled. He was blue-eyed.
He never had trouble making women interested in him. In fact, he always had more opportunities than he wished to take advantage of. He was not a compulsive chaser. Had his marriage been happier, he might never have looked for satisfaction on the outside. But under the circumstances, he felt himself forced to do this or gradually die of boredom.
At least, that was his rationalization, and he was too intelligent a man to delude himself to any great extent.
The door of his paneled office opened and Julie entered. She closed the door behind her and approached his desk.
Julie was blonde and more the corn-fed type than aristocratic. She had a healthy look about her which went all the way from the radiance of her pert face to the extravagant and firm curves of her bust and laps. She had shapely legs, exceptionally full in their upper portions and smartly arched at the calves. She was wearing a slim gold skirt and a close-fitting wool over blouse of light mist-green with contrasting bands of gold and olive at the waist in front. The outfit showed off her figure and was perhaps a little more bold in styling than some girls would have worn to an office.
Julie stopped at the side of Paul's desk, in full view. She was smiling slightly, her brown eyes conveying a cute sparkle. "Don't tell me there's dictation now, with just an hour to go before the end of the week?
Paul didn't object to Julie's lack of formality, which had been evident right from the first day. He found this appealing. Though a junior partner in a stock-brokerage firm, Paul had never been the least bit stuffy.
He grinned back at her. "No dictation. At least, not the kind I want you to take in shorthand. Sit down, Julie."
There was a chair beside her and she sat. Her skirt, which was as short as fashion permitted, slid well above her knees and she slipped one sleek-stockinged leg over the other. She looked good that way, her legs possessing more interest than most women's. Her knees were attractively dimples, and above them her legs tapered to a fullness which was definitely stimulating. Paul could see part of a darker-colored stocking top but no flash of skin. Though she always wore short skirts, Paul had never glimpsed any nude exposure of her upper legs, such as many girls nowadays displayed when they were seated.
"Are you planning on doing anything over the week end to rebuild that tan of yours?" Paul asked. "I noticed it's fading a little."
"Well, this is almost Thanksgiving, Mr. Marborn. Regardless of what they tell us, Los Angeles does have a winter."
"There are places that don't."
"Sure. Like Palm Springs."
"You must be a mind-reader." Paul said. "That was Just the place I had in mind for me?"
"For us."
Though she didn't reply immediately, she didn't appear surprised. Her expression reflected interest and, Paul thought, a certain degree of satisfaction.
He pressed forward pleasantly: "Well? How does that idea sound?"
She smiled a little. "When you set out to lead a girl astray, you don't walk the least bit softly, do you?"
Paul chuckled. "That leading astray bit went out with flappers and speakeasies. Nowadays people are more enlightened. Love is fun ... or haven't you found that out?"
"That's not fair, Mr. Marborn. If I answer no, I'm a prude. If I say yes, I'm a loose woman."
"Not in my book. If you say yes, it's a sign that you're healthy and honest."
She narrowed her eyes a little. "This is awfully sudden."
"I guess. Maybe I'm a man of moods."
"I like you, Mr. Marborn."
"Paul, when the clients and the senior partners aren't around."
"All right. I like you, Paul...."
"But?"
"No. Not but. It's just that we both know you're married."
"So is most of the world. That doesn't stop people from having their side-play, though."
"And a play week end is what you're suggesting?"
"Just that. Afterward, no regrets and no involvements."
"You really put things on the level."
"That's the only way to have them."
She appeared to be considering, though Paul was pretty sure she had decided long before he'd asked. Her problem now was how to avoid seeming cheap.
"You'll enjoy yourself, Julie. That I promise. We'll stay at a fine spot. No one will know who we are."
"And after the night clubs?"
"That will be the best time of all."
"Mr. Marborn!" she exclaimed playfully.
"If I've shocked you with my directness, it's because I planned to. Now you shock me by being just as direct. Say you'll go with me. Right now. As soon as we can stop by your apartment and pick up some things."
"Before quitting time?"
"I'd like to beat the freeway rush."
"But what will people think?"
"That I decided to quit early and, from the goodness of my golden heart, let you go home early, too. Even a junior partner has that prerogative."
"And well meet...."In the parking lot."
"Sounds deliciously wicked."
"That's my girl."
She uncrossed her legs slowly and stood up. "I know I shouldn't do this. As the maiden who was about to lose her virginity said, "I'll hate myself in the morning.'"
"But you won't," Paul assured her. "Anyway, you're not a maiden, are you? I mean, in the strict sense?"
"Aren't we getting personal!"
"A man who's about to spend a week end with a girl had a right to know."
"Would that make a difference, one way or the other?"
"Yes."
She waited for him to explain.
"If you were a virgin. I'd withdraw my invitation.""
"Really?"
"I do have a moral code, strange though it may be."
"And your code rules out virgins, hm?"
"Definitely."
"We have no problems."
"That means you're not and you will?"
She nodded.
Smiling in triumph, Paul sat upright and reached to gather the papers which were spread in front of him. "Lock up your desk and run along. My car's the blue Caddy in Section A. I'll meet you there in five minutes."
She returned his smile and walked quickly to the door which connected his office with the small reception room where she had her desk. He watched the rolling, slightly-quivering sway of her plump but well-contoured buttocks.
This is going to be a whale of a week end, he thought to himself. As soon as the door closed, he reached for the telephone to place a call to his wife.
Edith Marborn was nude.
She was nude because she had stepped from the tub three minutes before and had just finished toweling herself.
She had taken particular care with her bath that afternoon and intended to take even greater care with her application of powder and cologne, because she planned to present to her husband that evening the finest gift which was within her power to bestow:
Herself.
She realized that she had been holding back a bit too much lately and that Paul was growing restive. She didn't want him doing anything foolish. So she had decided to give herself to him in a most emphatic way that night ... and as soon as he arrived at home.
She would meet him at the front door in a peignoir with martinis in hand. They would have their drinks, play for a couple of hours, then get dressed and go out to some intimate place for dinner. Afterward they would come home and play again. She would give Paul a night to remember and one that would hold him, she hoped, for another four or five days.
Just then the telephone rang.
Edith slipped her feet into white high-heeled scuffs and walked through the open doorway and across the bedroom to the princess telephone on the stand beside her husband's twin bed.
Edith was dark-haired. Her face was patrician and her figure tall and lean. Her legs were good, though not very full even where they merged with her hips. The most arresting feature about her was her breasts which, though not particularly large, had extraodinary shape. Their tops were concave, causing their tips to jut forward in a startling way. As she walked on high heels across the shaggy white rug, her breasts juggled up and down prettily.
Edith picked up the phone. "Hello."
"It's me, dear." Paul's tone was flat, business-like. "I've got an out-of-town thing set up for the week end. A corporate reorganization in Phoenix. I'm flying there tonight and it'll be late Sunday before I'm home."
Edith was mildly concerned but not disappointed. She hadn't really been looking forward to what she had in mind for herself and her husband; she had merely considered this a function to be performed in the interest of maintaining a marriage which she found satisfactory, all things considered. Now the idea occurred to her that perhaps Paul was up to something. She knew he had had affairs in the past, though she had never found out about any of them until they were over.
Her voice carefully controlled, she said, "I'm sorry to hear that, Paul. I thought we might have a pleasant evening together."
His answer was acid: "Don't tell me you're finally in the mood?"
"Paul, please...."
"Well, I'm sorry, Edith. I'll see you Monday morning."
"Which client is this, dear?"
"They're new. You wouldn't know them."
"
Edith was silent.
"Is there anything else?"
"No, Paul. Have a good trip."
"Thank you. Bye-bye." The phone clicked.
He's going somewhere with a woman, Edith thought. This feeling came to her strongly. She sat on the edge of the bed and looked unseeing at the opposite wall, contemplating her situation and what might be done about it.
Have him followed? Pretend she didn't know? Have things out with him when he got back? Change her tactics with him altogether?
These possible answers registered in her mind. She eliminated the first but decided the others would require more careful weighing.
Standing, she considered what to put on. No use dressing up, since Paul wasn't coming home. Slacks and a blouse would do because she would be staying in alone, with Jack Paar and the other Friday nighters to provide some measure of diversion via the tube.
If only Nadine weren't out of town, she thought.
But Nadine would be back Sunday morning, Edith recalled her friend having said. That would mean they could get together during the afternoon.
The week end would be very dull until then.
Edith crossed to her bureau to select some under-things.
Paul, that louse! she thought. But he was no better or worse than any other man. Thank goodness she had never let herself become emotionally involved with any of them.
She stretched a pair of white nylon briefs and stepped into them, one leg then the other. She drew then up around her slim hips and let the elastic snap.
She wouldn't bother with a bra, she decided. The way she was built, she never really needed one, except for purposes of concealment so that her nipples didn't show through. That evening she would wear a heavy blouse. Anyway, what would it matter?
As she strode to the closet for her other clothes, her out-thrust breasts jig-jigging saucily, she wondered about the woman her husband was with.
Was she blonde? If so, she was most likely not a real one. Did she work in his office or was she a client? That new secretary of his was a tempting wench. Perhaps she was the one he was going with. Edith stepped into her slacks and drew them up. More than anything, it hurt her ego to know what her husband was doing. But also, of course, it represented a threat to her security. Who knew but what, one of these times, Paul would get really hung up over one of his casual conquests and would want to play house with her on a permanent basis?
Well, Edith would give him a divorce in that event.
But he would have to pay dearly for the favor. If she was going to give up the advantages of marriage, she would get enough money in return to make the exchange worth-while. Whether Paul would find it worth while, when the chips were down, would be something else again.
After buttoning her blouse over the jutting peaks of her breasts, she walked to the dresser to attend to her hair and make up.
CHAPTER TWO
During most of the two-and-a-half-hour drive to Palm Springs, Julie sat close to Paul in his Coupe de Ville and let him caress her lightly and casually when he felt like doing so.
Paul had outgrown long ago the tendency to grab at women. As a college boy, when he was out with a particularly appealing coed, he had been inclined to start touching her right away, even though they were en route to dinner, a dance, or a show. He would think nothing of pushing her skirt lap-high, if she would let him, and caressing her in a way which, by rights, should have been reserved for a bedroom. As a result, he and his date sometimes didn't arrive at the dance or show at all. More than once, the girl had ended up with her fluffy gown thrown over the seat of the car and her pants in the side pocket of Paul's dinner jacket. But the girls have never complained afterward. Such had been Paul's art with women, even then.
At present stage of his life, he had somewhat better self-control.
With Julie, he merely rested his palm on the warm sleek nylon which sheathed a shapely knee, a couple of times allowing the tips of his fingers to stray upward onto the ribbing at the top of her hose, around and over the clasps of her garters, and off the rim of a stocking to the satin-smooth roundness of her upper leg. He was pleased to note how warm her leg was. This fact held a considerable degree of promise.
His sallies met with only token resistance on Julie's part, and he had the impression she enjoyed them.
She was still wearing the gold-colored skirt she had worn at the office, now with a matching cardigan jacket thrown over her blouse.
Paul had not as yet tried to investigate her bosom. The car was no place for this. Wait until they reached the motel; then he would have that jacket and blouse off her in no time and he would find out if the high round curves he had been admiring for the last two weeks in the office were all her own and whether they fell too badly once her brassiere was removed.
Paul liked variety among women. His wife had extraordinarily fine breasts, of a type, and he recognize this. But he like other kinds, too-the fuller, rounder ones which yielded more readily to the pressure of a man's fingers; the extravagant ones between whose soft inner slopes a man could press his face for awhile and be very warm.
He was a connoisseur of nipples, also-different shades and different sizes.
In fact, his analytical interest in females extended to all features of their anatomies. With Julie he was looking forward, in particular, to an exploration of her hips and buttocks and her upper legs. There was a lot of good firm flesh there, from the looks of her with clothes on, and all of this seemed to be formed exceptionally well.
If he had gauged Julie's attitude correctly, she would offer no great objection to anything he might feel inclined to do. He believed she was quite taken with him, basing this judgment on the way she had acted toward him from the very first. He recognized that her interest might have more to do with his position in the firm of Townsend, Hood and Marborn than with his personal charm, but that was neither here nor there. If she still entertained any thoughts of winning him away from his wife, after the form his proposition had taken, she was merely inviting disillusionment.
They cruised into Palm Springs after dark, and there was a little nip in the air. Though pleasantly warm on most days throughout fall and winter, the Southern California desert is usually cool at night cooler than Los Angeles much of the time. The greatest blessing of this locale is the clearness of the air, the virtual nonexistence of smog or fog.
Paul had not reserved accommodations. There was no need to do so that early in the season. He drove directly to an apartment hotel where he had stayed before, and he found they had a nice double room available. He registered as Mr. and Mrs. Theodore Roberts. When he checked out, he would charge the week end to one of the credit cards issued in the name of his firm. As far as anyone would know later, the room would have been occupied by a client.
An attendant parked the car and a bellboy carried the bags to the room. Once the boy was gone and the door was closed, Paul drew Julie into his arms.
"You're a fast man," she whispered, and then she didn't say any more nor did he answer in words.
His kiss confirmed the truth of her observation, as did his palms and fingertips. Even as his firm lips moved against her softly pouting ones and as he began to enjoy the pleasurable kiss he found awaiting him, his hands were cupping and patting gently her springy buttocks. She was as free of a foundation garment as his earlier observation had led him to believe, and this was good. Fighting a girdle was always awkward. If Paul could have had his way, he would have outlawed such contrivances.
He moved his hands in slow rotation, maintaining a certain degree of pressure all the while, and then he contracted his hands just enough to get the total feel of these fine buttocks which outclassed his wife's in every way. He liked a girl with some flesh on her. No flab, understand, but good flesh. Julie had this.
Also Julie was a good six years younger than Edith. Maybe more.
Now Paul wrapped his arms around her back so as to bring them closer together. He felt the pneumatic surge of her breasts and was gratified. There was no foam rubber in Julie's bra. What he felt was all girl and roundly firm.
They continued to kiss and Julie moved her body of her own accord. This had such an effect that very soon neither of them wanted to prolong the kissing phase of their love-making. Not now. Not when there were so many other things to do, and with Paul so obviously anxious to get on with them.
Julie stepped back from his embrace, flushed of face, her eyes containing that special look which women have when they have reached the time of imminent surrender. "Let's get undressed," she murmured, her voice a little husky. She started to slip the golden cardigan from her shoulders.
Paul stopped her with his hands. "I want to do that," he said. "I want to take everything off you."
"This was an essential part of the fun, as far as he was concerned. Particularly the first time with a woman.
She said, "Hurry, please. I'm not a slow girl when I get turned on."
"And I've turned you on, hmm?" he asked as he disposed of her jacket and lowered the zipper on the back of her dress top.
"The feel of you...." she said throatily and she touched him.
He chuckled and lifted her clinging blouse over her head and off. Her breasts strained forward, imprisoned by the lace-decorated cups of a pale-pink brassiere. They were much fuller than his wife's, and softer looking, too.
Paul unzipped her skirt and peeled that down, tugging her pink slip gently so that this garment went along. Both fell at her feet and she stepped to the side, freeing herself of them. He waited not a moment, but reached around her back to work deftly with the hooks of her brassiere. He freed them and the bra sprang apart. He lifted this away, the ribbons trailing down Julie's arms and off.
She was a vision of delight as she stood before him now, her breasts round and standing forward in cream-pink nudity, their rosy nipples already erect, surrounded by clearly defined discs of pebbled rose-beige. The rest of her beauty was only partially concealed, for all she wore were sheer pants of pale-pink nylon, a white garter belt beneath them, and light-colored hose Which reached midway between knees and hips. Her bare upper legs were as roundly full as Paul had hoped they would be, and perfectly smooth.
He became anxious to complete the process of her disrobing. But there was the matter of his own clothes first. He wanted to get them out of the way at this point, so that he could concentrate on the final undressing of his girl and not have to face interruption when he had her nude and ready.
"Lie down," he directed, "just the way you are."
She moved to comply, turning away from him and stepping to the bed as he went to work on his clothing. He stared at the beauty of her buttocks which showed plainly through the pastel of her pants. The plump under-curves had escaped her panty elastics and were naked. Now she bent to strip the spread and covers to the foot of the bed. This stretched her panties taut and pulled them a bit higher.
Paul feverishly rid himself of his clothes and, by the time Julie was stretched out on the bed, awaiting him, he was nude except for his socks. He left these on.
She stared with obvious appreciation as he moved to the side of the bed and climbed onto the field of white percale. He bent forward, the stiff-nippled crests of her bosom serving as magnets for his lips. He touched one rosy, high-standing point.
Julie sighed pleasurable and arched herself, lifting on the support of her right elbow to offer her left breast more fully to his kiss. At the same time, her left arm circled to pull against his naked back and her fingers extended themselves at his neck.
"The other one," she murmured after awhile, and Paul changed breasts, Julie shifting in a complimentary way so that he could derive the fullest possible enjoyment of her.
He raised his head and she fell to a relaxed position. He held one of her breasts in each hand, testing her nipples with a gentle stroking of his thumbs and fingers, then squeezing to test the firm fullness of the globes on which the rosy nipples stood. He bent and kissed her along the arms, then around the waist.
He asked her to turn over and she did.
His fingers curled around the elastic at the top of her silk pants and he very slowly stretched and drew this downward. His lips followed its retreating course, moving to the fullness of one buttock, then changing to the other. He touched her many times as his slack lips caressed and his teeth moved lightly across the flesh. He raised up then, working her pants lower until he could tease the undercurves of her buttocks.
He removed the panties and tossed them over the foot of the bed.
Now he kissed the backs of her legs, using his hands at the same time to caress and smooth her buttocks, then to trail lightly over the columns of pinkish white which extended below these firm hemispheres.
Leaning back, he held her by the legs and turned her onto her back once more as his lips circled again.
Julie was gasping and panting, and an urgent motion which betrayed her need was taking possession of her. Paul kissed her around the waist, then the legs again. She was nude now, except for her shoes, stockings and garters.
This was the way he wanted her.
Exactly like this.
Her eyes went closed, her head pressed backward against the pillow, and her body arched as he forcefully brought their love-making to its most exciting phase. She twisted and turned and gave herself to him without the slightest inhibition or reserve. She was warmly alive and the thrill of her traveled all the way through him, exciting an even more forceful expression of his own desire.
He exulted in the glory of the moment as he became the complete male, intense and dominant, and Julie responded as women have responded throughout all the ages. He was aware of the sleek touch of her stockings, but most of all he knew her urgent warmth as she gave him all of herself and clutched against his naked back with hands which were demanding more and more of him.
He responded to the demand.
He exceeded the demand.
She quaked and cried and trembled in completion. He continued. Her cries turned to ones of protest bat he paid no heed, except to slow the rhythm and to twist his head this way and that, capturing first one and then the other of her rosy breast-buds.
Gradually he drew response from her again, and he increased the tempo. She picked this up. They raced ahead to what he hoped would be a mutual completion. He judged her perfectly.
The universe tilted for him and seemed to fly asunder as they found fulfillment in mutual moments of bliss.
Finally they were at rest.
Lying beside her, he cuddled her in his arms and gently caressed the length of her body as she kissed him about the face and throat and shoulders.
In a few minutes, they got up, splashed happily in the shower together, and dressed to go out for dinner.
To Paul, who had known many women, Julie was one float in a long and beautiful parade. But she was one of the best. He had the impression, however, that she thought of him in a totally different way.
Across the snowy tablecloth in one of Palm Spring's finest restaurants, golden candlelight flickering between them, he could not help but be aware of the warm glow in Julie's eyes. He had lit that flame, he told himself, and this gave him a certain satisfaction. Paul was not a man who took pleasure in gaining the love of women only to hurt them. He didn't enjoy hurting anyone. But he had at least as much vanity as the average man. And vanity is a sleek and hungry beast which must be fed.
Julie's adoring smile was giving his vanity a feast that night. And this was far sweeter and more satisfying than the roast prime rib or the wine.
They became acquainted as human beings. He learned what sort of child she had been, and this told him more than he had previously known about the sort of woman she was. He talked about himself, also, but neither of them mentioned his marriage.
He found the passionate blonde to be more companionable than most of his casual feminine acquaintances.
He enjoyed himself at dinner nearly as much, though in a different way, as he had enjoyed Julie on the bed in their hotel room. This fact gave a special impetus to his desire to return to that bed as quickly as possible.
He mentioned the name of the well-known popular singer who was appearing at one of the local clubs and he suggested they might go there to catch the show. But his tone made it clear that something else was uppermost in his mind.
Julie commented that there was no reason why they couldn't see the show tomorrow night. After all, there was no point in trying to do everything in one evening, was there?
They returned to their room.
And they spent most of the night making love.
CHAPTER THREE
The next morning they rode to Palm Canyon.
Here amid the brown brush-dotted foothills of the desert they found a secluded pocket of lush grass, clear-rippling water, and clustered palm fronds sparkling in the sun. All who week end in Palm Springs, provided they have the slightest athletic inclination, take this short ride by horseback across an Indian reservation east of town. And they pay a toll to the Indians for the privilege.
Paul and Julie lunched after returning, then put on swimwear to take the sun beside the hotel's pool. Palm Springs has more pools, for the size of its population, than any other city in the world.
Paul, reclining on a chaise lounge divided his attention between the beauty of his week end companion and the different kinds of natural beauty afforded by the Palm Springs skyline.
The latter is impressive in its own special way.
Palm Springs, while qualifying in every sense as a desert oasis, also is situated at the base of a mountain range whose sculptured ridges rise abruptly to heights of more than ten thousand feet above the desert floor. An inspiring contrast to the vast sweep of brown sand is furnished by these purplish peaks which serve as a backdrop against a clear-blue sky.
Paul was capable of being inspired by this.
But on the particular afternoon in question, he found a greater inspiration in the beauty which was closer at hand.
He studied the golden fullness of Julie's upper legs, which he had gotten to know so well by sight, touch and taste during the night before. As she strolled to the pool for a dip, he admired the rolling of her. hemispherical buttocks, which her bikini pants tried valiantly but vainly to control. When she returned, wet and glistening, there was the bobbob of her full breasts which were as little restricted by the top of her brief bathing suit as her buttocks were restricted by the pants.
She had a pretty abdomen, too.
Paul had always been of the belief that this portion of the female anatomy was too lightly regarded, by males. In their preoccupation with breasts, buttocks, legs, lips and other attributes, men tended to ignore the beauty which was presented by a smooth golden midsection, gently undulated and bearing its cute dimpled crown.
Paul ignored nothing about a woman. And this afternoon he was finding himself increasingly hard-put to ignore the special attractiveness of Julie.
At first they had swum together. Later he had remained on the lounge while she had walked to the pool, mounted the diving board and arched gracefully into the water, her bikini-swathed buttocks pertly upraised and her long legs gleaming. He had watched her rise to the surface and do a jackknife, her all-but-nude bottom flashing momentarily above the water as she went down again. She had bobbed to the surface several more times, presenting teasing glimpses of joggling breasts, sleek legs, and a back that was sheer poetry.
Now, as they reclined side-by-side on the pool deck, Paul leaned close. A vagrant breeze caught some golden strands of Julie's hair and sent them fluttering against his face as his lips approached her ear: "Let's go to the room."
She turned. Her eyes were concealed by very dark glasses, but her pink lips curved and her white teeth flashed in a confidential smile. "Just what are you suggesting, Mr. Marborn?"
"Please!" he whispered in mock dismay. "The name is Roberts."
"Very well. What are you suggesting, Mr. Roberts baby?" The question ended with a nuzzle.
"I'm suggesting that you let me take you into the room and give you a most wonderful...." He finished the sentence in the bluntest possible way, his voice hardly louder than a breath.
Julie's eyes sparkled in excited surprise at his frankness.
He chuckled. "What do you say?"
"I say ... let's suffer until tonight."
"You don't know what you're asking of me."
"Yes, I do. I'm only asking you to keep the tiger in his cage."
"But he's restless."
"Tough for him."
"Hell become very fierce."
"Tigers are no good when they're tame and cuddly."
"You witch!" Paul grinned.
She laughed and leaped up, heading again for the pool.
Paul didn't follow her.
When they went in to change their bathing suits, Julie mirthfully out-maneuvered him and took sole possession of the bathroom.
He was surprised that she was turning out to be such a tease. But he didn't object. This somehow enhanced the value of the prize which he knew he would claim before the day and evening were over.
And claim and claim again.
She came out wearing a robe and a look that was bright but faintly apprehensive, as if she half expected him to leap at her.
He didn't.
He had decided that he shouldn't appear too eager He would play the game she had started and let her see how she liked that.
He showered and, by the time he came out of the bathroom, she was standing in front of the dresser mirror in bra and panties, attending to her make-up.
Behind her, but at the opposite side of the bed, Paul stripped off his robe.
His nudity caught her gaze in the mirror. "Show-off!" she said perty.
"You don't have to look if you don't want to."
She was still looking.
Paul sensed the beginning of a problem. He had decided not to insist on having her right then but, if he didn't watch out, Nature was going to take the play away from him. At the very least, be was going to show Julie that he was not as cool as he pretended to be.
He quickly walked to the end of the bed and opened a drawer of the bureau. From the corner of his eye, he could tell that Julie's gaze was still on him. And not in a completely disinterested way, either.
He cursed to himself and pulled out a pair of shorts. He bent to step into them.
"Oh...." Julie said, voice falling.
"Don't give me a bad time now," he warned.
He pulled the shorts up and straightened them. Then he turned to the closet to get the rest of his clothes.
Julie went back to painting her eyes. "You're good for a girl's ego, Paul."
"I'm good for more than that."
She shot him another eye-sparkling look by way of the mirror. Then her expression became serious-a little too much so. "You're good for me in every way. If only you weren't married, you'd see this girl really go to work."
"I'm flattered." He fastened his trousers and walked to the bureau to get a shirt.
She watched him for a little while as if she were hoping he might draw out this particular line of conversation, but he remained silent. This was forbidden ground as far as he was concerned. He was married and he was going to stay that way. Julie was a weekend date and nothing more.
That evening they did the night-clubbing he had promised her and they both enjoyed themselves. There was a question, however, as to whether the main source of their pleasure was the dancing and entertainment in the clubs, or their thoughts about the entertainment of a much more private sort which they would share after they had returned to their hotel room.
They didn't stay out late.
When they did return to their room, they didn't take time even to turn on a light. They didn't need one, since a full moon was shining through the windows directly onto the king-sized bed.
As Paul closed the door, Julie immediately turned to him, knowing that he would want to take her right away and letting him know that he could do just that. There was no doubt that she was as anxious as he was.
She wore, that evening, a dance dress of black-rayon velvet-the finest item in her wardrobe. It had thin straps and a low-scooped neckline. All evening Paul had been admiring the creamy swells which were half-revealed at its top. Now he pulled the zipper down her back and, before Julie had a chance either to protest-were she so inclined-or to help him, Paul lifted the wide skirt together with its attached petticoat. They billowed up and over her head and he tossed them aside.
She was a shadowed study of darkness and light-the darkness of her bra which raised her breast from underneath, leaving their tops nude, white, and trembling with every motion; the white of her naked waist and of the tops of her legs; the darkness of brief pants made of black lace.
Paul's hands went immediately to her waist and stretched the elastic backward. He quickly peeled the clinging lace down and away from her soft buttocks. He bent to draw her pants all the way off and to help her step from them.
As soon as he stood up once more, Julie started to undress him. Her body was still shadowed but Paul could make out most of its detail.
While she stripped his jacket away and removed his tie, he opened the front of his shirt. That came off. Next his trousers dropped. He bent to rid himself of them, together with shoes and socks. Then, he opened the hooks at the back of Julie's brassiere.
As had been the case the first time they made love, he didn't remove her stockings, which tonight were shining black. Nor did he remove the thin black-lace garter belt which held them in place.
She stretched out on the bed, her white bosom tossing its rosy crests in the moonlight flood. Paul moved beside her.
The realization that he was about to know this adorable blonde creature again, filled him with exultant joy. Through this was no time for introspection and though Paul had forbidden himself the indulgence of falling in love, the truth was that he hadn't known such excitement with any woman for a very long time. He wanted and needed Julie with all of himself, and he was reaching for her now in a way which was more than physical.
His lips found hers and pressed them tenderly. He kissed Julie deeply and passionately while her arms wound around him.
He trailed his parted lips along her cheek and across the line of her jaw. He nibbled at the dainty lobe of her ear.
"Paul," she murmured. "I need you so much. Oh, darling, I love you!"
That was the word he didn't want to use and hadn't even wanted to hear. Worst of all, he was nearly prepared to use the word himself.
But he held off.
Instead of speaking, he applied his kiss to a different purpose and one which Julie quite obviously enjoyed. Gathering one of her lush breasts in his hand, so that its nipple stood high and thrusting, Paul treated the entire crest to the ardent torment of his kiss-swollen nipple, puckered aureole, and even some of the white surrounding flesh. He kissed passionately yet tenderly, taking fire from her and at the same time exciting her to an even higher tangent of desire for him.
From far away he heard her cry out, as her turning made her flesh roll against his lips. She gasped, "Oh, lover ... baby ... angel ... darling...." And she went on from there, as he switched from one of her breasts to the other. She told him wonderful things that were tender, lustful and sweet all at the same time.
He knew he would have to kiss her more.
More passionately.
More intimately.
His lips roamed along the satin plane of her waist and across the clinging lace of her garter belt. He felt the slithering warmth of her nylons brushing against him.
She lifted, crying and panting as his lips drove her to a frenzy. She was so very sweet and warm and passionately responsive that he all but forgot himself with his absolute worship of her body.
The flash was like a silent burst of lightning.
Startled, Paul raised his head, There was no storm; soft moonlight poured through the window to flood the room.
Julie had gasped and was drawing her arms toward her, at the same time sitting up and scooting backward to the head of the bed.
Paul whirled around.
The room lights went on and he stared at a thin-faced man in a white open-necked shirt. The man was grinning at him in a way suggesting tension and triumph. He held a flash-camera in his left hand.
Paul vaulted toward him, unmindful now of his nakedness. The man, untouched, fell backward against the wall of the room, his grin changing to a look of intense viciousness. His right hand quickly crossed in front of him at the waist, flew back, and turned to point the muzzle of an automatic pistol Paul's way.
Paul stopped, his arms hanging in midair momentarily. They fell to his sides and his weight rolled back and forth on his heels. He steadied himself and stared.
"Sit down Marborn," the intruder said. "We're going to have to talk."
From behind him, Paul heard Julie's voice: "Frankl I thought you were dead."
CHAPTER FOUR
Paul dropped into a chair. He was not a cowardly man and he was jealous of his personal rights, including the right of privacy. Also, he had been engaged in the preliminary phase of the most passionate experience a man can know-the taking of a woman.
But he was facing a gun.
Those who have never looked at the small black bore of an explosive weapon, clutched in the grip of a person precariously perched on the rim of rationality, couldn't know the sensation. Of those who have lived such an experience, some have reacted in mindless rage or fear ... and most of these have died or been seriously wounded.
One mark of the well-adjusted personality is the ability to maintain intelligent control in the face of peril. Paul was a reasonably well-adjusted man.
But he seethed Inwardly as he stared at the leering thin face behind the gun.
The man's dark eyes flitted from Paul to Julie and back again as he side-stepped to a chair and sat down, the gun poised all the while in fingers that showed pale-white. He was about thirty, Paul guessed. From the looks of his clothes, he was in need of money. His black hair was combed in a neat enough part, but was too long around the ears and had a notable lack of luster.
After placing his camera carefully on the floor beside his chair, he twisted his body as if to settle himself more comfortably. But he remained tense and comfortable-looking as a man could be. The grin, which he still wore, was thinning in a way which suggested it might at any moment break into pieces and fall from his face.
Paul glanced at Julie and was puzzled by the look which she returned. Though she seemed terrified, there was a questioning quality in her eyes which made him wonder.
"You know this guy?" Paul demanded.
She said, "Yes. He's ... my husband."
In the second or two during which they stared at one another, the questioning look in Julie's eyes grew stronger, as if she were more concerned with Paul's reaction than with the peril which faced both of them in the intruder's tense hand.
Paul faced the man. "What is this all about?"
"You'd like to get dressed, I suppose, Marbom...." The man's voice had a smooth quality in spite of his obvious tension. There was, if anything, too much smoothness.
Paul swore. "I want an answer to my question. If your'e not about to shoot us, what's the pitch?"
Frank sniggered. "The pitch ... is that I want to make a deal."
"You're after money?"
Frank laughed in the same way again, evidently a nervous mannerism with him. "Everybody's after money, Marborn. But I want more than I could get from you."
"Don't fence with me," Paul snapped. "Tell me what's on your mind, then get the devil out."
Now ... wait a minute...." His speech was like wet silk. "You aren't exactly in a position to tell me what I have to do. But I'm in a good position to tell you some things ... and expect you to carry them out." As he finished the last sentence, his left hand was patting the camera on the floor beside him. But he didn't once take his eyes from Paul or lower the gun which was aimed at Paul's chest.
"So I'm being blackmailed," Paul stated. "But for what, if not money?"
"Cooperation. That says the whole thing. You and I are going into business."
"You're out of your mind."
Frank sniggered again. "You'd better wait until you hear what I have to say before you decide about that."
"Then talk!"
"Sure you wouldn't like to get dressed first?" The man's smoothness of voice contrasted strangely with the tension evident in his gun grip. Paul concluded that the excessively smooth manner was habitual with him and that he could no more abandon this than he could change the way he walked or thought. "I should think a man would have trouble talking business when he's ... like that." Frank's smile was a sneer.
"All right." Paul stood and moved to pick up his clothes.
Julie hadn't said a thing since she'd identified the man. As Paul gathered his clothes, he glanced at her and noted that she was watching Frank apprehensively.
Paul picked up her dress and tossed it to her. After a moment she took this, straightened it, and dropped it over her head, wiggling her body to settle the garment around her.
When Paul had his pants and shirt on, he sat on the edge of the bed. "Now tell me what's on your imbecilic mind."
Frank grinned. "Sure. Well, in the first place, you know what kind of picture I have of you and Julie." He sniggered. "It's not the sort you'd want your wife to see, I'm sure."
Paul tensed but didn't make a move. He stared grimly.
"That little picture's my insurance that you'll do just what I say."
"And what's that?"
"I told you. Go into business."
"You're either going to make some sense in a hurry or, so help me, I'll be at your throat, gun or not."
Frank raised the automatic half an inch but otherwise didn't react. "What's happing here is a sample. Only in the business you and I are going to run, there won't be a threat or violence. No guns at all."
Paul's eyes narrowed. "You're talking about some crazy blackmail stunt to pull on someone else?"
"Not crazy, Marborn. But blackmail. Big time stuff, too. You're acquainted with a lot of big-time people."
"Now, wait a minute...."
"I know all about you. Ever since I found out Julie was working in your office, I've been checking. I've also been waiting for the two of you to step out together. I followed you from L.A. and, when I saw what a cozy setup you had here, well ... I figured the time was right to move in."
"You were waiting in the room when we got home tonight, weren't you?"
"In the bathroom behind the shower curtain."
And you did all this to try to force me to help you with a blackmail scheme?"
"Not a scheme, Marborn. A business. It'll yield a big profit for both of us ... might even net you more than you make at that stockbrokerage outfit. And it'll be safe as boiled water as far as you're concerned. No sweat ... no risk. You see? I'm doing you a big favor." He grinned.
Paul turned to Julie. "You didn't know anything about this?"
"Paul! I thought he was dead. I told you that."
"Yes, you told me. But try to understand if the circumstances make me a little suspicious."
Though she didn't say anything, the sadness in her eyes provided an answer. She seemed hurt that he should doubt her.
"When did you see this tramp last?" he asked the girl.
"Months ago. Last spring. He walked out on me."
"Why did you think he was dead?"
"He wrote me a letter, said he was going to kill himself and that he wanted to let know so I could marry someone else if I felt like it."
"Oh, come on, now! If he thought so little of you as to walk out, why would he do that?"
"How do I know?" Julie replied. "Ask him. He was always doing kooky things-one day sweet, the next day sour."
In spite of himself, Paul was persuaded to believe her.
He glanced back at the man with the gun. "I won't make any deal. I'm a respected businessman. My clients trust me. Do whatever you want with that picture." He stood up.
Frank's eyes hardened a little, but otherwise his face didn't change. He kept a firm grip on the gun. There was about eight feet between Paul and him-too far for Paul to make a successful move against him, and Frank apparently knew this.
"Get out of here," Paul said.
Frank stood up. He smiled more thinly than before. "I think you figure me for a bluff. Well, I don't blame you. Maybe, if I were in your place, I'd think the same thing." He began backing toward the door of the room. "So it's up to me to convince you. I can do that easily enough."
"What do you have in mind?"
"You'll learn, Marborn. And when you do, you'll be ready to talk business."
He felt for the doorknob behind his back, using the hand that held the camera. His blue-steel automatic remained pointed at Paul.
"Wait a minute," Paul said and glanced at Julie. "You're going with him, aren't you?"
Her face contorted and she flopped onto her stomach. She sobbed against the pillow. Paul stared at the long bare line of her back which was visible between the unzipped edges of her dress.
"I don't want her, Marborn," the other man said. "And I'm sure she doesn't want me. I'll be seeing you." He side-stepped through the door and closed it quietly.
Paul swore.
He turned to Julie who still lay face downward, her nearly bare back moving gently as she sobbed. He looked at her for a few moments, then got cigarettes and lighter from his discarded jacket. He dropped into a chair.
"Sit up, Julie." His voice was calm, even kindly. He lit a cigarette.
Julie did as he asked, dabbing at her eyes with an edge of the bed sheet. She looked at him uncertainly.
Although her make-up was smeared and her hair disarrayed, he still wanted her. Strangely enough, what had happened a little while ago hadn't destroyed his passion.
At the same time, he was upset and worried. There was no telling what a man like Frank might do, and the evidence which Frank held against him was enough to destroy his marriage and complete his financial ruin, perhaps for all time.
Julie said, "I swear, I had no idea Frank was around. I didn't know whether or not he was really dead but I thought he might be. He's the sort of man who would kill himself. He's always said he was a failure and that there wasn't any reason for him to go on."
"I believe you," Paul said. "The question now is what he's apt to do next."
"You can't put anything past him."
"Really?"
"He's worked several kinds of confidence schemes, but always little stuff. A chance at something big is what he's wanted for as long as I've known him."
"How long is that?"
"Two years. We were married in December, sixty-two."
"Your real name's not Simmons then?"
"No. Lavoranti."
Paul drew on his cigarette and said bitterly, "He certainly picked a good time to click the shutter of that camera. "
"I'm so ashamed." She turned away and slipped to her side on the bed, her body curled slightly and her dress pulled high on her legs.
"You needn't feel like that." Paul stood up and moved toward her. "Really, everything was pretty wonderful. I'm not ashamed of the picture, but there's no doubt that hunk of film could ruin me."
"Oh, Paul...." She stared at him from the pillow and, at that moment, she seemed more appealing than ever. Frightened and tear-tracked, her face was peculiarly child like though this impression was contradicted by the fact that one side of her gown had slipped, exposing most of her naked bosom. Also, her legs were bare nearly to her hips.
Slowly Paul removed his shirt. He fixed his trousers and kicked them away.
"Darling, darling...." Julie murmured.
Before he knew what was happening, she was on hands and knees in the middle of the bed, one breast falling out of her gown. She was leaning forward, caressing him.
"You have to know how much I love you," she said. "I have to prove this. I want to try to make up, a little bit, for what happened...."
She bent further and began to kiss him.
Paul was speechless. But at such a time speech was uncalled for, if not virtually impossible. He tousled her blonde hair, then reached to cup and stroke her breast which was hanging free. The nipple quickly became still. He yanked the other side of her dress, snapping the thin shoulder strap, and this set free her other breasts as well. He held and stroked that one.
He stroked both of them at once, his hands working downward, as Julie kissed him.
When he had taken all he could stand, he pressed her onto her back, shoving her billowed dress and petticoat into a mountain of black velvet and white lace which obscured her face from his view. Though her face was obscured, she was blatantly naked, made all the more so by the posture which she assumed.
Paul quickly moved to take her and crushed the dress and petticoat cruelly.
He worked with wild urgency, thinking nothing of the girl but only of the need to satisfy his own lust which, blunted a little while ago, was now more demanding than ever. Not only was he trying to satisfy himself, he also was venting the rage which he felt-a rage directed toward the entire situation in which he found himself and toward everyone who was responsible, including Lavoranti, Edith ... yes, and Julie, also.
In hate he was performing the act of love.
But Julie was receiving him with simple hunger.
Though he gave no thought to her satisfaction, the total fervor of his embrace was driving her quickly to her own peak. She cried out, her body tensed against the mattress. He knew she was almost there.
When he reached the ecstatic moment of release, she was with him. The most thoughtful lover in the world could not have timed himself better.
He clutched her, gasping, as she sighed and murmured against his ear.
He rolled away.
He slept very little that night, even though they lay in the dark, nude, side-by-side but not touching. Julie didn't seem to know what her husband might have in mind as far as the picture was concerned. Paul was certain he wouldn't show this to Edith right away.
If he did, that would rob him of the leverage he possessed. But what did the blackmailer intend to do? Paul didn't know.
He lay awake, thinking about this. He could reach no conclusion and could think of nothing to do to extricate himself from the man's evil influence.
Why had he let himself get into such a spot?
For an answer, he could only blame Edith. Except for her, he wouldn't have been in that hotel room with another woman.
He had taken his fun in the past and never had to pay the piper. The kicks had all been for free, he had thought. Now he was apparently being asked to pay for all those other times, as well as for Julie.
He had compassionate feeling toward the beautiful blonde beside him. She seemed to be as much an innocent victim as he was.
Innocent?
He guessed that wasn't exactly the right word. But victim ... yes.
He wondered exactly what Frank Lavoranti had in mind for him to do-exactly how Lavoranti wanted to use his "contacts" in the furtherance of a blackmail plot. He wondered how long before he would find out.
More than anything else, he wondered if he could resist Lavoranti's demands and face up to the probable alternative of having the picture of him and Julie shown to his wife.
He was left with nothing but questions about everything. He had no answers.
After awhile he got up, fumbled around for cigarettes, found them, and lit one up. He dropped into a chair near the foot of the bed. He swore to himself.
It wasn't enough that he was already in trouble financially ... now he had to be neck-deep in a morass like this, as well. One aggravated the other. Were he prosperous, he could face up to a divorce battle with Edith and even pay her what she would demand in exchange for granting him his freedom. As things were, he apply himself to the task of getting on his feet again? with Julie and Lavoranti hung over his head, how could he apply himself to the task of getting on his feet again?
However he looked at the situation, it seemed hopeless.
There was, of course, only one sure way to beat a blackmailer. That was to kill him.
Paul didn't seriously consider this. He couldn't commit murder.
But he couldn't do what Lavoranti had indicated he would have to do in order to keep from being exposed, either.
Or could he?
Paul sat in the dark, smoking his cigarette, and thinking about the choice which faced him.
What had happened that evening was like a bad dream, but there would be no waking up to save him.
At that moment, he didn't see how he could possibly be saved.
CHAPTER FIVE
Edith Marborn awakened the next morning feeling happier than she had for two days. Nadine was the reason.
The relationship between Paul Marborn's wife and the delicately blonde interior decorator went back nearly ten months, to the time when Edith had decided to have the house re-done.
Nadine had been recommended to her by a friend-a perfectly innocent friend, Edith was sure. Nadine was highly regarded in her field, and she didn't give the impression of being a latent Lesbian at all.
You had to know her.
Yes.
Edith smiled to herself as she though about this-about how they had gotten acquainted. She evealed the event as she relaxed in a warm scented tub.
She remembered the sky as it had been that day-gray and thick with moisture waiting to fall. The weather hadn't been unusual for Los Angeles in early February. There was even a raw and blustery wind.
It had been a day for wearing snug woolen pants and sipping brandy in front of an open fire. That was exactly how Edith was dressed and what she was doing when Nadine came to call. Nadine was wearing a snug sweater, also, and without a bra beneath it.
She frequently went without a bra. She thought nothing of doing so, because her breasts were extraordinarily erect. And 'he sweater she had chosen had a tight enough weave so that her flesh would not show through.
Nadine hadn't had an appointment. When Edith had called her a few days earlier, they had left things on an indefinite basis. Nadine was to phone back when she had a free hour or two in her busy schedule and, if Edith was at home, she was to come over.
Only Nadine didn't call.
She just arrived.
The moment Edith opened the door and saw her standing there in a trim little raincoat, her pale-golden hair protruding in upcurled wisps from beneath a blue scarf, Edith wanted her. There was nothing subtle about this, and Edith did not mistake the emotion for anything other than what that was.
Edith had been experienced in such things. Her first Lesbian affair had occurred in college and, since then, she had indulged herself in this way with several women. But she had been discreet and had never gained a reputation as a deviate.
Though she had shared love, in a sense, wtih these other women, she hadn't fallen in love until Nadine. What she felt for the lovely little blonde was a unique experience in her life. Never with a man had Edith known any emotion approaching this.
Edith had helped the other girl with her coat and they had sat in the library for awhile, in front of the warming fire. They had sipped brandy together and talked.
Edith remembered vividly:
"I'm really quite independent in my ideas, Nadine Bergen was saying. "Particularly concerning colors. Conformity, as such, doesn't appeal to me. I'm telling you this in advance as a warning." She smiled almost shyly over the rim of her brandy glass.
Edith read more into the other woman's remarks than a mere commentary on interior design. Independent ... non conformity ... these were the keys. If Nadine Bergen regarded herself in this way, and actually took pride in the image, perhaps there was a possibility....
In due course, they strolled through the large house and Edith listened to the decorator's ideas. She liked some of them very much; with others she disagreed, but this was the least of her concern at the moment. Mainly she was studying Nadine.
They returned to the library, talked some more, and Nadine jotted some estimates.
Edith promised to let her know very soon, and they had what was to be a final brandy. Sitting in front of the fire, Edith sprawled across a large chair, one leg cocked over its arm and the other extended along the floor, while Nadine sat almost primly, her slim legs crossed, her stockings catching a glow from the dancing flames. There was something in the way the delicate-featured blonde, looked at Edith-at Edith's body, particularly-which didn't bear out her attitude of primness. This encouraged Edith even more than Nadine's earlier remarks had done.
Edith was smoking a cigarette. As she reached to drop an ash into the receptacle on the small table beside her chair, she conceived a daring plan. The lovely blonde had glanced more than once at the sharply out-thrust peaks in the front of Edith's sweater; Nadine had no doubt perceived, from the way these cones moved with the motion of Edith's body, that they were un-cupped beneath the clinging wool. Edith decided to cater to the interest which the other woman's glances had betrayed, and to do this in such a bold way that Nadine would be forced to make plain her true inclinations.
As casually as possible, in view of the excitement which was bubbling within her, Edith sat back in her chair, lifted her cigarette toward her lips, then dropped the red-tipped cylinder to her chest so that it would land on the tautly stretched wool between her bosom peaks.
"Oh!" Edith cried and fumbled at the cigarette, apparently unable to pick it up. What this accomplished was to force the glowing coal of tobacco firmly against the weave where it scorched, then burned the wool. A tiny curl of smoke arose. When Edith had finally lifted the cigarette away and tossed it into the ash tray, her sweater was obviously damaged. Worse than that, she could have burned herself, though she had actually been careful not to do so.
"Did you get burned?" Nadine asked solicitously, leaning toward her.
"A little," Edith said. "And look at this sweater. It's simply ruined."
"That's a shame." Nadine was sympathetic.
"Well, there's only one thing to do. I may as well take it off right away."
Crossing her arms in front of her, Edith gasped the hem of the clinging garment and peeled it upward. Her waist gleamed white and smooth above the top of her dark stretch-pants. Swiftly the sweater went higher until first one and then the other of her aggressively jutting breasts leaped to naked freedom. Edith whisked the sweater over her head and tossed that away.
Nadine couldn't keep from staring at the lovely high bosom which stood trembling before her. The delectable coned were clear white, tipped with modest circles of beige. Edith's nipples were fully aroused because of the dragging of the sweater-cloth across them, but they were not large. Though boldly thrusting, Edith's breasts were delicate.
Edith smiled at the blonde girl. "Want to run upstairs with me while I find something else to put on?"
Nadine had finished her brandy. Had she not been interested in Edith in a way which was separate and apart from professional consideration, this would have been her cue to say, I really must be running along.
She didn't say this.
She smiled shyly and agreed. She followed Edith to the stairs and up them to the bedroom which Edith shared with her husband.
Nadine continued to watch the dark-haired woman as she searched for a blouse or another sweater to put on. Her breasts jumped and quivered actively as she moved about.
Finally Edith said. "I don't seem to have a thing I can wear with these pants, and, standing fully in front of Nadine, she stripped the stretch-pants down her long lissome legs and rid herself of them.
This left her entirely nude.
Nadine's fascination was now so evident that Edith was emboldened to make a more daring move and one which would commit her irrevocably.
She gestured toward the twin beds and smiled. "As you can see, my husband and I don't sleep together."
"Not ever?" Nadine asked. Her blue eyes were strangely alight and her voice had changed a little.
Edith shrugged and ran her fingertips in a smoothing motion over the bedspread beside her. "Oh, you know ... he's a man, after all, and I'm married to him. But the only time he lets me into the same bed with him is when he insists."
"You don't ... enjoy him?" Nadine couldn't keep her gaze from hopping, triangular-fashion, from one point of interest on Edith's body to another.
"Not ever."
The gazes of the two women met and held. Edith's was confident, almost demanding, while Nadine's was still uncertain but seemingly mesmerized by the naked appeal of the woman who stood before her.
"Are you married?" Edith asked. She had, of course, already noted that Nadine did not wear a wedding or engagement ring.
"No. I ... I never have been."
"You don't like men either?" Edith smiled a little and her tone was casual, but her eyes revealed the basic seriousness of her attitude.
"Well, I ... I go out with them. I mean...."
Perhaps you haven't faced up to the true facts about yourself," Edith suggested and she moved a little closer to the blonde-haired girl, lifting a hand to one of Nadine's slender arms.
Before Nadine could answer, Edith went on: "I was a little slow in admitting the truth myself. At first no woman likes to think she's unusual. But when her body and her mind both assure her that she is a certain way and that she can never be any different...."
"I don't know if that's true about myself," Nadine protested and she looked half fearfully into Edith's eyes.
"Then it's time you found out. Let me help you." Edith released one of the large buttons on the top of the other girl's two-piece dress.
"No" Nadine clapped her small hands to her bosom in an effort to hold the dress together.
"Afraid of what you'll learn?" Edith challenged.
"No," the blonde said defensively.
"Then why shouldn't we have the experiment? I won't force the issue. If you decide that you're really not meant for this sort of thing, I promise to leave you alone. Far be it from me to try to lead a man-loving woman off the conventional path."
Nadine was breathing more quickly, her dainty bust rising and falling, and her eyes were now obviously frightened.
"Relax," Edith advised softly and eased Nadine's hands away from the front of her dress. "Let me show you one or two little tricks, that's all. You'll either like them or you won't. If the answer's no, your mind will be relieved."
"And if it's yes?" Nadine asked tremenulousry.
"Then you can set about making your adjustment to reality."
The argument achieved its purpose.
Though still quite obviously afraid, Nadine didn't resist as Edith undressed her. The top of her dress was abandoned, leaving her naked from the waist up except for a dainty white brassiere with flowery applique upon the cups.
Her skirt dropped and she stepped from that. Edith then helped her off with her slip.
She stood now in bra, light-colored hose, and a white panty-girdle which her figure obviously didn't require.
Edith knew that many women wore panty-girdles just to hold up their stockings, and some wore them to gain a certain feeling of security which thin silk pants didn't provide. Conversely, other women wore light pants to escape that very sense of restriction. And there were those who, for some reason, wore nothing at all beneath their outer clothes.
Edith removed Nadine's bra, freeing her little breasts which had adorable pink-rosebud nipples. Anxiously now, the aggressive woman began to roll down Nadine's girdle, not bothering to free her hose from the garters.
Nadine's daintiness excited Edith to such an extent that she urged the other girl backward and onto the bed. With Nadine in a reclining position. Edith quickly stripped the girdle and stockings away.
Both women were nude.
Because of the fascination which Nadine had shown for her breasts, Edith decided to tease her by the offering of her bosom first. The experienced Lesbian had learned that the hunger to caress and kiss another woman's breasts was the first clear manifestation of abnormal desire which many women had. By feeding this hunger, a broader desire could usually be brought about.
So Edith proceeded to feed the special hunger which Nadine had evidenced. Lying beside the blonde girl. Edith ran one arm beneath Nadine's body and, with her hand, cupped a shapely breast, aiming its light-brown tip directly toward Nadine's face.
Tentatively at first, Nadine touched the firm half-oval of flesh, then brushed her fingertips against the firm little nipple at its crest. The thrill which passed over Edith's body was indescribable. Nadine must have found a similar response for, in what appeared to be a single spontaneous surge. Nadine's face moved to meet the tender sensitive peak which was thrust toward her.
Edith's nipple brushed the other girl's lips and flicked across the edges of her teeth. Then Edith was aware of a most wonderful sense of warmth and pressure against her flesh. She closed her eyes and bent her head back, at the same time caressing Nadine's slim white body and the silken light-blondeness of her hair.
They did everything that day. Everything.
Nadine was hesitant, of course, but Edith led her along. The dark-haired girl was the dominant one and Nadine was her very submissive sweetheart.
Edith knew Nadine's body thoroughly. Little by little, with appealing shyness, Nadine attained an equal familiarity with the dark-haired girl.
From that very first day, there seemed to be more involved in the affair, from Edith's standpoint, than mere physical consideration. There was love-tender and deep and multi-dimensional. This grew with every subsequent meeting, and with the painful periods of absence which stretched between.
Finally Nadine acknowledged this also.
Now Edith felt she needed the other woman as she had needed no one else in her entire life.
As Edith dressed with care on this particular Sunday morning, she continually glanced at her bedside clock, marking the hours and the minutes and the seconds. The closer she drew to her rendezvous with her beloved, the slower the time seemed to pass.
CHAPTER SIX
For Paul, the tiny wheels of his watch turned in accompaniment to the wheels of his car.
He was coming back from Palm Springs, though it was not yet noon, and Julie was with him.
He didn't know quite what his true feeling was toward the lush blonde whose body had drawn him into a trap of such potentially disastrous proportions that he was threatened with ruin regardless of what he did to try and escape. He resented her, of course. He still doubted her a little, also, though this had been minimized by the love for him which she had professed and actually demonstrated the night before.
What troubled him more than anything, as far as Julie was concerned, was the question of whether or not he was in love with her. He didn't want to be, and he had done what he could consciously do within the arena of his mind to prevent this emotion from taking root. But man can control his reactions only to a limited extent. Fate or Nature or the mere perversity of circumstance frequently steps into overcome the conscious will. Paul wasn't certain if this was what had represented only an avenue to pleasure, nothing enough to give him pause.
He had never been uncertain about a woman before.
In the past, every woman he had ever known-with the exception of Edith in their premartial days-had represented only an avenue to pleasure, nothing more. There had been no question of an emotional attachment.
Girls, to Paul Marborn, had meant pretty smiles and succulent breasts. Squeezable, bounceable buttocks. Long silken legs. Softly passionate words in the dark. Praise. Perfume and never pain.
But there was pain with Julie-a pain which affected them both-and this pain threatened to establish a different sort of relationship. Also, there was the sharing of misfortune, which always tended to bind persons together.
Paul returned Julie to her apartment with a promise to call her if anything important happened before he saw her the next morning at the office. Then he drove to his own house, arriving at a little after one o'clock.
He wasn't surprised to find Edith not at home, for he had told her he would not arrive until late. She always had things to do during the day, outside interests of which he was only dimly aware and which he had no desire to learn about. He and his wife no longer made an effort to share such things with one another. He went into the library, poured himself a large drink, and set down to contemplate his problem.
He finished his drink and poured another.
Still Edith did not return. No one phoned or came to the door. The house was utterly quiet.
Midway through his third drink, a possible solution to at least one aspect of his problem began to assert itself. This aspect had nothing to do with Frank Lavoranti, but with Julie and the special attachment which Paul feared might be arising between them.
The way to find out if such an attachment existed, a voice told him, was to have a date with another woman. Not only would this pretty well convince him as to whether or not Julie meant anything special, but, if he found that she did, this would offer some possible aid in cutting the emotional tie before it became too strong.
There was, in this line of thinking, the peculiar logic which alcohol inspires. Since alcohol deludes with respect to its own effects as well as with respect to everything else, Paul believed he had hit upon an idea of unusual brilliance.
Anyway; as long as Edith didn't expect him at home until late in the evening, why shouldn't he go out? The liquor he had consumed had dulled the impact of the threat posed by Frank Lavoranti, and this made it possible for him to think of other things and even of the possiblity of enjoying himself.
Yes, he would call a girl he knew.
He killed off his third drink and crossed the room to the telephone. Paul kept his little black book in a pocket within his brain. He had found the memorizing of addresses and phone numbers preferable to worrying about the possibility of Edith laying hands on evidence which she could use against him. Hementally leafed through the book, chose a particular listing, and dialed the phone.
He waited while the called instrument rang.
Then it was answered. By a man.
Paul said, "Is this Mr. Frederick Bennett?"
The answer, in a questioning tone: "Yes?"
"Well, this is the Amalgamated Charity League, Mr. Bennett, and your wife's name was given to us as someone who might possibly be able to contribute some time to our doorbell-ringing drive next month. If she's at home, I wonder if I might talk with her, please?"
"Yes ... I don't see why not. But her time is pretty well taken up already. Just a minute. I'll call her to the phone."
Paul smiled to himself and waited.
Then there was Rhoda's voice: "Hello?"
"Mrs. Bennett? Amalgamated Charities here."
"You nut!" She chuckled warmly.
"I thought the master of the house might be on an extension."
"We're safe," Rhoda said. "He went back to his workshop."
"So, how are you these days?"
"The days aren't bad ... but the nights could be a lot better."
"Methinks I sense thy meaning."
Rhoda asked, "So what's all this charities bit? Are you really calling on behalf of the needy?"
"I sure am. Namely me."
"I wouldn't mind supporting that cause," Rhoda said. "When does the drive begin?"
"In an hour? At the old place?"
"Old is right. We haven't met there for three or four months. As a matter-of-fact, Paul, I was afraid that maybe you had lost my number."
"Never, Rodie."
"You don't mind if I interpret that in my own way, do you?"
"Depends. How do you mean?"
"I suspect that you dropped me for another girl."
"You're right. But the other girl happened to be my wife."
"Are you still working on that marriage kick?"
"I thought I ought to give it another try."
"And it bombed, hm?"
"Like Hiroshima."
"Had enough now?"
"Of her, yes."
"Divorce?"
"You know better than that." Rhoda sighed. "I suppose so."
"An hour, then? At the motel?"
"All right."
"What are you going to tell the chief?"
"Don't worry about him. I have a dozen good excuses; I'll shuffle them and draw one."
"You must have been busy since I last saw you, hm?"
"No, That's why all my excuses are still good."
Paul, of course, didn't believe her. Rhoda was a very loose woman. Everyone knew this except her doltish husband.
He chuckled. "I love you, baby."
"You can demonstrate when I see you."
"Let's not be lewd," he said.
"Until we're nude," she retorted, completing a couplet.
He laughed again. "By-Bye."
"One hour," Rhoda said and hung up.
Paul was exactly on time and Rhoda was already there. If he hadn't known her pretty well, this fact would have struck him as very peculiar, for women are almost never early for dates ... especially when they have only an hour to prepare themselves and be where they have to go.
But even a woman can hurry when she really wants to, and when there is nothing to be gained by taking her time.
He knew Rhoda would want to in this instance for a long time. Far from gaining anything by keeping him waiting, she knew he was the sort who might pick up and go elsewhere if she wasn't right on time. Paul had cultivated this impression by treating her with a deliberate lack of concern. This had stemmed partly from the fact that he didn't respect her very much, but more from his awareness that the technique produced good results. Though seeming to possess a great deal of spirit, Rhoda was the sort who longed to be dominated. Her husband just didn't fill this bill.
Her pale blue Plymouth convertible was parked, top up, around the corner from the motel, at the exact spot where they had always met before. Paul braked his Caddy right behind her car and waited for her to get out and walk back.
As she did, he looked her over.
She was tall, with the body of a Las Vegas show girl. This was not a coincidence. She had paraded in one of the French-style revues at the desert resort until she'd been presented with the opportunity to snag Fred Bennet four years age. She had managed to keep her figure; a few years of maturity had, if anything, improved her appeal.
Her hair was dyed red, a few degrees lighter than mahogany. Her eyes were dark-green and suggestive. Her make-up was always flawless, and her complexion as smooth as vanilla ice cream in the sun.
Paul leaned and opened the left-hand door for her.
"Rodie, you're lovely as ever."
She got in and slipped stockinged leg over stockinged leg, letting her skirt hem slide back. Her legs were perfection.
She smiled at Paul. "And you're as handsome. I've missed you, you dog."
"Don't call names," he admonished pleasantly and backed the car far enough to let him swing across the street and into a driveway. He turned around.
At the motel, he left Rhoda sitting in the car while he entered the office and registered. This time he used the name Peter Hopkins. Mr. and Mrs., of course.
That was all this motel required. A man could rent a room for two hours at a special rate, so long as he registered for himself and wife. In this way, the motel could make its registration cards available to the police at any time, as the law required. As for rate discrepancies on different rentals, there was no law against this. And a man and wife might very well rent a room for two hours, might they not? Suppose they merely wanted to take an afternoon nap before continuing a long rigorous drive.
In the room, Rhoda immediately went to Paul's arms and they kissed. She presented him with her best effort and he enjoyed this, returning the favor in kind. As they continued to kiss, Paul placed his hands around Rhoda's bottom and gently kneaded the trim rounds of flesh.
After their kiss ended, he turned to the package he had brought into the room and deposited on the dresser. As he removed the bottle of Scotch, he remarked, "Putting on a little weight, aren't you?"
He hadn't really thought so. He couldn't remember, as a matter-of-fact, just how her buttocks used to be. He only wanted to needle her.
She said, "Why, you louse! My weight has been the same for two years and my measurements haven't changed, either."
"Okay," he said casually, removing the cork from the bottle. "Maybe I made a hasty judgement."
As he took the protective paper covers from a pair of glasses, Rhoda said, "I'll give you a chance to correct your mistake."
"You will?" His tone was conversational. He knew this apparent indifference would bother her, and perhaps encourage her to go to certain lengths to please him. The further she would go, the better the chance of eliminating Julie Simmons from his mind, Paul thought. So far, his date with Rhoda had accomplished little in this regard. "
"There should be a way to convince you," Rhoda said.
"Could be."
"Do you mind if I get comfortable while you pour?"
"Please."
He completed the pouring process and corked the bottle without so much as glancing in the mirror in front of him, though he was aware of reflected motion there.
He turned to face Rhoda, a glass in each hand, and found her standing in bra and panties-both a delicate shade of light beige, lace-trimmed. Her sleek hose were tautly gartered to a belt under her pants.
"Very pretty," Paul said and handed her a glass.
She sat on the edge of the bed, crossed her legs decoratively, and went to work on her drink. He sat in a chair opposite her and looked as he sipped.
"You're quite a man," she said thoughtfully as she lowered her glass. "You always make a girl feel as if she's auditioning."
"I don't mean to," he replied.
"That's all right. Maybe that's what I need to bring out the best in me."
"I'm kind of a challenge-is that what you mean?"
This, of course, pleased Paul's ego. "Mm-hmm."
Paul knocked off the rest of his drink and stood up. "Mind if I get as comfortable as you are?"
"You don't have to ask."
He stripped down to his shorts, then took Rhoda's glass and carried that with his own to the dresser. He poured another round.
"How do you keep that trim physique of yours?" Rhoda asked as he brought her glass back to her.
He sat down again. "Exercise."
She laughed wickedly. "One kind in particular, hmm?"
"That doesn't work off fat. Just frustration."
"I have a large amount of that right now."
"Freddy's been neglecting his duty, I suppose."
"He tries."
"Often enough?"
"Every night, if I'd let him."
"Then what's the matter? He doesn't know the combination?"
"Freddy's just Freddy, that's all."
Paul sipped his drink while she took most of hers at once.
"Hurry up," she said. "This booze is starting to hit me."
Paul was a good deal further along than she was, thanks to what he had consumed at home. When he finished the remainder in his glass, he figured to be just high enough.
He let his eyes travel slowly over her body, brushing along the creamy fullness of her legs and over her middle where she was embraced by the beige-tinted panties with lace around their edges and an appliqued flower at one side. Above the narrow elastic which encircled her waist was more smooth nakedness. His eyes hooped to the globular thrusts of her bosom.
"Take off your brassiere," he said as he sipped from his glass.
Obviously nettled by his casualness, but determined to do whatever might be required to overcome this, Rhoda reached behind her. The hooks of her brassiere yielded. The bra slid from her shoulders and off the rounded tips of her beautiful boobs.
Rhoda's breasts stood in excitement, rounded and quite large. The pale-red wafers surrounding her nipples curved over the summits of the mounds as much on their upper slopes as at their fronts. The brighter-colored nipples themselves aimed rakishly high.
Unless a man was partial to more angular jutting lines, he would have been forced to agree that Rhoda's breasts were the cream of the bosom crop.
"You don't seem anxious for a sample," Rhoda commented, her eyes a little more smoky now that she was displaying her naked breasts to him.
"I'm drinking Scotch right now," he said.
Rhoda gave him a long calculating look, then stood up. She stretched languorously, raising both arms high above her head and twisting her body slowly. Her stomach muscles tautened, which caused her navel to lift above the elastic of her panty briefs. He;' breasts swelled high and proudly as she forced her shoulders back. She ended the stretch with a maddening twist of her shoulders which caused her breasts to roll back and forth, trembling all over.
Then, without a word, Rhode turned and climbed onto the bed where she lay face down.
Paul stared at her back. Her buttocks rose in perfect arcs, set very close together, smooth and creamy-breasts, Rhoda's buttocks managed to look very soft, yet were firm at the same time.
Her cheek against the pillow, she was facing the other way. She murmured, "Care to reconsider what you said about me getting fat?"
"I didn't use the word fat. I said I thought you were putting on weight." Paul stood up. "But maybe I had better check that a little more closely right now."
He finished his drink, put down the glass, and shucked away his shorts.
He took the few steps to the bed, looked down at the sight which was displayed before him, then placed his open hand gently across the summits of the woman's buttocks. He shimmied them back and forth.
"Well?" she asked.
"Can't be sure yet," he said.
He got down on his knees beside the bed and bent to kiss her stockings. She murmured appreciatively. He trailed his fingertips back and forth, tracing the stockings rims, and finally brought both hands to the garter clasp which was nearest him. He opened this. He trailed his fingers to the outer slope of her other leg and opened the first clasp he found there. Reaching farther, he opened the other clasp on the leg closest to him. Very slowly, caressing gently and expertly every inch of the way, he brushed the gossamer stockings down her legs, past her knees, over her calves, and finally off her feet, taking her shoes with them.
He now devoted his attention to her garter belt, stretching the waist elastic of her pants outward so that he could unhook the clasp. He then pulled the belt, garters trailing, out from the final thin garment she wore. He tossed the belt away.
He caressed her buttocks with the silk pants still on them, the lace along their bottom elastics arching upward across the richly pouting mounds. He petted and patted gently, touching and watching the responsive flesh move against his hands. He traced the shape of each buttock and then he placed his hands around them, his thumbs along their under-curves and his fingers extended upward at their outer sides. He squeezed.
"Rhoda cried, "I can't stand any more! Come on and love me!"
"This way?"
"This way," she said.
She knew he liked variety at times, and this was the method she had chosen to entice him to an avid expression of desire.
Slowly and teasingly, with one hand curved against the outer side of her hips, he rolled her panties down. The sheer nylon wound about the slim elastic band at their top. Now the rich, round fullness was revealed as the panties became only a thin strand at the base of the delectable buttocks. He grasped the nylon firmly and stripped this all the way down her legs and off.
He caressed slowly ... thoroughly ... igniting for her a blazing inferno of desire. When she was more than ready and he was ready himself, he began in earnest.
She moved responsively, helping as he made slow but inexorable progress. Though she gasped and whimpered, he knew that this was from pleasure and not from pain, for he was caressing her in a way that made up for the selfish nature of his approach.
He worked more and more and was rewarded with a warmth of embrace which was wondrously thrilling. Rhoda was helping all the while. As he moved, he realized that there was nothing in the world wrong with her buttocks. They were plump and soft, yet resilient, and delightful.
He finally altered his actions to begin the more conventional rhythm of love. Rhoda responded to this, though he knew his hand was offering her the greatest pleasure. And the pleasure which he gave her contributed to the pleasure which she gave him.
Higher, higher he went toward the shrine of passion. Her warmth, her softness, were lifting him quickly. Finally he was aware that his caresses had brought her to the ultimate height. She cried out and worked fervently.
This triggered his own response.
All inhibition and restraint were gone, and the trim line of his body rippled like a sawblade. Rhoda cried out as she knew the full fury or his unleashed assault.
He finished in a blinding moment of blissful release that shook him and seemed to cleanse his soul of all lust.
He lay beside her, gasping.
Before the day was through, he knew the warm soft comfort of her resilient breasts, and then he took her the easy way, working slowly and expending close to half an hour on the process. This pleasure, mutual and shared naturally, was not as sharp but more deeply satisfying than the first.
Still, as he showered, Paul realized that the passion he had experienced with Rhoda had not changed things between Julie and himself. This was not entirely comprehensible to him and certainly not in keeping with what he had wanted to have happen. Nevertheless, he was forced to accept the fact.
After he had dropped Rhoda off around the corner from the motel, and he was returning to his own home, he found himself in a darker mood than he had known that morning. Though this was out of keeping with the popular conception of love as a harbinger of happiness, Paul understood the reason for his depression.
Love had touched him once before-or so he had thought at the time, and then he had rushed into an unsatisfactory marriage. Now, at the second touch of the sorcerer's wand, he was facing the bleakest outlook he had known.
Julie was the only ray of light on his horizon, and he could not be sure about her.
He thought of Frank Lavoranti and the threats which the blackmailer had made. When would he show up and what would he do? How long did Paul have before he would be forced to make the decision which conceivably could cast its shadow across all the remaining years of his life?
Even if he could somehow get off Lavoranti's hook, there was still his money problem to worry about.
For the first time in his life, the thought crossed his mind that he should run. Run out on everything. Edith, Julie, his financial woes, Lavoranti.
But that response wasn't in him.
He drove home.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Paul parked his Cadillac in the garage at the side of his house and closed the garage door from the outside.
As he walked to the front of the house, he took another look at the car which was parked in the driveway. The Oldsmobile was five or six years old, with faded paint and a long scratch running along one side.
Who did he know who would drive a car that looked like that?
Paul glanced at his watch. It was nearly nine o'clock-pretty late for a salesman or canvasser to be calling.
He turned to the front door and opened it.
He heard his wife's voice: " ... must be my husband now. Stay right there and enjoy your drink."
Paul closed the door behind him and waited for Edith to appear. She had a peculiar expression on her face. "Hello, dear. Good trip?"
"Good enough." He embraced her loosely and made a motion of kissing her on the cheek. "Who's here?"
She backed up and looked at him. "Do you know a Frank Lavoranti?"
Paul froze.
"He says he met you yesterday under peculiar circumstances-I think that was the way he phrased it-and he wouldn't tell me any more. He's been here for over an hour. He seemed determined to wait.
Paul cleared his throat and said with an effort, "I can't ... imagine what he wants."
"Are you all right?" his wife inquired.
"Yes. Of course." Paul brushed past her and strode directly to the living room. Now that the initial shock had faded, he realized that Lavoranti would be too smart to let anything slip in front of Edith. Showing up this way, in Paul's home, was merely the blackmailer's method of demonstrating that he meant business.
Paul didn't doubt Lavoranti's earnestness.
He hadn't doubted this since last night.
He entered the living room. "Hello! Didn't expect to see you again ... so soon." He smiled and extended his hand.
"Hello, Marborn. Well, when I got back to town, I just had an urge to stop by. You invited me, you know " His snearing grin and oily tone of voice were the same as they had been before, only he was more relaxed this time. And he was dressed a great deal better-in a brown business suit with a white shirt and tie. His shoes were even shined.
"I'll fix you a drink, dear," Edith was saying. "The usual?"
"Yes, That'll be fine."
"You certainly have a charming wife, Marborn ... and a beautiful home. I envy you." Lavoranti sat down again and Paul took a chair near him.
Paul found himself growing more tense. He wanted to deal with Lavoranti in an outspoken manner, but now he had to watch every word. Edith was the inquisitive sort, and he was sure she wouldn't leave them alone.
She brought his drink and sat down beside him.
Lavoranti began to unreel a line of small talk. Strangely this revolved about Phoenix-what a great town it was, the weather, what a good time the two of them were supposed to have had when they'd "bumped into" one another over there.
Paul went along, forcing smiles and comments of agreement. As he did so, an entirely different set of thoughts was turning in his brain: How had Lavoranti known about Phoenix? Only Edith and Julie had known. Paul had told Edith over the phone that he was going there and he had recounted this story to Julie when she had remarked, during the drive to Palm Springs, that she was curious about the way married men managed such things.
The only conclusion he could reach was that Julie had told the blackmailer that Paul was supposed to have been in Phoenix over the week end. That meant they were cooperating with one another. So she had led him into a trap not unknowingly but with full knowledge of what she was doing. She and Lavoranti were in the shakedown together!
Now it was doubly difficult for Paul to maintain his poise. Anger had risen within him and yet, with Edith right at his side he dared not show this. She was watching both him and Lavoranti closely as the phony conversation moved back and forth. Paul took this to mean that she suspected there was something amiss.
Finally Lavoranti stood up. "Well, it's been nice, Marborn ... Mrs. Marborn. I've enjoyed your hospitality but I have to be on my way now, I'm afraid."
"I'll walk you to the door," Paul said, and herded the other man out of the living room as briskly as he could. Edith was left behind.
Soto voce, Paul cursed him when they reached the front of the house. Lavoranti merely smiled. As the door was opened, he said, "I'll give you a call one of these days ... very soon. Maybe we can get together for lunch."
He was gone.
Paul stood, his hand on the doorknob for several seconds. When he turned around, Edith was standing in the living room doorway watching him.
"Care to tell me what that was about?" she asked.
He shook his head and looked down. "It's nothing." He walked past her, returning to the living room to pour himself a large drink.
"With all that man's talk," Edith said from behind him, "I couldn't figure out just how you two happened to meet or what in the world you had in common. He's a strange sort. Just who is he, Paul?"
He tilted his head back and drained his glass in a single gulp, neat. He realized as he did this that it was likely to make Edith even more suspicious. He didn't usually drink this way.
He cleared his throat and turned to face his wife with a smile on his face. "How was your week end? Do anything interesting?"
Edith's expression didn't change. She was still watchful. When she spoke, her words were not responsive to his question: "What flight did you take out of Phoenix, Paul?"
"Hm?"
"What flight?"
"Oh. Seven o' clock"
"Their time?"
"Yes." Then he realized he had flubbed. "No. Of course not. Our time. I didn't change my watch."
"On Western?"
"Yes." He usually flew Western Airlines and Edith knew this.
"How did the deal go?"
"Oh, fine." He stared at the glass in his hand, then turned back to the bar. He poured himself another.
"What corporation is being reorganized?"
He whirled to face his wife. "Edith! What's the idea of the cross-examination?"
"You've had to much, Paul," she said quietly. Don't you take any more, hm?"
"I'll take another one if I want too!" he-retorted. To prove he meant exactly that, he turned and gulped the drink down.
As soon as he had replaced the glass on the bar, he said, "I'm going up to bed. I'm very tired."
Edith's eyes followed him as he passed her. "You don't look so good." She hesitated. "I wish you would tell me about that man."
He turned "What possible difference could it make to you, Edith? What do you care about my affairs anyway?" His voice rang with the anger he felt toward her ... and toward Lavoranti, Julie, everyone and everything which had so miserably fouled up his life.
"Some of your affairs I care about, darling." The acid in her voice stung him. "The ones that have to do with females."
They stared at one another. He was fairly drunk by that time and wasn't sure what his wife's remark had meant. Was she only fishing or did she really know something?
He said, "I'm not going to discuss anything now." And he strode out of the room.
He didn't look back as he mounted the stairs. If he had, he was sure he would have seen Edith standing in the living room doorway, staring after him.
Surprisingly perhaps, he slept that night. He had the liquor to thank.
In the morning he awakened with a dry, bad-tasting mouth and a headache. All he had needed to complete his woes was a hangover; now his misery was complete.
He extended his legs over the side of the bed, got uncertamly to his feet, and looked down at his wife who was lying in a twisted state, or her side from the waist down but with her shoulders flat against the bed. She evidently had tried to turn over, but her lower body had gotten wound up in the covers. This peculiar posture, and the exertion which she had made in an effort to complete her turn, had caused one of her firm jutting breasts to poke out above the neckline of her gown while the other one remained covered.
Paul stared at his wife's light-brown nipple, which had become excited in the morning air.
He thought of Rhoda Bennett's nipples.
And Julie's.
Breasts! Man is but an animal who can not be satisfied, he philosophized.
He found his way to the bathroom, braced himself against the sink, and stared at his reflection in the mirror. He looked rough ... and older. He felt old that morning.
What a miserably misspent week end, he thought.
He took out his shaving cream and razor, deciding to reverse his usual morning order and shave before he showered. He didn't stop to consider whether the deliberate reversal of this habit-pattern represented a pretest of some sort-a striking back at the forces which were assailing him and a proof that he could still assert his own will.
He shaved and cut himself.
He swore.
He dressed quickly and was out of the house before Edith woke up. He thought about Julie as he drove to Wilshire Boulevard, where his office was io-cated, and as he sat in the coffee shop down the street.
Two cups of coffee and one roll-that was breakfast. The aspirin he had taken before he left home had stopped his headache, and the coffee gave him a boost. He felt human again.
But he was a human in trouble, and they didn't make pills or drinks that would help a bit with what was bothering him.
Julie was already in the office, of course, when he walked in. The first sight of her tweaked an emotional response ... but then he remembered.
She smiled at him affectionately.
He growled, "Come in." and continued past her desk into his private office.
She followed and closed the door. She approached his desk, regarding him inquisitively.
"Sit down."
She did so. "What's the matter, darling? Did Frank...." She stopped, sensing that she shouldn't say any more.
"You were in touch with him while we were over there," Paul said simply. "Sometime that first evening or the next day; probably again before we left."
"No. Paul. I wasn't." Her brown eyes were very earnest.
He grudgingly admired how well she could fake a reaction.
"I know you were,'; he said firmly. "The crumb showed up at my house last night, with my wife right there. That was his way of showing me he meant what he said about going through with his threat if I don't do as he wants. He dished out a line about how he and I had bumped into one another in Phoenix the day before yesterday and how I'd invited him over to the house to meet my wife when he got back in town. Phoenix. He couldn't have known I'd told Edith I was going there if you hadn't filled him in."
"Paul, you have this all wrong. I haven't lied to you. I didn't know where Frank was or even if he was alive. Even if I'd known how to get in touch with him, the last thing in the world I would have done was to help him in a scheme like this."
Paul stared at her. Those eyes of hers were convincing as the devil, but logic argued against them.
"We weren't together all the time," he said. "When we were at that first night club Saturday night, you left out table."
"To go to the powder room, yes."
"You could have called your husband right then," he accused.
"But I didn't! Paul, I swear I didn't!" She looked as if she were about to cry.
"And yesterday morning, before we left Palm Springs you went out to buy some aspirin."
Her expression changed, softening. She leaned forward. "I know how you feel, darling. I don't blame you for suspecting me. What happened was such a terrible thing! But, darling ... I love you. I have no use for Frank. I never want to see or speak to him again, and I've felt that way for a long time. After you've thought this over, I'm sure you'll realize I'm telling the truth."
He looked at her and didn't say anything.
"What did Frank have to say last night?" she asked. "Did he tell you any more about what he had in mind?"
"No. Just that he'll get in touch with me soon. We can have lunch together, he said."
Julie looked down disconsolately.
"You may as well get back to your desk."
"I only wish there was something...." She raised her eyes to his, then got up and walked to the door.
Paul stared at her lush and beautiful buttocks and cursed himself for still desiring her.
CHAPTER EIGHT
So now you're ready to talk, huh, Marborn?
I thought you would be." Paul slid into the red-upholstered booth opposite him and didn't say anything. Lavoranti had phoned Paul's office in the middle of the morning, as Paul had designated
"I already ordered." Lavoranti twisted his head around. "I'll get that waitress over here for you."
"I'm not hungry," Paul said. "Sure?"
"Yes. Now tell me what the scheme is that you have in mind ... and I'll give you a half-a-dozen reasons why it won't work."
Lavoranti grinned. "Oh, now, that isn't the right attitude, Marborn. That's not the right attitude, at all. I've thought this thing out, and it'll work all right. You've got to hear it with an open mind."
Paul lit a cigarette. "Go on."
Though he hated the man intensely and could hardly stand to talk with him, Paul was holding his emotions under control. There was no point in blowing up now. His only way out was to convince Lavoranti that the plan was all wet or else, when he'd heard the details, to try and figure out an angle that he could use to wiggle free.
"To start with," Lavoranti said, "we have your contacts-the people you do business with I imagine that you and your wife get together with these same people socially from time to time, right?"
Paul nodded.
"If you were to lease a house in Palm Springs for the winter, these people would accept invitations to visit you there on week ends wouldn't they?"
"I suppose so."
Lavoranti gestured. "That's all there is to it ... as far as you're concerned."
Paul laughed bitterly. "So you'd frame them while they were at my place, and later, when you put the bite on them, they'd know I was in on the deal. They wouldn't have anything more to do with me. Pretty soon I'd be ruined."
Lavoranti was smiling in an indulgent way as Paul finished his speech. "All wrong, Marborn. You don't have the picture yet. What would happen would be...."
The waitress brought Lavoranti's order and he stopped talking while she set the plate in front of him She glanced at Paul. "What will you have, sir?"
"Just coffee," Paul said.
She left to get it.
Lavoranti began to eat and Paul waited until his coffee had arrived and the waitress had gone on her way again. "What's the rest?" he asked.
Lavoranti chewed up the food in his mouth. "The thing is, Marborn, your contacts are the most important asset we've got. We couldn't afford to do anything that would destroy the trust those people have in you."
"How could you avoid that if you're going to blackmail them?" Paul demanded.
"By making sure you have no connection with the blackmail itself. There'll be no way for them even to trace the plot to you." Lavoranti gestured with his fork. "All you'll do will be to get them to come to your house-the one you're going to rent in Palm Springs. You'll give some parties. Nice dignified affairs. But at these parties there will be girls whose sole purpose will be to lure the pigeons we happen to be working on. When a girl gets a mark interested in her, she'll tell him where she lives and invite him over there-right then, if she can get him away, or at some future time. That place--an apartment-will be where we'll get the evidence against the suckers."
"Concealed cameras, hm?"
"Exactly. Then I'll make the contact. There'll be no way to link you with me and, as for the girls ... well, who knows how broads like that get to parties? They just show up. You won't be blamed."
"You've got one good girl for the job," Paul remarked.
Tn response to Lavoranti's questioning look. Paul said, "I mean Julie."
"You still think she's in this deal with me, don't you? Well, that's not so. When I broke in on you two the other night, she was as surprised as you were."
"I don't believe that," Paul said, "but there's no point in arguing. Who do you expect to get to help you frame your victims, if not Julie?"
"There are lots of babes around. Show them the chance to make five hundred bucks and they'll do just about anything."
"You'll use different girls for each time?"
"Sure. It wouldn't do to have a pigeon see the girl who'd framed him hanging around other parties."
"These people you're planning to frame...." Paul said. "They're not fools. Don't you realize that as soon as the second one gets burned after coming to one of my parties, I'll be marked. People will start avoiding me as if I were a typhoid carrier. Even though they can't prove I had anything to do with the frames, I'll be suspected."
"You're not thinking, Marborn. That won't happen because the last thing in the world these people will do is to talk about what's happened to them. If a guy who had been bit were to see the same girl going after somebody else, he might whisper in the other man's ear that she was dangerous to play with, but he'd never say a thing against you-to do that, he'd have to furnish an explanation, and that would reveal exactly what had happened to him. Since there won't be any talk, you won't be suspected. Each guy will think it was only incidental that he met the girl at your party."
The more Paul thought about the plan which Lavoranti out-lined, the more it seemed to him that the scheme might indeed work.
Paul asked, "How much do you intend to get from each. . pigeon, as you call them?"
"That depends, first on how well fixed they are, and second on how badly they'd be hurt if I showed the pictures I'll have of them." He grinned. "I'll not going to be soft. You can count on that."
"There's some risk, sure. But only for me. You're in the clear all the way. As far as I'm concerned, I'll be careful. And I'll hit each guy only once. The first pay-off is easy to get. It's when you try to follow up that you run into resistance."
In spite of himself, Paul asked, "What kind of split did you have in mind?"
Lavoranti's smile spead. "Now, you're talking, Marborn!" He sobered quickly, putting on an air of sincerity. "I believe in being fair with the people I work with. You're in for one-third. And you've got no sweat and no risk. How's that for a sweet deal, hm?"
"I still don't think the scheme will work." Paul's tone, however, was lacking in conviction.
"Well, if it doesn't, what do you stand to lose? You give it a good try, and I won't have any reason to hurt you regardless of how things turn out.
Paul stared into his coffee. "I'll have to think it over." He hadn't expected to make even this concession.
"Sure. Think good. And while you do think of the money you stand to make-thousands, tens of thousands, a hundred thousand or more before we're through."
Paul looked away. He was thinking of the money already. How he could use that!
"Something else you might think about is Julie." Lavoranti's silken voice was increasingly persuasive. "All the money you want ... and the woman you want. What man could ask for more?"
After Paul had returned to his office, he could think of practically nothing else. He had a couple of interviews with clients and found it difficult to keep his mind on what they were discussing. He had already instructed Julie to transfer his incoming calls, except for the most important ones, to someone else in the office.
Tens of thousands of dollars. A hundred thousand or more. Julie.
After his last interview of the day, Julie came into his office and closed the door after her. She crossed to his desk and sat down in the chair beside it.
"I know you saw Frank this noon," she said. "I recognized his voice when he called in and I listened."
"So I saw him."
"Well?"
"Nothing's been decided."
She chewed at her lower lip. "I can't tell you what to do, of course."
"That's right. You certainly can't."
"You still think I was in the deal with Frank, don't you?"
"You had to be. He wouldn't have known about Phoenix otherwise."
"You're wrong, Paul."
"Then you explain how he knew I was suppose to be in Arizona last week end."
"I can't do that. But I can tell you something else that ought to be even more convincing."
"Such as what?"
"I love you."
He stared at her.
"What's more, I think you feel the same way about me."
"Don't be too sure of that. I'm not the sort of man who loses his head over a little fun on a mattress."
"That's what you're telling yourself, but I don't think you really believe it."
"Leave me alone, will you?"
"No."
He met her level gaze and was surprised by the confidence he saw there.
"I'm going to prove I'm right, Paul. I'm going to prove you want me, and I'm going to make you admit this to yourself."
He could only look in amazement as she stood up and crossed the office to the door. She turned the lock, then returned to his desk and picked up the telephone. She dialed the company switchboard.
"Mr. Marborn is not to be disturbed. Amy," she announced. "Refer all calls or take messages."
She put down the phone and turned to Paul with a wicked smile on her face. "Now we'll find out." Her hands moved to the buttons of her white blouse.
Paul jumped up. "No you don't! Not in the office. This is insane."
She laughed softly and continued to open her clothes. "You can't stop a girl from undressing herself, Paul. If you try, I'll pull and tear things. And I'll make noise, too. Then everyone will know about us."
"Julie, this isn't fair!"
"Oh, yes this is. This is the fairest way I can think of to make you face up to the way you really feel about me. And you'll have to do that if you're going to make the right decision."
"So you're still working for Lavoranti, hm?"
"You'll find out, before I'm through, just who I care about. And you'll learn the same thing about yourself."
She had her blouse entirely open now and she slipped the garment off. Underneath she wore only a pink bra. Her softly rounded breasts rose above the cups and pressed close together at the center, where the bra was cut in a deep vee.
Paul sat down. Though the sight of her, that way, was very appealing, he said, "You're just going to make a fool of yourself, Julie. I won't stop you from undressing, but that doesn't mean I'll touch you."
"You think not? Wait and see." She pulled a short zipper at her hip and pulled the snug skirt away. She stepped from the skirt and placed that with her blouse on a chair.
As Paul watched her short lacy slip come down, he began to experience a positive reaction-and this was in spite of the compound problem which he faced and the fact that he couldn't be sure of Julie. The appeal which she had for him was already stronger than everything else.
Still, Paul was determined to resist her. Although his body reacted, his will would maintain control. He would prove to her and to himself, also, that he was his own master.
There was no question, however, that this was going to be hard to do.
Where women were concerned, Paul had always been a man of action. He had shunned strip shows-both public and private-where men were expected to stand by and watch a woman divest herself of her clothing without responding in an active and self-serving way. He derived no pleasure from mere watching, except as a prelude to the act of love.
But now he was called upon to watch. And he knew that the show which Julie had in store for him was not going to be restricted by the rules which defined the bounds of decency for public performances.
Julie was going to go all out.
Even now, the sight of her in high heels, light hose, pale-pink panties and brassiere was doing something to him. And she had only started her performance.
The bra went next.
Then, instead of proceeding immediately with the rest of the strip, she elected to take advantage of the partial concealment of her charms to tease Paul and heighten his desire to a point where he would find himself practically incapable of resisting her ... she hoped.
In the entire catalogue of possibilities, there were few sights more delightful to Paul than that of a voluptuous blonde with large and well-formed breasts, parading in front of him in stockings, shoes and panties.
Stockings, tautly gartered, always dramatized and glorified a girl's legs. High-heeled shoes also helped in this regard, and made possible the most advantageous display of her other charms as well. Particularly was this true when the girl was bare-breasted and walking, for the solid thrust of high heels against the floor sent a rhythmic vibration through her entire body which could not help but make itself evident in the resiliency of her bosom.
Julie's ripe, soft breasts quivered delectably and nodded up and down. Her rosy nipples were excited as the result of both the cool air and Paul's eyes being upon them. She strutted back and forth and, each time she turned, gave a little extra swing of her shoulders. They shook, joggled, quivered, bobbed and trembled before Paul's ardent gaze, her nipples like sun-reddened surfers on the crests of waves.
No burlesque dancer had ever put on a more exciting performance. In fact, it was doubtful whether any professional could possibly have performed as effectively on a stage. The very fact that Julie was strutting in an office was exciting in itself. Then, too, there was none of the artful comouflage afforded by colored spotlights, and Julie was far closer to her audience than any burlesque dancer would have been.
The bobbing jiggle of her breasts did not represent the only attraction of her performance.
There was the touch of Julie's nylon-sheathed legs which whispered one against the other. Though Paul could hear the sibilant sound of her nylons brushing, what fascinated him even more was the silent kissing of her bare legs, full and soft and cream-toned above the rims of her hose.
Raising his eyes further, he was treated to perhaps the most fascinating sight of all: Beautiful buttocks in pink silk pants.
Rolling, swaying, she pulled the sleek fabric this way and that.
The pants which Julie was wearing that day were opaque, so that the detail of each buttock was not revealed, but the perfect shape of them was dramatized and this was more exciting, in a way, than total nudity would have been.
Paul stared at the composite spectacle of feminine appeal which was on display before him and he was strongly affected. Still he remained resolute. He could not afford to respond. He dared not admit to Julie-or to himself-how much he wanted her.
After parading several times back and forth in front of him, she stopped beside his desk and began very slowly to roll her pale-pink panties down. The softness below her waist became bare, and then the panties were rendered useless. She dropped the silken ring from her knees and stepped from that.
She moved even closer to Paul, bending forward so that her bosom hung suspended before his face. She moved her shoulders slightly, causing the delightful, soft, white melons of flesh to sway back and forth.
Paul had only to raise his hands a few inches in order to grasp and squeeze those breasts. Or, if he so preferred, he could have extended his arms around her sleek smooth body and cupped her buttocks with his palms.
But he did neither of these things.
He was still determined not to touch her, difficult as this was.
Julie was not discouraged. She straightened up and turned to cross to the soft beige couch against the wall. She sat there and languorously raised one leg to cross over the other. From where he sat, Paul could observe every exciting nuance of her performance as she slowly ungartered her hose, twisting and turning and moving her legs this way and that. Nothing escaped him.
When she had rid herself of her stockings and garter belt, Julie stretched out full-length and began the most persuasive phase of her effort.
On her back and totally nude, she danced for him.
Horizontally, she imitated the techniques which exotic dancers display standing up.
Paul could no longer resist.
Rising from his chair, he threw his jacket off and adjusted his other clothing as he crossed the office.
Then the dance on the couch became a duet.
Had music been available, a number such as "Night Train" would have been appropriate, giving way to something like "Saber Dance" as the performance reached it final stage.
In the very midst of this rendition, the music would have come to a sudden stop and there would have been a repeated crashing of cymbals.
Then there would have been silence.
But heavy breathing was heard, together with a soft curse from Paul's lips.
Julie murmured, "Darling, lover, I'm sorry. I wouldn't have behaved that way if you hadn't forced me to. But you can't deny the truth any longer. You can't doubt that I love you or deny how you feel about me. If I didn't love you very much, I wouldn't have degraded myself like that, and if you didn't love me, you wouldn't have responded."
Paul was forced to admit this was true.
CHAPTER NINE
Before the week was over, Paul had leased for the season a furnished house in Palm Springs.
It was one of the finest homes available there and he would have been unable to pay the staggering monthly rent on it for long, without extra money coming in. He did have sufficient funds to advance the first and last month's rent, which was all the lease required him to pay on the day of execution. Frank Lavoranti assured him that, by the time the next payment fell due, their partnership treasury would contain more than enough money to cover this. It was understood that all expenses of their "business," including fees paid to the girls they were to use, would be deducted before he and Frank made their one-to-two split.
Paul didn't argue for a bigger slice of the cake.
He felt, somehow, that bargaining in a transaction of this sort was beneath him. It was bad enough that he was forced to have anything to do with the deal.
Forced was exactly the way he thought of his involvement. The force was exerted, he believed, by circumstances, all of which had been against him for some time.
His falling in love with Julie was the only element of his present situation which he regarded as mixed-bringing pleasure as well as torment.
The money which he stood to make was in the nature of a necessary evil. He planned to invest these funds carefully and, as soon as his investments began to pay off, he would drop out of the deal with Lavoranti.
Anyway, the season would be over by that time and the climate would be too warm, in more ways than one, to make a continuation of the setup advisable.
Paul had to tell his wife about the house he was leasing, for he needed her assistance in entertaining the guests he planned to invite there. No problem arose in this connection, because the actual blackmail plot was to be strictly separate from the house and Edith would have to know nothing at all about this.
As far as financial considerations were concerned, she had no idea Paul was in difficulty. Since relations already were strained between them, he had decided not to take her into his confidence in this regard.
So she raised no objection to the Palm Springs lease.
On the contrary, the idea pleased her and she was anxious to move there right away, to get the place in order for their first week end of entertaining. This was to be something like a housewarming, to which they would invite a number of prominent guests.
Lavoranti decided to get the new "business" off to a good start by employing a pair of women for the first week end and attempting to lure two pigeons to the love nest he had rented.
Paul refused at first even to take a look at the apartment where Lavoranti was to take the blackmail pictures.
He might never have gone there had it not been for Mary Byron.
She was the first girl Frank Lavoranti hired to lead a not-so-innocent lamb to the slaughter, and a less likely prospect for the job Paul could not have imagined.
But as Lavoranti explained, revealing a wisdom greater than that possessed by most crooks, of whom Paul had considered him to be a representative example, "To catch a high-class mark, you need a high-class broad."
Mary Byron was that.
Or, at least, she seemed to be.
Paul saw her for the first time on the evening of the party, and at first he didn't recognize her as a girl Lavoranti had hired. But she interested him right away because of her exceptional beauty, which was almost unworldly.
She arrived with a man who identified himself as Giles Talbert. The man's appearance didn't match the dignity of his name somehow, though he was smoothly dressed. He didn't seem to match the girl he was escorting, either. Paul wondered about them.
As the evening wore on, and as Giles Talbert's girl seemed to have abandoned him in favor of the man whom Paul and Lavoranti had marked as one of their first victims, Paul was forced to conclude that Mary Byron must indeed be one of the girls on their "payroll."
In fascination, Paul observed her at work.
She was barely twenty years old, or perhaps only nineteen. Her hair was a dark lustrous brown, worn short in a stylish way. The cast of her facial features was sweetly provocative-and this was where the other-worldish quality appeared. Her eyes were brown and capable of showing warmth but usually aloof. Her nose turned up a bit. Her lips were expressive, the lower one quite full. Her chin was cute. She had high cheekbones.
Her body was elegantly slim but with a sudden pert curve at the buttocks, and with firm high breasts which were teasingly revealed in party by her expensive gown.
Paul had difficulty accepting her as a call girl because she seemed to possess a delicacy and sensitiveness which were incompatible with that profession. Still, he assumed that she must be a professional. Who else could Lavoranti have gotten for such an assignment.
The man she was working on was a major stockholder in one of the large aircraft companies-worth millions and dedicated to the purpose of making more. His name was Samuel Vinson. He was about fifty, bald on top, too heavy for his short height, and a constant smoker of cigars. He came to parties more to buttonhole business cronies and talk investments than to socialize, drink, or make time with beautiful women.
He was married, of course, but he and his wife always separated in a gathering of this sort and rarely paid a bit of attention to one another during the evening.
This made Mary Byron's work easier.
The only factor which threatened to hamper her was the fact that Sam Vinson had always seemed more interested in playing with money than with girls.
But somehow-Paul would never know how she managed this-Mary made him notice her and succeeded in completely captivating his interest before the evening was over.
The other "working" girl at the party Paul had spotted right away. She was a blonde with a weak face but a highly creditable body, who had fastened herself to the other pigeon of the evening, a well-to-do doctor by the name of Markowitz. Since Mrs. Markowitz was not present, the blonde had a clear field.
Paul took no particular interest in her, even when she left the house and Markowitz departed shortly thereafter. They were going directly to Lavoranti's apartment, undoubtedly.
Paul didn't devote any thought to what would happen there, but only to the money which he stood to make after Lavoranti had gotten the goods on the good doctor and had confronted him with the blackmail demand.
With Mary Byron, however, Paul's interest was different, centering about the girl herself.
By this time he had adjusted himself to the fact that he was in love with Julie. He thought of her a great deal and they spent as much time together as they could. Still, this didn't keep Paul from continuing to look at other women, any more than any man is rendered blind to all feminine charms except those attached to his beloved. Males simply are not made that way.
Sometime after the blonde seductress had left and Dr. Markowitz had followed her, Mary Byron left the party with the man who had brought tier.
Sam Vinson remained, and eventually he and his wife left together.
Paul wondered if Mary Byron had succeeded in making a date with the aircraft magnate for another time.
He was thinking more about this than about the outcome of the blonde's date with Dr. Markowitz when he got together with Srank Lavoranti the following morning.
The thin-faced oily blackmailer was beaming when Paul arrived at his hotel room. "We had a great night!" he said. "Patty outdid herself. You want to see the pictures I got of her and the doctor? They're the wildest, I'll tell you!"
Paul shook his head. "Don't bother. Where did you get those two girls?"
"Patty's a hundred-dollar broad from San Francisco. I got her through a guy I know up there; had him fly her down. One thing I wouldn't do is use local talent-too much chance that the mark might know them, or that he might bump into them again afterward."
"How about the other one-Mary Byron?"
"Oh, her!" Lavoranti laughed. "Well, she's a filly of a different breed, so to speak. I had some experience with her back east, when I was working another kind of deal. I gave her a call the other day, told her to hurry up out here. She came right away."
"She's not a pro, is she?"
"Not her. That babe is as blue-blooded as you could find." Lavoranti smiled to himself. "I wonder what she told her rich daddy when she left home to fly here."
"But why?" Paul asked.
"You've taken quite an interest in her, haven't you?"
"Maybe I have," Paul admitted. "You want to see her in action?" Lavoranti's eyes glinted.
"You mean with Sam Vinson?"
"Hm-hmm."
"No." The expression on Paul's face did not reveal such certainty, however. "Sure?"
"You mean the apartment is set up so that you can see everything that goes on?"
"And everything that's taken off." Lavoranti sniggered.
"I didn't realize that."
"How did you think I was going to take the pictures?"
"I don't know. I guess I assumed the cameras were automatic."
"I wouldn't take a chance on that," Lavoranti said. "I had the bedroom partitioned across one side and a two-way mirror installed. I can sit there and see everything that happens, then take the pictures through the glass when the moment's right. You can come over with me, if you want. Vinson's due to show up at two o'clock this afternoon."
Paul cleared his throat.
Remembering Mary Byron-how beautiful she was and that peculiar appeal which she had for him-Paul was strongly tempted to take Lavoranti up on the offer. Still, he didn't want to get that much involved in the sordid end of the business.
"There's no risk," Lavoranti said. "The mark couldn't possibly know you were there. Mary doesn't have to know, either, if you don't want her to."
"Well...."
"Come on. You ought to see how I operate ... just in case I get sick or something and you have to carry out both ends of the business."
"I wouldn't do that."
"Now, don't get holier-than-thou with me, Marborn. We're in this thing together, don't forget."
"How could I?" Paul paused, then asked, "How much are you going to hit Markowitz for?"
"I thought twenty grand. That's not too much, but enough. The doctor should be able to pay it without any strain ... and he will, once he sees the prints of these pictures. Doctors really do know some different ways; I didn't believe that until I watched him and Patty in action."
Paul glanced at his watch. "You say the Byron girl and Sam Vinson are going to be at the apartment at two?"
"That's right. Have you decided to tag along?"
"Maybe I will."
"That's the way, Marborn! We ought to get there at a little after one, unless you want to meet Mary. She'll probably show up at one-thirty or so. Vinson thinks she lives there, you know."
"Okay. We'll go at one, then."
Lavoranti sniggered. "I'll bet if Julie knew you were hung on this broad, she'd be a little unhappy."
"Let's leave Julie out of our conversation, hm?"
The dark slim man became confidential. "She's a real sweet baby, isn't she? I mean, when everything's going smooth."
"Shut up," Paul said.
Lavoranti laughed. "You don't have to be like that. I'm through with her. I have another woman on the line. That's the way I am, Marborn-a few months with one, then I jump to another. As good as Julie is, she couldn't hold me."
"I'm not the least bit interested in your love life, Frank."
But Lavoranti was enjoying himself. "I'd give Julie a divorce if she wanted. I'll bet she'd like to marry a man like you-well-fixed and respectable."
"I'm married, as you darned well know."
"I thought maybe you'd be thinking of doing something about that."
"Well, I'm not."
Lavoranti shrugged. "No skin off me, one way or the other." He glanced at his watch. "How about some lunch and then we'll run over to the apartment and watch the fun?"
"Have lunch by yourself. I'll meet you over there."
"What's the matter? Think you're too good to eat with me?"
"No. But it's not a good idea for us to be seen together."
"Maybe you're right. You know the address of the apartment?"
"You told me the other day."
"Okay. See you there at around one o'clock, hm?"
Paul nodded and turned to leave.
"Maybe you'd better bring some tranquilizers, Marborn," Frank said to his back as Paul walked to the door. "When that high-born little Mary gets in the rack, you're going to see some action!"
CHAPTER TEN
Frank hadn't exaggerated a bit.
The "room" from which Paul and Frank Lavoranti observed and listened to the activity which took place in the bedroom was as long as the bedroom was wide, but only deep enough to permit them to sit down in front of the rectangular glass, which was permanently mounted as a mirror on the bedroom wall.
Lavoranti used an expensive camera loaded with fast infrared film, so only a dim light was required in the bedroom-the sort of light which couples frequently like to keep burning while they make love.
Lavoranti also had a device which, when fastened to the wall beside the glass, would pick up every sound from the bedroom. By dividing a set of earphones between them, each of the men could hear all that went on.
Paul felt a little guilty, spying and eavesdropping this way, but he convinced himself that this was foolish. He and Lavoranti were blackmailing Sam Vinson, weren't they? Or, at least, they planned to. Next to blackmail, what did spying and eavesdropping matter?
As far as the girl was concerned, she knew that Lavoranti would be watching. Another man, more or less, shouldn't make any difference.
Paul's conscience, which had used to be fairly taut, had become surprisingly elastic during the last couple of weeks. He found it increasingly easy to rationalize anything he wanted to do.
Both men were in the "observation room" when Mary Byron arrived at the apartment. Lavoranti had previously said that Byron was not her real name. Though he claimed to know what this was, he didn't divulge it and Paul didn't press him to find out.
She entered the bedroom immediately and began to change clothes.
"Does she know you're here?" Paul whispered as she unfastened her dress.
Lavoranti grinned. "Sure. I told her to check for my car out front."
"You'd think she would undress in the living room, then," Paul said. "After all, why should she show herself any more than she has to?"
"Because she tingles at the thought that a guy's wanting her, Marborn! You don't know this little witch-t she's true dynamite."
Paul believed that before the afternoon was over.
Now he stared through the glass as Mary undressed so close in front of him that he could almost have touched her if the glass had not been in the way. And yet she couldn't see either him or Lavoranti.
She walked back and forth in front of the glass, as if she weren't being observed. Or, at least, this would have been a person's first impression. The more one watched, however, the more one would have realized that she was consciously posing. Her head and body were held perfectly at all times, and she placed herself in such a way that the best possible view was presented to the glass.
Beneath her dress, she was in blue and white-a light-blue bra, solid color, and a printed petticoat which featured blue flowers on a white background with a scalloped white-lace edge.
She lowered and removed the slip to reveal a matching garter panty in the same print style-blue on white. At the top was a band of blue net; the leg elastics and garters were also blue.
She sat on the edge of the bed, facing the two-way mirror, and ungartered hose. She brushed them down firm young legs which were delectably tanned. Slim though she was, her body was excellently proportioned. This became particularly evident when she removed her brassiere.
Mary's breasts were lusciously tip-tilted, set high on her chest and far enough apart to dramatize their separate identities. Her nipples were as dark as cherries, excitingly firm and high-pointing. Her breasts were as tan as the rest of her body, revealing the fact that she sun-bathed without a top to her bathing suit.
She faced away from the window to remove her pants with the dangling blue garters. The buttocks which she bared were impudently curved. Paul knew, from the looks of them, that they would be rock-firm to a man's hands, but as smoothly soft on the surface as fine satin.
He thought of clutching her buttocks as they made love.
Naked, she bent to open the small suitcase she had brought with her. From that she took what appeared to be a single sheer blue garment, but Paul soon realized that this was a set-matching nightgown and peignoir.
She shut the suitcase and carried it to the closet, being careful to close the sliding door afterward, so that her gentleman caller would not see that her occupancy of the apartment was strictly transient. Then, standing fully in front of the glass and facing her "audience," she raised her arms and dropped the pale-blue gown over her head. She got into the peignoir and fastened its yoke.
As she walked, the two garments drifted against her contours as softly and lightly as a breeze. She made a truly beautiful picture.
Lavoranti asked, "What do you think so far?"
"She's high-class talent," Paul replied.
"You'd better believe that. But you can't judge a phonograph until you hear it play."
She had moved into the living room of the apartment now, so the men in the observation room could talk more freely-not that it really made any difference, but there was a pretense to be maintained.
"You didn't answer my question before," Paul said.
"What was that?"
"Why a girl like this Mary, if she comes from a good family and all, would get mixed up in a deal of this sort ... and actually want to, from the way you told the story."
"She's a little strange. But aren't we all?"
"That's okay," Lavoranti said. "I'm not an amateur psychologist but, as nearby as I can figure her, she's a compulsive bad girl. She gets a real boot out of being with different men, and the cheaper the situation is, the more she seems to enjoy herself. I figure it's something about degrading her family as much as herself. Maybe she feels unworthy because she's one of them, and this is her way of punishing herself and them at the same time."
"For a guy who knows nothing about psychology, you have some pretty definite ideas."
"I'm just guessing. She's never leveled with me about why she is the way she is."
"How did you happen to meet her?"
"That's a long story. I told you I was working a con game back east. My pigeon was a guy she was going with. She tumbled to what I was trying to do but, instead of blowing the whistle, she talked me into letting her in on the game. I've used her a couple of times since."
"And she doesn't take money, you said?"
"Never. She's all for kicks."
"She is a kook," Paul said.
"But a real lively one. You'll see what I mean."
"Have you ever had her?" Paul wanted to know. "Yeah."
Paul felt a pang of envy.
"And I've watched her work, too," Lavoranti added. "The same kind of deal as this?"
"I've never worked this sort of pitch before. The time I watched was at a party. All for fun."
"To coin an expression, I guess it takes all kinds."
"The world doesn't have many like her," Lavoranti said.
This became evident after Sam Vinson arrived. The men in the observation room could hear the door-chime, and then the rumble of voices in the living room.
Perhaps forty-five minutes passed before Mary brought the man into the bedroom. If it hadn't been for the fact that Lavoranti had possessed the foresight to install a small-capacity air-conditioner at the end of the observation room, where the room touched the outer wall of the building, no one could have remained there for that long. As it was, the temperature was cool and there was an ample supply of fresh air.
The room seemed to become a great deal warmer when Mary and Sam Vinson appeared in front of the Window, however. She was already nude and the short stocky financier was in sport shirt and slacks.
Lavoranti fastened his listening device against the wall and handed Paul one of the earphones. From that point on, it was as if he were watching a movie in stereophonic sound. Technicolor, and three dimensions.
Had this really been a movie, the script would have read somewhat as follows:
MARY (turning beside the bed to face the man): 'Really, Sam, you're so impulsive! Why can't we have another drink and talk some more?"
SAM (red-faced with excitement and tearing at the buttons on his shirt): "Talk? Man oh man, who could talk at a time like this!"
MARY (gesturing nonchalantly): "I don't see why we shouldn't talk for a while and build up to things slowly. After all, we're both grown up, and this shouldn't really mean that much to us."
SAM (taking his shirt off): "I'm not a maniac, baby Matter of fact, I hardly ever think of taking a woman to bed-even my wife any more--but when I see you parading around in front of me, I can't help myself. For gosh sakes, let's go, hmm?
MARY (laughing softly): "Oh, Sam, you're like a high school boy."
SAM (opening his belt): "And you're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen."
MARY (eyes brightening): "Really? What do you like most about me?"
SAM (unbuttoning): "Just everything! Those books ... that cute rear."
MARY (turning to pose with her back directed toward him): "I do think my back view is pretty good, you know."
SAM (finishing unbuttoning): "I can believe that!"
MARY (backing toward him): "Touch, Sam. Find out for yourself."
SAM (stepping out of his clothes): "Just get onto that bed, baby, and I'll find out. That's the way I want you."
MARY (turning toward him again): "All in due time. Oh, Sam. you are like a high school boy!"
SAM (proudly, as he finishes undressing): "Darn right-when I've got inspiration!"
MARY (extending a hand); "Mmm...."
SAM (holding his breath): "Easy, easy . .
MARY: "You lie down, Sam."
SAM (beaming): "You want me to?"
MARY: "Yes. That's just what I want."
SAM (turning to the bed): "Okay, baby."
MARY (approaching): "Would you like me to kiss you, Sam?"
SAM: "I'd like that very much."
MARY (bending forward): "How's this?"
SAM: "Wonderful! Ter ... rific! Oh ... lovely, lovely...!"
(Time passes. Finally Mary sits up and looks at him dreamy-eyed.)
MARY: "Did I kiss Rood, Sam?"
SAM (excitedly): "The best! The best!"
MARY (teasingly)-"On you want me now. Sam?"
SAM (more excitedly than ever): "Yes! Yes!"
MARY: "Tell me."
SAM: "I want you! I want you!" (He makes a lunge and gets his arms around her back.)
(Mary allows herself to be drawn forward, then settles and they begin.)
SAM: "Oh!"
MARY (making wildly passionate love, breasts swaying): "Oh! I like this ... T like this!"
SAM (growling): "Baby! Baby! Oh, you're good!"
The performance went on and on. Paul stared in rigid concentration, not even noticing when Lavoranti raised his camera and snapped pictures through the glass. Paul gripped his earphone so tightly that his hand began to ache, but he was only dimly aware of this.
He was completely mesmerized by the slim, lithe, young beauty of Mary Byron and the utterly uninhibited way in which she gave herself to the man-a man more than twice her age.
When the spectacle was finally over and Sam Vinson had taken his leave, Mary slipped into her gown and peignoir and walked to the door of the observation room.
She opened the door and said, "Well, did I give you what you wanted?" Her tone now was flat, almost as if she were discussing last year's wheat crop.
"Did you?" Lavoranti said. "You gave Sam what he wanted, too."
"That fat pig," she said.
Her glance moved to Paul. "Who's this?"
"My partner," Lavoranti said. "Mary Byron, Paul Marborn."
"How was I?" Mary asked, raising her head a little but not smiling. "Very good."
"Thank you."
Paul was fascinated by the reaction which had set in. He asked, "How do you feel?"
"Cheap ... and happy."
"You don't look happy." She laughed ironically. "You don't know."
"While you were with him, you seemed to be very happy indeed."
She asked Lavoranti, "Who is he-a psychiatrist doing field work?"
Lavoranti laughed, "He's all right."
"I'll bet you'd like to have me, wouldn't you?" she challenged, looking Paul right in the eyes.
He said, "Yes."
A slight expression of triumph passed across her face. "Well, you never will. Never!"
Paul was puzzled, if not hurt. "Why?"
"Because I pick and choose carefully. Maybe that doesn't seem that way to you, but that's the truth. Fat-pig Sam was just what I wanted ... and I had him just the way I wanted him, too. Frank knows."
"If you'll excuse me...." Paul said and edged past them out of the narrow and elongated room.
He heard Lavoranti telling her, "You can jet back home any time you want to. There's only one go on this deal."
"All right," she replied. "Fat Sam will hold me for a while."
Paul looked after her as she left the observation room, reentered the bedroom, and closed the door. He said to Lavoranti. "She's certainly a strange one.
"Mmm. But she was handy for us."
"You got some good shots, hmm?"
"What do you think?"
Paul thought they should make some pretty good money off fat Sam Vinson.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The experience-merely watching-had been a new one for Paul. And a disturbing one.
As he drove back to his week-end home, he was aware of a seething turmoil inside him, a turmoil of lust which demanded satisfaction.
He needed a woman.
Julie was not, of course, in Palm Springs. She was his week-day mistress. There were a couple of women in the desert resort whom he knew well, but he hadn't been in touch with them recently. He wasn't even sure that they were in town that weekend.
There was, however another woman whom he knew even better and who was certainly in town. Not only was she in town, she might be right in his own bedroom at that very moment.
Edith.
She had not been a wife to him for nearly three weeks now-not since before his week-end jaunt with Julie. The time had arrived, Paul decided as he sped back to his sprawling, tile-roofed, pastel-pink house which, with its small green lawn and walled-in patio, was surrounded by sand and cactus.
The time had arrived for Edith to be a wife again, if only for an hour.
He left his car in the driveway and strode to the front door of the house. He let himself in and began prowling in search of his wife.
The living room? No.
The dining room? No.
The patio? No again.
He walked through the kitchen, laundry room and utility porch. She was not there either.
He knew that she wouldn't be in the maid's quarters so he didn't check there.
He headed toward the back of the house and to the bedroom where they had both slept the night before-in separate beds side-by-side, so close and yet so far from one another.
Conveniently, and as he had half expected, Edith was in the bedroom. Even more conveniently yet, she was half undressed.
Her top half.
She wore a half slip, hose, shoes, and something beneath the slip. But from the waist upward she was totally bare. As Paul opened the door, she was walking toward the closet, apparently going after a dress.
The first thing he noticed about her was the jiggle of her jutting breasts.
She stopped, startled, and faced him. She raised an arm to shield her bosom and said, "What do you want?" Her tone was sharp.
"I want to see you," Paul said.
"Well?"
"All of you." He looked meaningfully at the arm which hid her nipples.
"Paul, what is this?"
"This, my dear wife, is what is known as a husband asserting his rights. I don't blame you for not recognizing the phenomenon, because you haven't had much opportunity to become accustomed to it."
"Paul...." She took a step backward.
He smiled. "I'm not going to hurt you. Really. I'm only going to give you what wives are supposed to like. Who knows, even you might find some pleasure." He took a step forward.
"No, Paul!"
He stopped, his eyes narrowing. "That isn't going to be the answer today, Edith. I want you, and I'm going to have you. With your consent, I hope. If not, I'll have you by force."
"Rape?" She spoke the word as if she could hardly believe he would consider such a measure.
"If there can be such a thing between two people who have been married for eight years," Paul said.
"I'll scream, Paul!"
"No, you won't. You wouldn't want a scandal." He took another step. Now he was close enough to lunge and grasp her arm if he wanted to do so.
He waited.
"This isn't the time," Edith said, still keeping her arm in position across her thrusting breasts. Paul could see most of the tops of them, but only light-brown rims where her aureoles began.
"I can't think of a better time," Paul told her. "Besides, it's been three weeks."
"You haven't asked me," she said defensively.
"I'm asking now."
"But it's daytime."
He chuckled. "Edith, you would be surprised how much daytime hanky-panky goes on in the world. Why, I'll bet at this very moment that there are thousands of couples loving in this state, and scores of thousands across the country. Can't you visualize them? There're a man and his wife in a bedroom in Pomona, another on a living room couch in Burbank; there're a woman and a door-to-door salesman in Santa Monica, a man and his mistress on a shaggy rug in Beverly Hills. And how about that high school girl and her boy friend on the grass in Griffith Park?"
"Stop that!" Edith exclaimed.
Paul took another step. He was still smiling, but the expression had hardened to include more than a touch of menace. "You're not going to turn me down this time," he said. "I'm going to have you, one way or another."
Edith's eyes were flashing. "I'll scratch."
"Good!"
"I may even bite."
"Then I'll bite you back."
"I'll hurt you, Paul."
He laughed. "That'll be the day!"
Her gaze flicked to the side. She obviously was trying to judge how she might get away from him. But she was in a bad position-the bed was at one side and there was little room to run the other way; a wall was behind her.
Perhaps over the. bed, she thought.
She leaped onto the bed, her upraised leg pulling her short petticoat high and exposing a flash of bare leg above her stockings. To maintain balance, she had to take her arm from in front of her breasts and the out-thrust cones bobbed in full view.
That sight made Paul want her more than ever.
As she was about to leap off the other side of the bed and make a dash for the door, he quickly backed up and moved to his left, positioning himself at the foot of the bed, ready to lunge in either direction.
"You animal!" Edith shrieked at him.
This now seemed to have become a great matter of principle with her. Paul was puzzled that she would resist to this extent. But he was nonetheless determined to go on. He would have her. He had to have her!
"Come down from there," he said.
"I thought the bed was where you wanted me," she taunted. "Well, here I am. Come and get me." She laughed harshly. "You know that the moment you make a move one way or the other, I'll be able to get to the door. Then I can lock myself in another bedroom. I'll stay there all day and all night if I have to ... until you have to leave town to be back at your office in the morning."
The sight of her standing there like that, her breasts high and firm and thrusting toward him, was too much for him to resist, especially in his condition after watching Mary and Sam Vinson. What was more, the fact that she was so blatantly refusing him was intolerable.
He wouldn't put up with this. Not from his own wife. He didn't have to!
He faked a lunge to his left and Edith jerked quickly in the other direction. But, seeing that he wasn't really coming after her yet, she didn't move her feet. Her breasts moved more than any other part of her. They swung violently from side to side, then bobbed to a stop.
Her small nipples were very excited now.
The sight of her, like this, was causing Paul to become mightily anxious.
He absolutely had to have her!
"Don't make me get rough with you, Edith," he warned.
Fear showed on her face, but there was no sign of her giving in. "What's the matter with the woman you've been seeing lately, Paul? If you hurry back to L.A., you may be able to have an afternoon with her."
"Who are you talking about?"
"The one you were with a couple of week-ends ago-when you were supposed to be in Phoenix."
"But I was in Phoenix."
"Don't lie any more," she advised. "I took the trouble to check on you. I called the airline that you said you flew on, and they didn't have any flight from Phoenix at the time you said you left."
"Maybe I gave you the wrong time. I don't try to remember those things."
"And there was that man who came to the house that night," Edith continued. "There was something funny about him, too."
"Oh, Edith, for God's sake!"
She laughed. "Not so anxious now, are you?"
"You tramp!"
"Oh, I wouldn't call names like that if I were you. You're the one who's been stepping out."
"All right!" he said loudly. "What if I have? You can't prove anything, so I may as well admit that. If you had been a proper wife to me, I wouldn't have looked at any other woman."
"Proper? You're talking about what's proper?"
'Yes, I am!"
She laughed. "You ought to see yourself-standing there like a hound who's trapped a rabbit. I'm your wife, Paul, and you have no more consideration for me than that."
"What consideration do you have for me?" he snapped back.
"More than to treat you like an animal, and to behave like an animal myself."
"At least an animal has flesh and blood," he said. "Sometimes I think you have cold water in your veins."
"Well, I can see that we're not getting anywhere."
"That's right. We're not."
"If you grab me, Paul, you won't enjoy yourself."
"I'll worry about that."
"You can work up all the sweat you want, and I won't help a bit."
"You don't have to. Just open those arms of yours, that's all."
"You don't love me any more, do you? You don't love me any more at all."
"No."
"And yet you want me?"
"Yes."
"And you think I should give in to you, knowing how you feel?"
"At this point, Edith, I don't give a damn whether you give in or not. The point is that I'm going to have you, and the way I do that can be either smooth or rough. You have the choice."
She cursed him.
He laughed. "Go ahead, show me how you really feel."
She shut up.
"Don't stop now," he said. "Get everything out of your system. Let's put every feature of our beautiful relationship out in the open for once and take a good look at what we've got. That might be very illuminating, to both of us."
"You vile, contemptible . .
He laughed again.
"All right, Edith," he said, "which way is this going to be-rough or smooth?"
She tensed and didn't answer.
He held back for only a few seconds more, then vaulted over the foot of the bed.
Edith leaped almost as soon as he did, but he caught her by the arm and pulled her backward across the bed. He fell to his knees as she rolled over in an effort to get up. She couldn't accomplish this. Paul pressed a forearm against her back and held her firmly to the bed.
She cried and beat her fists against the mattress. Her feet flailed, and all this accomplished was to cause her petticoat to slide upward. Thin strips of bare flesh were revealed above the rims of her stockings.
With his free right hand, Paul grasped her slip and yanked this the rest of the way to her middle.
She wailed as he paused for a few moments to admire the beauty he had uncovered. Her little buttocks were packed in the nylon confinement of sleek white pants. As she struggled, her buttocks shook within the nylon.
A spanking is what she needs, Paul thought.
He had never spanked her, though he had been tempted more than once. Now, with the opportunity so conveniently at hand, the urge was too strong to resist.
He lifted his hand high, then brought the hand down hard and fast. Spat!
Her flesh wobbled and shook, the nylon rippling. Edith cried out in shock and hurt. Paul's hand tingled where his palm and fingers had come in sharp contact with her firmly resilient bottom.
Spat!
Again Paul's hand tingled and Edith's flesh shook. Spat!
He was hitting her harder and harder, hurting both of them. But the sound of her anguished crying, her frantic struggles, and the trembling quiver of her punished buttocks pleased him more than he had ever imagined he could be pleased by such an experience. Spat I
"You fiend!" Edith screamed. Spat!
He decided to pour on the steam. Now that he had started this, he thought, he might as well do a thorough job.
Spat ... spat!
Spat ... spat ... spat!
Her silken pants were shaking and jiggling in a constantly vibration as the taut flesh fairly danced.
Suddenly Paul wanted to remove her pants. He didn't want anything between his wife's tender buttocks and the punishing hand which he was bringing to bear upon them.
He grasped her pants at the waistband and pulled savagely. The elastic popped and the nylon shredded, falling away. As Edith screamed and threshed futilely, Paul peeled the remnants of her underwear away from her hips, down her legs and off.
He began to spank her in earnest.
Her bottom grew pink.
Still he spanked her.
She cried and screamed and sobbed, and every sound she made seemed to act as a goad upon her husband. Her smooth blushing bottom was a drum on which he was beating a rhythm of revenge for all the nights that she had refused him.
Then, finally when he'd had enough, he rolled her onto her back. Her face was tear-tracked and she glared at him hatefully. But she didn't fight any more. He had taken all that from her.
He adjusted his clothes and started, taking her immediately. To his surprise, he found this easy, as if the spanking had prepared her.
He acted like a machine, without the slightest consideration for her. At that moment, she was nothing but a device which he was employing to achieve satisfaction.
Edith did not respond at first.
But, as her husband's needs became more forceful and more rapid, she began to work as well. Pretty soon, her body was very active on the mattress.
Paul was exultant as his wife gasped and whimpered and gave herself to him with a fury which he bad never known from her before. He didn't love her now. He was sure he didn't. Nevertheless there was a satisfaction in having her respond to him this way at long last.
He worked wildly, and then he saw the blinding light before him. He was racing toward this like a rocket headed for the sun.
Closer, closer....
His passion exploded in a shattering moment of release. And Edith was with him, pressing and crying out and clutching him around the back.
The tumult finally was still.
He rolled away.
He didn't know what her reaction would be now.
Had he reached her psychologically as well as physically? Would she admit she had been wrong and say she wanted another chance for them?
Even if she did, Paul felt the time was too late. There was Julie, and she was the one he was in love with.
No problem presented itself for, when Edith got up from the bed, she didn't so much as look at him. She strode to the closet, snatched a robe, and immediately went into the bathroom.
That was just as well, Paul decided. He didn't want her any more. But if this was the last time for them, Paul had proved his supremacy.
CHAPTER TWELVE
During the weeks that followed, the extortion enterprise of Paul Marborn and Frank Lavoranti paid off handsomely.
Paul devoted nearly all of his attention to the investment of his share of the illegal gains rebuilding with care the financial structure which had crumbled as the result of a single unwise investment some weeks before.
Nearly all of his time and attention went to this.
Of the remainder, a good portion was devoted to the planning and hosting of his week-end parties at the Palm Springs house, and the rest to his love affair with Julie Simmons.
Though Julie had given him every reason to feel sure of her in the weeks since he had made the deal with Lavoranti, there was still the nagging question of her possible complicity in the original frame-up.
He could not keep this out of his mind and, as their attachment deepened and took firmer hold of both of them, this problem festered, assuming an importance out of all proportion to its actual meaning.
Even if Julie had deliberately set him up for the frame by Lavoranti-and he couldn't help but believe, deep inside, that this was so-she had proved that she now loved him and she was certainly faithful. So the other was ancient history.
But Paul could not see things that way.
When he was alone, he found himself brooding over the question more and more.
As for his life with Edith, she remained with him because she still considered it to her advantage to do so. But they occupied separate bedrooms, and he no longer made any pretense of accounting for his time. She knew he had a mistress.
She helped him with the entertaining at the desert place because he had convinced her that this was necessary to his business advancement. That was something Edith understood, and she was glad to do her part.
Theirs was now a completely cynical relationship, externally normal but without the slightest warmth.
Paul didn't know how long he could put up with this. But, for the time being, he was determined to do so. He needed Edith's help for as long as his deal with Lavoranti lasted. Then, when he had finally gotten on his feet, he could break that odious contract and perhaps sever his tie with Edith, as well.
So now he was working, building, and marking time.
And making love to Julie.
Julie's warm love became his haven from the unpleasantness he was forced to endure-the sordid deal with the oily blackmailer who had trapped him, and the cynical relationship with a wife he no longer loved.
The haven would have been warmer and more secure, however, if he could only have been certain about the one issue which continued to stand between Julie and himself.
His desire to resolve this issue forced it into their conversation from time to time. But nothing was ever accomplished. Always Julie reacted with anger and resentment that he should continue to blame her for something which she assured him she had not done.
This added to his own resentment, for he remained convinced that she was telling him a lie.
They fought sometimes.
And then they loved.
They fought and loved, and fought and loved, in a bittersweet cycle which both of them knew could not last forever. The outstanding issue would eventually have to be resolved.
One night when they were together in her new apartment-the place in West Los Angeles which Paul had rented for her-the marathon argument reached a kind of crisis.
Julie, naked since their love session of an hour earlier, was lying on the bed, and Paul was pacing back and forth, wearing only a pair of shorts. They hadn't gotten dressed because there was an unspoken mutual agreement that they would make love again before he left, but now their conversation had slipped into the old familiar avenue of distrust and suspicion.
Paul, smoking nervously as he walked, was saying, "If there was only some way I could be sure-really sure-about what happened!"
"There is," Julie retorted a trifle sharply. "You only have to trust me and believe what I've told you. If we love one another, is that asking too much?"
"Of course it's not asking too much," Paul said. "And I do trust you, darling. But what explanation can you give me to hold onto? It wouldn't even have to be a good one. but just something I could feed my brain and say, Now this is it-take it and shut up."
"We've gone all over that," Julie replied. "There are only two possibilities, but you've dismissed both of them."
"They're too outlandish," he scoffed.
"Are they? Let's look at them again. Why couldn't your wife have tipped Frank off in some way about you being in Phoenix? She could even have come right out and said that was where you were and he could merely have picked the line up."
"No," Paul said. "I've asked her about that. I mean, I've asked her to go over exactly what happened when he showed up at the house. She told me that before she had a chance to say a thing, he identified himself and explained he had bumped into me in Phoenix the day before."
"Then it has to be the other answer," Julie said.
"Amy Vollmer? That's ridiculous!"
Julie sat up. "Why is it? Paul could have gotten acquainted with her and he could have had her listen in on your calls. He told us that first night that he'd been checking on you. What better way than by getting chummy with the switchboard operator in your office?"
"But Amy's a married woman-and happily, too, as far as anyone knows."
"So you were happily married, as far as anyone knew. But that didn't keep us from having a week end together. And that isn't keeping us from being together right now."
"I trust Amy," Paul said firmly.
"More than you trust me?"
He looked at his blonde mistress and realized that the entire issue did in fact boil down to that.
"Well?" Julie demanded, anger more evident on her face now.
"I can't say that."
"I should hope not. But that's the way you've been talking,"
"It's only that the idea seems incredible-I mean, that Frank would go to so much trouble."
"He was setting up a deal, Paul. When a con man is setting up a deal, no amount of trouble is too much."
For the first time, Paul began to think that perhaps Julie was right. He "wanted to believe she was
"How can we possibly find out?" he asked.
"You could make a play for Amy yourself."
Paul stopped pacing and stared at the lovely blonde. "You're kidding."
"No, I'm quite serious."
"But what good would that do? If she had spied on me for Frank, she certainly wouldn't tell me so."
"Of course not. But if you could talk her into going to Palm Springs with you for the week end and plant her in that apartment that Frank uses...."
"I begin to see what you mean. I could be in the observation room, and then when he showed up and found her there ... I'd find out, wouldn't I?"
"Mm-hmm."
"But you know what that would mean, if we went to Palm Springs together. I would have to make love to her."
"So she's a good-looking girl, a healthy man like you ought to enjoy the job."
"How would you feel?"
Julie took a deep breath and sighed. "I wouldn't like the idea, of course. But if that would put an end to your suspicions of me, well ... it's a question of the lesser of two evils."
"The entire notion is pretty chancy. In the first place, she might not go for me."
Julie smiled wryly. "Oh, come on! You're the handsome, rich, young junior partner, and the switchboard operator wouldn't give you a tumble?"
"She might be madly in love with her husband."
"If that were the case, Frank couldn't have gotten to her ... and I'm sure he did. Give a try, hm?"
"But maybe she can't get away for a week end? That's not so easy for a married woman, you know."
"Persuade her, Paul. You're a very persuasive man. I can speak with some authority about that."
Paul thought the proposition over. "The scheme might work," he said finally. "But there could be problems at the other end, too."
"So you can take care of those."
"I'd have to do some careful planning."
"I'll admit that the easiest course for you-and for me, also-would be for you just to believe me. But you seem unable to do that. So this is the only other way."
Paul shook his head. "As if I don't have enough problems now!"
Julie laughed. "To hear you talk, anybody would think you didn't see any pleasure in a week end with Amy. If you ask me, she's probably a pretty warm number."
"You can have her," Paul said.
"No thanks! I prefer boys ... remember?"
Paul grinned and walked to the bed. "Then you can have me."
"That's more my style."
He lay down beside her.
Now that a possible means was at hand for resolving his doubts concerning Julie, Paul felt somewhat relieved, even though he had not actually decided to carry out the plan. He was willing, however, to place the entire matter on a back shelf of his mind and concentrate on having fun with Julie for the time being.
He began with her breasts.
This was a more or less arbitrary choice, because with Julie there were so many places to start. And, being nude and reclining, she was entirely available to him.
He could, for example, have started with her toes. He could have kissed each one, ending with a little pinky. Then he could have kissed the instep of her foot, her ankle, her calf, and he would have been off and running.
Or he could have started at the very top of her head. He could have run his fingers through her honey-blonde hair, and then he could have buried his face against this silken softness and breathed the sweet perfume.
From there, the next step would have been to kiss her brow and to close each of her eyes with his lips. He could have kissed the tip of her nose, each corner of her mouth, and finally have centered on her lush and lovely lips.
He could just as well have started with her fingers, gently nibbling at each of them, then kissing her palm, the heel of her hand, her wrist, her lower arm, the inner side of her elbow....
Or had he wanted to be daring, he could have begun with the adorable little dimple at her waist. A kissing journey begun from there could have taken off in any of several directions.
The fact of the matter was, however, that Paul began with her breasts.
And he did not begin by kissing these lush, rosy-nibbled promontories, either. He began by taking one gently in his hand and squeezing. First he encountered softness at its surface, then firm fullness as he pressed a bit more.
He moved to the other one and did much the same thing, ending by brushing the flat of his hand back and forth across the turgid tip, which caused the tip to become even more turgid and also caused the luscious globe to which the tip was attached to shake.
Paul spread his hand and placed his little finger to one of Julie's nipples and his thumb on the other. He pressed them both gently, then agitated his hand.
"You're driving them crazy, darling," Julie murmured. "Look how excited they are."
They were. Paul studied tham and decided that he had never seen such eager nipples in his life before.
"I know what they really want," he said.
"Then go to work."
He did.
Julie caressed the back of his head as he kissed her most passionately, coaxing one of her thrusting buds of pink sensitive flesh into ever, greater excitement.
He went to the other one.
Then he placed himself in a position where he could very easily kiss Julie's lips without having to twist his body at all.
He kissed her lips at the very same instant, he claimed her.
The synchronization of the two heightened their pleasure. A man should occasionally vary his actions, however, for variety is the spice of love-making.
So Paul pressed his cheek against her soft silken hair and whispered in her ear as he made vigorous love to her. And his whispers were synchronized with the bodily rhythm. This was easy to do because he whispered only a single word-a vigorous, urgent one-syllable word which seemed peculiarly appropriate to the occasion.
Julie seemed to agree with his choice, for she said, "Yes, yes...."
And they went on that way, loving and whispering, until their lips could no longer keep time with their actions.
The bout ended with a savage uninhibited burst of passion which swept both of them along, as if on the crest of a tidal wave, and left them finally, gasping, at a calm lagoon of fulfilled desire where they could float beneath the warming rays of the sun and spend an eternity in four or five minutes.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Paul began his conquest of Amy Vollmer in a simple way. The next morning, as he sat at his desk, he merely picked up his telephone and dialed nine. She answered, "Office."
"This is Mr. Marborn, Amy. I'd like to ask you a question."
"Why yes, Mr. Marborn."
"This is only hypothetical, you understand, but let's say that there was a boss who was very much attracted to one of the girls who worked in his office and he wanted to have an affair with her. The girl was young and pretty, and the boss was ... well, not too much older and considered handsome. Do you follow me so far?"
There was silence for a moment on the line. Then: "Yes." A lot of expression was embodied in Amy's utterance of that single word-interest, apprehension, curiosity, and more.
"The boss was a junior partner in the firm, and he had enough money to show the girl a good time. The problem was that both he and the girl were married-to other persons, of course."
"I see...." Amy said.
"The boss was a little reluctant to tell the girl how he felt about her, and yet he could hardly keep quiet. Now this is the question I want to ask you: Do you think the boss should ask the girl to go away with him for a week end, or do you think he should try to forget her?"
"Well, Mr. Marborn...."
"Yes?"
"I mean, it's very difficult to ... that is...."
"Just give me your opinion, Amy, from the standpoint of a young attractive woman who's married. If you were in that girl's place how would you feel? Would you want the boss to speak his mind or wouldn't you?"
"Well, I would ... I think I'd ... like to know...." Her voice became very weak and played out, as if she thought that she perhaps had said more than she should have.
"You wouldn't be offended?"
"Nnno. I mean, if I liked my boss and ... "
"Do you like me, Amy?"
"Why, Mr. Marborn! You know I do. I like you very much."
Paul smiled at the telephone. "Then, Amy, wiB you? Spend the week end in Palm Springs with me, that is?"
"Mr. Marborn...." Her whisper was awed.
"Well?" He purred the question back at her.
"I'll have to think ... I mean ... a week end ... it's kind of hard to ... it's so sudden ... I mean...."
"How would you like to come into my office, Amy? Maybe we could talk about this more easily here."
"Why, yes ... all right ... I'll get someone to take over the board...."
Paul hung up the phone and chuckled. This was as easy as Julie had said it would be. Maybe Julie was right about the whole business, he thought. Maybe Amy was the one who had given Frank Lavoranti the information about him.
During the next few minutes, in Paul's office, the date was arranged. Amy had a sister living in San Diego, and Amy was reasonable sure that if she phoned her sister and explained that she just had to get away from home for a week end, the sister would call her back at home that evening, say she was very sick and needed care. Amy's husband certainly couldn't deny Amy's wish to go, and he couldn't accompany her because he worked Saturdays and Sundays. So everything would work out nicely, she was sure.
Paul was sure, also.
The look in Amy's eyes told him that he might be in for more than he had bargained for, during the forty-eight hours to come.
Amy Vollmer was in her late twenties. She had a moon-like face which was faintly Oriental in cast, her eyes narrow beneath arching brows. Her hair was auburn and hung straight and loose to her shoulders. Figure-wise, she was heavy in the balcony. If Paul had been forced to guess her measurements, he would have said 43-24-36, give or take an inch here or there.
The prospect of spending a week end with her was not altogether an unpleasant one, though she was not the sort of girl Paul would usually go after. There was a boldness about her, which began to assert itself as soon as she felt sure of where she stood with him.
He liked girls to be receptive, of course, but not too forward. The man, after all, was the one who should take the lead in matters of amour.
As they drove to Palm Springs the next evening-Friday-Amy took the lead away from him. Edith had flown to the desert resort that morning, as usual, so as to get a head start on preparations for the week end.
Amy sat very close to him all the way, the warmth of her communicating itself through her thin clothing and to the nerves in his hip and leg. She moved subtly against him from time to time, and this heightened the effect.
Her conversation played a part, also: "I just had no idea," she said. "In all the time I've worked for the company and watched you moving around the office, and admired you so much, I didn't have the slightest notion that you were paying any attention to me."
"Well, I was. But I knew you were married, Amy. And, of course, I am too. That made the situation so awkward."
"But you should have said something before this. My goodness, being married doesn't mean a person has to stop living, you know."
Paul remembered the line he had given Julie, when he had propositioned her, and smiled to himself at the similarity.
Amy went on: "I've thought a lot about you, Paul. I've looked at you and said to myself, I'll bet he'd be wonderful in bed."
"Have you really?"
"Mmm, you don't know! I even talked about you with some of the other girls, and they agreed that they'd like to get you on a mattress."
"In a minute, you'll have me blushing."
She laughed throatily. "Now, don't get bashful with me, Paul, because I'm really looking forward to this week end. This is going to be one to remember. I want to do just everything."
"Everything?"
"Absolutely." She snuggled closer to him. "Don't you think it's good for a person to completely let their hair down every once in a while-do all the things they're not supposed to, just for the devil of it?"
"I'm not about to argue," he said and placed a hand over her nearest knee, which was right next to his own.
He realized, almost immediately, that this was a mistake. For his simple gesture furnished Amy with a go-ahead which she had evidently been awaiting. No sooner had he rested his right hand on her left knee than she placed her left hand on his right leg.
But not on the knee.
Amy was not a girl who was interested in the knees of men.
Her hand landed on the inner slope of his leg, exactly where his boxer style shorts ended beneath his trousers. She caressed his trousered leg slowly and expertly, moving her hand in a small lazy circle and drawing a fire from his body which surprised him with its sudden intensity.
In a way, he wanted to tell her to stop. After all. they were speeding along the road at eighty miles an hour!
But the highway was divided and, by then, they had gotten out of the heaviest traffic which clustered around Los Angeles. Anyway, he didn't want to discourage the girl. In order for him to achieve his main purpose with her that week end, he would have to have her complete confidence, and her affection, of course.
So instead of telling her to stop what she was doing, Paul decided that the best move for him to make was to reciprocate. He did this by gently lifting the hem of her skirt and the lacy edge of her slip upward from her sleekly stockinged knees, and carrying them to a point which was about as high on her legs as her hand was on his. Then he began to caress her, the same way that she was caressing him, his hand partially on the top of her left stocking and partially on the warm, smooth flesh above the nylon.
He caressed in slow torment.
Amy did the same.
And desire built steadily for each of them. In short order. Amy proved how very much she wanted him. While Paul was willing to confine his caressing to the portion of her legs which he had laid bare when he had raised her skirt and slip, Amy accepted no such self-limitations.
She was an elemental girl who believed in going n the heart of things.
Paul took a quick breath.
"Oh, honey...." Amy said.
"Can't you wait until we get there?" Paul asked and began to caress.
Why should we wait for anything, when we're both ready? Do you want to see how ready I am?" She took his right hand in her left and drew his hand toward her lap. Her warmth told him, even though then was a thin layer of silk in the way.
He enjoyed no such protection from Amy at that moment. Her hand was cool and soft and skilled and constantly in motion.
Paul swore. "You've got to cut that out!"
"Stop the car," she murmured huskily. "Pull off the road somewhere."
"Are you crazy? This is a heavily traveled highway."
"So find a cross-road."
"But it's early. There's still lots of traffic around."
"It's dark," she said. "Darkness is all we need."
"I don't want to," he told her. She laughed and tightened her grasp. "Don't tell me that!"
How could he in honesty? The proof of the way he felt was too readily apparent.
He took his hand from her, letting her dress and slip remain high, and lifted her hand away from him. "I'll look for a road," he said huskily.
He found one, signaled, and swerved to the right. The Cadillac dipped down off the elevated highway and into the rolling farm country. They crossed a railroad track and found themselves between what seemed to be a hayfield and an orchard-walnuts, he guessed.
"Let's get under those trees," Amy said, pointing.
"We're still too close to the road."
"But I can't wait any longer! Touching you was just too much!"
Paul didn't have the urge to fight her at that point. The urge which he did possess was of an entirely different kind-a fact equally evident to both of them. She was now caressing him again.
The road on which they were driving was narrow, and there was no other traffic visible. When he spotted a driveway running through the center of the orchard, he slowed the car and turned. The Cadillac lurched slightly as they left the pavement. He slowed the car more.
He went for about a hundred feet and stopped. He doused the lights and turned off the engine. "All right," he said.
"Let's get out," Amy told him. "On the ground?"
"Sure on the ground! I need room to fly."
"But I don't have a blanket in the car."
"The ground's pretty clean. We can brush the dust off us afterward."
If that was what she wanted, Paul thought.
He got out and walked around the front of the car while Amy stepped out on her side and left the door open. The car's interior lights cast a dim glow. Otherwise, the darkness around them was thick. There was only a sliver of moon, and the thick tops of the trees kept out most of its light. Amy gazed avidly at him as he moved into the circle of light at the side of the car.
Then she reached.
"Stop that!" Paul demanded.
Amy laughed. "You sound like a young girl protecting her honor."
"Oh, yeah?" Paul said and pulled her against him.
His lust goaded her as they embraced tightly and he brought his mouth to her waiting, parted lips. They kissed and there was an immediate mutual spark.
At the same time, Paul's hands began searching. He had held off for a long time before, but no longer. He immediately began pulling up her skirt at the back. He went delving underneath the skirt and slip, grasping and petting the nyloned backs of her legs. Up came his palms until they were above her nylons altogether and were wrapping around the warm softness of her, with only the slender straps of her garters to get in his way.
He held her bottom in his hands, squeezing the silk-covered mounds, then rotating them gently. He found the elastic hems of her pants and lifted these up. His hands touched the lower parts of her buttocks and petted them. Now both of his hands were beneath her panties, holding her buttocks.
Amy pulled her mouth from his. "Oh, bay-bee! I can't stand any more. Love me!"
Paul took his hands back. "Get undressed, then. I'll do the same. We'll have to take off all our clothes so that we don't get them dirty. We don't want to show up at Palm Springs looking as if we'd just rolled around in an orchard."
"Even if we did, hrnm?" Her eyes twinkled in the sparse light.
"That's right."
Each of them went to work on their clothes.
Paul removed his trousers first, then his jacket, his tie, and his shirt. While he was doing this, Amy was ridding herself of jacket, skirt and blouse.
Paul fixed his shorts as she took off her slip. Then she stretched to catch the hooks of her brassiere and stopped.
She was staring at him again, just as she had done before.
"Hurry," he said.
"Mmm!" was the only vocal response she made, and she dropped to her knees, evidently not giving a darn about getting her stockings dirty.
"No!" Paul said and held her by the shoulders.
She struggled, "Please, please...."
What the devil, he thought, and relented. Might as well be agreeable about this.
As she enjoyed herself and brought intense enjoyment to him, as well, he reached out to pry one hand under each cup of her brassiere. He bent the backs of his hands downward and flipped both of her big. soft, glorious breasts out. He stroked them and polished their red, softly-corrugate crests from which her two fat nipples began to extend.
Finally she swayed and fell backward, planting the seat of her pink silk panties right in the dust.
"Come on, honey!" she demanded. "Hurry!"
Paul grabbed for the silk, got a firm hold on both sides, and pulled. Dust flew and the panties flew, as well.
Then Paul was busy. Quickly. She still had her bra on, and her breasts were still wedged upward, sticking out above the tops of the cups. As Paul worked, he placed his kiss first here, then there, loving the wide, red rings which shoved at him, and the thick high nipples which stood at their centers.
As her body was jolted with lust, Amy whimpered, "The bra ... that's killing me. That's slicing my boobs."
"I'll fix that," Paul said and he hooked two fingers under the elastic fabric between the cups. He pulled.
"Oh!" Amy exclaimed.
As the bra broke apart, her breasts tumbled in freedom-big, plump, and round. He dropped his face and touched a nipple, aureole and all, as he continued to find a passionate tattoo.
They were so busy and concentrating so fully on the pleasure which was rocking them that neither of them was aware that another car had pulled into the orchard driveway and had parked some distance behind their own. Since the Cadillac's interior lights were now out and since the other car had turned into the orchard with its lights off, the occupants of the second car obviously hadn't seen theirs.
Paul's loving went on and on, and she gave as good as she took. When the final frenzy gripped them, dust rose in little puffs around their furiously active bodies-something like the smoke that rises from a dynamite fuse.
The fuse burned shorter and shorter. Paul and Amy worked faster and faster, and then there was the explosion, which all but ripped both of them apart.
Only when they had sat up did they realize that they were not alone in the orchard.
Barely fifty feet away from them, there was another couple on the ground. Paul and Amy heard:
"You're sure this won't hurt, honey? Promise me?" The young girl's voice was excited yet fearful at the same time.
Amy stood up. "That'll hurt, baby, but you won't really mind."
"Hey ... J" A young man's form loomed to standing position beside his reclining girl friend.
Paul could have called Amy everything under the moon and then not succeeded in expressing his extreme annoyance with her. Why couldn't she have kept quiet for a little while, and waited until the others had left?
Paul remained on the ground. Let her get out of the mess alone, he thought.
But the young man who had leaped to his feet was not inclined to cause any trouble. "Come on, honey," he gasped and helped his girl friend to her feet. also.
Half-nude bodies flashing in the moonlight which filtered through the trees, they ran back to their car. Its headlights immediately winked on, and the motor roared.
Amy laughed as the car backed out, turned, and headed down the road.
"What a stupid thing to do!" Paul said. "We could have had a brawl here, you know."
"You could have whipped him, lover," Amy said. "That would have been fun to watch."
Paul stood up and brushed the dust off himself. Amy was doing the same.
She started looking around. "Where did you toss my pants?"
"I wouldn't worry about them if I were you," Paul said. "They'll be too dusty to put on."
"I guess you're right," Amy agreed. "And my bra's ripped. I'm going to feel easy as can be, riding into Palm Springs without any underwear on."
Paul felt impelled to make a more cogent comment about her easiness, but refrained. He didn't want her getting mad at him now.
Amy opened the car door and began to put on what clothes she had. Paul began dressing, also.
"You were wonderful, darling," Amy told him. "I don't know when a man has loved me as good as that!"
He was tempted to ask how his technique compared with Frank Lavoranti's, but he knew that would ruin everything. She wouldn't admit to him that she knew Frank, and the mere mention of Lavoranti's name would have spoiled the rest of their week end.
What Paul said was, "You gave me lots of inspiration."
"That's nothing to what will happen when we get to Palm Springs and onto a bed," she avowed.
Paul wondered how he was going to keep her satisfied until he could arrange a meeting between her and Lavoranti. After all, he had to put in an appearance at his own house that night. Not that Edith wanted him, but he would have to let her know he'd arrived in town.
Perhaps he could phone her, he decided.
His bout with Amy had been pretty good, and another round, later that evening, might go very well indeed.
When they had finished dressing, they climbed into the car. Paul started the engine, turned on the lights, and turned the Cadillac around.
As they headed out the driveway, Amy said, "Look!" She was pointing to the place where the other lovers had been and where the Caddy's headlights were now sweeping. The beams picked out a small white garment in the dust.
"I'm not the only girl who left her pants behind," Amy said.
"Looks that way," Paul replied.
She laughed. "Do you suppose he'll get her before the night's over?"
"Probably not. You probably scared both of them so badly that she won't let him now and he probably wouldn't be able even if she said okay."
"Will a shock do that to a man?" she asked.
"A shock at the wrong time has been known to."
"That's too bad." Amy seemed actually contrite. "Fine time to think about that now," Paul grumbled.
"I just couldn't resist," Amy said. "I felt so darned happy right then."
Paul shook his head in silence and thought, What a girl!
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
AS SOON AS they arrived in palm springs, he parked in front of a drug store.
"I need cigarettes," he told Amy. "Wait here. HI be right back."
Before she could say anything, he had hopped out and was half way across the sidewalk.
Inside the store, he placed a call to Edith. "I just got in town," he told her, "but I won't be home for a while. Don't wait up."
"When do I ever?" his wife said. After a pause she asked, "New girl?"
"None of your business."
"My, but we're testy!"
"Good-bye, Edith."
He didn't wait for her to say anything else, but hung up immediately. Then he bought the cigarettes, so that he would be able to show a new package when he returned to the car.
He drove immediately to the apartment where Lavoranti took the blackmail pictures. Paul had a key to the place, though he had never used it before.
"What's this?" Amy asked as they stopped in front of the small pastel-colored apartment house.
"It's a place I rent on the week-ends," Paul told her. "Come on."
They went into the apartment, which was in back and on the ground floor. Every unit in the six-family structure had its own entrance.
"Nice," Amy commented when he had turned on the light and she looked around.
She spotted the door to the "observation room," which opened off the apartment's tiny entry hall. She tried the knob but the door was locked. "Where does this door go?" Amy asked.
"Nowhere. That's just a closet."
"And you keep it locked, hmm?"
"Usually."
She shrugged and continued into the living room.
They had eaten dinner before leaving Los Angeles, and the hour was now fairly late.
Amy said, "Well, it's me for a tub bath, if you don't mind being second. I picked up a lot of dust back in that orchard."
"Go ahead," Paul told her.
She opened the door to the bathroom. "Hey, there's a separate stall shower. You can use that while I use the tub."
"Okay," Paul agreed. "Keep the door unlocked, huh?"
Amy threw him a wink and walked inside.
What a goer! he thought. She could wear a man out in no time!
He dropped into a chair and began to think about how he was going to arrange things.
The best plan seemed to be to place a call to Lavoranti at his hotel. Paul would tell the blackmailer that he had driven over to the apartment to check the place and make sure it was ready for use the next night, but that he had seen a light on inside. Naturally, he hadn't gone in because he didn't want whoever was there to identify him.
Lavoranti would be curious, of course, and he would want to come right over to investigate In the meantime, Paul would return to the place and let himself into the observation room without Amy's knowledge.
This would have to be done fairly late at night, after Amy was asleep.
The scheme ought to work up to that point, Paul thought. From there on, it would go one of two ways. If Frank did know Amy, Paul would have the confirmation he was seeking and he could confront both of them right on the spot. On the other hand, if Frank didn't know Amy, things would be a little rough. Neither Amy nor Lavoranti would know what to make of the other's presence in the apartment, and it would probably be best for Paul to sit tight in the observation room, hoping that Lavoranti wouldn't look in there. And he probably wouldn't, Paul assumed, as long as the door was locked.
Later, he would have to come up with some sort of explanation for Amy, not only to cover Lavoranti's appearance but also to explain the fact of his own disappearance after she went to sleep. Well, he could manage that.
Anyway, he didn't think he would have to worry about this alternative. The better he got to know Amy, the more he was inclined to believe that she and Lavoranti had really been in cahoots, after all. There was this to consider, too: Would Julie have urged him to go to Palm Springs with the girl if Julie herself had been in league with Frank?
Having settled on the plan, Paul stood up and slipped out of his clothes. Naked, he walked to the bathroom and opened the door.
Amy was in the tub, warm water lapping at her sides and bubbles billowing around her. She made an appealing picture.
She looked him over, and Paul guessed that he appealed to her right then also.
"There's room in here for two," she said smilingly.
"In the tub?"
"Mm-hmm."
"No, thanks. I'm not a contortionist."
She shrugged. "Well, that's all right. I prefer a bed myself. I think we've had enough of primitive methods for today. Let's make the next time slow and comfortable, hm?"
"My sentiments exactly," Paul told her and stepped into the shower stall.
By the time he came out, the tub was empty. He dried himself and walked into the bedroom. There was a single dim lamp burning and Amy was stretched out on top of the bed. She was utterly nude.
This was Paul's first good look at her.
He was pleased with what he saw,.
She was a lot of woman, tall and lavishly curved. But she was especially appealing in the breasts department. He lay down beside her, deciding to leave the lamp on.
She turned to face him, which pressed one of her soft melon-like boobs against the bed while the other one lay on top of its lower twin.
Paul, bent down and touched the top of the nipple with his lips. He moved his lips very lightly, keeping his touch confined to the topmost surface of the tender bud.
The nipple began to be excited immediately.
The red sensitive flesh swelled and rose against him, thickening and lifting to a truly amazing height. When Amy's nipple was just as excited as Paul wanted, he began to kiss in earnest, while with his hands he held the full, soft, globe-like breast, squeezed its resilience, thereby forcing the nipple more firmly against him.
When Paul finally came up for air, Amy rolled a little more onto her back and lifted her other breast toward him. Paul bent to that one, then.
As he kissed her thoroughly, taking from both her breasts all the excitement which such luscious boobs could possibly impart, Amy was caressing him with a slow and practiced skill which he soon found himself unable to ignore.
He shifted and began to take her.
She whimpered and moved against him and, in the dim glow of the bedside lamp, her soft white breasts shook as he made vigorous love.
This bout lasted a very long time, the climb to their height of passion being slow and laborious-but a sweeter labor no man could imagine.
Unlike the episodic arrival of the other car in the walnut orchard earlier that night, when the outer door of the apartment opened and Frank Lavoranti walked in, both Paul and Amy knew right away that someone had arrived on the scene. The sound of the door opening and closing was too sharp.
Amy gasped, "Who's that?"
Paul thought he knew and, at that moment, he wasn't sure if he was glad or sorry. But there wasn't anything he could do to prevent the imminent confrontation of the three of them.
He remained still, his neck craned around to look at the door, until Lavoranti appeared.
"Well, I'll be...." was all Lavoranti could say.
"Hello, Frank," Paul said and turned his head toward Amy again.
She'd had her head twisted to the side so that she could see Lavoranti, also. "You two know each other?" she demanded of Paul.
So there was his confirmation!
"Yes," he said, "but I wasn't sure if you two did."
"You stupid broad'" Lavoranti exclaimed, moving up alongside the bed.
"If you'll excuse me," Paul told him, "I'll finish what I was doing. You can be next." Paul wasn't angry with the blackmailer for using a woman in his office to gain information about him. Not now, at least. He was too relieved to know at last that Julie hadn't been involved.
Amy said, "Why, you...!"
She wasn't able to finish the statement because Paul began working once more. Violently. As violently as he could.
Amy gasped and doubled her fists at her sides. As Paul continued, she beat them against the bed.
"Whoo-eee!" Lavoranti whooped. "Go get 'em, Paul boy! Go to town!"
Paul acted faster and more forcefully until he felt himself caught by the grip of Nature and he could not have stopped if his life had depended on doing so. He reached fulfillment well ahead of Amy.
In fact, Amy seemed hardly to have enjoyed herself at all since Frank had arrived. She stared from one man to the other, as if unsure of what was going to happen or what the presence of both of them in the room meant.
Paul moved aside and Lavoranti, who had been standing beside the bed all the while, took Paul's place. He began.
Amy hadn't tried to prevent him from taking her and she wasn't fighting him now. But she wasn't showing him a very good time, either. She seemed stunned.
"Go, you cheap tramp!" Lavoranti yelled and leaned on one elbow to swipe his other hand across her face. "Act alive, will you?"
She cried out and swore at him.
Lavoranti hit her again, this time across the breasts. Paul watched the high mounds bob and shake and heard Amy's anguished shriek, and then he turned away. He didn't care to watch any more.
He opened his suitcase, took out some clean clothes, and carried them into the other room. As he got dressed, he could hear that things were going Frank's way in the bedroom.
There was a metallic sound which told him, and then there was Amy's pleasure-filled murmuring. He smiled to himself.
She was getting a lot more than she'd bargained for that night.
Paul had gotten what he'd wanted, too.
Julie now belonged to him fully and completely. There was no longer any issue standing between them.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
As the weeks rolled on, the money rolled in.
Paul's overall financial situation brightened steadily and he began almost to count the days until he would be able to drop out of the deal with Lavoranti.
Surprisingly enough, the blackmail operation had produced no trouble for either of them. There was no suspicion that Paul was in any way involved, and every mark paid off as soon as Lavoranti went after him.
The system was as close to being perfect as any extortion plot could be.
Still, Paul wanted out as soon as possible.
Even though his conscience had become a lot more elastic than it had used to be, this was not his way to live. He was a man born to respectability and he was not comfortable when he was off the broad clear road.
The time finally came when he felt he had made enough money from the racket so that if he sank all his funds into a certain investment which he had in view, he would end up in approximately as good a position as he had occupied before he'd plunged into the unwise venture which had all but destroyed him the previous autumn.
The investment which he now had his eye on was risky, to a certain extent. But the deal, at least, was an honest one and the risk involved would be worth taking, considering the probable return. Paul had checked the proposition backward and forward, and had convinced himself of its basic soundness.
The company in question was Planetronics, Incorporated, and they were well-established in the field of outer space communications. They were now engaged on several government contracts and there would surely be more to come, provided the company's present sound management policies were continued.
These policies were almost entirely in the hands of a forty-year-old industrial genius by the name of Bryce Raymond. He controlled the company by heading the syndicate which owned a majority of the stock.
Paul knew Bryce Raymond well, their friendship going all the way back to college days. Bryce had been studying for his master's degree when Paul was getting his bachelor's letters. They were members of the same fraternity and belonged to the same country club.
In offering the investment opportunity to Paul, Bryce was letting him in on something which would be available to very few. In all respects, it was one of these deals which came along once in a lifetime.
Paul had every reason to believe that this investment, in a matter of a couple of months, would put him squarely on his feet again. So he was concentrating now on raising every dollar he possibly could lay his hands on. He was spending less time with Julie and, as for his wife, he scarcely gave her a thought.
Very soon, he assured himself, he would be able to do something about that unhappy situation. He would leave home and let his attorney begin negotiations with Edith. They would drive the best bargain they could, then draw up a property settlement agreement. From that point on, the divorce would be a mere technicality.
When he was free, he would marry Julie. Everything was mapped out. He knew exactly where he was going ... or so he thought.
After he had made his investment in Planetronics and he was waiting anxiously for this to pay off, he suddenly got a break which made the future look even brighter.
The situation began to develop at one of his weekend parties, and the first evidence of what was happening disturbed him greatly. For the first time since he and Lavoranti had set up their deal over three months before, an acquaintanceship had sprung up between Edith and one of the girls Lavoranti had hired.
The playgirl was a svelte champagne-blonde, very sophisticated-looking and one of the choicest morsels that had vet been tossed to the mark. Her name was Lila.
No sooner had this girl appeared at the party than Edith began to pay attention only to her and to neglect all the other guests. The neglect of the other guests didn't concern Paul as much as the fact that Lila had work to do and Edith was obviously interfering with this.
Though he wasn't really counting on additional money to be made from the deal with Lavoranti, his Planetronics investment hadn't paid off yet and, until that happened, he couldn't be completely sure of his position. So he hadn't as yet told Lavoranti that he wanted to quit.
The deal was still supposed to be in operation, and they were depending that night on Lila to do her assigned work. But Edith was in the way.
There was really nothing Paul could do about this, because he couldn't tell his wife who Lila was or what she was doing there. He was forced to stand by uneasily and hope that Lila would be able to break away. At the same time, he wondered why it was that his wife seemed so interested in the other woman.
Finally Lila did go to work on the man she was supposed to seduce. But, having started too late, she was unable to accomplish anything. The man left alone.
Such things had happened before, of course. Not every setup had come off as planned. But in this case Paul was particularly disappointed because Lila had seemed highly competent and his wife had been the one to blame.
After Lila's quarry had left, she and Edith drifted together again, which only added to Paul's annoyance. As the party was breaking up, Edith came to him:
"I'm going out for awhile, Paul. Lila Martin-you met her, didn't you?-has invited me over to her place. She's been telling me about her collection of modern art, and I simply must have a look. I'll be back in a couple of hours or so."
Before Paul could utter a sound, she had left with the statuesque blonde.
Her place? Paul thought. Art collection?
If Lila was anything like the other girls Lavoranti had hired, she didn't live anywhere near Palm Springs. And as for her having an art collection ... Paul regarded that as highly un-likely, to say the least.
He picked up the phone and dialed Lavoranti's hotel. Since his partner was staying in one of the smaller places and had rented his room by the month, the hotel management had permitted him to have his own phone installed. In that way, he and Paul were able to discuss business without any fear of being overheard by a desk clerk or operator.
"You know, by now, that the deal with Lila fizzled," Paul said.
"Yeah. I waited over at the apartment for awhile, then gave up when nobody showed."
"This girl, is she local?"
"Don't be silly! I wouldn't get a local dame mixed up in this."
Where's she from?"
"I got her through a guy in Vegas. She's been active around there."
"Is she staying at a hotel here?" Paul asked. "I don't think so. Far as I know, she flew in this morning and will be leaving tomorrow, unless I ask her to stay over. She was supposed to give me a call."
"Frank, I want you to do something for me. Get over to the apartment, will you?"
"Why?"
"I think Lila's on her way there right now."
"This late?"
"She probably realizes you've already gone. And she's not taking a man to the place."
"I don't get it."
"She's with a woman, Frank. I want to know what happens. Maybe you can take some pictures, hm? I'd go myself except Lila and this woman have already left here and I couldn't possibly get to the place ahead of them. But you're real close and you can get there first, if you hurry."
"Well, sure, Paul. If this means that much to you. Who's the other broad?"
Paul hesitated, then said softly, "My wife."
The photo prints, when Frank Lavoranti showed them to him the next day, nearly made Paul ill.
The thought of Lesbianism had always repelled him. But to see the weird practice depicted in pictures ... and with his wife as one of the participants ... was almost more than he could take.
He swore. "Eight years we've been married, and she's kept that hidden from me all this time."
Lavoranti said, "There's no doubt she's had a lot of experience. Well, you can see that for yourself. She was the aggressor all the way. She showed that blonde a few things, I'll tell you!"
Paul sat and stared at the pictures, still only half-believing what he saw.
Then suddenly the real value of the evidence became clear to him. This was grounds for divorce. If Edith didn't agree to release him quietly, with a very modest settlement, he could bring an action on the evidence he now held and undoubtedly cut her off without a cent.
She wouldn't let that happen, Paul felt sure. She would come to terms.
He had her exactly where he wanted her. He didn't even have to wait for his Planetronics deal to pay off.
The advantage of his position and the realization that he would soon be free to marry Julie far outweighed the hurt which he felt as a result of his wife's deception.
Lavoranti asked, "You want the pictures or should I destroy them?"
"I want them, boy!" Paul grinned. "Oh, how I want them!"
Lavoranti gave him a peculiar look, then shrugged. "Just be careful what you do with them, huh? If your wife finds out about our picture-taking setup at the apartment, that might not be good."
"Don't worry. There's not a thing in the world she'll do about it-not as long as I hold these over her head."
"I suppose you're right," Lavoranti agreed.
Paul decided not to say anything about the evidence until he'd had an opportunity to talk with his attorney. But he had little doubt that all the bargaining power was now on his side. He would have a divorce on the terms that he wanted, and he would be free of Edith at last.
A Lesbo, he thought to himself after Lavoranti had left. He'd been married to a blasted Lesbo all these years and not known!
Well, that explained a lot of things.
Paul resolved, then and there, that he would not be content simply in winning a divorce settlement on his own terms. He would work out some very personal revenge also. He would make his wife painfully sorry for the way she'd treated him!
He sat down and began to think about how this could best be arranged.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The plan which Paul finally evolved gave him a great deal of satisfaction to contemplate, for not only did this embody justice in the most simple sense but in a poetic sense, as well.
Edith had deceived him with women; women would now provide her punishment.
Lavoranti knew some girls who, for the right amount of money, would participate in the plan. He had told Paul, at the beginning, that the girls he could obtain through his contacts would do just about anything for five hundred dollars. Paul had been convinced, through the intervening months and now particularly, that this was correct.
It was on a Sunday afternoon, when he and Edith were alone in the house, that the three women showed up. This was carefully prearranged. Paul had even met with them and explained exactly how he wished them to behave.
All three women were blondes.
This was based on Paul's assumption that his dark-haired wife preferred light-complexioned women. Lila Martin had champagne-colored hair, and she was the woman with whom Paul had caught Edith.
The three blondes who appeared at his home on the particular Sunday in question were not the equal of Lila in svelte beauty or sophistication, but they were fairly good-looking. Their figures were sufficiently provocative to permit them to make from fifty to a hundred dollars a night for the lease of them.
None were Lesbians, as far as Frank Lavoranti knew. Paul had left it up to Frank and his contacts to do the picking.
The women had met at a coffee shop several blocks from the Marborn house and traveled the remaining distance together. Paul was anticipating their arrival, of course, and answered the door when the chime sounded.
He showed them into the living room.
Edith looked up, let her eyes move from one girl to the other, and her gaze then moved to Paul. She waited for him to say something.
He did. "Edith, I've arranged something special today ... just for your benefit, dear."
"Have you?" Her questioning eyes moved from her husband to the girls again.
"I know how you enjoy the company of beautiful women...."
Edith's gaze snapped back to Paul's face.
Pretending not to notice her reaction, he casually went on: " ... so today I've asked these young ladies to come over. They're going to put on a little entertainment that both of us will enjoy. Isn't that right, girls?"
They nodded. Two of them smiled, while the other one stared at Edith fixedly.
"What's this all about?" Edith asked.
"You'll see, dear, you'll see." As Paul turned from Edith to the blonde girls his tone changed from one that was dripping with false affection to one of crisp sharpness: "Go ahead."
The girls did exactly this, moving with such swiftness that Edith was taken completely by surprise.
The blonde who had not smiled before-the shortest one of the three-quickly moved behind Paul's wife. She had been holding, concealed against the palm of her right hand, an adhesive bandage which she placed securely over Edith's mouth, pressing the edges down tight. Then she pulled the dark-haired woman's arms behind her back, and another of the girls whipped a length of nylon cord around her wrists. This was tied securely.
The third girl had knelt in front of Edith, at the same time, and was tying her ankles in a similar manner.
Paul took a chair a short distance away and to one side, where he could watch the entire spectacle which was about to unfold. Though he knew what to expect and, in this way, had a great advantage over his wife whose eyes, at that moment, were brimming with fear, Paul was nevertheless looking forward to the actual observation of the events with a great deal of pleasurable anticipation.
He was not a sadist. But he felt that his wife had wronged him terribly, and over a considerable length of time. He felt that she deserved drastic punishment, and he could not help but be pleased that the time of punishment was at hand and that he would be privileged to observe this.
One of the girls produced a pocket knife which she carefully inserted between Edith's breasts. With a deft pulling motion, she slit the top of Edith's dress and cut her brassiere in two.
She continued to draw the knife downward-carefully, so as not to scratch Edith's flesh-and parted her dress all the way to her middle. When she reached the elastics of Edith's slip and pants, she cut these separately, slitting each garment so that they would easily come off.
She put the knife away and completed Edith's disrobing by hand. Since Edith wasn't wearing stockings, the process was simple enough, and in just a few seconds she was left with only her shoes on.
Now, as she continued to stare at her captors in abject fright, the three blonde girls began to remove their own clothes. Blouses dropped; a dress came open. Skirts dipped to the floor, and the dress fluttered up and over a blonde head. They wore different colored undies-white, pink, and green. These came off, one piece at a time, until finally each girl stood as naked as if she had just stepped from a shower.
One of them looked at Paul questioningly.
"In the closet ... over there," he said, pointing.
She went to get the three small leather whips which Paul had acquired several days before.
He had instructed the girls carefully as to how the whips were to be used: He didn't want Edith's body to be permanently scarred; he didn't even want to have her badly hurt. He wanted to frighten her severely and to hear the sound of the slender leather thongs stinging her legs and hips and back.
The girls didn't begin to whip her immediately, however.
First they danced.
They moved back and forth in front of her in a ritualistic way, the whips folded and held in front of them much as daggers or swords are held in rituals of different kinds. They displayed their charms wantonly and traced the handles of the whips along their fronts-first to flick at emerging nipples, then to touch their dimpled waists, the caps of their knees, the very tips of their noses.
Next they lined up in front of their terrified victim, let the lashed fall free, and shook the whip handles gently, causing the slender lashes to lick at the air a foot or two from Edith's bound and helpless body.
This went on for some time, as Edith pulled against the ropes which held her.
Finally the girls took a forward step, then another.
They resumed the gentle lashing motion, and this time the very tips of the lashes bit at Edith's flesh-though not painfully, as yet. One lash bit at a nipple, another at her hip, then at her legs, her sides, her shoulders, and even lightly at her face.
Edith flinched and twisted from side to side, but could neither stand up or slide out of reach of the cruel tongues of retribution.
The girls now began to administer the punishment in greater earnest, flicking the small whips from side to side and lashing Edith across the legs, across the tender middle, and across her even more tender breasts. Still, they were not striking her hard enough to make marks. A pinkness began to appear, however, in slender multiple strips across her white flesh.
As the blonde girls swung the handles of their whips, the motion caused their voluptuous breasts to shake and quiver before Edith's eyes.
After a time, the shortest member of the group, who seemed to have been chosen by the three as the one to give the signals, backed off and the others followed suit.
The whipping stopped temporarily.
But only long enough to permit the short blonde to grasp Edith firmly by the arms and turn her over onto the couch where she had been seated.
When she had been placed face downward, the three girls moved forward and began to whip Edith across the back and bottom.
Now the lashes imparted a more severe sting.
The slender tongues zipped through the air and licked across the helpless body which lay twisting beneath them-now at the small of the back, now across the upper legs, now at the pert roundness of the buttocks.
The whippng went on and on, never too hard but hard enough to sting severely. Tracks of pinkness began to appear, running crosswise over most of Edith's body, from her shoulders to the backs of her knees. The tracks crisscrossed one another and crowded together.
Finally, as one or another of the girls became a little too involved emotionally in her work, dots of blood appeared along the tracks.
Finally Paul stood up. "That's enough."
The girls stopped, the shortest one of the three seeming definitely reluctant to do so. But all of them backed away.
"You can get dressed now," Paul said.
As they got into their clothes, Edith lay motionless, her shoulders hunched and her face pressed close to the juncture of the cushions at the back of the couch. Her back was now laced with pink stripes and at the places where the skin had been broken, the droplets of fresh blood gleamed brilliantly.
When the girls were dressed, Paul told the shortest one, "Sit her up. Then you can go. I'll take off the bonds."
The blonde girl did as he had directed.
Then, without another word to him or to Edith, the three girls left the house.
Paul stepped over to his wife and first untied the nylon cord which bound her ankles. The front of her body was crisscrossed with pnik stripes, as was her back, though these were neither so numerous nor so bright, and her skin was not broken there.
He reached around her and released her arms, then removed the bandage from her mouth.
She gasped, and he stepped back a couple of paces to look at her. She sucked breath hungrily through her mouth and worked her jaws, loosening her lips at the same time. Her eyes were dulled by her fright and the pain which she had felt. There was no sign of anger ... but there was hate as she finally raised her gaze to that of her husband.
He spoke softly and with some measure of compassion, the resentment having left him: "Things are settled between us ... in a personal sense. All that remains is the divorce. You'd better see an attorney; I'll have my lawyer get in touch with him."
"I never thought I could hate anyone so much," she said, but some of the intensity of the statement was relieved by the fact that Edith was forced to wriggle against the discomfort which she felt in sitting on the couch. She stood up.
"You can imagine how I felt," Paul said flatly, "when I saw you and Lila Martin."
"That's what I can't understand," Edith said. "How could you have seen?"
"I was in that apartment. The place wasn't Lila's, at all."
"You mean you trapped me? You had Lila take me there just so you could find out what would happen?"
"No. That was all Lila's idea. But the place belongs to a friend of mine ... and of Lila's too. He had a strange hobby-he likes to take pictures of people when they don't suspect they're being observed. He had the bedroom of that apartment equipped with concealed cameras."
Paul walked to a library desk and opened the top drawer. He removed a sheaf of photo prints and carried them to Edith. "Look at these. I have another set, incidently, so it won't do you any good to tear them."
Edith gaped in amazement as she shuffled the enlarged pictures in her hands.
"I'm going to give these to my attorney," Paul said. "He'll negotiate with your lawyer from that standpoint."
Edith stared at her husband. "I could kill you."
He smiled slightly. "No doubt you feel that way, but you'll have to admit that you brought all this on yourself. I don't intend to cut you off without anything in the divorce settlement; but you won't have the chance to take me down the line. Not now."
She turned away from him and reached to gather up her torn clothes.
"There's one other thing Edith. I have a very large investment that's about to pay off, perhaps in another week or two. The company is Bryce Raymond's. I've invited him out here next week end. That will be our last party of the season and I expect you to act the loving wife, as you've been doing right along. This shouldn't be too difficult for you, since you haven't really loved me for a long time, if ever. Right after that, I'm giving up this house, and I'll rent a bachelor apartment in L.A. The divorce negotiations can be started then."
Edith looked at him. "What if I refuse? What if I leave you right now?"
"Then I won't be as magnanimous as I said I'd be. I'll tell my lawyer to use the evidence I'm going to give him, and you'll most likely end up without a penny's worth of alimony. I'll get most of the community property too. If that's what you want, you can walk out op me now."
"You're not giving me much choice, are you?"
"Not much."
"All right, Paul. As you said, I haven't loved you for a long tme, anyway, if ever. What difference does another week of pretending make?"
"That's a good girl," he said quietly.
Edith turned and walked out of the room.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The outlook was now so favorable with respect to his Planetronics investment that Paul felt he could safely tell Frank Lavoranti that he was through with their deal.
One thing was for sure: He didn't want the deal to infringe on the social activity which he had planned for the coming week end. For the first time that winter, he was going to host a party which didn't involve a setup for extortion.
He went to see Lavoranti that evening and found him at home in his hotel room. Frank was looking over the pictures which he had taken the night before and which he would use in the week to come as a means of extracting payment from a certain retired oil magnate.
"What's on your mind, Paul?" the blackmailer asked after he had showed the pictures to his partner proudly and had drawn only a disinterested glance from Paul.
"I'm through with the deal, as of right now. I've made enough, and I think I've done more than enough for you. I want to break clean. You can keep all you get from this last shakedown."
Lavoranti's small eyes narrowed, "Now, wait a minute...."
"I'm not going to argue the point, Frank. I've made up my mind."
"And you don't figure I have a thing to say about this?"
"Not particularly. A partnership can be dissolved any time one of the partners wishes, and I wish to dissolve ours right now."
"But you've got a party planned for next week end, haven't you?"
Yes. That doesn't concern you, though."
"The devil it doesn't! I've got a girl coming. The guy I know in Frisco is sending her down."
"Then call the guy and say the deal's off."
"Why should I?"
"Because the man who's coming out to my place next Saturday is a close personal friend and I have important dealings with him. We've each got most of our funds tied up in a venture that's almost due to pay off. If you hit him and he had to come up with a pile of cash, it's apt to crimp the deal for both of us. That would hurt me in a way that I can't stand right now."
"That's tough," Lavoranti said sarcastically. "Now listen-I mean this! You send any cheap broad over to my place Saturday night and I'll throw her out on her rear. You understand that?"
"I hear you, but I'm going to pretend I didn't."
Paul stared at him in silence.
"You think things over, boy. Think real good. Then you'll decide your deal with me is more important than any other you've got on the fire. I still have those pictures I took of you and Julie, you know."
"But you wouldn't use them. Not now."
Lavoranti laughed callously. "You just go on thinking that, and you'll have one devil of a surprise!"
Paul took a step closer to him. "Frank, I'm warning you: Lay off! I'm through with the deal and I'm through with you. As far as those pictures are concerned, you wouldn't dare give them to my wife. If she used them in a divorce action, you'd be called to testify as to how they were taken. You could have testified a few months ago without hurting yourself. Now you can't-not since that apartment's been used for blackmail and you've been the one to take the money from the marks. You wouldn't dare stand up in court."
From the look on Lavoranti's face, Paul knew he had won.
He turned and walked to the door of the room. "Call the girl off, Frank. And don't get in touch with me again."
As he walked out of the hotel, Paul considered the fact that he was in exactly the same position-with respect to the pictures taken of his wife and Lila Martin-that Frank occupied with respect to the pictures of himself and Julie. But Edith didn't know this. As long as she didn't know, the pictures which he had of her would served as a successful bluff. He wasn't worried. Everything seemed to be going his way.
Paul miscalculated with respect to one vital point, however, and this had to do with Edith's determination not to let him go without collecting enough money to make all the years she had spent with him worth-while.
He also miscalculated somewhat with respect to Lavoranti, but, as this turned out, the error did not hurt Paul.
During the ensuing week, Paul and his wife had little contact with one another. They slept in separate rooms, of course, and he left for work each morning before she got up.
He spent his evenings with Julie.
Between fervent sessions of love, they made plans. As soon as he had left his wife and his attorney had begun negotiations for a divorce, Julie would file an action against Lavoranti. She could charge desertion and there should be no problem at all.
While the two divorces were pending, they could continue to see one another as they had been doing for the last few months. When the actions became final, they would get married.
Paul would be rich; he would have the woman he wanted; for the first time in his life, he would be completely happy.
Or so he thought.
He and Julie celebrated the making of these, plans with the most passionate love-making they had yet experienced. She was warm and very responsive, and Paul was a better male than he had ever been before.
During the last evening which they spent together-before Paul left for his final week end of the season in Palm Springs-they began in the shower stall in her apartment, since he had arrived when she was in the midst of her bath; they went from there to her bed; in time they went to the bedroom floor, to the floor in the living room, and ended up on the cold linoleum tile in the kitchen.
Paul felt most of the coldness, since he was lying on his back.
Julie's lush and beautiful breasts shook before him and he caressed them, finally taking one of her rosebud nipples to his lips and kissing this fervently as Julie did most all the work to bring them to a chattering mutual crest of passion.
The fervent warmth of this last meeting stayed with him as he drove to Palm Springs. And, during the following day, he found that he was thinking as much about Julie as about the impending payoff on the Planetronics investment.
Shortly before their guests of the evening were due to arrive, the phone rang. Paul answered it. "Mr. Marborn?" The man's voice was strange to him.
"Yes."
"I'm calling for your freind, Mr. Raymond. He's had some car trouble and he's at my gas station, six miles west of town on Highway One-eleven. The place is called Granger's. He wondered if maybe you could pick him up, then drop him off later. I think I can have his car fixed late tonight."
"Sure," Paul said. "I'll be right there."
Edith had stepped into the room and was standing behind him.
"Bryce has had a breakdown with his car." Paul said. "I'm going to get him and Dorothy."
Edith merely nodded, and there was a strange look in her eyes which Paul was to wonder about during the few minutes which remained to him while he walked to the garage, got into his car, and backed out of the driveway.
As he turned in the street and headed toward Highway I'll, he suddenly felt a hard object thrust against his back. A rough voice ordered, "Keep drivin' to the next corner, then turn left and up into the hills."
"What the devil's the idea?" Paul demanded, staring at the man's face in the car mirror.
"You'll find out, Marborn. You'll find out soon enough."
"But I have to pick up a friend." He realized, as soon as he had said it, that the statement was absurd.
The whole thing had been a setup. The call had not been from a service station operator at all, but had come from a partner of the man who was even then in Paul's garage waiting for him-the man who now held a gun against his back.
He began to sweat.
"My wife?" he said, his voice tremulous. "She hired you to ... do this?"
"You catch on fast, Marborn. What's gonna happen is, you gonna have a little accident. Afterward nobody will be able to figure just why you went off the road and into the canyon. As for the bump on your head ... well, you could've got that in the crash, couldn't you?"
In his fevered mental state at that moment, Paul could scarcely think at all. He was, however, conscious of an impulse to stop the car right where he was, to jump out, and to run.
But there was that gun against him.
Even though he'd been told he was driving to his death, there was the hope that something would go wrong with the killer's plan.
But nothing went wrong.
Paul drove exactly where the man in the back seat told him; he brought the Cadillac to a stop and set the parking brake, then he knew nothing else.
Ever.
The gun had descended against the back of his skull and, five minutes later, he lay dead in the wreckage of his car at the base of a seventy-foot cliff.
Edith had little difficulty making an explanation to Bryce and his wife when they arrived. Paul had suddenly been called away, but she hoped that he would be back before the evening was over.
In the meantime ... drink and be merry.
The other guests arrived and she repeated the explanation, together with Paul's apologies.
Edith was puzzled by the arrival of a sleek brunette on the arm of a man who identified himself as Giles Talbert. "Paul invited me," was all that Talbert said.
For all Edith knew, this was so. She remembered having seen Talbert at one of their other parties, she thought, and strange women had showed up from time to time, presumably invited by her husband.
She thought nothing more of the beautiful brunette, or the man who had brought her, until later in the evening when she noticed that the girl was paying a particular amount of attention to Bryce Raymond.
She couldn't know that they were making a date and that this date would, by a strange combination of circumstances which were never brought to her attention, result in the virtual wiping out of the estate which she had expected to inherit from her murdered husband ... and to spend in the company of Nadine Bergen.
Not only was there no estate to speak of, since even their Los Angeles home was heavily mortgaged, but Paul had borrowed on his life insurance, as well.
All of this had been done for the Platetronics nivestment, which proved to be worthless following the financial collapse of the syndicate headed by Bryce Raymond. According to the newspaper accounts, Raymond was suspected of having dipped deeply into the company's funds to satisfy some shadowy personal obligation which even his own wife didn't know about.
There were only two people who knew, actually.
There was Frank Lavoranti ... and his wife, Julie.
He told Julie all about it shortly after he received the huge payoff from his last victim. And, of course, with Paul Marborn dead and all the plans which Paul and Julie had made now consigned to limbo ... what was? girl to do but look out for herself?
Anyway, she'd always wanted to see Rio de Janeiro.
While Frank wasn't ideal company-she would have much preferred being with Paul-he was her husband and he now was very, very rich. She decided that she could perhaps learn to like him again.
