He'd taken only a dozen steps before he heard his name called out by a woman's voice. He looked around and found Valerie Montbatten sitting in a sports car parked at the curb.
"I think you can use a ride, Mr. Condon," she said through a half-open window.
He stepped around the car and slipped into the front seat. She sped off the minute he'd closed the door.
"Where to?" she asked.
He was looking down at her legs. Her dress had slipped up her legs and left her knees exposed. And they were beautiful knees, beautiful legs.
Mallory took her in his arms and pressed his lips hungrily against hers. Her kiss was wet and soft, her tongue quick and curious as he felt it delve into his mouth. His hand slipped down her blouse and closed over one of her breasts, then his fingers squeezed the nipple gently. He could feel her breathing deeply already.
CHAPTER ONE
Mallory Condon was exasperated. It was all a matter of inches but it was almost impossible to decide which were the right ones. The hem of the dress lay three inches above the model's knee. He had tried it as high as seven up and the damned dress had begun to look like a bathing suit.
He asked Helen to turn around slowly. The blonde model moved in a tight circle. Condon looked hard at the effect as she came about. The trouble made itself apparent as Helen's bony hip hit him in the face. If he was going to design for the teenagers, for the disco set, the teeny boppers, he had better see what his creations looked like on a teenaged body. Helen was alright but she was emaciated, high fashion. At five feet eight, she starved herself to weigh in at one hundred and twelve pounds. Her breasts had lost their melon shapes and looked more like French breads; her chest was bony, you could cut your hand on her hip if you were foolish enough to try to grab a handful of flesh, and worst of all her thighs had become corded and stringy. Not one bit teenage! Condon lit a long, lean Mexican cigar and damned Fidel Castro as he sucked the first smoke in. The match flame caught on the pink scar gash which ran down his left cheek.
"OK, baby," Condon said, "that's it for today."
Helen relaxed into a sag. "Mai, that design is a killer; no matter what you do, it doesn't seem to come off. Junk it, lovepot, and pay some attention to me. I always get that feeling after a working session with you."
Helen put her arms around Mai Condon's neck and smiled her very even white smile at the rugged face which regarded her with practically no show of emotion.
"It's not the design; it's you, baby. I've been trying to lay a teenage rag on a matronly frame."
"Matronly! You've got your nerve, louse! I'm twenty-five!"
"Thirty-one, Helen. Would you like to see your social security records? That's not the point. I prefer bodies that are not teenage-or let's put it the other way. I prefer grown-up adult women. That means you-at one hundred and thirty five pounds." Condon grunted in pleasure at the image of a heavier Helen which he had created in his virile mind's eye.
"But high fashion models are creatures of no joy!"
"You wouldn't hire me if I weighed a hundred thirty five!" Helen said, pouting a little.
"But I'd make love to you," Condon said, smiling for the first time. "Put yourself in my place, Helen.
How would you like to get into the sack with a living skeleton."
"Mallory! It's not that bad. I'm still pretty good with twenty pounds less on me."
"Maybe. What does your husband say?"
Helen became thoughtful at Condon's last question. She walked slowly away from him. At the door to the dressing room she turned. "Maybe, I'll go out and eat a great big bowl of pasta and then come back."
"Well, you do that, honey. But try it out on your husband first. See if you pass muster."
"Louse!" the model said undoing her stocking from the garter belt snaps and rolling the nylons down her very shapely legs. "Why can't I make it with you, Mallory? You are the sexiest, the most exciting hunk of beefcake I've ever looked at. I've tried for two years now to give you a sample and all I ever get is no thanks."
"Too skinny."
"That's not it, lovepot. Oh, I have a bone or two sticking out here and there. But that's not stopping you. I also know from the other girls around the shop that you are not exactly a eunuch."
"Really? Some of the girls have been talking out of school."
"You just find me unattractive?"
"No."
"Because I'm married?"
"Don't be silly!"
"What is it then?"
"I really can't tell you, Helen. It just didn't click for us. Casual affairs are like that. Something happens that's just right and there you are having a ball. Sometimes it doesn't happen. Accident."
"Let's have an accident, Mai," Helen said as she stepped out of a Condon designed dress and dropped it on the floor around her ankles.
Condon laughed and blew a cloud of smoke toward the pockmarked acoustic ceiling. "Not now, Helen. Hey, pick that dress up! I don't want to soil it."
"Well, I tried, Mai," Helen Brooker said as she kicked the dress upward in Condon's direction. He snatched it out of the air. "I'll never know heaven, lovepot," she said with a final look of wanting and then turned and left Mallory Condon's studio for the dressing rooms down the hallway. Condon gently crumpled the dress in his hand. Damned stupid mistake, he thought, the design was probably just fine; he should have worked with teenage models from the start. Well, it wasn't fatal. He had lost a few days of time. He had ample time to create his teenage line.
Condon sat down in his black leather and chrome swivel chair and turned it toward the window which ran completely across the wall of his studio office. The sounds of people and traffic thirty-two flights below were barely discernable to him. Across the roof tops, almost like an aerial view of multicolored patches of farmland, Condon could look out over the city to the rivers which sealed in its own smog and dirt. Someone was sailing a red sailboat northward, up river. He watched it for a long time until the cigar ash fell into his lap. He slapped the ashes away and looked closely at his trousers for burns. There weren't any. He swung away from the window to the long teak table which served as his desk and work surface. "Get Zukor," he said softly into the intercom.
"Yes, Mr. Condon," the secretarial voice answered.
Bill Trask Zukor: Condon wanted to talk with him as much as he wanted to date a crocodile! Talk about ugly that was true blue ugly. Not the physical casing, although that was bad enough, the character was something Condon was sure was manufactured by Hollywood sensationalists. Something intended to outdo the usual hype but something which had failed completely. Failed because Bill Trask Zukor was too much of a horror for Hollywood to take. Condon gave himself the pleasure of imagining Zukor drowning in quicksand with several hundred of his victims standing about watching him struggle and cry for aid. None moved to help. All smiled benignly as Zukor sank down in the slimy sand.
The phone buzzed. "I've got Mr. Zukor on the line Mr. Condon."
"OK. Put him through, please," Condon said and braced himself for the sound of that overly grinding voice. "Bill?"
"Yes, Mallory! I hope that you are not calling to cancel our dinner. Damn it, Mallory, I've been waiting for months to sit down with you."
"No, no, Bill. I'm calling to confirm it! Seven o'clock sharp."
"Good. I'm sending my car to pick you up; be in front of your building five minutes before the hour."
"You know the address?"
The receiver filled with Zukor's gasping laughter.
"Very funny! Very funny! Does anybody in fashion not know the address of the House of Condon? Very funny, Mallory!"
"I'll meet you in the car, then. Until later, Bill," Condon said softly without waiting for Zukor's goodbye. Even the phone conversation made him feel dirty. He decided to take a shower. While he undressed he dictated some letters and some design ideas into his recording machine. When he had finished dictating he was completely nude. Condon was about to move toward the office bathroom which was fully equipped with bath, shower, and sauna when the door opened and Estelle Fetucci walked in.
"Here are your appointments for tomorrow, Mr. Condon," the secretary said and began to read from her pad. She glanced up and suddenly noticed her naked employer smiling at her, holding his shorts before him like a fig leaf. While the deep red of her maiden lady blush crept up her cheeks, she could not help and see and feel the handsome and rugged beauty of Mallory Condon.
He was inches above six feet. He was broad in the shoulders and in the chest, powdered with black curly hair, lean waisted, his thighs and legs were powerful and athletic. His skin seemed to glow and it was a deep bronze everywhere-except where it was hidden from Estelle Fetucci's view. She would never know about that. All she knew at this moment was that if something did not happen to save her from this terrible predicament she would die, positively die, on the spot.
It was Mr. Condon who saved her. He said, "Miss Fetucci, please turn around." Somehow she found the presence of mind to do just that. "I'm very sorry for embarrassing you this way. I should have locked the door. It was a very inconsiderate thing for me to do. Please forgive me."
"It was quite a shock, Mr. Condon. I've gotten used to all the girls running about naked but, you Mr. Condon, you!"
"I was about to take a shower," he continued in a mock apologetic tone which his secretary did not detect
"All right, I accept your apology. Now may I read the notes or shall I leave?"
"It seems to me that there would be no harm in reading the notes ... as long as you don't look."
Miss Fetucci read the notes and left without a backward glance. Condon dropped his shorts and went into the bathroom. He turned the water on to a brisk force. He massaged the foaming soap into his skin and began to think of Zukor and the teenage fashion line of the House of Condor.
He was still thinking of this as he sat in the mile-long black limousine. The House of Condon did not have to go into teen fashions. Condon had made his reputation by designing for the smart woman, the grown woman. In his mind-prior to this teenage venture-Condon's women began at the age of twenty or, he had conceded to himself, when they had the feel of being true women. Condon also put it another way: when they stopped hankering for ice cream cones and began thinking of the beauty of martinis.
Going into teen fashions had one purpose to him. To take the play in the field away from Geraldine Reagan. He had made up his mind to do this the season before when Jeri Fashions had marketed two of his designs a month before he did. He didn't like the idea of stealing-even when it was done by a gorgeous tomato like Gerry Reagan. He also didn't like the aftermath of the affair. He had to discover who on his staff had been paid off by Gerry. When he did and he had fired them, he also had the strange feeling that it was not over. That there were others on his payroll who might be bought. Condon didn't like the idea of always having to think about whom he could trust and whom he could not.
Gerry Reagan's stealing annoyed him much more than it had wounded him. After all it was, in a-way, quite flattering to have his leading competitor steal his ideas and admit that they were better than her own. For Condon, Gerry's theft had become a challenge. He wanted to beat her at her own game, her strong point: teenage fashions. Hence, Bill Trask Zukor. Zukor was probably the country's leading buyer of teen clothing. He influenced the purchase and sale of millions of dollars worth of girls' clothing. Zukor kept Jeri Fashions up on top. Why? Gerry was good, but there were at least a dozen other houses as good as Jeri. The answer always came out Zukor! If he could swing Zukor, Condon reasoned, Gerry Reagan had to be hurt. Any business on teens for the House of Condon would have to bleed right out of Jeri Fashions.
And, Condon knew, Zukor was anxious to see him.
Zukor had, as a matter-of-fact, allowed Condon to push him around; something that Bill Trask Zukor never permitted anyone to do. Maybe there's more to the business than meets the eye, Condon thought, as Zukor's chauffeur rolled Zukor's car to a soft stop in front of Zukor's grey stone townhouse. Condon glanced up at the impressive and graceful mansion in the heart of the city. He smiled. Zukorsville, he thought as he walked up the gleaming white marble stairs.
A very proper English butler asked Mallory Condon for his hat. He seemed a little disappointed when Condon shrugged and indicated that he didn't wear any. The beagle-faced servant guided Condon into the library where William Trask Zukor, looking like a Buddha in evening clothes, beamed a greeting to him from the large armchair.
"Mallory," Zukor said through his wide smile, "It's been a year since I've laid eyes on you. Not since the Awards last year. I got tired watching you being called up to the podium for one award after another."
"As long as it didn't offend you, Bill," Condon said, his eyes busily regarding the extraordinarily handsome English library room. The books were not merely pretty leather and tooled gold decor, but, Condon guessed, wall to wall first editions and rarities. The seventeenth-century fireplace was a gem of a museum quality. Everything was right about the room, Condon thought cynically, except the round, crude man who owned it all. But then again-money buys everything; even faultless taste.
"You like it?"
"Well enough to buy it."
Zukor chuckled. "Flatterer. I won't sell it-especially since you like it, Mallory. But this is nothing; you should see the other rooms. It's all English antiques. Set me back a fortune."
"Don't tell me how much. You'll spoil the enchantment."
"But how could you know how important this place is if I don't tell you what the tab is."
Condon, lit a thin cigar. "Not tonight, Bill. If you mention it, I'll leave."
Zukor's heavy face folded into obvious disappointment. "All right, some other time. But you have to see the other rooms!" And when he nodded, Zukor brightened. "I have a den with genuine suits of armor in it. My bedroom's got a bed big as a battleship which was slept in by Henry the Eighth. Can you imagine that-me and Henry the Eighth in the same bed."
"With different broads, I hope."
Zukor roared appreciative laughter. "Different broads!" He thumped Mallory on the back with a heavy hand. Zukor slipped his arm through Condon's and began to lead him from the library. Condon, however, stopped dead in his tracks when he faced the doorway.
She leaned against the door frame like something out of a romantic dream. Her hair was dark and cascaded in open waves down to her shoulders, barely touching a stately and haughty neck. Her complexion was an unbelievable pink and white as if sunlight had never touched her. Her eyes were a lively and deep blue. Clinging to her shoulders were the thinnest straps from which a jade green Empire gown dropped. A demure bow sat provocatively below her breasts. Doves, Condon thought, absolute doves in a green sleep. He had a great urge to reach out and stroke them before they took flight.
"Dinner is ready to be served, Mr. Zukor," she said in the lightest of voices.
"Thank you," Zukor replied. "Allow me to introduce Mr. Mallory Condon. Mallory, this is Miss Montbatten. She takes care of things around the house."
"How do you do, Mr. Condon."
She smiled slightly, then turned to leave. Condon glanced down at her splendid legs. He knew that Zukor was watching his every move.
"Pretty woman," he said as they headed from the room. "I admire your taste."
"In designers?" Zukor grinned.
"No, in women."
The dinner was very English. A standing roast of beef, a Yorkshire pudding, and popovers. Zukor babbled through the meal, but Condon was more interested in the occasional appearances of the young brunette when she came into the dining room to watch the servants serve the dishes.
"By the way," Condon said during one of her visits, "I don't think I caught your first name."
"Valerie," she smiled. "Rhymes with Mallory."
It was only after dinner that Zukor was able to capture his attention again. This over brandy and cigars in the genuine suit of armor room. This after Valerie had joined them for only a moment to say goodnight. When she took his hand there were no pressures, no signals, just a lady's hand in a departure gesture. The delicate face, as before, said nothing.
"I'm afraid," she said, "that it was my idea to be here tonight, Mr. Condon. I was so anxious to meet you because of my admiration for your work. Now, I'll be off and allow you to get on with whatever it is which brings you together."
Neither Condon or Zukor had an opportunity to say more than a quick goodnight before Valerie had turned and was gone.
"I suppose you noticed that she was wearing a Condon design."
"What?" Mallry asked absently.
"Valerie. She was wearing a Condon dress."
"Tough to notice the dress when it's hanging on a body like that," Mallory said. "Now what is it that you wanted to talk about?"
Zukor took a deep breath. "I hear that your teen line is pretty well developed."
"It's coming along, Bill. But I'm not sure that I really have it yet. Teen stuff is not exactly my dish."
"If I were sure of that I wouldn't worry so much, Mai."
"I don't understand it, Bill. Why in hell should you be concerned one way or the other?"
Zukor poured more brandy for each of them. He hefted his paunch almost as if he wanted to be sure that his great stomach had not vanished. "Mallory, I buy enough teenage clothes...."
"To dress every fourteen-year-old girl in the western hemisphere," Mallory finished.
Zukor laughed. "OK. You are talented enough to switch the whole market; take them away from what I tell them to buy to what you design."
"Meaning?"
"Jeri Fashions is on top because I buy tons and advertise jeans and jam the channels of distribution."
"Meaning?"
"If I buy what you make, I make you."
Condon smiled. "Sorry if I'm dense, Bill. But you know that I'll be happy to see to you."
"Exclusively?"
"I haven't thought of that."
"Think about it, please. I won't become a poor man if you don't go along with me on an exclusive deal. But you will knock me off my perch. You did it once before."
"Not to you."
"True. But your naked look designs turned the market upside down. If I owned that-if I had an exclusive there-millions!"
"I gather that if I give you an exclusive you will dump Jeri?" Condon knew what the answer would be.
"Of course. I've given Gerry Reagan a good deal-up to now."
"But you admit that I could make it without you."
"Sure, you can. But it will be slow and lumpy because I'll fight you. I can fight rough, Mai."
"I've heard it told."
"What do you say?"
"No deal," Condon said and watched Zukor's jaws clamp down on his cigar. "You see, Bill, the reason I'm going into the teen bit is that I want to beat Gerry Reagan in the open market. I want that coldhearted bitch to be out-designed by me and outsold by me on my efforts. No fix. No deal. If you drop her and push me I'd have too big an edge. You'd spoil my fun."
"But if I'm on her side, she'll have the edge!"
"That's true, provided that the little teeny boppers don't find my designs so good that they'll go miles out of their way to get them. Then you won't have the edge. Matter of fact, like you observed, Bill, you'll get knocked right off your perch."
"Is that how we're going to play, Condon?"
"That's how," Mallory Condon said lighting a fresh cigar, the pink scar ridge on his cheek glowing in the flame. "I'm beginning to enjoy this. Really, I am."
Zukor bit through the wet end of his cigar and spit it furiously from his mouth as Condon walked out of the room.
The street on which Zukor's mansion was was quiet and tree-lined. Condon felt the light rain touch his hair and face. He looked up toward the desolate strip of sky which lay along the length of this city street and wished he were out of it.
He'd taken only a dozen steps before he heard his name called out by a woman's voice. He looked around and found Valerie Montbatten sitting in a sports car parked at the curb.
"I think you can use a ride, Mr. Condon," she said through a half-open window.
Mallory stepped to the car. "I was wondering why Zukor hadn't offered me his car for a lift home."
"Oh, this isn't official business," Valerie smiled. "I'm through work for the night, and what I do on my own time is none of Zukor's business."
Mallory admired her face, her eyes, the smoothness of her flesh that was exposed by the green dress. "In that case, I can use a lift."
He stepped around the car and slipped into the front seat. She sped off the moment he'd closed the door.
"Where to?" she asked.
He was looking down at her legs. Her dress had slipped up her legs and left her knees exposed. And they were beautiful knees, beautiful legs.
"Home," he said. "I live...."
"I know where you live," she smiled without turning her head. "In any hurry?"
"No, why?"
She sped through a yellow light, engine whirring smoothly, her delicate hands working the gearshift. "I thought you might want to stop off somewhere."
Mallory turned to face her. "Why?"
"Oh, I don't know," she shrugged. "I guess I've always wanted to meet Mallory Condon."
Mallory was still staring at her. He knew there was another reason. A reason that had to do with Zukor. He decided to call her bluff right away and get it over with.
"I'll tell you what I'd like to do," he said. "I'd-like to pull over somewhere and take off your clothes."
He'd expected her to act surprised, but she took it all in stride. "Won't do us much good in a car as small as this one. You do work fast, don't you?"
"At everything. When I want something, I go after it."
"You want me?"
He glanced at her legs again, then up at her shoulders, her pale flesh set off by the green of her thin dress straps. "Very much."
"Mr. Zukor wouldn't like this, you know," she smirked.
I bet, Mallory said to himself. "I can keep a secret," he replied.
"Well then," she shrugged, "I like to work fast, too."
She pulled over to the curb on a deserted, warehouse-lined street and shut off the engine, then turned toward him. "You're a good-looking man, Mr. Condon."
"You can call me Mallory," he chuckled, reaching out and slipping one of her dress straps off her shoulder. "You're not bad looking yourself. How'd you get mixed up with a creep like Zukor?"
"Oh, it's a long story," she said softly, slipping the other strap from her shoulder.
The dress fell down in front, baring two pert, firm tits that needed no bra to remain in place. Each was tipped with a bright, long nipple.
Mallory took her in his arms and pressed his lips hungrily against hers. Her kiss was wet and soft, her tongue quick and curious as he felt it delve into his mouth. His hand slipped between them immediately and closed over one of her breasts, then his fingers squeezed the nipple gently. He could feel her breathing deeply already.
When she pulled her lips away to take a breath, he began kissing her on the neck, then the ear, the cheek, then returned to her lips again and shot his tongue back into her mouth. Her tongue curled around his, then shot into his mouth. Mallory's cock was already rock-hard under his pants.
He massaged one tit, then the other, cupping the soft mounds in his palm. Then his hand left her chest and dropped to her thighs, slipping up under the green dress along the scorching flesh of her inner thighs. Her legs shot open immediately.
But before he could work his hand farther under her dress, he felt her hand on his hard thigh, moving inward toward his crotch. His heart leapt with excitement when he felt her press her fingers gently against the hard mound of his prick.
"Mmmmm," she purred into his ear as she caressed it. "I can see you like me."
"No, you can't see," Mallory whispered between kisses. "But you're welcome to."
He leaned back when she reached into his crotch with both hands and tugged down his zipper, then opened his clasp and spread apart his fly. His cock was outlined against his tight underwear.
Her delicate, pale fingers slid under the elastic band of his underwear and pressed against his hot pipe. Then she pulled the briefs away from his crotch to bare his prick and balls.
"I've heard about you," she smiled, staring down in wonder at his long, fat prick. "I can see the rumors were no exaggeration."
Mallory's heart was pounding as her fingers closed around the middle of his cock and began stroking softly, jerking the loose outer flesh along his bony stalk. His balls leapt up and down gaily as she worked, her eyes riveted on his thick, dark cockhead.
He shifted in the seat, pulling his pants and underwear down almost to his knees, and she reached down farther, gripping his prick around the base and stroking. But then, before he could reach out for her thighs again, she bent down slowly and planted a tender kiss on the tip of his cock.
"That's terrific," he gasped. "Go ahead, suck it."
He could see her firm tits wobbling slightly as she rose and looked down at his cock, then lowered her head again and planted a second kiss on his cockhead. Mallory felt his balls stirring with excitement as her warm lips slipped over the dark crown and then closed, locking him in her oral fire.
Her lips worked gently, sucking, nibbling at his cockflesh. Her dark hair fell alongside her face, making her pale flesh seem even more white. Then her caress moved slowly down his cock, almost to the midsection, and returned to his crown to suck gently again.
Mallory's thighs were tense, his hips in motion when she plunged again, taking more than half of his long tool inside her mouth. Her tongue twirled around the rod as it entered her, then circled his cockhead when she'd risen to the cap again. He squirmed in the seat when the tip of her tongue slid into his pisshole, lapping up a drop of pearly lubricant that had already formed there.
With her fingers around the base of his cock, holding it upright, she began rising and falling smoothly on his stake, taking in more of his cock with each plunge. Gism was already soaring toward his cock as he reached out and stroked her shoulders in encouragement, then cupped one of her small tits in his hand and thumbed the hard, pulsing nipple.
If she had any orders from Zukor, Mallory said to himself, they were to make him happy any way she could. And she was doing her job splendidly, wolfing down most of his shaft with each plunge, lapping at his cockhead with her tongue from time to time, then trailing her tongue all the way down his shaft, from the edge of his crown to his balls, then upward again until her warm, wet lips were again wrapped around his hard tool.
When she plunged again, he pumped with his hips to drive his cock even deeper into her. He could feel his cockhead move along the roof of her mouth, then slip into her throat. But she continued to plunge, taking his cockhead in her throat eagerly and closing her lips only when she'd taken in the entire length of his throbbing manhood.
If Valerie were one of his girlfriends, or even a woman he'd picked up for the night, he certainly would have warned her that his prick was about to blast open inside her mouth. But she was Zukor's tool, and Zukor meant him no good. And ultimately, he knew, neither did she.
Her hair was falling over his thighs now as she dropped sharply onto his cock, contracting her throat to squeeze his cockhead when it passed through her mouth and beyond. His thighs tensed, his balls danced in her fingers. He held his breath as his rod filled with seed.
She rose and licked around his cockhead again, then wrapped her lips very softly around it and dropped down on his stake again. His prick pushed deeply into her mouth, he gasped, and then groaned as he felt the first relieving squirt of semen explode into her throat.
But she continued to suck and swallow as he creamed, moving her head up and down as he squeezed her tit in his fingers and pumped his hips to drive his cock ever deeper inside her. Spurt after spurt of his warm gism flooded her mouth, filled her throat and dribbled out of her lips, before he finally felt the last drops leaking into her.
"Mmmm, you taste good," she smiled when she lifted her head, wiping a drop of come from her lips. Her tits still quivered deliriously.
"You're very good at that," he said, tucking away his still half-hard prick. "Mr. Zukor should give you a raise."
"What does Mr. Zukor have to do with it?" she said, leaning back and stroking the insides of her thighs.
He knew what she expected now. But he had a surprise for her. "Everything," he said, then leaned over, kissed her on her come-moist lips, and opened the car door.
"Mallory, what?...."
He slammed the car door and leaned in through the window. "Tell Mr. Zukor I thank him, but it won't work."
"What won't work?"
"He's laying a trap," Mallory replied, "and you're the bait. I didn't get where I am today by being careless, Miss Montbatten."
"But Mallory...."
He straightened up and started for the next corner in search of a cab.
CHAPTER TWO
The city was a confusing place for Amy Twain. She had made up her mind to love the whole stone and steel romance of the big town, but at this very moment she was not at all sure. After all, there was no one to meet her at the airport, and she was sure that there would be. Miss Reagan of Jeri Fashions had written to her a week ago to say that everything had been arranged, but that's not the way it turned out. When she finally called Jeri from the airport it was quite evident that the person who had answered the phone did not even know who Amy Twain was! After a little while some secretary or other got on the phone and apologized for Miss Reagan. The secretary, Miss Welker, told her to take a taxi and check right into the Nilson-Bates, which was Miss Reagan's personal hotel. Miss Reagan, Miss Welker said, would explain everything later.
Then she had stayed in her room at the Nilson-Bates all day waiting for word from Miss Reagan which never came. Waiting for the phone to ring, Amy Twain studied her fashion sketches, did a whole flock of new ones and catnapped in her panties and bra to avoid wrinkling any of her dresses. She loved designing but she hated ironing.
At first she had accepted the confusion without much concern. The flight from Iowa had been delightful. It was her first flight alone and it was her first visit to the place where everybody wants to visit but where nobody wants to live. Even as she accepted a martini with her supper she reasoned: I am over eighteen-even if it's only two weeks over. She had not counted on the martini getting her drunk and she thanked goodness that she was on a darkened plane in a seat with no one next to her and she could pretend she was asleep.
Pretending to be asleep included pretending she had made a play for the sailor across the aisle. Boy, was she ever drunk! Why, she wondered, in her fantasies about having sex, she never got any sensations? The sensation was supposed to be overwhelming but in her daydreams, Amy Twain felt nothing at all. Was there something wrong with her, she wondered. Then she fell asleep. When she awoke the plane was flying below stars and over red topped clouds.
She could not sleep for the rest of the flight and just enjoyed the excitement, the thrill of it all! Here she was America's number one teenage designer of clothes. Winner of the Golden Thimble Award. That meant twenty-five hundred dollars in her bank account and, most important, a job as a junior designer with Jeri Fashions.
Amy Twain's heart had pounded in anticipation when the big plane had landed at 5:45 a.m. After an hour of waiting, she had felt lost. After two hours she felt forgotten and desperate. After three hours she called Jeri and then had to call again after nine before the phone answered. She was angry as she taxied into town from the airport.
Now the anger had gone and only the confusion remained. Didn't Miss Reagan care? Was she fired? Would they pay her for loafing? Then, she reasoned, Miss Reagan would not have had her told to come to her personal hotel if everything was not all right.
The only thing she could think to do was to take a shower. It was not at all an unexciting experience. The Nilson-Bates bathroom was very special with its lavendar tiles and gleaming chrome fixtures. Best of all was its size-as big as her bedroom at home. Next best was the lavendar deep piled rug which covered the entire bathroom floor. Before Amy Twain got under the shower she sat on the lavendar bench before the mirror and studied her face.
It always distressed her. She thought her nose was too short. Her hair, she believed, could not get blonder without vanishing entirely; it was pure platinum. Her eyes were the light green of a sneaky tiger. She began to think about the condition of her mouth when she thought better of her self analysis. I'm not supposed to be a great sexpot, she reasoned; I'm here to design clothes, that's all. The thought made her happy and she marched determinedly into the shower.
She dropped her robe and revealed a beautiful young body tanned completely by a strong Western sun. Even the young firm breasts, which required no support except, perhaps, to subdue their natural movement. The nipples in spite of the tan of her breasts, remained a bright pink. Her stomach was smooth and flat, her buttocks firm and round, and her thighs supple, strong and naturally exciting. She turned the needling waters on and enjoyed the massage, hot and cold, on her beautiful flesh.
She tried to avoid having shower fantasies which Amy Twain almost always had. This time she found herself thinking of Charles Rider. Charles Rider, football player. Broad shoulders. Not shy like the others. He always let his hands wander. Once in a while she had let those big hands find things they shouldn't. Then of course, she had acted offended. Some of the other girls had gone all the way, but not Amy Twain. Why not? She didn't really know. But she wanted to very much and very soon, if she could do it without a great deal of trouble. Charles Rider, she thought. Oh, Charley Rider! Oh! Oh! She turned the cold water up full and the flames were beaten out by the cold needle shower.
The phone rang insistently and Amy ran naked from the shower. "This is Gerry Reagan," the voice, smooth as a bolt of silk, said. "I want to apologize personally, Amy. May I call you Amy?"
Amy managed to say yes, and then Gerry Reagan's voice crooned on and everything was explained away. Everything was just fine. Finally, Gerry Reagan said: "Now I'll expect to see you at my office tomorrow morning at nine sharp. In the meantime, just you have a wonderful night on Jeri Fashions; whatever the bill is, just tell my secretary.
All right?"
"Golly!"
"Wonderful. Goodnight, dear." Amy Twain put the phone in the white cradle and danced happily about her room.
I'm going to love this city, Amy thought happily. She reached for her bra, which was a see through House of Condon design with openings to allow the nipples to peek-a-boo out. It was a clever piece of work and the designer certainly knew women, both physically and psychologically, Amy thought. It made her feel wicked when she wore it. She thought for a moment and decided not to wear it. She hefted her breasts with her hands. She didn't need a bra. Maybe she would when she was older, when she was twenty or so. But not now, she said to herself.
She pulled her dress over her head. The cut of the bodice was tight at the top of her breasts; then it fell free from there down to the hips, where it hugged. The skirt ended halfway up her thigh. It was an original Amy Twain Design. Perfect for teenagers, perfect for dancing. She just knew that Miss Reagan would like this one better than the outfit which had won her the Golden Thimble Award.
Amy Twain decided that she was famished and that meant a great big rare steak in the famous Nilson-Bates Roast Room. She jammed on her wide-brimmed black straw hat and walked confidently to the elevator. She enjoyed the stares she received from the men (and women) on the way down to the dining room, and on her way up. In the city a man's look, Amy thought, was more exciting than it would be back home. Back home in Regina, everybody knew you and even when someone whistled or put his hand under your dress, like Charley Rider, there was no mystery to it.
Here, in the city, looks were exciting, romantic, dangerous and mysterious. The stare of the good-looking grey-haired man in the elevator, who was alone with her between the thirtieth and twenty-second floors, and turned about and simply looked from her shoes right up to her eyes and had ended with the most devilish of smiles. The blond man in the Roast Room who nodded to her and obviously was waiting for her invitation. It was just an exciting city!
She also had a martini with an onion which the waiter said was a Gibson. Now she was warm, a little loopy, and singing silly rock lyrics to herself in her beautiful room which looked out on the millions and millions of lights of the city. She undressed and stood naked before the window and said to the city: I'm here! Amy Twain is here! And before too long you're all going to know it!
Then she had a thought. She wasn't looking out a window in Iowa. This was New York. Someone perhaps was watching her standing in the window, naked.
She gazed around at the skyline, but there were too many windows to search, too many buildings. Still, the idea she might be watched by someone, somewhere, made her tingle all over.
She drew the curtains and jumped onto the bed. The sheets were cool against her bare flesh. She lay back and looked down at her body. Her tits were high and round, full and fleshy, her nipples swam on silver-dollar sized aureolas that were as pink as the long, fat nipples themselves. When she stroked one of the nipples, it began to grow harder in her fingers.
Her belly was flat and nicely tanned, her navel deep. She ran a finger down between her tits, into the warm slice between them, and then down over her belly to her navel. Her legs were lean and smooth, her thighs like columns of opaque glass, her calves firm. Her feet were small, her toes straight and tipped with white polish.
She spread her thighs slightly and looked down at her pussy. The hair was thick and blonde, fluffy. She could see, underneath the mesh, the pinkness of her cunt lips. It seemed somehow strange to her that, throughout her entire life, men had seemed ready to die to get at that cunt, to caress her nipples, to stroke her thighs. And it suddenly seemed even stranger that she'd never let them.
Spreading her legs farther, she reached into the blonde tangle and rubbed her fingertip along her cunt. The lips were dry and warm, but as she continued to stroke them, they grew wetter. She thrust her thighs apart as far as she could, picked apart the lips of her cunt with her fingers, and with her other hand began to gently stroke her pussy.
Her pink clitoris poked through the lips, peering out from underneath the fleshy hood, and she took it in her fingertips and rubbed it softly. Immediately she felt her cunt grow even wetter, so wet that now her fingers were slippery with her juices.
Amy was breathing deeply now, her tits were quivering and her hips were moving with a life of their own. She stroked her clit with one hand and then slipped a finger from her other hand smoothly through her cunt lips and into her channel.
Now she tightened her cunt around her finger, so that her finger felt thicker. She worked the digit in and out slowly, still stroking her clit with her other hand. Her hips began to bounce on the bed, her breath grew heavier, her eyes slipped closed.
She pictured Charles Rider, naked, on top of her, pumping his hips. It was his cock that was sliding in and out of her cunt, his fingers that were stroking her clit. Then she thought of the sailor on the plane. It was his cock inside her, while Charley rubbed her pussy. Her fingers worked faster now, her hips thrashed, her legs opened and closed, her cunt flexed around her finger. And then, she couldn't help letting out a moan as she felt herself reaching the crest of her passion.
She came with a series of whimpers, bouncing up and down on the bed, working her finger in and out of her creaming cunt as fast as she could and squeezing her clit firmly between her fingers. Then she felt her passion begin to ebb. She opened her eyes, slid her fingers from her cunt. She was still breathing deeply as her eyes closed again and she turned onto her side, curling up against one of the pillows. Then she felt the complete relaxation sweep over her body.
She was dreaming even before she was sleeping.
"Well, well," said Gerry Reagan across her desk, "Aside from being a very talented designer you are also a gorgeous creature." Amy winced. "Don't you think so?"
Amy shook her head. "I'm not my idea of what a beautiful girl should look like."
"What would that be?" Gerry asked, laughing.
"If I had my choice, I would want to look like a sexy movie star."
"I see," the handsome dark-haired director of Jeri Fashions said solemnly. "I suppose nature has cheated your, dear; but in the event you fail as a designer at Jeri we will always employ you as a model. We need an ail-American girl look-someone with a spray of freckles across her nose."
Amy touched her nose self consciously.
At the interview's end, Amy found herself turned over to a thin young man whose job it was to show her through Jeri Pashions. He seemed to Amy to be very polite but quite disinterested in her and his task. She wanted to remind him of the fact that she had won the teenage dress designing contest and the Golden Thimble Award. She decided, however, that he would not be impressed. She followed along and listened to his lisping sing-song. "This is the seamstress' room. This is the guest dining room for big shots, you know. This is the rest room for the ladies. And of course gents but that wouldn't interest you unless someone asked. Fabric storeroom on your left. Walter Kundler is in charge."
Amy was astounded at how many rooms there were at Jeri Fashions. The better part of four floors were taken up with them. And the plant was located in another state! Miss Reagan flew there once a week for visits.
"This," said her guide, "is the girl's locker room." He pushed the door open. There were eight women sitting before the mirrors of dressing tables in various stages of undress.
One tall, willowy redhead was completely nude as she peered into the mirror and applied a thin black line to her eyelids.
The models hardly reacted to the intrusion. "Good morning, Harold!" a small blond girl in pink panties and bra sang out.
"Good morning!" Harold replied with a certain amount of airy disdain.
"How's the keeper of the harem today?" came from a brunette whose black brassiered bosom seemed a little large for her trim torso.
"I am splendid," Harold answered. Not without a touch of pride, Amy thought. "Girls, I want to introduce Miss Amy Twain."
"Well, how are you all, honey?" a blond wearing a bra but no bottoms drawled.
"Iowa. I'm from Iowa," Amy said and she could feel some color come up into her face.
"Anyway girls, she's the new designer for something or other," Harold said.
"Teenage," Amy said.
"Oh," said the small blond model. "The Golden Thimble Winner! Well, I'll be modeling a lot of that, angel. Please make enough room for my boobs. I'm little but they're not." And she lifted her breasts to emphasize the point.
"Don't be so pushy, Elly," the naked redhead said. "Amy has a pair of thirty eights under those candy stripes. She knows what to do." The redhead got up from her mirror bench and walked with a graceful long-legged stride over to Harold. "Have you a match, Harold?" she asked. As Harold fumbled for a match book, the tall redhead positioned herself so that Harold's head straightened right up into her petal tawny bosom.
"Excuse me." Harold muttered.
"You've excited me,' the redhead said, looking coolly at Harold who had become nervous. "You've got me aroused, Harold. Now finish the job."
"Sari Grimes, you stop that. I don't want to have any of this thing going on," Harold shrieked angrily.
"Harold, please!" she said, raising her breasts toward him. "Just one kiss, baby." The other girls tittered. Amy thought she would fall through the floor. Yet, as she watched the lovely redhead playing at seduction with the flustered Harold, she felt aroused. She covered her excitement with shock and outraged feelings.
The redhead, her hips swaying, slinked toward Harold, who was very busy backing away. It seemed almost at the last moment that he found the door knob and bolted out. The models burst into laughter. "That was not very kind," Amy said as the laughter subsided.
"I don't know," said the brunette who now stood as nakedly as the redhead, "Harold must surrender his virginity sometime. And one of us is going to take it away."
This was greeted with a titter. "Miss Twain," the redhead said, "Harold uses every excuse to come in here when we are dressing. Then he makes believe we don't exist. Once in a while I just get this great urge to show him what a woman is."
"You just scandalized him," Amy said, defending Harold.
"Is that what they call it in Mississippi?"
"Iowa," Amy corrected.
The redhead suddenly smiled. "You're new here. We shouldn't be making it rough for you. I'm sorry if we upset you, but Harold-forget him; he really doesn't matter."
Sari Grimes slipped into her undergarments and donned a fragile, short skirted yellow dress which had an orange scarf at the neck. She looked ravishing. She smiled at Amy and promenaded before her. "All right?" she asked.
"Beautiful!" Amy said.
"You're a nice kid. Drop around anytime and take your clothes off. Ta-ta! The buyers are waiting," she said and went out the door.
CHAPTER THREE
Before the day was over, Amy had decided that she was quite pleased with Sari Grimes. The redhead-even if she sometimes seemed to be crude-was a very warm person. She had invited Amy to lunch and, since that was the only invitation Amy had gotten, she accepted it avidly.
Sari took her to a lovely little Italian place which was a few minutes walk to the west. The menu was extensive and suggested dozens of dishes which Amy had never heard of. In Iowa, at least in her town, Italian cuisine meant spaghetti with or without meat balls, pizza, minestrone soup, and three different kinds of sauces. Seeing the menu, it was perfectly obvious to Amy that the Italians had to have a greater variety.
The yellow restaurant walls were decorated with oil paintings. They were not very well done, Amy knew, but she was delighted with them. Especially the Venice scene with the gondola and lovers in soulful attitude as they stared deeply into each others eyes. Sari did the ordering. They had wine with their lunch.
Sari apparently was very determined to see that Amy got the real low-down on the city, the places in it, the men in it, how to conduct your sex life in it.
Amy was really interested in Sari's How To Conduct Your Sex Life. As Sari talked about sex, Amy sipped her wine and hoped that her eyes did not pop out of her head too much. The words which Sari used were the same four-letter words which Amy had read in books pirated to her and the others even at Junior High School.
She had rarely heard any of the words said out loud except by street urchins or angry football players. But on those occasions the words were not used in a sex sense, but rather as an expression of disappointment or anger. In Sari's mouth each word, coolly used, described the most intimate sex activity as if all it amounted to was a kind of trip to a beauty parlor. Amy had no doubt that Sari enjoyed her attempt to control her reactions. There were several occasions when Amy blushed deeply at something Sari was describing. Sari smiled when this happened and very eagerly added to her lecture at that point. , Amy did her very best to hide from Sari the one single thing she did not want her to know: her virginity was still intact.
The first week at Jeri Fashions flew by. The work was very interesting, and what she most wanted and was most afraid she would not get had been immediately granted to her. She actually was allowed to design. She actually could call models from the model pool. She actually could order any material she wanted to use-even experimentally, even wastefully. Her designs moved quickly from the drawing board to her cloth. The seamstresses liked what she was doing and the models did too. Best of all, Gerry Reagan liked her work.
It was on Wednesday afternoon that Miss Reagan examined Amy's pink and green design which had a slightly Latin motif and which Amy called her "Teen Bolero." Miss Reagan looked at the dress very carefully and asked Amy to try it on.
"Here?" Amy had asked.
"Of course!" Gerry smiled.
"I should go some place to change ... someone might come in."
"Amy! You've been here three days. You know that we have no room for prudery during working hours. Now hurry, dear, time is money!"
Amy had already begun to pull her dress over her head, and she finished this almost before Gerry had issued her last sentence. In her bra and panties Amy's sun-gold beauty stunned the sophisticated Gerry Reagan. In the few seconds Amy shucked her dress and put on the green and pink design, Gerry Reagan made a professional evaluation of Amy Twain's body. The body was one which belonged to a modern Venus. It was lush. It was blonde, gold, ripe, but nowhere did it hint of softness. And it was sexy. The great pink nipples peeping through the openings in the transparent bra and marvellous young hips unhidden by the wisp of panties which were as transparent as air on a clear day when you could see forever. Mallory Condon's designs, Gerry Reagan could not help noting. Most appealing about Amy Twain was that, on top of this wonderful feminine machinery sat this innocent, freckle nosed face. How innocent? Gerry wondered. Her thoughts were interrupted by the clothed figure of Amy Twain.
"Marvellous," Gerry said. "Turn."
Amy moved about slowly. Gerry's pearl-ringed hands smoothed down the pink and green stripes which hugged her buttocks. "Splendid," Gerry said. "Splendid!"
"Do you think the skirt is a trifle too high?" Amy asked.
"I wouldn't lower it a centimeter. Perfect! I love the bosom. It's darling! Those tiny bows under the breasts! Perfect, darling." Gerry Reagan put her arms around Amy and kissed her on the cheek. "I'm proud of you! What have you named it?"
"Teen Bolero."
"That's a little square. Not enough fun in it. Jazz it up, can you?"
"TeeBo!"
"Amy Twain's TeeBo! You are wonderful."
Then Gerry Reagan waited for her to take the new design off. Amy became aware of the possessive look Miss Reagan gave her. She almost felt like covering up. Then she thought better of it and defiantly straightened her body, pushing her breasts forward. Gerry Reagan noticed this, too, and smiled at it. Amy handed her the newly christened dress and Gerry Reagan flipped it over her shoulder and walked briskly from the room shouting back: "This goes right into the works, Amy."
Amy was proud beyond belief. She had to restrain herself all of that Wednesday. If she didn't she would have danced through the streets of the city, singing, laughing. Life was so wonderful! Amy managed to swallow her joy and keep working. The minutes, the hours, the days of that first week just would not keep from flying.
Sari was also helping her find an apartment. An appropriate apartment for one of America's great new leaders of fashion-Miss Amy Twain! This was an exhausting procedure. Amy dashed off with Sari at lunch times and after work to look at various places which were either too dismal or too expensive. Finally, and only because Amy knew that she had to vacate the Nilson-Bates suite, she accepted a three room furnished sublet on the upper East Side of the city. The people who had lived there obviously had lower middle income department store decorating ideas. It was tasteless even though it longed for taste.
"I'll have to take it, Sari," Amy said sadly. "I just can't afford to go on living at the hotel."
"You designers," Sari said walking through the rooms, "what in the world do you expect. The place is clean. The furniture is practically new and the bed is a big double and foam rubber. I think the place is a bargain."
"I suppose so." Amy's sadness was perfectly obvious.
Sari laughed. "Tell you what! You take the place and just to cheer you up, I'm going to have a moving-in party for you Saturday night."
"Sari!"
"Tut, tut!" the big red-head model said and smiled at her new friend. "Don't thank me now. Thank me Sunday morning because after that party you are going to think that this is absolutely the greatest place in which to live."
Amy took the apartment.
The rest of the week was busy, rapid and joyful in spite of the little setback with the apartment. Her suitcase had already been moved in and she had found some old movie posters to hang on the walls. These did much to change the apartment's flavor. Amy also had some other ideas to make her new home more livable for herself. Even the apartment situation brightened in her mind and she began to think ahead to the party on Saturday. But Sari refused to let her get involved in the blow-out. "This is my party for you; you just keep your cotton-pickin' fingers off."
"But I'm from Iowa," Amy playfully protested and they both laughed at the joke which had become a good natured standard at Jeri Fashions. Even Harold participated in it.
And there was one great item of intrigue which fascinated Amy. Mallory Condon. The name, House of Condon, Mallory Condon, seemed to be mentioned by almost everybody at Jeri at least three times each day. It was almost as if Mallory Condon was the reason Jeri Fashions existed.
The conversations buzzed through Amy's head as she worked at her drawing board on a sweater and slacks ensemble: Did you see the new Condon bareback gown. He cut it right down to here. No, it doesn't show the cleavage but reveals the curve....
I don't think he can repeat. Not even Condon can walk away with all top honors two years in a row. It was a fluke ... But where does a beautiful hunk of man like Condon get all of that talent? ... He knows what women are made of, baby. He's been on that scene. How come he's never got to know me? ... I hear Condon's will design for teenagers this year. He'll get a bloody nose for that; he can't compete with Jeri ... Don't sell him short. What did they say five years ago-he couldn't compete with the Europeans ... Look at it this way honey: Whose underwear you wearing? And whose hot little hands are holding up your little old breasts? Condon's. Right? Mallory Condon, The House of Condon, Mallory Condon, Condon, Condon....
Even Gerry Reagan couldn't avoid mentioning his name. And she hated him or, as Sari suggested, she was afraid of him. It had to do with Condon accusing Miss Reagan of stealing two of his designs.
Amy protested and defended the integrity of Gerry Reagan. Sari smiled broadly at Amy's ardor on this matter. "Look, baby, all is fair in love, war and in everything else where one guy wants to get ahead of the other guy."
"That's terrible! Why there is no honor at all then!"
"That's right, my cornball friend. Isn't it marvelous? You can do anything you like, whenever you like, to whomever you like, and you can never be wrong no matter what! Delicious!" Sari said crinkling up her nose.
Amy lapsed into silence. She did not know how to answer Sari. She refused to think anything but the very best about Miss Reagan. How could Sari Grimes have thoughts like those anyway-so evil-so ... then Amy smiled. Oh, that Sari, she thought, she's teasing me. She just wants to see how little Miss Innocent will fall for big city put-ons. She got back to her work. The minutes, the hours, the days, all blurred and there it was quite suddenly Friday afternoon, five o'clock.
Jeri Fashions emptied as if an air-raid siren had sounded. Amy and the cleaning woman seemed to be the only ones left in the shop. Amy cleared her desk, put her pencils, pens, and crayons away. She picked up her purse and freshened her mouth with a pale orange lipstick. It suddenly occurred to Amy that it was the first time she had been alone at this hour since starting at Jeri. Since Monday she had spent every spare moment with Sari doing one thing or another. She gasped! She had not written or called home! What must they think? Certainly that she was at least raped and in the possession of a big city monster and most probably dead with her throat cut. Immediately, Amy Twain called Regina. Collect.
It was a long walk to her apartment from Jeri Fashions but she enjoyed it. It gave her a chance to see the city; at least part of it, anyway. The fact that she was wearing patent leather flats made the three mile walk very comfortable.
The pigeons filled the sky above the buildings and Amy thought that this was beautiful. It occurred to her that there were practically no pigeons to be seen in Regina and here in this sprawling concrete domino construction there seemed to be pigeons by the millions.
And taxis, too. They seemed to ride along right at her heel just waiting for her to tire, to lift her hand in signal.
The endless changes in architecture fascinated her. Some of the city was very old, as old as the beginnings of the United States. You could watch the city being torn down and built up again. No matter where she looked Amy could see cranes and booms reaching into the sky. Buildings being demolished and buildings springing up. It excited her. It was a city which would never die, she thought; it was a city which continuously renewed itself.
Amy Twain was so engrossed in the city that she was completely unaware of the whistles and wolf calls which greeted her as she walked through the streets. The beauty of the city, that is how Amy Twain thought of it, was not wasted on her and certainly, the beauty of Amy Twain, according to those who watched her walk home in the late afternoon, was not at all wasted on the city.
Once inside her now movie-postered apartment, Amy realized how pooped she was. The entire excitement of the week, the breakneck pace of the work, now exacted their toll. She fell asleep in the red flowered linen armchair.
The phone ringing woke her up, It was dark outside.
"Amy? Where the hell have you been? This is the third time I've called."
"Oh, Sari! I fell fast asleep in the chair."
"OK, Goldilocks. About the party tomorrow night?"
Sari gave her a list of little things to get, like extra ice cubes, loads of paper cups and napkins. Amy wrote everything down and promised Sari she would have them all in the morning, first thing.
Amy found a TV dinner to eat. She undressed and found herself suddenly amused by her Mallory Condon bra. She pushed her bare nipples back into the apertures from which they extended. "Who let you out?" she asked aloud softly. "Mallory Condon," she answered. What kind of man was he? Why did they all talk about him? He was handsome in a rugged looking way. She knew that because, like almost everybody in the world interested in fashion, she had seen his photo in magazines and newspapers. There was that thin rope-like scar which ran down his cheek. From what? she wondered. And there was part of the mystery of Mallory Condon. No one really knew very much about him. The House of Condon was only five years old. Mysterious. Romantic.
Amy fell asleep naked on her bed. In her dreams Mallory Condon replaced Charlie Rider. It was a vast improvement. In Amy's fantasy Mallory Condon brought her to complete ecstasy on the windswept red flagstone roof of a deserted skyscraper which quite mysteriously was located in a cornfield near Regina, Iowa.
Sari, naturally, was the hostess and she opened the door as guests arrived. Some of the girls were Jeri models, but none of the men were known to her. It was difficult to count how many people crammed into her small apartment. It became quite apparent to Amy that not even Sari knew the guests who flowed laughing through her door. It seemed that people had just heard that Sari was throwing a party and they had come. It was very much like one of those contests to find out how many people can be jammed into a phone booth or on a dance floor. The evening certainly would have been ruined if the night had not been so very hot. Within an hour, more than three quarters of the uninvited guests had crashed out just as they had crashed in.
"We are lucky!" said Sari. "Hot night, no air conditioning, and I put out no drinks and no ice. Now bolt the door, Amy. Just in case the zombies come."
Amy was happy to throw the bolt. "Now," Sari said, "I'd like to tell you-all eight of you-this party is for Amy Twain; to welcome that poor girl to our town."
"Hurrah," a young blond man cheered in a very conversational tone. "I would have left an hour ago, Sari. But there were two broads in my lap and it would have been rude. My name is John Vole. And where are the drinks?"
"Coming up!" Sari said, kicking off her shoes and retreating to the kitchen. "Put on the record player."
"Haven't got one!" Amy lamented. "Oh, dear!"
"Don't fret," John Vole said. "Turn the dial to ten thirty six and let Uncle Dunkle give us the top forty."
The sound stormed the room and Amy found her self dancing with John Vole. He was tall and quite broad in the shoulders. He was handsome, Amy thought, in a very undistinguished way. That is, you knew he was handsome because he looked like magazine photos and swimsuits and ice cream. The glass of whiskey in John Vole's hand seemed out of place. Amy guessed that Vole might be in his early twenties-perhaps twenty-five. The contrast between John Vole's broad shoulders and his extraordinarily slim hips were quite marked. Amy found herself looking between the Vole shoulder and hip as they danced.
"Something wrong?" the blond boy asked. Amy shook her head. She continued dancing. "Don't you like the way I dance, Amy, baby?"
"I didn't say that, silly."
"I have great action, I always say." His eyes closed. "The world's greatest! Soul and fire!"
"Yes," Amy said and noticed for the first time that everybody was dancing. Sari, with a big dark-haired man who had taken his jacket and tie off, was turning her hips into a deep pelvic grind. Her short skirt had crept way up her thighs. Amy could see flashes of her Condon panties. Certainly, the big dark-haired man could too; he squatted down low enough to look right up and through. Amy blushed intensely; she was wearing the same kind of panties. When the number ended, she used the excuse of wanting a drink to stop dancing. John Vole volunteered to fix it for her. When he asked her what kind of drink she wanted she said: "Martini." It was an automatic answer. Amy was not even sure that she liked martinis.
"Dry?"
"Yes."
"Like a flannel nightgown," John Vole said as he mixed it. He presented it to her in a paper cup. "Down the hatch!" He tossed his own drink off and she followed his example.
A moment later Amy found another martini in her hand and this time it was she was said: "Down the hatch!"
Everything had become dream-like and detached. Amy Twain's head had separated from her body. And her body danced with everybody in the room. She danced with Sari's dark-haired man and she knew he was twisting into a deep crouch so that he could look up her skirt. She didn't care. Even when he reached out and touched her breast, she showed no resentment. She just smiled and pushed it away. "Not tonight," she heard herself say.
There was a short man dancing with her. He had tight curly brown hair and thick glasses. He was amazingly graceful-although built like a sack of potatoes. Sweat rolled down his face. "I'd like to try it with you," he said over and over again.
Amy head her distant voice saying: "I don't know what you mean." She knew, of course, that she was dancing. Her body had gone off on a wild adventure of its own. It kicked its legs in all directions, its hips made circles and moved up and down, its breasts bounced and its nipples grew larger in their Condon cut outs. Her mind lived in a cotton world where all the martinis were very dry.
In a vague way Amy Twain realized that the lights in the room had been turned off and that illumination came from the lights of the city outside, the flames of matches and the glow of cigarettes. She was dancing still and John Vole was dancing with her. No one else was dancing. They were on the couch, on the chairs and on the floor. Amy looked away from Vole's hips which writhed and which beckoned to her. What was everybody doing, she wondered. Where was Sari?
Oh, Oh, Oh! Amy heard her voice saying when she saw Sari. She was not sure if her voice had sounded out loud or if she had spoken to herself, inside herself. But Sari! She was on the couch with the dark-haired man and her dress was off. Her bra was off. The big man fondled Sari's well formed breasts. He stroked her nipples gently and Sari writhed and moaned and seemed in a trance.
In the chair, when she looked, Amy could see the back of the little man with the wavy hair. It moved rhythmically. Amy could not decide what he was doing. She gasped when she noticed two shapely nylon legs extending. Her own body had begun to throb. Everything was becoming unbearable. Soon she thought if nothing happened she would explode. She didn't dare look toward the couch again where Sari's nude bosom was being explored, or toward the chair where the legs were; and, especially, was she afraid to look down on the floor. The sounds which came up from there....
"Something wrong, honey?"
"I don't know. I feel woozy."
"Is that what you call it, doll?" he said and put his hands around her waist. "I hate this dress. It hides what you've got."
"Oh, John, please."
"Please, what?"
"Your hand. So many people here." Amy was limp in his arms. "John, please."
"Want privacy?"
"Yes, privacy," she said as he guided her to the bedroom.
"Look at that," Amy heard him say. "It's empty. That bed looks like a first class playground. Take your clothes off, honey."
"Can't."
She closed her eyes, the room was spinning. She felt his fingers working at her buttons and snaps, undressing her, but she hardly moved. The breeze from the window was cool on her fevered body as she lay back on the bed, feeling that her breasts were exposed, that he was slipping off her bra and touching her hard nipple with his fingertip.
When she felt the bed shift with his added weight, she opened her eyes. She was almost naked, her blouse and bra were off and below her waist she wore only panties. He had stripped to his pants, and his fly was open.
"You're beautiful," she heard him murmur in her ear as he kissed it. "You're unbelievable."
"John...."
He quieted her by pressing his lips over hers. After a kiss that seemed to last for hours, he moved his lips over her cheeks, then nuzzled his way through her blonde hair and caressed her ear again. When his tongue began licking into her ear, she felt herself breathing deeply.
When he returned to her lips, she felt his tongue moving into her mouth. She twirled her tongue around his, feeling thrills she'd never felt before, then chased his tongue back into his mouth when he withdrew it. Suddenly she realized that her arms were around him, that her hands were moving up and down his back, reaching down to the edge of his slacks.
Their tongues curled furiously around each other, their lips pressed firmly together. Then he slid his leg between her bare thighs and pressed once against her crotch. Her panties were wet.
"John ... I don't know what's happening to me ... I feel so...."
"Shhh," he whispered, kissing her again, pressing his thigh against her crotch. "Relax, honey, just relax."
She lay back as he stroked her bare belly, swirling a finger around in her deep navel. Then his palm pressed against the softness of her tits. Her nipples were hard and swollen, tingling as he caressed them.
As they kissed again, Amy let her hand roam along his thighs, then felt her heart skip a beat when she accidentally brushed against his crotch. She could feel the outline of his cock and balls through his slacks, the warmth, the hardness. He was trembling, breathing deeply into her mouth as their tongues intertwined. She pressed her palm against the bulge again, then felt him pushing her hand away and ripping down his slacks.
Her eyes were closed, but as he lay down beside her again, she knew he was naked. He kissed her again, caressing her neck and then her nipples with his hungry lips. She opened her eyes wide. His cock was hard, and bare, arched up his belly almost to his navel.
She stared wide-eyed at his rod. The shaft was pale and thin, his crown broad and pink, his balls taut. She could see the cockhead bulging as it throbbed, could almost sense his balls tingling. Curiously, she reached for his prick and squeezed it gently in her fingers.
John lay back, taking his lips from her mouth. Amy held the pole upright now, still staring, and felt the hot blood racing through his bulging veins.
"Stroke it," he whispered. "Oh, God, Amy, please, stroke it!"
She squeezed the shaft again, then began jerking the flesh along the hard skeleton of his prick. After a few strokes she closed her fist snugly around the rod and began jerking it more quickly, brushing over the rim of his crown from time to time. His hips were moving now, his breath was quick and deep.
Amy fondled his prick as if it were a new toy, squeezing it, rubbing it, stroking it, pinching the spongy flesh of his cockhead between her fingers. Then with her other hand she reached for his balls and pressed them into her palm. Goose bumps seemed to break out along his thighs. My God, Amy said to herself, he's naked, and I'm touching him!
He reached out to caress her nipples as she caressed his cock. His fingers moved over her tits, her belly, then between her legs. Her panties were stained with moisture now, and her thighs parted as he moved inward to her pussy.
Suddenly John rose on his side and slipped his fingers under the elastic band of her panties. In two seconds flat he'd slid the frillies down her lovely thighs and pulled them from around her ankles. She was naked now, her blonde-fringed cunt sparkling with moisture as he gazed into her crotch.
Her whole body was trembling as she felt her nakedness, the coolness of the breeze, his fingers stroking her hard nipples. Her bush was sopping wet. When his palm came to rest on her knee and then moved inward along her tan thighs, she opened her legs wider and threw her head back in rising passion. By now she'd released his cock, it was pulsing freely, cockhead gleaming with excitement.
Her eyes opened again as he knelt between her thighs, stroking them, moving nearer to her cunt with each stroke. Her blonde bush sparkled with dew, her pink cunt lips were visible through the hairy mesh. She was on fire now, her flesh pins and needles to his touch. She was too excited to think.
John trailed a single finger along her thigh almost to her cunt, sensing the electric thrill he was leaving in its wake. Goose bumps broke out on her legs as he moved his hand back to her knee. He guided his fingers back to her crotch and pressed against the wet hair, and she began shivering all over, panting, closing her eyes and shaking her hips.
And then, his finger found her cunt lips and began rubbing them smoothly. Amy couldn't help letting out a gasp. Her tits shook, her thighs parted farther, his finger slid between the oozing lips and found her pink, pulsing clit.
Staring down at her blonde and pink love nest, he worked his finger up and down her slit, then rubbed her hard clitoris between two fingers. Amy suddenly bounced on the bed, a raw thrill coursing through every vein in her body. Then, carefully, he slid a finger between the wet doors and pushed it almost a full inch into her virgin cunt.
She screamed and shuddered as she finger entered her, bucking her hips as if she were trying to cram the finger deeper and deeper into her body. He slid the finger out, then sliced it in again, poking with his thumb at her bright, pink clit. His fingers were already slippery with her cunt juice.
Her eyes were closed again, his finger still thrilling her, when she felt his lips around one of her nipples, his hand cupping her tit. He kissed one nipple, then the other, then trailed his tongue down over her belly, around her navel, and into her bush.
Amy let out another gasp as he neared her love hole. His finger emerged from her cunt, his tongue quickly took its place, lapping along her wet slice. Then with both hands he pried open her doors until he could see her clit gleaming between them, closed his lips around the pink morsel, and began sucking.
Again she screamed, bounced on the bed. His tongue lapped up and down the length of her chasm, his mouth filled with her juices. His nose pressed against her clit as he edged his tongue between her lips and twirled it in her pussy. When the tip of his tongue found her clit again, her thighs began to shake. By now, Amy was wailing loudly and continually.
John slipped a hand under her ass and sank his fingers into her molten buttocks, still working his tongue and lips skillfully over her pussy. His face pressed hard against her cunt as he pushed her ass upward. John had to pull his head away to gasp for breath.
"Oh, don't stop now, John," she muttered, shaking her head back and forth on the pillow.
But instead, he dove on top of her, bringing his hard cock against the softness of her bush.
"No, John, not that...." she moaned. "Oh, God, no!"
"Amy!" he gasped. "Let me put it inside you!"
"No, I've never ... "
"Please, let me!"
He rubbed his hot crown along her drooling cunt lips. He was gasping as loudly as she was now. "John, please ... "
"You're so wet!"
He guided his cock to the entrance of her love hole, nudging it between her cunt lips. Her entire body stiffened when he pushed the knob through the snug opening.
"Oh, John!" she screamed. "No, I can't!.
He pushed his rod deeper, but her channel was tight, very tight. He tried to twist his hips and ram his hard organ through her cunt lips, but still she was too snug.
"Stop, John, stop before I...."
"You're so tight!" he groaned, sweat beading his forehead as he strained to break through and slice his burning prick into her body.
"Oh, John!"
She found herself clawing at his back now, her hips moving already as he pushed the cock deeper into her. Now almost all his cockhead was buried in her warmth. As her cunt lips were stretched, she felt his warm flesh against her clitoris, and an electric thrill surged through her thighs.
"Yes, John!" she heard herself wail. "Oh, yes, yes!"
Pushing in again, he felt her wince, felt her fingernails raking his back, her hips bucking in anticipation. Another lunge failed to drive the shaft into her chasm. Then, as she froze, he twisted his hips and lunged again. The cockhead popped through her pussy lips and bored into her tight cunt.
"Oh, God!" Amy screeched, "I can feel it inside me!"
Screwing his hips around with all his might, John felt something pushing apart inside her, opening up deep within her hole. His cock slid in forcefully, then seemed to break through the tightness and slice into her channel fully. He pulled back, then pumped again, stuffing her channel fully with one long, smooth lunge.
Amy screamed in his ear as his cock filled her cunt. He eased back, screwed his hips around, and sailed back into her, his stiff shaft sliding through the snug hole and filling her to the brim. Already his gism was soaring toward the snugly-wrapped member.
His pelvis slammed against hers as he lunged forward again, his bush bristled against hers as he left his cock buried inside her for a moment before easing it back. His next thrust brought a wail to her lips, a buck to her hips. Slowly at first, he drilled into her juicy passage, swinging his balls against her flesh.
Amy found her own hips working with his, threshing in response to his strokes. He quickened his lunges, slapping his naked body against hers again and again. Her head shook back and forth, her hair flailed over her face, her buttocks bounced on the bed. And then, she felt herself beginning to come.
"Oh ... John ... I ... OH!"
She tried to say something else, but her words came out as an unintelligible scream. He lifted himself on his elbows and twirled his hips around smoothly, twisting his buried member in her cunt. Her channel was flexing around his rod. Still suspended on his elbows, he sailed into her as quickly as he could, swinging his balls wildly into her buttocks as she scratched at his back.
Suddenly the wave-like movements of her body became more spastic, her hips began to fly. He lowered himself onto her body, crushing her tits against his chest, and drilled ruthlessly into her creamy cunt. Then as she gasped, screamed, scratched, and writhed, she realized she was coming, coming for the first time with a man inside her!
His lunges stuffed her to the hilt as she slithered around under him, shaking wildly as her body was seized by orgiastic tremors. The sensation swept over her, her body convulsed, her hips rose frantically to meet his lunges and he continued screwing into her as quickly as he could.
She was just beyond her peak when she felt his cock plow back into her wet hole and erupt, sending spurt after spurt of his hot fluid deeply into her pussy.
"I feel it!" she screamed. "Oh, my God, I feel it inside me!"
John continued thrusting, groaning as he spurted into her. A few seconds later she felt his cock swimming in her tight, come-gorged channel as he slowed his strokes. He was still gasping desperately for breath when he came to a rest on top of her.
Her body was suddenly seized with fatigue. She didn't want to move. When she felt him slide his cock from her body, she didn't even open her eyes. He kissed her, fondled her tits, curled up beside her for a moment. And then, five minutes later, she felt him leave her.
He dressed and left the room. Amy lay still, eyes closed. It took a half-hour before her heartbeat returned to normal.
She dropped off to sleep, then awoke suddenly without the slightest idea of how long she'd dozed. Naked, she rose from the bed and walked to the living room. The radio was still on, the room was strewn with paper cups. A pair of pantyhose clung to the armchair. But only Sari remained now, lying on the couch, naked, her red bush seemingly as thick as a high-piled rug.
Amy thought of waking her, then returned to her room instead and lay on her back in the darkness. She had a feeling it was going to take her a long, long time to fall asleep again.
CHAPTER FOUR
Word had traveled through the fashion industry that the House of Condon had decided to wow the world with a revolutionary teenage line. Condon realized that the fast travelling word had been released either by Bill Trask Zukor or Gerry Reagan. In no way would he have given it any attention except for the lousy fact that he was not getting anywhere with his teeny bopper onslaught.
No matter what he had done so far to get into gear, Mallory found it to be ineffective. He had employed five teenage models. One came to him with her mother in tow; the girl was fourteen. Condon discovered that having mother on hand was not only advisable but an iron necessity. The girl-Cheryl Lelasche-had an amazingly mature body. Her breasts, Condon reasoned, should they grow any larger would qualify her for burlesque queen activities. The real problem was her precociousness. To Cheryl, Condon was just another available man. Every time he looked up, it seemed, Cheryl had managed to bare a breast or two. One afternoon when her mother had gone out to the hairdressers, Cheryl had openly propositioned him. When he told her, in what he believed to be fatherly fashion, that she was a little too young and that he was perhaps a little too old, Cheryl said with simple scorn: "Dad, you don't know what you're missing. The last man designer I worked for went out of his mind. Mother just spoils it all. She thinks her gang has got the right idea about sex; you know, you wait till you've got wrinkles. Anyway, Mallory, if you don't do that kind of thing you might at least get me a strawberry malted."
Condon did and let her go at the close of the day. Mother protested. "Mrs. Lelasche," Condon told her, "I can't design clothing and protect my chastity at the same time."
Mrs. Lelasche removed Cheryl in a cloud of black smoke. "If you don't control yourself, mother, I'll give up this modelling crap. All you ever think of is money."
"And what do you think of; what do you think of?" Mrs. Lelasche screeched.
"Of very nice things, mother."
Condon shook his head and chuckled as their voices faded down the hall.
The other models gave him dimensions which were right. Yet, he thought, they were little cold professionals without any spirit of what the teenager was really like. In their own way they were inferior to his regular, slightly older models, and certainly inferior to Cheryl who was teenaged in essence. Oversexed to use an old fashioned word, but in a very innocent way. Sex or ice cream were both nice to her. If her breasts were not so large and if she didn't insist on making him, Condon thought he might have enjoyed working with her. But Cheryl did one thing for Condon. She made him wonder what the true teenager was really like. The world could not have changed that much since he was fourteen.
Condon spent part of his time watching teenage girls. He visited at their schools. Went to the beaches, to dances, and to concerts. He convinced himself that the world had truly changed and that he did not quite understand it. He also concluded that he had learned nothing about designing for the teenage lady. When a plain-clothes man cornered him at the beach and questioned him very carefully as if he was a dirty old man, Condon was convinced that he would have to solve his design problems in other ways. If everybody were not expecting him to bring out a teenage line, Condon admitted to himself, he'd chuck the whole business and let Jeri Fashions keep it. Revenge on Gerry Reagan was not that dear or that important to him now. He had become frustrated and bored.
If his frustrations with the teeners were not enough, the newspaper stories about Amy Twain would have been the final blow. Here was this sweetfaced teen-aged blonde-eighteen but that is still part of the impossible group-who comes out of Iowa and is already presenting stunning ideas for teen fashions. And who does Miss Twain work for? Jeri Fashions. If Zukor had known about Amy Twain, why in the world had he worried about Condon? He had little chance to beat Jeri now, he thought. Suddenly he became angry with himself. What the hell was he saying!
When he couldn't out-design, out-think, out-create any damned teenaged corn-husker from Iowa and Gerry Reagan and Bill Zuckor all put together, he would throw his pencil into the river and retire.
The next day he took a different, a new approach. He invited his four teenaged models to have lunch with him in his studio. He knew them each as bodies but he had no knowledge of them, at all, as personalities. Ruth Kilgore was fifteen. She was a black-haired, blue-eyed girl with a perfect little body. In time she would add two inches to her chest and probably four to her bottom but she would still make a very pretty picture. She was extremely cooperative, apparently modest (she would never expose any part of her anatomy if she could help it).
There was Elly Petitpierre, who was, in a certain way, amazing. She barely had the dimensions a model her age (she was an old fifteen) should have. Her breasts had not matured enough and were quite small. Hardly hand fulls. Her hips and thighs were a trifle too lush. Not their size but rather the way she moved them. Because her breasts were small, her arms seemed a little heavy at the biceps and shoulders. Yet this was redeemed by the most graceful lower arms, hands and fingers. Her brown hair, had it not been so luminous, would have been dreadful. Her teeth were very small and very white and quite irregular. For a professional model, that is. What made her a professional model? Why did he select her? He was not sure. When he had selected Elly he had thought: She's off beat; that might help. But he realized, or thought he did, that the reason for picking her was her spirit. She sparked. Beyond that he knew nothing more about her than he knew about Ruth Kilgore.
Maria Holmes was a tall blonde girl. Fourteen. Lovely grey eyes. Her shoulders sloped dramatically. Her legs were so long they seemed infinite. When he worked with her he sometimes thought that those legs would simply leap up from her ankles to her chin. Her pelvis was broad, her hips flat. Her breasts were larger than Cheryl's but somehow seemed proportionate for that long-legged angular frame. He had wanted to describe her as a gawky fawn or a leggy colt but that would have been wide of the mark. Maria Holmes was a doe; she was a filly; who one moment before, just one slender moment before, had been gawky, leggy and wet. She was a newly arrived woman but a woman now; and what a woman she would be as time touched about her and brought her to ripeness.
Cicily Akers, blonde and tall, was sixteen but saying "just fifteen." Almost as if she knew that she was at the apex of a career which age was going to destroy almost immediately. Her breasts, mature, had begun to sag slightly. Cicily had almost developed a reflex action about them. She almost incessantly adjusted them. Lifting them up. Fixing her bra, fearing at any moment that some mysterious elastic would give way and her carefully cultured bosom would fall down to her belly button. In body and face, if one did not look too carefully, Cicily Akers was perfect. Yet she was not. She was, he thought, the opposite of Elly Petitpierre. Elly's spirit transcended all her physical faults; Cicily's lack of spirit was destroying and aging a perfect body.
Yet, he did not know any of them. So far none of this knowledge had broken the teenage barrier. Maybe, just maybe, Condon thought, hoped rather, that just talking to these half-chicks might give him an answer.
When they had gotten comfortable in his studio, Condon said: "Girls, I've invited you to lunch and a bull session because I need your help."
"Mallory Condon, you are kidding," Elly Petitpierre said lighting a cigarette. "All right if I smoke?" When Condon hesitated she said quickly, "It's all right. I mean it's not a joint. Not pot, just a filtered nothing."
"Of course," Condon said and thought that the lunch might have more to it than he had bargained for. "Of course, I want you to feel completely free. Smoke. Have what you like for lunch."
"Anything?" asked Ruth Kilgore. "I mean just anything?" she squealed with girlish delight.
Condon looked at the faces of the girls. They were obviously responding with the same kind of happy day-camp surprise.
"Yes, anything," he agreed with a laugh.
"How about steaks and salads all around?" Maria Holmes suggested. There was immediate agreement.
"Desserts?" Condon asked and looked from face to face. There were no takers. "That's what I call iron discipline, ladies."
"Only on weekends," Cicily Akers said wearily. "How I would love a ... no ... I won't say it."
"Last call, kids. Anything else?"
Elly looked at him, the smile on her pretty face holding steadily: "Anything? Do you really mean it, Mallory? Anything; just anything we want and it's OK and you won't feel angry or annoyed?"
"That's it. You're my guests. What do you want?"
"A very dry martini, no garbage, on the rocks," Elly Petitpierre answered, her smile not wavering.
"Oooh," squealed Maria Holmes, "me too-that's my lollipop."
Condon managed to preserve his cool, although he felt a tingling sensation around the perimeter of his scar. "Two lollipops," he managed without a change in voice. "And what about you, Ruth?"
"No, thanks. It's murder for my ulcer."
"Cicily?"
"I hate liquor."
Condon ordered the lunch through the intercom and he listened to Miss Fetucci gasp. Almost instantly she called him back. "Mr. Condon," she said urgently, "If you are going to have one of those orgies with those children, I will leave your employment!"
"Miss Fetucci, I wouldn't blame you one single bit. Do me a favor will you? Pop in here every fifteen minutes."
"All right. That will help you control yourself."
"Estelle, it's not my control I'm worried about. I need protection. These kids might attack me."
"Mr Condon!" She snapped off.
They had been kicking Mallory Condon's problem around between mouthfuls of steaks. Elly and Maria handled their drinks without any obvious difficulty.
At first the conversation seemed aimless and filled with laughter. The girls were enjoying the outing. As a matter-of-fact, Condon admitted, he was too. What he enjoyed was the testing. The girls wanted to find out how far he would go in terms of tolerance. Was he really a sincere person? Or was he another grown-up who was going to suddenly start to lecture them? When they had thrown him curve balls, fast balls and spit balls, and when he had handled them nicely and according to their satisfaction, they dropped their guards. They could talk to him and they could trust him. They had by unspoken common consent allowed Mallory Condon to look into their world.
"Mallory," Ruth Kilgore said as she patted her mouth with a napkin, "I feel I can call you Mallory."
"Mai."
"Mai, then. I'm tired of that 'Sir' bit."
"Why in hell have you been calling me 'Sir' anyway?"
"Oh, it's part of my act," Ruth paused to light a cigarette. "It makes people remember me. I think it gets me work; helps my career. Hell with that. I've been thinking one of the reasons you can't design for teens is that you're ... not square, you're not that ... you're too ... you believe that we are what we look like."
"Innocent, Ruth; is that the word, I'm innocent?"
"Yes. About us."
"I think she's hit on something, Mai," Cicily agreed enthusiastically. "Oh, we know you're a swinger. Cripes, look at you! MMMMMMm! I look at you that way but you don't look at me as anything but a green peach."
"I wouldn't say that."
"Honesty, must be honest, Mai." Elly chirped. "This is like group analysis and we must be honest."
"OK. I think of all of you as kids, green peaches, potential women or at the very most-barely women!"
"It's honest," Maria said, tossing her blonde head, "but hardly encouraging. I thought I was getting to you, Mai."
"You do look shocked, Mai," Elly said. "Please don't be. I know two models-no names, now-who have slept with you. They think you're great. They recommend you."
"I have to admit that I really am unprepared for this much honesty."
Cicily laughed. "Give up, Mai? Have enough?"
"Nope. I have to learn how to design clothes for your generation."
Maria said, "You have a funny approach with all this truth and consequences bit."
"You have a better way for me to understand what kind of clockworks you've got?"
"I don't know anything about clockworks."
"If I know you, I can design better. I know the women of, excuse the expression, my generation. I therefore think I know how to dress them."
"And undress them," Elly piped.
"That too."
"I love your bras," Maria said. "So you must know something about our...."
"That's universal woman; basic. I must know what is special about you."
"I only wear your bras when I feel I want to be sexy," Maria added. "Why don't you make a cool bra, Mai?"
The girls began to titter and suddenly it occurred to Condon that they sounded like teenagers. It was a welcome sound. Until that moment Condon felt out of touch with reality. It seemed that they had come from another planet as spirits and by some science fiction kind of reasoning had taken over the bodies of Ruth Kilgore, Elly Petitpierre, Maria Holmes and Cicily Akers. The bodies now were controlled by out-of-this-world minds. Condon listened to the continuing laughter and he was much relieved. He heard his own laughter start and join theirs."
"If sex is nothing, so to speak," Condon resumed, "what is important?"
"We're looking for that; we can't find it," Cicily said.
Maria Holmes said, "I've got it! I've got it!"
"Got what?"
"About designing for teenagers. It just came to me in one big blast."
"Tell us," Cicily said, "before we all die."
"Yes," said Mallory, "before we all die."
"Well, it's this. You can't design for teenagers. Teenagers really design for themselves. All you can do is keep your eyes open and wait for some kookies to camp something or do something, then you take it and build from there. I'm not being too clear. Do you understand me, Mai?"
Condon, stunned at the astute analysis, slumped into his black leather chrome chair and slowly lit a slim cigar. "Yes. Yes, Maria, I understand perfectly. I think you're right. Damn it, I know you're right. Thanks."
As they left his office Elly Petitpierre stopped before his desk. "Mind if I take one of your cigars, Mai?"
His eyebrows hardly went up. "Sure, lover, but please smoke it outside. Everybody knows that those are my brand and I won't have anybody accuse me of corrupting the morals of minors."
The girl with the little bosom sniffed at the Mexican cigar and smiled at Condon. Her eyes held his in a steady stare, until he lowered his eyes and swiveled his back to her. 'He heard her laughter tinkle as she walked out of the room.
The lunchroom session with the teeny swingers was a shattering experience for Mallory Condon. He had believed that he was a man of the world, a true sophisticate. Now he felt foolish and very much like a child himself. For the first time, in a very long time, he also felt frightened. Were those the mothers of tomorrow?
He decided to take a brisk walk through the town. It might, he hoped, shake the shock out of his battered head. The walk was brisk but the shock did not quite leave. So when the call came from the PR firm which handled the affairs of the House of Condon, Mallory was unnerved by it.
Ivan Courtney was on the wire: "Right as rain, Mai-this is one hell of a coup!"
"Repeat that slowly, Ivan," Mai said in a daze. "Very slowly."
"Something wrong?"
"No, nothing. Just repeat it. I'm to do what?"
"You're to be on the Herk Handly Show. He'll interview you about what you're going to do about teen fashions."
"Yes. I got that part. But about Amy Twain?"
"Oh, this kid designer! She'll be on, too. You know, Condon, the master, discusses fashions for teens with Amy Twain, the amateur. Then after that you and this Amy Twain will get out on the floor and do a little dance with the other kids."
Condon's laughter burst out like water from a fire hydrant turned on suddenly. His laughter roared and rose up.
"Mallory, what the hell is the matter with you?" The laughter got louder. "Mallory? Mallory?"
Then Ivan Courtney heard a crash. He thought it sounded like a chair toppling. A chair with someone in it.
CHAPTER FIVE
The TV studio floor was filled with them. The enemy, Condon thought. The loudspeakers poured the sound through the air of the large room. Large enough for several trucks, a few elephants and a few acres of hand to hand combat. The concrete floor was filled with boy bodies and girl bodies, twitching and jerking and looking out into space or up at the huge lamps which illuminated the scene.
He watched the dancing, and he especially watched the girl dancers. More than half of them wore what he recognized to be Jeri Fashions. If that average held nationally, Zukor and Regan were without a doubt rich, rich, rich.
A blue dress caught his eye. It was obviously home designed and made. It didn't fall right on the girl's frame but the idea was interesting. Condon took out a notebook and sketched. The blue dress could become something, he thought. Herk Handly's voice sounded over everything.
"Hi, Kids. You're doing swell! Great out there!
Everyone of you is wonderful! You're all great! Just keep having fun and when you hear the next disk which is the new Bantly and Mantly hit we'll be on the air and I do want you to scream it out for Herk Handly-OK?"
And then came Bantly and Mantly and then came the great big scream and all of the bodies danced at a faster pace. Condon looked at the control room where the technicians and director kept a half eye on the action. The sound man was riding gain and reading the newspaper at the same time.
A few of the dancers seemed to be enjoying themselves. Another few, quite select, Condon thought even had the knack of making their dance erotic. A small girl-not quite five feet tall-in a heavy sweater which didn't manage to swallow her breasts in a sea of wool had her dance partner sweating in a corner of the studio. She was doing excellent grinds and bumps in perfect tempo. What she was saying to him Condon could not hear, nor could he read it on the lips of her laughing mouth. Condon watched her dance the boy right against the studio wall and then press against him. The boy's hands remained limp at his sides. The poor male thing was being raped and he was utterly helpless. He wondered how old the girl was-thirteen?
Handly's voice sounded again: "Good evening everybody and anybody I've left out. Good evening, grandpa and grandma. Watch the boys and girls having fun and listen to ol' Herk Handly. I'll be bringing you news of the young world where the big sound is everywhere and where the big ideas come from. Today, we have Rubin and his Red Robin Rangers to sing their new smash hit. We have Celeste-still on top of the top forty-to sing her brand new song. She wants you to tell her-will she make the charts again?" Roar of affirmation from the floor. "Wait till you hear her do it. We also have a new group here from California-the Davey Jones' Locker with the new sound and their new climbing song 'I Heard You Cry In The Church Yard.'" Another roar.
"Also, and this is mainly for the girls. We have as our guest the great designer Mallory Condon to talk fashions with us. And to help us out with all that fashion jazz we have our own expert Amy Twain who won the Golden Thimble Award for teenage design! In the meee-annn time, kiddios, leave us get loose and dancio-dodo."
Condon got the sudden urge to run like mad. Get out of here. Leave this junior version of hell. Go find an old lady of twenty-five or twenty-eight. A decrepit dame and do her in. But run, Condon, run.
But it was too late. An old teenager of nineteen had him by the elbow. "Mr. Condon?" she asked.
"You've got me."
"Will you come with me? Herk wants to pre-interview you between records. Amy Twain is already here."
He followed behind her. She walked to the sound of the beat. Her behind twitched like the tail of a fly ridden burro. When they reached the platform where Herk Handly sat, the girl turned to him with a warm smile. Condon thought she was going to say: Did you like that, Mr. Condon? Instead she said, "Herk will be right with you."
Sitting alongside Herk Handly was Amy Twain. He recognized her at once. She was, he admitted, far more attractive than she appeared in the newspaper photos. Her platinum hair-genuine, obviously-snapped brightly under the studio lights. Her green eyes-where had he seen that kind of deep dancing green-were filled with excitement. She was hardly nervous. Her fingers snapped to the music and her shoulders and her buttocks were jumping to the sound.
The dress she wore was stunning. It was a turtleneck geranium red A-line affair with no sleeves. The dress hugged her neck, cunningly hugged and lifted her lovely breasts, and then touched her hips teasingly only to flare out and away. Like the skirt of a little girl. It kept the illusion of innocence and it screamed sex in four-letter words. And Amy Twain, this girl he looked at, who danced where she sat, had designed it!
As he lit a cigar, Mallory found that he could not take his eyes away from Amy Twain. It was difficult to think of her as eighteen. The face, yes, but that body. He forced himself to concentrate on her dress. It was very good, indeed; but, and he smiled to himself, she had not figured out two problems. The skirt in mass production would never flare out that way. The turtleneck if it were to grip the neck would have to add to the expense of production and lift it out of the mass market. But she had talent. He found his eyes staring at her bosom again. Inside his head, Condon heard himself saying: I want her!
Handly leaned down to him. "Hi, Mallory, want to come up here so's we can talk a little?"
Condon stepped up. Herk interviewed him in whispers between record plays and guests. Mai Condon answered in whispers keeping his eyes on Amy. When Herk finished he gestured Mai to sit down in the chair next to Amy Twain.
He did it quickly and briskly. "I'm Mallory Condon, Miss Twain."
Amy's mouth opened in a half-laugh, half-smile. Her nose crinkled and her spray of freckles danced across it. "I know that, Mr. Condon. I'm so pleased to meet you."
"I'm flattered. But in a certain way we're rivals."
"I know. Still and all, I've learned more from you than from anybody else alive."
"Now you've flattered me again. I've been studying the dress you have on, Miss Twain. There's no influence of mine in it. Matter of fact, I learned something from it."
"You really did?"
"Oh, yes. I think...."
But Herk's old teenage assistant interrupted them. "Herk is going to announce you now. When he does, Mr. Condon, you just take Amy's hand and lead her right over there to that table-see it?-where they are putting down those big ice cream sodas."
"Yes," Mallory said.
"Good luck," said Herk's assistant.
Herk Handly concentrated his interview on Mallory Condon. Mai sat stiffly through the introduction which he had heard a hundred times before.
Professional boxer, black belt karate man, engineer, and, of course, America's top designer. He was inwardly furious with Ivan Courtney. That was the one thing he wanted to get done. Kill all reference to his predesigning days. He hated being a hero. He hated being described as a rough, tough, killer type. All it meant was that he would soon become somebody's target. Like the gun-slinger in the Westerns, somebody would want to try him on for size. His background brought spectacular results when it appeared in a newspaper or a magazine. Television should produce, he thought, a new kind of experience. For the moment he closed it out of his mind.
By and large the show interview and talk about teen fashions was quite good. He said as little as he could. He let Amy Twain carry the ball with her warm enthusiasm and marvellous embracing generalities.
As the interview ended, Herk announced his surprise for the audience. "Now, kiddios, here's a thing you're going to enjoy! Amy Twain is going to dance with the dashing, smashing, handsome Mallory Condon!" Big roar from floor. "That's not all, Amy Twain is going to try a tango with Mallory Condon-and she has never done that before!" Roar. Roar. Laughter. "So begins the battle of the designers. Give them that big beat, Rubin Rubin!"
The sound started up and Amy Twain and . Mallory Condon were out in the middle of the vast studio floor. The teenage dancers circled around them. Amy began to move. Mai moved right along. The dance was simple and, of course, he had done it before. The teen swingers in the circle watched the great grace of Mallory Condon. They clapped hands in rhythm as Condon danced.
Amy Twain who danced with him felt his presence and felt that he was holding her, controlling her. Somehow, he had turned the dance from no-touch to deep-touch. Amy looked into Mallory Condon's penetrating black eyes as long as she could bear it. Then she looked down to avoid them.
Looking down was no good either. His hips and his waist moved in easy circles. Talking. Touching her with a terrible force. She looked off to the side. Yet her body tingled and a hot wave of longing rode up her skin. She wanted to yell out-or to go off the. floor but they were on camera and who knows how many tens of thousands of people were watching. Still he was doing this. She became angry. Was he trying to embarrass her or make her chicken out, lose her cool. She decided to show him but the music stopped.
Everybody applauded. Mallory applauded her. She, of course, applauded him and when their eyes met Amy could see that he was laughing.
The music started again. It was a tango. And this was very true: Amy Twain had never danced a tango.
Mallory's arm swept around her waist. His strong fingers holding her side just below her breast. The tango rhythm flowed through his body and into hers. He moved her as if she were a doll. She felt terrified knowing that she had to move as he directed or look like a fool. After a moment her fear left.
She felt secure. She knew that Condon would not let her be hurt. He was smiling at her as he moved her through a dream in a tempo she did not know but which had begun to burn her and light her desires. She wanted to have Mallory Condon. More than anything else she wanted to go to bed with him. He whirled her around. Her skirt flared out, whipping against her thighs. Condon swept her against his chest, the nipples of her breasts crushing into him. His face close to hers. Then it ended. The music ended and he released her as the audience applauded them.
"Wonderful, wonderful!" Herk Handly shouted into his microphone. "Mallory Condon and Amy Twain!"
Another record blast filled the studio. The kiddios began to dance and Condon holding Amy by the elbow whispered, "Let's get out of here!" Still in a trance Amy smiled and moved with Mallory to the studio door and out.
They found a coffee shop to sit down in. " I want to apologize for making an absolute ass of myself, Amy."
"How do you mean, Mr. Condon?"
"Amy please. The tango. I just got carried away. I hope you had no relatives watching."
"No. They're in Iowa. Anyway, I loved it. Thank you for seeing that I didn't look too bad. I tried to make you look silly."
"I know. But it didn't matter."
"I'll say it didn't. You did it better than I did."
"Well, I learn fast. As a matter-of-fact, I've spent one entire day learning about the new generation. I must say that I learned a lot about you teenagers."
Amy felt annoyed by that. He was playing at being an adult. He was telling her politely that she was just a child. She would have enjoyed him just a little bit or a lot perhaps by saying: "You know what I did the other night, Mallory Condon? You can't imagine, can you? Well, let me tell you I went to bed with a man! I was naked and he was naked. And we went all the way!"
That would shock him she thought. But, it might drive him away. It was bad enough that he was thinking of her as a teenager. She tried another approach. She faced him directly so that her bosom lifted toward him. " I think something is wrong with the bust line of this dress, Mallory; what do you think?"
Mallory smiled: "There's nothing wrong with your bust line, Amy. I've been watching it all afternoon. The neck and the skirt need attention. But I'll not give you advice on that since you work with my chief competitor."
"Can't you be nice, Mallory; take me dancing."
"You're flirting, Amy, aren't you?"
"Yes."
"You don't have to," he said in a way which made her feel very much like a little girl. "Where do you live; I'll take you home."
Once in the taxi Mallory had become withdrawn. His handsome face had become a mask. Amy watched it, fascinated. The street lights and the city illuminations clicked across his face like a stick being pulled across the pickets of a fence, each light fragment hitting against the scar on his cheek and bumping up. It seemed to Amy that Mallory Condon's face was very sad.
A tragedy, she thought, that was it! Mallory Condon had some deep secret tragedy which he hid from everyone behind his dashing-man-of-the-world image. But she could see through it now.
Was it a woman, she wondered? Some divine creature who Condon loved, who had deserted him, or who had died in some hideous accident? Between the two situations, Amy thought, she would prefer that this ungrateful woman had perished.
Or perhaps it wasn't a woman after all. A parent? No. She cancelled that thought. It didn't seem right that Mallory would have parents. Born on a far planet, dropped on earth; that was Mallory. Immortal. Immortal, Mallory Condon.
Maybe he had committed a crime? The police chasing him all over the world! His name was not really Mallory Condon. Designing dresses was just a front. But sooner or later he would have to flee. Find a new name ... even a new face. Perhaps tonight was the very night he had to leave everything behind and run away. This idea reached Amy and moved her. Almost without noticing it, tears had filled her eyes.
She studied Condon's face again. The red ash of his slim cigar cast a pale reflection on the scar which ran so cruelly down his cheek. A secret agent? Could that be it? Of course, the explained everything about the Condon legend! How-no one had ever heard of him before-he came out of nowhere and soon became the world's leading designer. Marvellous disguise. It put Mallory in international circles so that he could be in easy touch with all friendly and enemy agents. And who would suspect a designer? As far as his ability to come up with new sensational clothes all the time-why that was even simpler! The government without a doubt had an army of top flight designers working behind the scenes. Probably every night there was a secret delivery of prize-winning fashions delivered to the door of the House of Condon.
That was it; Mallory Condon was a secret agent!
But he still looked out of the window. It was, again, almost as if she was not there.
Amy reached over and took Mallory's hand in hers. It was heavy and numb. He showed no signs of recognition. She caressed the hard long fingers with the carefully manicured nails. She put his hand to her lips and kissed it. She thought that Mallory's cheek twitched with that. He was becoming aware although his face still stared ahead in the passing lights of the early night.
Amy, as unobtrusively as she could, slid close to Mallory Condon. She had never done this before, made a play for a man. It was always a man moving after her. Sometimes she wanted him too, like Charlie Rider or Johnny Vole. But if she wanted men to reach for her or not she always knew that they would. But here, now, in this taxi she was going after Mallory Condon. Shameless, she thought! But so exciting! She simply did not care if it was right or wrong. All she knew now was that her body had caught fire. She could barely keep her hips from pumping in the seat. Her heart was beating Condon's tango. Her golden breasts tingled beneath her dress. As she kissed Condon's fingers again, she placed his hand between her breasts. The hand rested there, riding up and down as she breathed. If Condon was aware of what she did then, he showed nothing.
Amy wanted to take that strong hand with the dark hair on the back of it and place it next to her bare tits. She would have done it that instant except for the dress she was wearing. She muttered a very dirty word under her breath and surprised herself by doing it. She had no room to maneuver with a turtleneck pull-over design. She certainly was not going to get undressed in a cab! Her body throbbed. She closed her eyes. She moaned softly to herself. The breeze from the window touched her thighs and Amy realized for the first time that her skirt had pushed up very high on her thighs, bearing the flesh above her stockings and revealing her Condon see-through panties.
Amy looked slowly toward Mallory. Did he see her? His face, still withdrawn, looked straight ahead as if there was nothing in the world except him and his thoughts.
Amy felt that she was ready to melt. She put Condon's hand down, resting it on her nylon thighs. Like an animal asleep, the hand stirred, touched the nylon distractedly and then lifted away. She watched the hand rise up to his face and take the cigar from his mouth.
Condon turned to her. There was a half-smile on his face. "You'll be home in five minutes, Amy." Then the smile vanished and he returned to his private withdrawn world.
Amy angrily pulled her skirt down. He didn't seem to notice that either! Then she thought: I must make him see something, remember something! She turned quickly on the seat and kissed him. It was a hot kiss and she wanted to have him understand it that way. Her mouth had been open as she closed it over his mouth; her tongue had fluttered against his locked lips which had opened briefly in a display of surprise, just long enough for her tongue to burst in and taste the mouth of Mallory Condon. But his arms held her off. "Hey!" he said with a smile. "That was unfair. I'm not accustomed to being attacked in taxis!"
"Come to my apartment."
"Some other time perhaps, Amy," Condon said very gently. "I have appointments."
"Not even for an hour?"
"Not even for a minute. I might like it and stay."
"Are you afraid of that, Mallory?"
"Very much. You're a little young for me, darling. And who knows-you might also be romantic. One of my private rules for sex is: never play with babies because love is always involved."
"Mallory, I don't know what you are talking about. Do I look like a baby? Come with me!"
He stared into her eyes. His brain was telling him that she worked for Jeri, for Zukor and Gerry Reagan, that she was probably up to the same tricks as Valerie had been, and that he'd better watch out. But his cock was telling him that he wanted her more than anything else in the world at that moment, and that he could have her for the asking.
"Come with me, Mallory," she said again as the cab pulled up in front of her building.
He remembered the superb blow-job Valerie had treated him to in the car. He'd come out of that okay. Couldn't he handle this teenager? She was offering herself, for reasons he wasn't quite sure of. Couldn't he take what she was offering and enjoy it, without consequences, as he'd done with Valerie Montbatten?
He looked in her eyes hard again and smiled. "Okay, honey, you show the way."
Amy felt her heart leap into her mouth. She'd almost given up. Now she had him, and she wasn't quite sure what to do with him. He was used to women, to girls with experience. Now he was expecting her to please him. She only hoped she could.
They spoke little on the way to her apartment. Even as they entered, Mallory was still silent, as if he were thinking about something else. Amy was used to being chased by men. Now she was doing the chasing, and the feeling was very strange.
Mallory walked directly into the bedroom, she followed.
"Would you like a drink?" she asked nervously.
"No, let's get right to it, honey."
She stood in the doorway as he began to take off his clothes. He did work fast. But hadn't she been the one to suggest they make it? She couldn't back away now, couldn't let him see that she was nervous.
"Sure, Mallory, if that's the way you want it."
"That's the way I want it," he said, throwing his shirt aside. "Take off your clothes."
She was just removing her blouse as he sat on the edge of the bed in his underwear. Her heart was pounding, but she tried to look calm. She could feel his gaze on her body as she bared her tits, then slid down her panties and stood completely naked before him.
"Nice," he said. "Very nice. Come here."
She felt her legs wobbling a bit as she stepped toward the bed. Then, in a sudden move that gave her a surprised start, he reached out and pulled her down onto the bed beside him, crushing her into his arms and kissing her savagely on the mouth.
Their lips pressed together, their tongues twined around each other inside her mouth. She felt faint, completely in his power already, her fingers trembling as she gripped him around the arms.
"Mallory, y-you're too...." she stammered, pulling her lips away.
"Too fast?"
"Yes."
"I told you," he smiled, "I've got appointments."
She was about to reply when he pulled her closer and once again crushed his lips against hers. His hand dropped to her thigh, moved in toward her crotch, and she felt her legs parting on their own. When he began kissing her neck, she looked down at his crotch, and saw the outline of his prick and balls under his briefs. His cock looked to be twice the size of John Vole's.
"Touch it," he said.
She reached into his crotch and pressed her fingers against his bulge. But he rose quickly and slid his briefs down his legs. She gasped when she saw his prick, fat and very long, veins bulging along the dark shaft, cockhead throbbing as if to invite her to touch it.
Amy was still staring down at his prick in awe as she held the tool up straight, the swollen red cap aimed at the ceiling. The shaft was arched in full stiffness, the blood beat rapidly through his veins. She remembered what Sari had said about Mallory Condon, about his huge prick that every model in New York hungered for. It was hers how. And she wanted to show him that she could make him happy, too.
Slowly, heart fluttering, she bent over and let her blonde hair fall to his thighs. Mallory gasped when he felt the first caress on the tip of his cock. He'd made love to so many women in his life that he couldn't begin to count them, but he couldn't recall ever being as horny as he was now.
She kissed his cockhead once, then trailed her tongue down the shaft until her lips were pressed against the base, nibbling. Her light fingers massaged his balls as his thighs flexed. Then her tongue flicked his balls. .He shook. She wondered what to do next. Squeezing the cock harder between her fingers, she sucked his scrotum into her mouth and began working it around with her tongue.
"Amy, that feels great!" he blurted out.
Encouraged now, she sucked his sac hard, then let go of the hairy balls and licked her way upward along the shaft again. Her tongue circled his cockhead, her lips closed around the cap and her caress moved halfway down his long shaft, then up again.
He watched her work, watching her soft lips move slowly up and down his gleaming shaft. He could tell that she hadn't done this much before, but her caress was wonderful, exciting, eager, tender, loving, hungry. Already, he feared, his gism was creeping toward his prick.
She moved the soft, delicate circle of her lips up and down his shaft slowly. He felt the heat of her mouth moving down, covering inch after inch of his long rod, then her tongue lapping out around his cockhead when she'd risen to the top again. There was no doubt about it; if he let her continue, he was going to come in minutes!
Amy too was gasping for breath as she rose and fell rapidly on his thick shaft, sucking furiously on the head, curling her tongue around the shaft as it entered her mouth. He stroked the smooth flesh of her shoulders, pushed her blonde hair away from his thighs so that he could see her lips working, see her luscious tits quivering. Her nipples looked so swollen they appeared ready to burst.
Her lips shone with moisture as she sucked on the glowing knob of his cockhead. Mallory had to gasp again when she slid down his rod, taking in most of his long shaft and sucking on it a moment before she rose again. He knew that a few more plunges would send his gism spurting into her warm mouth.
He took hold of one of her tits and massaged the putty-like flesh in his fingers. She was gasping more loudly now as she sucked his cock, fingering his balls and shaking her hair over his thighs as she plunged. Then he felt his cock gorging with semen. He waited until he was ready to burst, then pushed her head away and groaned.
"Mallory, what?...."
His prick was bent forward as she held it, still pulsing, cockhead swollen. Then he felt the gism subsiding. He was going to fuck her now, fuck her as she'd never been fucked before. He pushed her hand away from his cock and reached out for her.
His prick snapped back against his belly, she looked into his eyes with disappointment, as if he'd just taken away her most prized possession. But before she could say a word, he took hold of her waist and pulled her on top of him.
Her buttocks were blazing as they settled on his thighs, her tits were quivering before his eyes. She stared down at him, grinning, her eyes glassy like his and her mouth open as she breathed very deeply.
"Put it in me!" she gasped as she reached down for his prick. Her fingers closed around it. "Ah, darling, it's so hot!"
She lifted her buttocks from his body and raised his prick upright so that the cockhead was nestled in her bush. He was gasping and groaning himself as he took hold of his prick and rubbed the crown along her cunt lips. The pink flaps were positively drooling with pussy juice.
Digging his fingers into her waist, he pulled her down sharply on his crotch. His fat cock bore cleanly into her wet channel, her blonde bush met his bush and her soft buttocks crashed into his balls as she sat on him, fully stuffed.
"Oh!" she crooned, shaking her head back and forth. "It's so deep, I can feel it!"
"God, you're tight!" he blurted out. "And so wet!"
For a few moments he couldn't move. He savored the snugness of her pussy, felt it twitching all around his member, felt her warmth penetrating his shaft and her wetness coating it. But then she slowly lifted herself, easing her channel upward along his shaft until his crown was left inside her. When she dropped again, her buttocks slapped into his thighs, his cock drove deeply into her cunt and sent her head shaking back and forth again..
Now he took firm hold of her waist and screwed his hips upward to fill her. She bounced on top of him, screaming and gasping, her tits wobbling from the force of his lunges. Within a few moments she was bouncing furiously, erratically, like a puppet on a string pulled in every direction at the same time.
He watched her tits shake in front of his eyes, watched her face contort with pleasure, her lips open to gasp for breath, her eyes open once and then close again as he drilled his prick up into her cunt again.' He let go of her waist with one hand and took hold of her flying tits, grinding the steaming flesh against her chest as if he were trying to flatten her tit into a pancake. But they were much too large for that.
Her nipple throbbed against his palm as he fondled her tits. He slid a finger into the crack between her mounds, then looked down at his cock as she rose above it. His prick emerged from her body, glistening, he could see her pink cunt lips stretched open by his thick manhood. Then he watched her blonde bush descend to his pelvis again, watched his cock disappear into her pussy and her tan thighs slap crisply against his at the end of her plunge.
But he remembered that, when she was standing naked by the bed, it was her tan buttocks that had most enticed him. He let her rise and fall a few more times on his cock, then, just as his rod began to stiffen with seed again, he lifted her from his stake and tossed her onto her belly.
She groaned when she felt his cock leave her. But before she had time to miss his delving thrusts, he climbed to his knees and straddled her ass, prick in hand.
"Oh God, hurry!" she bleated.
He gazed in wonder at her firm, dark moons, then pressed his open palms against the scalding cheeks and yanked them open. Her ass crack was hairless. But an inch from her asshole, he could see the blonde hairs of her bush. He steered his cock between her buttocks and rubbed the hot tip along her wet slice.
She reached under her body to guide him into her. His crown cleared her doors, he pumped once and drove his long staff into her cunt all the way to the base. She screamed so loudly as he entered her that he had to wonder if she were coming.
For a moment he didn't move, and she lay still underneath him. Their bodies were locked together, his pelvis rested on the warm pillow of her buttocks. Then he pulled back and rammed his pole into her cunt again, his wet cockflesh slipping easily into the tight channel, his balls swinging freely against her upturned cheeks.
The room was suddenly filled with her wails, with the steady slap of bare flesh against bare flesh as his pelvis clapped against her ass again and again. Amy shook her head back and forth, then buried her face in a pillow to stifle her screams.
He reached under her body and took hold of her tit, massaging it softly at first, then twisting it around in his palm as if he were trying to tear it from her body. Her pussy twitched wildly around his pistoning member, squeezing it when he was inside her, flexing a few times as he slid it from between her cheeks, twirled his hips to rub his hot stake against her clit, and then lunged hard again, filling her to the brim. Gism was soaring into his prick again, and this time he had no intention of stopping.
But he wanted to feel her tits against his chest as he came, wanted to stare into her face as he reached the peak of his pleasure. He pumped a few more times into her cunt, then slid it gently from her body.
"Oh, Mallory, don't stop!"
Before she knew what was happening, he flipped her over, spread her thighs, and jumped between them. His cock rubbed against her wet lips, he took hold of the organ and slid the cap through her doors. She was shaking her head back and forth again and moaning continually as he readied his first lunge.
When it came, she tightened her cunt around his prick and screamed in his ear. He pressed his chest against her breasts, feeling the nipples beating against him, caressing her lips and neck madly as she shook under him.
Her hand roamed over his back, then found his hard buttocks. A finger slid into his ass crack, then another hand pressed against his cheek, pushing down, sending his prick sailing into her cunt all the more quickly. The fury of her passion was so intense that he had no idea if or when she was coming.
She flexed her pussy around his member, digging her fingers into his buttocks and lashing her tongue into his mouth when he pressed his lips against hers. Each thrust of his hips brought a loud, wet, sloshing sound as he tore into her snug channel, then a clap of flesh against flesh, then two long, sensuous groans.
"I'm gonna come now!" he panted in her ear. "I can't stop now!"
"Do it!" she wailed. "Do it, do it, do it!"
She shrieked as the entire length of his thick tool bored deeply, quickly into her thrilled cunt. She was almost sobbing now, scratching his ass with her fingernails as he quickened his strokes.
He could feel the end of his rod reaching to the farthest limits of her channel, ripping along the tight, wet channel, sliding from her cunt for only a split second before he drilled back into her. Gism swelled his cock, shudders of pleasure surged through his balls, his pelvis, and his ass as her fingers caressed it. In all his life, he'd never felt such total, thoughtless pleasure.
A hoarse groan caught in his throat as his cockhead bulged inside her. Two quick thrusts brought him to the brink of his orgasm. And then one long, hard lunge pushed him over the edge.
Pumping at top speed, he swung his balls against her ass and ripped mercilessly into her cunt. Amy bucked wildly under him as he grunted in her ear, lashing his prick to the ends of her channel just as the first squirt of gism blasted into her tight cunt.
They were writhing on the bed as he came, rocking the mattress, slapping their bodies together with an insane fury. Mallory's orgasm seemed to last for a full minute before the last drops of his seed oozed into her creamy love hole.
He could hardly catch his breath as he came to a rest on top of her.
"Oh, Mallory, that was so good, that was the best, ever, I mean it!" she panted. "I could feel your come squirting into me."
When he'd caught his breath, he slid his cock from her pussy and lay on his back for a few minutes.
"Did you like it?" she asked, stroking his hairy chest.
"Yeah, you can report to Gerry Reagan that I absolutely went wild over you, honey," he replied as he sat up. "Tell her you're twice as good as Valerie."
"As who?"
He rose from the bed and began dressing. "You play that innocent game very well, too."
"Mallory, what are you talking about?"
He didn't reply until he was fully dressed. Amy still sat up in bed, eyes wide, mind swirling in confusion.
"Mallory, what is it? Tell me."
He walked over to the bed and pecked her on the lips. "Too bad you're with that bitch, honey. I could really go for you."
"What bitch? What does Gerry Reagan have to do with us?"
"Everything," he answered as he started from the room. "Tell Zukor and Reagan that whatever it is they want, they might as well come and ask for it, because I'm not going to fall for their little game."
"What game?" Amy said, lips trembling as she felt herself near tears. "Mallory, please, don't go! You don't understand."
"Sure, honey, sure."
He left the room. She sat motionless until she heard the front door slam. Then she fell onto the bed and started to cry.
Five minutes ago, everything was perfect. What had happened that made him change so? What had she done wrong? Why had he treated her like dirt?
She sobbed into the pillow, cursing him. For the first time in her life, Amy hated someone.
CHAPTER SIX
In the House of Condon during the days following the Herk Handly telecast, almost everyone noted Mallory's tenseness and they stayed clear of him. The fact that he had barked at Estelle Fetucci and had put her in tears was enough to warn the entire establishment that "the Boss" was having a hard time. Yet he managed to work. His teenage design ideas had begun to come along. He could see this on the drawing board. From what his teeny bopper models said and how they looked in preliminary fittings, Condon knew he was getting there.
Elly Petitpierre put it into words: "Mallory, I think you're digging the teen scene. Almost like you tripped and fell and found yourself a new bag."
Condon had only grunted in response but he had a feeling that Elly was right. The feeling grew. Condon had cut in on the teenage world. What was he like as a teenager? More romantic, more rebellious, more desperate than most. Isn't that why he had lied about his age and had joined the army at the age of sixteen? By the time he was eighteen and a half, he had been honorably discharged and given a disability pension for his wounds of which there was practically no trace. Teenager Condon, he thought, never existed.
Condon tried the new design on Maria Holmes. It was a simple black and white dress. The black was in six broad shafts in bold verticals. The shafts varied in their widths. The neck line was cut low but absolutely truly square. Instead of allowing the dress to cascade down from Maria's bosom in a free fall, he had moulded a little, just enough to announce: I am young but I do have a bosom. Do you see my young bosom? Look and wonder what it is like!
To soften the hard machine-like feel of the black and white verticals, Condon flared the skirt just a little. As he had treated Maria's breasts he treated her hips, bringing into the design the whisper of tomorrow's complete woman.
"What do you think, Maria?" he asked.
"Zing!"
"What?"
"Zing; you know. Like a trip. I'm going somewhere in this."
"You think it's all right, then?"
"Best thing I've seen this year. But do you think it will look just as well on small girls like Elly?"
"No; I'd have to make the stripes thinner, cut the neck just a little lower; an inch or two."
"Her boobs would fall out."
Condon looked at her. "Pull the neck down two inches; let's see." She did. "It's fine."
"Not my boobs; Elly's. Hers are way up to her chin."
Condon for the first time in several days smiled. Maria's description of Elly's breasts made him chuckle. The image was not true in fact but quite true in essence. One always had the feeling that Elly Petitpierre's breasts were under her chin. Why that illusion? Condon asked himself. Her torso was a little short. Her build gave her the effect of cuteness and she was that. "That's it for the day, Maria," he said. "Take it off. Tell the other kids they can quit now."
Maria pulled the dress over her head and wiggled out of it. She turned back to Condon and handed him the garment. She was bare breasted. Her top nudity did not produce any self-consciousness in the blond model nor in Condon. When Maria turned to leave the room Condon suddenly said: "Hey! Turn around!"
Maria did. "Something wrong?"
"Damn it, yes! Maria, I told you, you have to have a bra on under the damned thing! Girls wear bras!"
"I didn't think it was that critical because of the way you designed it. The dress lifts a little, Mai. I don't need that because I don't sag so I thought it would be all right."
"Come here," he said. "Let's see." The barechested model walked to him and stood quietly before him. He looked at her breasts carefully; frontal and profile. Then he looked at the dress he held in hand and examined the bodice construction. Condon placed his hands like cups under Maria's breasts. He lifted them ever so slightly and let them go. He smiled. "You're right this time, Maria. But please let me make the judgments."
His changed mood seemed to be a general signal for levity at the House of Condon. A weight lifted and people began to speak to each other once again. Almost to emphasize a return to normal, Estelle Fetucci brought Mai a cup of freshly brewed coffee. Condon mumbled an apology to his number-one girl and kissed her gently on the cheek. Miss Fetucci stammered wildly, dropped the pencil, then her pad, and, blushing, managed to get out of the door.
Mai sipped the strong fresh coffee and looked out over the city from his window. The sun was turning red-orange as it began its slow descent in the west. Some of the roofs glowed as if they were metal covered. Below his view on a twentieth story roof a nude woman sunbathed. She was a quarter of a mile off and there was no way for him to judge the quality of her body yet he assumed it was good to excellent. No woman, Condon reasoned, shows her body unless she thinks it a great one. Even if she overstates its value, it still is a good body. Also, Condon thought no woman who sunbathes on a city roof ever believes she does so in privacy. There is always a taller building to be seen from or so it seems. Just as he was seeing her, there were others and among those, some who were not discovering her accidentally. The city was filled with Peeping Toms aided by the technology of binoculars, telescopes and cameras with telefoto lenses. A nude figure seen by the naked eye from his distance, however, seemed as innocent as a painting.
From behind him Mallory heard someone softly singing. His ear cocked in the direction of the music. For he's a jolly good fellow; for he's a jolly good fellow, which nobody can deny . ... Condon swirled about. Into the room marched his four teenaged models led by Elly Petitpierre, in black jeans and pony tail, carrying an enormous chocolate cake. In the center of the cake was an American flag-kind of large, he thought-and a ring of burning candles surrounding it. For he's a jolly good fellow; for he's a jolly good fellow....They sang as they paraded toward him.
Elly sat the cake down on the desk. She kissed him on the forehead. The others did the same. "What the hell is this all about?" he asked. "Celebrating your black and white success," Ruth Kilgore said. "It's a winner!" Cicily Akers chimed. "Of course, we're taking Maria's word for it. But then, we all have to admit, Maria is the only one in this group who has any taste."
Condon looked at the ring of smiling girl faces. His face lit up at least as brightly as the candles. He rubbed his chin. "I'm touched. Now everybody gets a piece of this cake and get on out. I'll break into big manly tears if you girls don't vanish."
"Gosh, oh, golly-Mr. Condon we thought at least we'd have an orgy!" Elly said in her littlest girl voice.
There was nothing to throw at the impish sex pot. Condon just put his head back and he laughed.
He sat in the center of the silence. The black leather cushions of his chair breathed softly under his weight and Condon could hear it. The room had not gotten quite dark. Even thirty-two flights up toward heaven the land lights of the city managed to bounce into the studio. Then, there was the moon. Gigantic, pure orange and so close to the window glass that it seemed possible to seize it.
His private line lit up. He looked at the phone for a moment watching the light throb. He put it to his ear. "Condon," he said.
"Mr. Condon," a woman's voice whispered, "my name is Sari Grimes and I'd like to see you as soon as possible."
"That's nice. How'd you get my number; it's not listed?"
"I work for Jeri Fashions. I'm a model. Your phone was listed in Gerry Reagan's book."
"I see. What do you want to see me about?"
"Let me put it this way, Mr. Condon. It concerns your future welfare. If you don't want to talk about it, OK, forget it."
"Come up. Take the last elevator to the thirty-second floor. How long will you be in getting here?"
"I'm downstairs in the drugstore."
Condon dropped the phone into the cradle. Well, he admitted to himself, it was a very interesting development and he was damned curious.
He lit a cigar and walked toward the hallway where the elevators were. He would have to open the door and let her in. When he stood before the elevator watching the numbers blink upward he realized that he was wearing the tight red crew shirt he had worn through the work day. The elevator made its customary pinging chime. The bronze door slid open. Out stepped Sari Grimes. Condon smiled at the image. She was more than he had expected. Her hair was a natural red. Something like the deep glowing color one finds inside rock. Startling because it shouldn't be there. Startling because it had force, an urgency. He wanted to reach out and grab Sari Grimes by those thick natural tresses which piled up in a spiral and made her look endlessly tall. Instead, he extended his hand and announced: "Mallory Condon."
She took his hand and squeezed it. "I feel as if I have run up all those flights. Just so nervous. Maybe I shouldn't have come."
"You can always change your mind. But do come in, Miss Grimes," Condon said and guided her through the door and among the darkened desks toward the light of his studio.
The suit Sari Grimes was wearing was one he had designed. It was a teal blue silk. The jacket sleeves were short, ending at the elbow. The pockets were trimmed with broad flat white piping. The neck line plunged down in a sharp V. Enough to hint of the breast's roundness and yet not show it. The buttons were of silver dollar dimension, glittering mother of pearl. The skirt-what could you really say of it- was a skirt and it held tightly to Sari Grimes' hips.
"I like that on you," Condon said as he lit her cigarette. "The blue seems made for you hair."
"They go well. I'd buy more of Condon clothes if they weren't so costly. Make some cheap things, will you."
His eyes rested on the swell of her breasts under the blue silk. "I don't think cheap clothes were ever meant for you." He had flattered her without thinking. She was a good-looking woman and flattery was a natural response for him. Yet even as he had complimented, he knew that he was lying. Cheap was exactly what best described Sari Grimes. No matter how well she dressed. No matter how painstakingly she made up, coiffed; something in her walk, the manner of the smile, the inflection of the voice said: cheap. Also, if you looked into the brown spotted blue eyes the quality was tough. There was something else, too, which he almost saw or felt in her eyes but it was elusive and disappeared. "May I have a drink?"
"Of course," Condon said, "I'm very sorry. How would you like it and what would you like?"
"A killer, please. Double."
"My pleasure," Condon said and worked at the bar in the corner of the room while he spoke with Sari. "Do you find the skirt of that suit a little too snug?"
"Not at all. Look; sitting like this is quite comfortable. It doesn't ride up, either. None of your things do."
"Can you cross your legs easily?"
"Sitting this way? Never," she smoothed her thigh. "Make it out of stretch material; then, maybe. Oh, thank you; that looks yummy." Sari Grimes reached up for the tall drink Condon brought to her.
After she had siphoned off a third of the glass, Condon asked quite pointedly: "What kind of trouble am I in, Miss Grimes?"
"Did I mention trouble?"
"No, not exactly. The implication said trouble."
She smiled. "It's the way we want to hear things. Maybe it is trouble. But it's for you to judge. Let me tell you why I came in my own way, OK?"
"OK."
"I'll take this off, if you don't mind," she said and slipped out of her blue jacket. She wore a blouse which was cut almost to fit under the jacket she had taken off. Condon noted it; he regretted not having designed something like that to go with the suit. It was a mistake. Her breasts lifted against the white satin. The neck was a simple halter tie. The blouse had no back to it. An inviting little conception.
"I've worked at Jeri's on and off for almost five years. Maybe I shouldn't have any complaints but I do. Reagan admits openly that I'm her top girl but whenever there's really a good assignment someone else gets it."
"Like what?"
"Last year. I was the main pony in her promotion series."
"I remember that. Quite good. It was a variation of the design she had stolen from me."
"That's right. She laughs a lot about that, too. Anyway, when she took the show to London, Paris and Rome, this little pig stayed home. When Zukor had the last showing of Reagan's junk he did it on his yacht. A week's cruise to the Indies in February. I was left behind."
"From what I hear you missed two orgies and a lot of seasickness. They hit a lot of rough weather."
"I don't get seasick," she swallowed some of her drink, "and I can take or leave the other thing."
"OK. So you are unhappy. Disgruntled. So you want to hurt Gerry Reagan because you didn't go on boat rides. Whoopee! Miss Grimes, please do better than that. You don't look like the kind who is destroyed on a snub."
Sari laughed. "It does sound foolish, doesn't it."
"Yes, it does. Another drink?" Sari nodded; Condon mixed. "Try again, Miss Grimes. I'll listen."
"I don't know you very well, Mr. Condon. Apparently you're not convinced by my motive."
"I don't even know why in hell you're here, Miss Grimes; so I can't deal with motivation. Still you're right no matter why you're here; your motives are pretty damned weak. After all I couldn't care less that you don't like Gerry Reagan. It just makes you a member of the second largest club in the fashion world."
"What's the first?"
"Those who don't like me."
She laughed. Her breasts leaped inside their white satin net, the large nipples pressing up and impressing the smooth fabric. Those breasts intrigued Mallory Condon. He handed her the drink. When she took it from his hand he allowed his fingers to touch the nipple which pushed against the cloth. Her eyes rolled up for a second. How easy, Condon thought. Then second-guessed himself; too easy.
She drank some. "OK. This is it. Gerry Regan is a lesbian. I just won't let her get me into her bed. I hate it when you mix sex and business. I thought she'd let go after a while but...."
"Gerry Reagan never lets go. If you don't give her your pearly white body you can't get nowhere no how!"
Sari laughed very hard and crossed her legs. Deliberately? Her skirt moved halfway up her nylon-held thighs. "You don't believe me at all! It's getting funny."
"Funnier and funnier, Miss Grimes," Condon acknowledged with an easy smile. "Half the world-in fashion I mean-knows all about Gerry's sexual preference. It is also available knowledge if not common, that Reagan doesn't force anybody in her bed. The ambitious babes hop in ... if they're so inclined. Besides I get the impression that you would not fall apart if Reagan fired you ... for any reason at all."
"Now, you've got two strikes on me, Mr. Condon," Sari said, obviously enjoying the excitement of Condon's pushing aside her gambits. "I suppose my next argument must be a good one."
"That would help," Condon said turning his back to her, looking out the window at the twinkling lights of the city and at the orange moon which had taken a new position in the sky.
Behind him after a long silence in which the ice in her drink rattled against the glass he heard her say: "I'm not mad at anybody. Not any madder than I usually am which is not too little. I have some information for you. I have some sketches. I'd like to sell them for money-c-a-s-h-and I'd like to see you buy before I peddle to another house."
"Price?"
"One thou...."
"Pretty cheap."
"I think the price is right. I'm not selling military secrets. Just pictures and chit chat."
Condon turned back and faced Sari Grimes again. His eyes narrowed. His inclination was to throw her out. He wavered a moment and then he said, "I'll buy it, Miss Grimes."
Her eyes showed nothing special. "I'm glad. I think I would enjoy doing business with you. You've got class, Mr. Condon."
Condon ignored the compliment: "The sketches first."
Sari Grimes took an envelope from her purse and handed it to him. He looked at her face again and wondered to himself why he had accepted her proposition. What was he after? Or what was the redhead after-really? Her face smiled and there was nothing there to see. He opened the envelope. There were a dozen photostat copies of sketches in them. They were all signed by Amy Twain. They were very good.
"What's the story?"
"The sketches or the information?"
"The sketches first."
"These are the twelve designs Jeri Fashions will take to market. Two of them are already in production."
"In production? Already?" Condon showed some surprise. "They're a full month ahead of the season's production."
"That's right. That's part of the information. The other part is that Zukor is making retail deals hand over fist so when you come out with your teen line the chains and the independents will already to stocked."
"Overstocked." Condon fixed himself a drink. "What do you suggest?"
"Why, I thought that was obvious. Modify the Twain designs. Go into production yourself. Beat them to the punch."
His laughter started somewhere deep down inside his stomach. Slowly it made its way upward, gathering sound as it rose, finally exploding into the quiet room. Sari Grimes watched him. His hysterical laughter frightened her. For the first time she displayed nervousness. Unable to control himself, Condon in desperation bolted for the bathroom. He turned on the water tap and stuck his head under the icy flow. That did it; he was able to stop laughing and breathe.
His red shirt had become wet, soaked through as a matter-of-fact. He stripped it from his body and came back bare-chested into the room. Condon's hair glistened. The rope of his scar was pink against his tanned cheek. He watched Sari Grimes as she measured his broad, hard chest with her eyes. "Strike three!" Condon said softly.
"I don't know what you mean," the red head stammered out. "Everything I said is true. I swear!"
"Don't do that, Miss Grimes. It is a little bit too obvious. The question now is what shall I do with you."
"What do you mean?" she asked anxiously, her arms gripping the arms of the chair in which she sat, her blue eyes darting wildly like animals trapped.
"We're thirty-two flights above the city. We're alone. No one saw you come up."
"You wouldn't! It wasn't my idea!"
"All's fair in love and war. You'll have to pay the price."
"Please, don't, please, Mr. Condon. I don't want to die!" she blurted out.
Condon closed the distance between them quickly and squatted down by the chair. He placed his naked arms around her trembling shoulders. He turned her chin up to him. "Die? What are you talking about? What makes you think you're going to die?"
She blinked and after an effort she managed to speak. "Are ... aren't you going to kill me? Throw me out the window or something?"
"You fool. Kill you? I was threatening to make a violent play for you. After all, Miss Grimes, how long can a man look at your long legs, your whispering hips and those utterly gorgeous creatures you have behind that satin wall?"
"Not going to kill ... you want to...."
Condon did not permit her to finish. His mouth pressed down on hers. He felt her hands go about his back. Her fingers exploring the sea of muscles which rippled under his flesh. Her lips opened and Sari Grimes sucked at his still closed mouth. Gently, then harder, then gently. Her tongue like a wind-teased flame darted into the locked corners of his mouth. Up his cheek. Across his scar. Into his ear. Out again. Down to his mouth until Condon could not control it any longer. His mouth opened with what sounded like a sigh lost somewhere in his throat. Sari's tongue leaped inside him and startled his own mouth to a heat and passion which he tried to hold back.
Condon breathed her tongue into his mouth. Sari allowed hers to go where he wanted to take it. Her hands worked furiously at his back. Sari brought one hand between them and explored Condon's chest.
"Stand up!" Condon said pulling the redhead after him. She stood before him, her breath rapid, her breasts straining at the satin. Condon reached her blouse with his hand and tore it down and away, taking her bra with his grasp.
They were white. Her large ample breasts were white and crowned with nipples which matched the glowing red of her hair. "Lovely!"
"Darling, let me get this skirt off!"
"No! That's my creation, Miss Grimes. I put it on and I'm going to take it off. Come here!"
Sari swayed forward. Her breasts nodding at Condon. Her warm hips lifting to him with each step.
Condon hooked his hand into the skirt top and jerked her forward. He bent his knees slightly and with a two handed motion tore the skirt away. She gasped. She was in her Condo designed panties which exposed everything while moulding everything.
"You look better all the time, Miss Grimes."
"There's no couch," Sari Grimes said, half-panting. "Where will we...."
Condon's arms had encircled her, lifted her bodily, vertically from the floor. As he put her down his mouth touched her nipple, she shuddered at his arm. His mouth found her breasts each in turn. She moaned openly. "Don't stop, oh baby, don't stop!" She bit his neck suddenly. He pushed her roughly away.
The redhead stumbled against the desk and upset an inkwell, a bronze figured pot, eighteenth century. The blue ink splattered into the shape of a half formed eagle on the teak surface. It was cold and she winced.
"Come here, Miss Grimes," Condon called to her softly. She hesitated a moment. Then she straightened her tall figure and advanced toward him in her best professional style. She turned twice as she came, showing the lovely sweep of her back. The ink blots like a mad design of beauty marks decorated her shoulder. She stopped suddenly before him, folding her arms under her breasts and lifting them.
The game is over. I know that. But how did you know. Why did you call strike three?"
"You pick a strange time to ask meaningless questions," he said looking intently at the cradle of her arms which lolled her silent breasts up and back.
"Timing is perfect, Mr. Condon."
Condon laughed. "I could take it, you know."
"But you wouldn't. It's not your style. I could tell the way you touch, the way you kiss."
"I'm sure that your expertise is considerable in that area. I noticed the small scars around your eyes. Your nose has been broken at least once," Condon said softly, wooing her, yet knowingly offending her at the same time. His last remarks for the first time drew anger from Sari Grimes. Her eyes blazed, her teeth came to an edge and her arms tightened around her body and her breasts jerked up with their hostile movement.
"You see too damned much, Condon."
"No more 'mister'?"
"Let's stop the games. I came here to do a job for Gerry. OK. I didn't. So I lost a big fat pay day. A thousand from you and two thousand from her. I should be kicked in the can!"
"Do you always need someone to rough you up! Turn around."
The redhead laughed. "OK. You win. My good friends always tell me I get into trouble when I think or when I try to think with that grey lump I laughingly call my brain. Gerry told me I wouldn't get away with it."
"Well, well, thank her for me."
"Forget her. How did you know?"
"It didn't make any sense. An Amy Twain design is too unique. For the House to Condon to imitate would be ruin. Point two, you asked me to get involved in crime. That means both you and Reagan ... and Zukor?"
"Yes, of course...."
"Would own me. You personally, probably, would blackmail me."
Sari's arms dropped from under her breasts and wound about Condon's neck. She pressed her nipples lightly against his bare chest. She smiled with sardonic pleasure. "Not for money, never for money, you man!"
Condon removed her arms and kissed her fingertips as he moved her back one step. "I was beginning to like you when you began to tell the truth, Miss Grimes."
"Goon."
"You would in the first place blackmail me for money and in the second place you'd dial my number any time of the day or night and say come on to my house I want some candy. True?"
"True," her hands went around his neck again, her breasts pushed more heavily into his naked chest. She was smiling. "Baby, I know you have a point there. But it isn't necessary to tell me. I'll accept you on faith. Just kiss me." Her mouth reached up toward his face. He leaned his head away.
"But I want to listen to point three, Miss Grimes," Condon whispered into her ear, letting his tongue flit lightly around its perimeter, as she spoke. "Point three is this. I intend to beat Zukor and Reagan in the teenage race. I am going to help fat Billy lose a big fat bundle of his billions. I am going to put Jeri Fashions out of business. Point Four, Amy Twain is a terrific designer. She is worth competing with. I am going to beat her because that would have great meaning for me. Will you remember all of that?" Condon asked the ear his tongue was caressing.
"Oh, yes, yes," Sari Grimes hissed. "I'll repeat it word for word. Now stop this. I can't stand any more of this, Mallory, I'm burning alive."
Her head snapped around and their mouths locked in a deep and violent kiss. Condon's tongue, in a great filling thrust, took Sari's breath from her. She wrestled her head back to give her room and air.
Then she gently made love to the exploring tongue before it retreated and allowed her own wild dancing tongue entry into the darkness of his mouth.
She placed his hands, his fingers, gently to her burgeoning fiery red nipples. She whispered loudly into his mouth. "A bed, a couch ... the floor, the floor."
Condon's hands removed the Condon designed panties. Her mouth held his still as he lifted her naked form in his muscled arms. He walked toward the window which spread thirty feet across the wall. He touched a wall button. The glass slid back and Condon stepped out into the moonlight with the naked redhead clinging to him.
On the small balcony there was a chaise lounge. Above them the orange moon pressed close against the dark spires of the city. The moonlight turned Sari Grimes into a figure of total bronze. Her eyes were closed, her lips involuntarily arching up and pressing into the air, her nipples erected to a point of explosion, pointed out into the reflections of night lights and night sounds. She opened her eyes.
Mallory Condon stood naked in the moonlight. His magnificent body glowed.
"Mallory, Mallory," she moaned. "I can't stand...."
His body like a burning shadow of gold cut away the moonlight. She lay on the lounge chair, waiting, her eyes wide and her legs spread.
Mallory wasted no time. He knelt down beside the chair and slung her legs over his shoulders, then dove into her cunt, nuzzling through the thick red hair and twirling his tongue into the pink slice of her pussy. She sucked in her breath and stiffened the moment his tongue made contact with her body.
He reached in and parted her cunt lips with his fingers, kissing the folds greedily. Then he lapped along the length of her slice, lifting the hood from her clit with a finger. Her thighs were shaking now, her hand was trembling as she touched him on his neck. For a moment he thought she was going to come right on the spot!
He dug his fingers into her buttocks, pushing her cunt against his face, pressing his lips against her burning hole. Her thighs opened farther, he sucked furiously on her twat and drank in her juices. Then his tongue shot out again, through her lips and into the wet channel.
Her cunt contracted when his tongue entered it. He teased her with a few quick jabs into her body, then slid his tongue out and lapped over her clit again. When he looked up at her face, he could see her tits heaving, her eyes closed, her head shaking slowly back and forth, her face contorted with pleasure, her red hair gleaming in the moonlight.
Her belly rolled with delight as he ate hungrily at her cunt, lapping at her pink lips, pulling on her hard clit, twirling his tongue around the tender kernel, pressing against it with his lips. He used his nose to hold her lips apart and shot his tongue into her channel again, then ripped it out and began lashing at her clit again.
Reaching up, he took one of her tits in his hand and fondled it, feeling her chest rise and fall, her nipple pulse furiously in his grip. Her breath quickened even more when he took her clit securely in his lips and twisted it back and forth, still edging his tongue out to caress her. Her head was tossed back now, her pelvis was gyrating sensuously around his caress.
His fingers massaged her buttocks as he gobbled down her juices, working her clit around between his Ups and shooting his tongue into her again. He had to hold her thighs to keep her from shaking. Her hips were bucking, pushing her cunt against his face, guiding him in and out with a hand on the back of his neck. Good god, he thought again, is she coming?
He held on tightly to her thighs as she convulsed, twisting, shaking, undulating, gyrating, bucking, shaking. She thrust her pussy at his face as if she were trying to drill his nose right through her body. Her clit was trembling so much by now that he could feel it pulsing between his lips.
Suddenly her spastic movements slowed. He looked up and saw her eyes open. She had been coming!
"Did you?...." he began.
"That was only the first time, honey," she grinned. "Come here, I want po suck you."
He sat down on the lounge chair, she rose to her knees.
"Mmm, that looks delicious," she purred, eyeing his huge, hard prick.
He ached for her mouth on his cock as she licked at his hips, then tickled his chest with the tip of her tongue. She moved down again, over his waist to his hips, then down to his knees and back again to his crotch. He felt her tongue, wet and quick, trailing over his flesh like a feather.
She took his rod in her grip and lifted it, then blew her breath against the cockhead and, finally, took it in her mouth. She sucked, then plunged, then rose again and curled her lips around the crown. Her tongue traveled down his shaft, around his balls, then her hands pushed apart his legs and she lapped down toward his asshole.
He raised his hips as he savored the thrill of her warm lips on his ass. The tight doors opened as she parted his cheeks with her hands. Then Mallory had to gasp into the night as he felt her tongue edge through the crack and worm into his warm channel.
His body shook, his cock pulsed in her hand as she blew her breath into his anus. Her tongue licked quickly into the tunnel, then at his asshole doors, then slid between them again and twined down his bunghole. He let out a loud moan when she moved her tongue away from his hole and sliced a thin finger through the doors and deeply into his chute.
After pumping the digit in and out a few times, she slid her head between his legs, face upward, and took his balls in her mouth. Mallory was gasping and moaning as his hairy sac was enveloped by her heat; his balls squirted back and forth in her mouth.
Then she was licking up his shaft again, following the line of one dark vein until her tongue was again circling his cockhead. She closed her lips softly around the crown and slid more than half of the aching cock into the warmth of her oral caress.
As her lips reached the midsection, her finger jammed hard into his asshole again. His thighs shook, his breath heaved with pleasure. He could feel her finger twisting around in his anus, his balls swinging against her chin when she slid her kiss to the base of his cock.
Her caress swallowed his prick again, then moved slowly to the tip. Just as her lips left his crown and her finger slid from his ass, he rose and pushed her away, then took his cock in hand and urged her onto her back. She didn't catch on at first. But when he pushed apart her heavy breasts and rubbed his cockhead in the warm space between them, she opened her eyes and smiled.
Now she took over, placing a hand on each tit and pulling the spheres apart. His hard pipe slipped into the crevice, he pressed the rod against her body and sighed when she pushed her tits closed again and locked his prick in her warm vise.
Slowly he began to pump with his hips, pushing his prick through her tits. His cockhead slid through the crack and emerged at the top of her cleavage. She bent her head and let him slide the bulb through her lips. She left her head in place, her lips open, as he pushed his cock through her tits again and drilled it right into her open mouth.
His balls swung as he pumped, bouncing off the underside of her breasts. He stroked the back of her neck, his eyes opened to enjoy the sight of her bronzed body, the spectacle of her big tits parting as he thrust his hard member through them and into her mouth. His belly pressed against those fleshy globes, and he felt her nipples, hard and swollen, against his flesh.
He pumped a few more times, then felt his gism entering his cock. But he had other plans for his seed. He knew exactly where he was going to deposit it.
He knelt up and rolled her over on her belly. She thrust her ass in the air as he slapped her buttocks. Then he dove back on top of her, slipping his cock into the groove of her ass.
He knew she expected him to steer into her from behind. But instead, he yanked open her buttocks and steered his cock to the entrance of her anus. Before she knew what was happening, he stuffed his cockhead through the tight doors and was pushing it with his hips.
The cockhead pierced her cleanly. Her body froze, he stared down at her doughy cheeks as he prepared to lunge into her.
"Easy, Mallory, easy...."
She gasped as he thrust. His cock bent as it slid in, he withdrew it and then pumped again. This time his crown pushed deeper into her tight chute. He slid back an inch, then rammed it in again with all his might. The fat shaft sliced smoothly into her body, his balls swung into her ass as his cock was buried to the hilt in her warm anal smugness., The redhead lunged backward against his pelvis, screaming wildly. He eased his cock back, then drilled it in again, knocking her body down harder against the lounge chair. His balls swung into her ass again, and again she screamed.
His long pole pushed its way into her body, again and again as they both soared toward an orgasm. His wet member bored steadily into her hole, pushing apart the walls and seemingly making the channel feel looser and looser with each plunge.
When he rose on his hands to watch her ass quiver, he could see his glistening prick sliding from between her buttery cheeks, then disappearing when he slammed into her, leaving her moons wobbling. He had to admit that Sari had one of the world's great asses, just the sight of it was enough to send his gism surging into his pistoning member.
To delay his end for a moment, he eased his cock from her asshole and guided it into her cunt. A few quick strokes and she was near her orgasm, shaking her ass madly, screaming, bouncing on the lounge chair.
He worked his rod in and out, sliding his hand under her body to grip her swinging tits. Now each time he pumped, his hips clapped loudly against her ass, his cock sloshed into her cunt, her body was jarred forward, and she let out another desperate wail. Then, as he quickened his strokes, he felt her cunt flexing around his prick. She was coming again.
He continued pumping until he felt her working up toward another climax. Then he ripped his cock rudely from her pussy and crammed it back into her asshole.
"Jesus, you're tight!" he gasped, pumping already.
"God, you're so long!" she screeched. "So thick.
"I'm gonna come in your ass." . "Faster, faster!"
He sailed into her as quickly as he could, drilling his fat prick deeply into her tight asshole. Gism gorged his cock again, and this time he had no intention of stopping it.
She was still shaking her head, her red hair fell over the chair in front of her. And she was still shaking her ass, tightening her anus around his cock as it plowed into her. He could see her body shudder each time his balls swung into her buttocks.
Staring down at her beautiful ass, he pumped down the home stretch, gasping frantically as he strained to drive his gism into her bunghole. His hand closed around her swinging tit again, then he pressed his body down on top of hers and quickened his strokes. His cock filled immediately with come.
"Now, baby, now!" she screamed as she felt him about to spurt inside her. "Oh, God! Now!"
He screwed back into her burning asshole and let out a long groan as the first stream of hot gism squirted into her body. She wailed when she felt the warmth in her ass, his balls pounding into her ass.
Mallory pumped furiously as he came, sending his long, hard spurts into the deepest regions of her tight hole. Finally, it was over, his cock spurted its last drop and he collapsed, breathless, on top of her body.
Her buttocks were like pillows under him as he caught his breath. She too was panting as he eased his rod from her body and rolled over on the chair. They were both covered with sweat, despite the cool night air.
For a few moments they lay silently, naked, enjoying the afterglow of their wild lovemaking. Sari was the first to speak.
"Your reputation is not overstated, Mr. Condon."
He took a deep breath and sat up. "Thank you.
My compliments, also."
He stood up and walked to the balustrade.
"Mallory, this isn't the end for us, is it?"
"It shouldn't be, should it?" he commented softly and then looked across the roofs of the city below the balcony. "Two conditions, Miss Grimes. Always tell me the truth-I don't care if you cut my throat-but don't tell me lies."
"Never. I promise. What else?"
"I reserve for us every orange moon in this city. You call when the moon is like this."
"Not often enough!"
"Take it or leave it, Miss Grimes."
"One condition."
"What?"
"Call me Sari."
"Sari."
The redhead smiled at Condon who leaned against the balustrade and smoked a thin Mexican cigar. She studied his beautiful body. Lean, tough, six two or three; perfect proportions.
"Mallory," Sari Grimes said coming up to one elbow on the chaise, "Over your shoulder, look." He turned to see. "The moon is orange. Come here!"
"No, that's not fair, Sari," he playfully protested.
"A promise is a promise and a condition is a condition, Mr. Condon. The color of that moon over this city is orange."
Her face lit up in a warm smile as Condon flipped his cigar out into the high air of the city night and walked slowly toward her.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The beautiful image of Mallory Condon would not leave Amy Twain's mind. It was awful. He invaded her privacy completely. He would never let her alone. Even in her dreams, the ones by day and the ones by night, Mallory Condon was there. His smile which bobbed up suddenly, the dark face, the black hair. The scar. The grace. Neither Charlie Rider nor John Vole existed in her fantasies. It was always Condon now.
At Jeri Fashions all went well for Amy. At least fifteen of her designs seemed to please Miss Reagan and William Trask Zukor. Everybody spoke of his power with awe. He could make or break any dress house, any designer. That was hard for Amy to believe; mainly because until she had come to Jeri she had never heard of Mr. Zukor. It was almost as if you had just said that the Alps were among the highest mountains in the world and someone had smiled at you and said: Mountains? Why the Alps are valleys compared to the Thingamajig Mountains of the West.
At the drawing board Amy felt empty. It was as if all of her ideas had been stated. All of her thoughts taken away. It seemed to her that she would never be able to design another thing in her life. Her mind was a perfect blank. Anything she sketched on her pad seemed to be a copy of something else she had done. A doubt about her ability began to grow inside her. She began to feel afraid.
The great Amy Twain, she thought, was soon to become the late great Amy Twain. Well, she could always go back to Regina. Maybe Charlie Rider would still have her. Or if she was ashamed to return home perhaps Gerry Reagan would do as she had once suggested, give her a job as a model. How complicated life was!
Amy spoke into the intercom and asked if a model would be available to her for an hour. Teenage type preferred.
The model dispatched to Amy was Inga Jenssen. A black-haired Swedish girl. She was almost sixteen but the worst possible kind of manequin for teens! Inga was five seven and, Amy guessed, that she weighed about a hundred and ten pounds. Her hair hung down her back in a long pigtail which touched the back of her knees. She was very narrow shouldered but well busted. Her hips, slim, compensated for the shoulders and made them seem almost in proportion. Inga should be in high fashion and Amy was quite sure that she would soon be. Right now her body belonged to Amy. She would have to make do, she thought. If only Inga were not so all self-centeredly vain!
"Amy, what have you for me? They said go to you," Inga asked in her distracted lollipop voice.
"Oh, just potting around. Problems to work out. Take off the dress."
Inga pulled her floral patterned shift over her head and tossed it on the nearest chair. She wore a lacey pink brassiere which was apparently too small for her breasts. At the top of her left breast there was a black beauty mark which Inga had accented with a little mascara make up. She also wore a halfslip of pink which she was about to take off when Amy asked her to wear it.
Amy worked on the body with the blank mind. She tried various drapes, various materials, but it was no use. Nothing evolved. She almost was tempted to blame her failure on Inga but that would have been unfair.
It was true enough that a lively model sometimes sparked you, but not always. You could design on a dressmaker's dummy if you had something in your head. A model helped but only in a sense of speeding things up; you could see the dress form on a real live breathing body. Subtleties were found in the human figure, never in the dummy.
Amy also thought, as she pinned cloth to Inga's frame, that a body without a real personality to go with it was not as easy to work with as a body which had some personality. She always had the feeling that Inga could just as well wear a potato sack.
Of course, these were not Inga's thoughts, at all. Inga believed that she had been blessed with the greatest body of all time. The figure which would finally replace the Venus De Milo.
Inga not only regularly exercised to keep in perfect trim-and that she managed-she also had her nude body constantly photographed each month in all possible poses and attitudes. Each new set of pictures she would carry with her and show them to all her colleagues, male and female. Inga loved herself to a point some miles beyond distraction. Some of the men in the studio sensing Inga's self love had asked her for autographed photos of her nude self.. Flattered, Inga provided them. "I can't help it if nature made me so beautiful, so perfect," she would say if a question of her modesty was raised.
At any rate, Amy thought, she was not only an empty head but her body in a professional modelling sense was just adequate. In other senses it may have been more than that. Amy had seen photos of Inga which did not merely celebrate her body. The photos were of Inga's body being celebrated by others. This set was at least as large as the studies of her beauty.
The men in these pictures were varied. Sometimes she was with two men. In one photo with three. Through all of the sexual gymnastics in the photos, Inga never seemed to lose her smile and, absolutely never, did she lost stage center in the camera's eye.
She looked at Inga standing before her like a pony, her mind, if she had one, a million miles away. "I'm finished, Inga. You can go now."
"You didn't do much, Amy. What's wrong? Big night last night? Say, would you like to look at a new set of photos-mainly rear views. Georgeous!"
"No, some other time, Inga. I'm very pressed," Amy said quickly. Inga shrugged. Picked up her dress, threw it over her arms, and walked distractedly from the room.
Amy slid down in her chair, exhausted. She wished the entire whirl of designing had never started. At first it had seemed so glamorous. A fairyland world. You make beautiful things for women to wear to make them look radiant, attractive, oozing sexuality. Of course, Amy had day dreamed that every knowledgable man or woman would say: See that dress-it's an Amy Twain! But it never turns out the way you dream, Amy thought. She was just dead tired. Even bored.
She closed her eyes and there was the image of Mallory Condon again-naked but not naked. It was exasperating! Why couldn't she conjure him up complete and whole? Condon in her mind had become the Cheshire Cat of Sex-no sooner did he almost reveal his nudity than he would begin to fade. Part of him would be Charlie and another part John. Sometimes the parts would be strange, but she was sure that these strange parts didn't belong to Mallory Condon.
Amy was in a light sleep-light enough so that she knew that she was dozing, light enough so that she could hear the sounds inside her office studio and those outside. It was, she thought, a divine feeling, to be both awake and asleep; to be inside and outside your dream at the same time. To see Mallory and to not see Mallory. In the chair her body tingled and her hips rocked up and back, her thighs tightening. An excitement began to build in her body.
Amy opened her eyes and told herself again that she would have to forget him. Perhaps she'd never be quite sure why he'd treated her as he had, but she would have to forget him or her career was shot. She hated him. Yet she knew that if Mallory Condon would come through her door and tell her to take off her clothes, to do anything at all he wanted her to, that she would do it readily.
Yes, she would have to forget him!
Amy plunged into work again. The design which had eluded her on Inga's body came alive almost without thought on the sketch pad. It was a cross haltered mini-dress. The material was a breeze light organdie. The bodice was pale peach and pale green. The peach color, pleated, caressed one breast while the other breast was lifted by the green. Then the color ran away from the breasts swirling down like great serpents and ending in a raggedy effect five inches above the knees.
It would have to be cleverly lined so that you couldn't see through it. Without a lining, Amy speculated, it would show the body in dream terms. It would drive any man out of his mind. Even Mallory. It was by far the very best thing she had ever done.
Amy picked up her pad and walked quickly to Gerry Reagan's office. Miss Reagan would stop her whole factory for this one. This one, Amy felt sure, was something that was as good as Condon at his very best. Excitement throbbed through her. Her weariness vanished as she strode briskly through the gleaming corridors of Jeri Fashions.
Without thinking, Amy walked into Gerry Reagan's office. Her secretary was not at her desk and the door to Reagan's inner office was partly open. As Amy reached it she stopped suddenly. It was the voice of William Trask Zukor and it was very angry.
She watched him pacing through the opening. She could see the cigar in his pudgy hairy hand. Amy froze in her tracks.
"You don't send a Sari Grimes to a man like Condon. He could see right through her in a minute. Condon could devour her! Eat her up like a peanut!"
"I've used Sari in many situations. She's always been very successful...."
"With buyers, with store executives, with little big timers who think they have power, but with Condon! Gerry you must have been out of your mind."
"I admit I made a mistake, Bill. But it's not fatal."
"No, but we alerted him. We alerted him! I don't like to alert Condon. I want a self-satisfied Condon, an over confident Condon. We can beat him then."
Gerry Reagan's voice laughed inside the room. "Are we mad, Bill? We don't need a special advantage over Condon. We have the designs. We are already in production!"
"Gerry, maybe you're over confident. You're counting on Amy Twain's work completely."
"Why not? Aside from Condon, I don't know a designer with more ability. The girl is a gift from heaven."
Amy through the opening could see Zukor's dead cigar poking the air. "You said it just now, Gerry Aside from Condon! There still is Condon and Condon is still king."
"With Amy we'll dethrone him!"
"With a broken back we might dethrone him but with Amy ... the answer is only maybe."
"Bill, the betting is still at least even money."
"I don't play even money. You can lose. I don't lose. I don't ever lose. Besides, money or no money, I want to beat Condon to a pulp. Why should he go into teenage? Teenage belongs to me!"
"I thought it belonged to Jeri Fashions," Gerry's voice said almost critically.
"Stop that nonsense. I not only invented Jeri, I happen to be the majority stock-holder," Zukor shouted. Then his voice dropped. Very slowly he said, "If anything goes wrong and I will repeat, anything-you will be looking for a new job. And I will make arrangements so that you can't get one anywhere in this country! No, not on this planet except Saudi Arabia!"
Reagan's voice was placating now. "Bill, I promise you nothing will go wrong. Leave it to me, OK?"
The voices in the other room stopped suddenly. The air seemed so quiet, even heavy, Amy thought. The silence seemed to swell and reach toward her.
The door jerked open. Amy gasped. William Trask Zukor smiled wickedly at her. "Amy Twain," he said, "girl genius and door-listener."
"I didn't mean to overhear anything," Amy stammered into the jowled face from which a delicate perfume arose. "No one was at the desk. I was about to come in and I...."
"And you stopped to listen, of course," Zukor said softly as he took her elbow and guided her inside to face Gerry Reagan. "And naturally, Miss Twain, you didn't hear anything."
"I couldn't help hearing something. It was hardly intentional." Zukor's fingers were digging hard into her arm. "You're hurting me!"
Gerry Reagan put her hand on Zukor's wrist. "Bill, I think you're overexcited, dear. Amy is on our side, remember? Nothing that she's heard is a secret among the key members of our family."
Zukor's grip relaxed. "Of course. Forgive me, Miss Twain. I'm very emotional sometimes."
Amy rubbed her arm. "To tell the truth, I didn't like the way you threatened Miss Reagan."
"Oh, darling, he always does that. He never means it, though. Do you Bill?"
"Never," Zukor smiled. "I tell you it's this fight against Condon; gets on my nerves. I don't want to lose."
"And I do so depend on you, Amy dear."
"So I heard, Miss.
"Gerry, please, darling. After this scene you must call me Gerry. I'll think you simply hate me if you call me anything else. Do you hate me?"' Reagan asked and looked deeply into Amy's eyes. The steadiness of the look made Amy feel strange.
"Of course not ... Gerry." Amy looked down nervously at her pad. "I brought you this. It was the reason I came."
Gerry took the pad from Amy's hands which trembled slightly. She looked at it very carefully. Then her eyes moved excitedly in Zukor's direction. Then in Amy's. "Brilliant! It is absolutely the most stunning dress I've ever seen."
"It's still only a design. It may not work."
"It will work! Darling, this will work. When will you complete it, Amy?"
"As soon as I can. I'll stay late."
"What will you need?"
"Lots and lots of organdie. Rainbow colors. Two or three of the models."
"I'll arrange everything!" Reagan said excitedly. "Right now. I'll order up a scrumptuous dinner for you." She rushed from the room, thrusting the pad into Amy's hands as she swept by.
Stunned by Gerry's reaction, Amy felt the pad lift from her hands. Zukor looked at it. "Yeah," he said, "yeah." Zukor walked to the desk and sat down, smiling at the sketch. "Close the door, Amy. Close the door and sit down."
Amy, still almost in a trance, followed Zukor's instructions. She watched him light his cigar, a fresh one. The cigar made a round hole in the folds of his dark stubbed cheeks. He sucked at the flame which leaped from his slim gold lighter until a dense cloud of smoke enveloped his head, almost making it vanish from his thick neck. He waved a passage way through the smoke and said to her: "Did you study art?"
"Only a little."
"I don't believe it! I'm a collector of art. I won't go so far as to say that I'm a great expert but I know quality when I see it. You are a girl of many talents, Amy; you certainly know how to draw!"
Amy realized at that moment that the man was not looking at the design at all but at the almost fully rendered nude torso beneath the garment! She had sketched the drawing with Condon and Inga and herself in mind. She blushed deeply. Zuckor chuckled.
Amy recreated the drawing in her mind's eye. The breasts were golden under the transparent pink and green and the nipples-with a detailed treatmentblazed through with a brighter and deeper pink. The hands of the drawn figure were open and cradling each of the breasts as if they were living creatures, birds perhaps, ready to take flight. Then the long line of the torso fell away in a racing grace toward the curve of the hips and firm thighs and the legs were parted. It occurred to Amy now that the body she had drawn was undoubtedly her own body. More, it was the body of a woman screaming for love. Needing it, wanting it, almost breaking for it. From the look on Zukor's face, Amy was aware that this was what he had seen and this was what he had been smiling at.
"How old are you, Amy?" Zukor asked without looking away from the drawing.
"Eighteen, Mr. Zukor."
"Eighteen, well, well, well. That is a very beautiful age. You know something, Amy? There is a very famous writer, I forget his name right at the moment, but he wrote that youth is wasted on the young. I've never agreed with that at all. Not one bit. I say let there be lots of young, millions of young. I'll find some very good ways to use my share without waste at all."
Zukor got up from the chair and walked away from the desk. Amy was not sure where he had walked but she knew he was somewhere in the room, somewhere behind her. Amy was frightened. It was almost as if an ugly lizard had waddled across her path and was hissing at her. Ail she could do was to stay perfectly still and listen to the erratic beat of her heart and tremble. His voice came again like the flick of the lizard tongue.
"Gerry thinks very highly of you, you know?"
"Yes, I know. I appreciate it very much. She's very kind."
Zukor laughed. "Kind? Don't kid yourself, Amy. You are all that can save Gerry, your talent. If you didn't have the talent, kind Gerry Reagan would throw you out the window. She wouldn't waste a minute with you."
Amy opened her mouth to say something. To protest. To say to Mr. Zukor that she didn't believe it, but she felt his hand touch her lightly on the back of the neck. She felt unable to move.
"Think of this, Amy. Your designs are going to kill Mallory Condon. That's going to make me very happy. I can't tell you how happy. You'd enjoy beating Condon, wouldn't you, Amy?" Zukor's voice had begun to ooze oil.
"Yes, I'd like that very much," Amy said. Her anger at Mallory Condon colored her voice, making it seem firm and almost resolved. "Nothing would give me greater pleasure."
"Ah, that's good! I like people with fight in them, Amy," Zukor said as his hand lifted her hair and let it tumble back. Amy trembled. She was unable to tell her legs to stand up and if she had been able to issue that command her legs would not have responded. She was paralyzed. The hand, the powerful hand of William Trask Zukor stroked her neck, played with her platinum hair, moved sensuously down to her shoulder.
"I think I had better go," Amy managed to say. "I must rush this design."
"It's all right, we can take time out. When I say we can take time out, why, that's how it is, Amy." Zukor chuckled, "For a long time, Amy, I've been thinking that Gerry Reagan is out of touch with what teenagers need. She's too old for it. At thirty-five you can't feel about things like when you're eighteen. Do you know what I mean?"
"No, I don't. Please, Mr. Zukor. I do have to go," Amy said almost pleadingly.
Zukor laughed again. Amy almost imagined his jowls bouncing as he wheezed his laughter out. "I see, I see. You are pressing me for a better statement. I admire that." His hand had moved from the back of her neck to her throat. His fingers deftly opened the two top buttons of her blouse. "I'd like you to become the head of Jeri."
"No, I don't want it!"
"What is it? Do you want me to open a house in your name: Amy Twain? Is that it?" His hand was inside her blouse. His fingers found her nipple which jutted through the round window of her Condon bra. His thick fingers stroked and squeezed the nipple head. Amy felt herself turning into stone.
Zukor came round front quickly. He pulled the blouse wide open and yanked her bra up, freeing her breasts. He smiled down at the half-nude frozen figure of Amy Twain which sat in the chair. His big jowly face came closer and closer to hers. The little brown close set eyes of William Trask Zukor seemed to grow and separate as his head moved toward her. His mouth with the cigar-stained teeth smiled. The tongue came but and moistened his lips. His mouth hovered above her mouth. Amy pulled her head back arid screamed. She tumbled backward and crashed to the Persian carpeted floor.
Her flared skirt billowed up and folded across her stomach. Like a paunchy old bear, Zukor was down on the rug beside her, his hands gripping her thighs. Amy pulled one leg free and pressed it to Zukor's chest, straightened her leg hard and Zukor flew away.
He got up quickly and laughed. "Enough fun, Amy. Now I'm going to be serious because my desire is aroused. Don't frustrate me when I am in this state. I may have to hurt you, understand?"
She almost failed to see the quick motion with which Zukor seized her. His arms were around her waist and he had lifted her bodily from the floor. His mouth surrounded the nipple of her breast. She wanted to scream but her breath had gone out with his bear hug. She felt a darkness mount behind her eyes: I'm going to faint, I'm going to faint, she thought.
"What the hell are you doing?" Gerry's voice shouted from what seemed to be a very distant doorway. "Are you crazy, Bill? Let her go, let her go at once!"
Amy could feel Gerry tugging at Zukor's arms. "You damned fool! Do you want to ruin everything? Do you want this girl to quit us? How will we beat Condon? Bill! Bill, stop!"
Zukor's arms loosened. Amy dropped like a sack of flour to the floor. She watched Zukor's big, almost drooling head draw back and retreat. It got smaller and smaller. It became as small as a ping pong ball. As small as a black button. The room began to move. Amy Twain blacked out.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The sound of the jet stream was almost silent. The plane arrowed through the night sky and Amy took a deep free breath for the first time in hours.
"Are you feeling better now, dear?" Gerry asked, patting her arm.
"Loads." Amy smiled, "I'll have it all out of my system soon."
"Good. I hope you don't mind this late routine. I just feel it's dreadful to waste time when you don't have to. We'll arrive at eight a.m.-eat a great big breakfast and then we'll go to the plant."
"I'll love that. I can't wait-to see it. My designs turning into real clothing," Amy said and put her head back. She tried to imagine what the Jeri Fashions southern factory would be like. She couldn't do it. She smiled to herself. I have no imagination for anything except dress designs. For a while she and Gerry Reagan were silent. Amy dozed again. The vision formed in her dream and she awoke stifling a half scream.
"What is it?" Gerry asked, searching her face. "Dream?"
"Yes. Zukor."
"If you let him into your dreams, Amy, you will be in trouble. We reserve dreams for delicious experiences-beautiful people."
"I should get him out of my mind, shouldn't I?"
"Yes, you should. I invited you on this junket because I wanted to help you forget what Zukor did." Gerry put her hand up to shush Amy. "Don't say thank you or anything like that, darling. Try to" understand."
"Understand?"
"Yes. Bill was only acting like a man. You are so beautiful, any man left alone with you certainly would want to have you. Why not Zukor?"
Amy winced. "But I didn't want him. He's so ... so....
"Gross, is that the word you're looking for?"
"Yes, that's the word. Besides, he didn't care how or what I felt. He was just going to eat me like a mango. Then throw away the pit, I suppose."
"Men as rich and as powerful as Bill are used to having their women that way. He just didn't think you'd resist him."
"I wish I had resisted him. Damn it-oh, excuse me-but I was absolutely scared stiff. I was paralyzed. It wasn't until he put his oily mouth on my breast that I managed to let out a real cry."
"And hit the deck to give him a better crack."
"That was terrible. When you came in it must have looked just as if I had gotten on my back right in the middle of that posh rug and invited him. Oh, if you hadn't come in just then, Gerry...."
"Oh, you would have managed. What I don't understand, Amy, is why you resisted-it was a great opportunity. Even if Bill got tired of youhe pays handsomely."
Amy turned full face to Gerry Reagan. "But that's prostitution," she said.
"Is it? I suppose so. But the word is not very good these days. There are very few women who don't give a little to get a lot. Except eighteen-year-old virgins from Regina."
"I'm not a virgin!"
Gerry laughed and patted Amy's hand. "Well, I'm delighted to hear the good news. Anyway, it is not a question of virginity but practicality. Bill Zukor is a powerful man. He can buy a thousand female bodies-choice ones. You should feel flattered that he wanted to have you."
"I don't. I feel ... outraged."
"Why, Amy? Because Bill put a price tag on you. Because he didn't say I-love-you, or because he really is unhandsome and physically unpleasant?"
Gerry waited for Amy to answer. When she didn't, Gerry asked another question. "Answer honestly, Amy, if you want, but if you can't answer honestly say nothing at all. Would you have been so outraged if Bill Trask Zukor had been young, gracious and handsome?"
Amy could not help seeing Condon's face, its dark beauty, its scar, its smile. She imagined Mallory's mouth coming down to take the nipple of her breast. Her body tingled at the thought. "No," she answered.
"Good girl," Gerry said. "Sex is always sweet when the lovers are beautiful. Take my advice, Amy, never refuse a beautiful lover."
Amy looked at Gerry Reagan whose eyes were dark and dancing when she said this. In a vague way Amy felt that she knew what Gerry had meant. Yet she was not sure. "I'm not really sure that I know what you mean."
"It doesn't really matter, not right now anyway, Amy, dear. Just forget Zukor's big rush. He is very sorry about it. He asked me to apologize very humbly for him. He's so ashamed."
"Is he really, Gerry?"
"Honest!" Gerry said and gave the scout salute. "Bill, after I had a little talk with him, wants you to know that he had made a very bad mistake with you."
Amy knitted her eye brows. "It's so complicated, Gerry. I know I hate that man but somehow you've made me feel a little sorry for him. So complicated! I wish I were back in Regina," Amy said and sighed. The plane soared over the clouds of the Southern night. Amy turned off the light over her head and dozed.
Gerry looked at the face of Amy Twain relaxed in sleep. She looked at the white gold hair, the spray of freckles over the bridge of her slightly tilting nose. She longed to see the large eyes so filled with the green of tropic seas. She looked at the innocent, passionate mouth. She moved her hand toward it. Stopped her motion suddenly and turned her face abruptly away.
A Jeri Fashion factory delegation was at the airport to greet Geraldine Mona Reagan. Two men flanked her and talked into each ear. Gerry seemed to listen equally and intently to each of them. She spoke to each of them and at the same time waved greetings to others. Two young men were dispatched to get their luggage out of check. They swept out of the waiting room areas to a limousine. The chauffeur opened the door smartly as Gerry approached with her hosts. Amy felt left out and lost.
She had hopped and galloped after the fast moving group which was whisking Gerry away. It seemed almost sure that Gerry had forgotten that Amy Twain was with her. Only when Gerry had one foot inside the sleek black car did she stop and look about for Amy. "Oh, there you are, darling. Hurry up," she said, "before you get left behind."
Inside the air-cooled car Gerry introduced her. "Gentlemen," she said, "Amy Twain-Jeri Fashion's chief designer."
There was a murmur of approval as the two men shook her hand warmly. They poured out compliments. How marvellous! Best teen line ever conceived! Superb! Greatest! Through it all and through the great big breakfast which followed, Amy felt like a balloon. Her face seemed blown up in a continuous smile and her head bobbed and nodded as she mumbled thanks between bites of egg and bread.
After breakfast the limousine headed toward the factory. Once out in the countryside the conversation dwindled into nothing. Gerry burried her head in some typed reports which had been handed to her. The plant executives drummed their fingers nervously against their thighs. Amy was content to look out the window at a landscape which was unfamiliar to her.
Palm trees lined the roadways. Great birds filled the sky. They were in flocks which looked like clouds. Orange orchards appeared suddenly, stretched on and on almost forever and then, just like that, disappeared. At one point the car slowed to a stop in the middle of the road. Gerry looked up. "What's the matter?" she asked.
"Alligator crossing the road, ma'am," the driver said, matter-of-factly. The car started up again and gained its seventy mile an hour momentum.
The quiet maintained itself until Gerry had finished reading the papers in her lap. She nodded. "Good. Very good, gentlemen. The decision to open a southern mill apparently was a good one. I'm pleased. How much longer, driver?"
"That's the plant right up ahead, Miss Reagan."
"Good. Amy, I think you will enjoy this," Gerry said,, paying warm attention to her once more.
The car rolled up to the glass and bronze main entrance of Jeri Fashions Plant 4. They stepped out of the car. The doors swung open for them and they moved briskly into a line of waiting executives and key employees all of whom Gerry knew by name. Amy was amazed by the pomp and circumstance of the greeting routine. It was almost as if Gerry were a real queen.
Amy thought as she watched Gerry's ringed hand pass from one palm to the other, her diamonds glittering, this is what it means to succeed. A world is put at your feet. Not the world, but a world. That was most important. The world at your feet had no real meaning because everybody lived in that common-to-all-world. A world was the private world of power. The special power that you held over a group of people who belonged to you. It suddenly seemed tempting and delicious. Is that what Zukor had offered to her just for the use of her body? Was it worth it? The thoughts tumbled in on Amy Twain too rapidly. She shut them all off and contented herself with being introduced and smiling.
Finally, they were inside the manufacturing floor of the plant. It was enormous. Acres and acres, Amy thought. Endless as cornfields. Filled with colors. Bolts of cloth and stacks of cloth. Sewing machines whirring as operators pushed hems and necklines under the dancing needles which glinted much like Gerry's diamonds.
Great electric knives cut through foot high stacks of cloth; cut through according to patterns. At the end of various assembly lines finished dresses appeared. They were picked up quickly by young men who put them on hangers and rolled them on racks to women and men who inspected the new garments.
Amy's eyes combed through the factory. She looked at each machine, at each rack of finished dresses. Her face fell in keen disappointment.
"Looking for something, Amy?" Gerry's voice whispered into Amy's ear.
"My dresses ... I thought...."
"Don't be so depressed. You don't think, Amy, that I would permit your designs to be made up with these common models? Perish the thought. Come," Gerry said and took her by the hand to an elevator which took them down one flight to the basement.
They stepped out into the world of Amy Twain. The room was as large as the one above it. Every machine, every knife, every bolt of cloth was devoted only, completely, to making Amy Twain designs. Amy drank in the oceans of colors. Millions, she thought knowing that it was not nearly that much, millions of dresses and all of them, every one of them made by me, Amy Twain.
She had no idea at all that tears of pure joy were running down her cheeks until Gerry handed her a handkerchief. "I'm sorry. I know I'm carrying on like a fool. But it's so damned beautiful, Gerry."
Gerry's arm circled her waist. "I know exactly how you feel. Did the same thing myself when I saw my first dress popping off the assembly like that. But crying is only half the fun."
"There can't be any more than this!"
"No? Well, how about this, darling: I have a model of each Amy Twain dress in your size in our suite at the hotel. When we finish here, you can try on every single one of your creations."
Amy threw her arms around Gerry and kissed her on the cheek. "Oh, Gerry...." she said in helpless appreciation.
In the living room of the hotel suite, Amy studied the ten Twain designed garments. She picked up one and then another. Lovingly she examined the material and the workmanship. All of it pleased her.
Gerry Reagan, in the deep armchair, enjoyed Amy's pleasure.
"So you approve, my dear?"
"Approve? That's hardly the word for it. I'm in heaven!" Amy said caressing a blue-on-blue polka dot to her chest. "All of these are mine; they came out of my head, Gerry. Thanks to you."
"Nonsense!" Gerry said and fitted a fresh cigarette into a long holder. "But it is a great day, Amy. For you, for me, for all of us and we're going to celebrate it!"
"Wonderful! I do want to celebrate," Amy almost shouted, and she swirled about flaring her own skirt and the one of the dress she was holding. "Where shall we go, Gerry?"
"Nowhere. I've arranged our own private party."
"Oh?"
"Don't look so bewildered, darling. You will love it, I promise," Gerry said, smiling at her. Amy found herself returning the smile. She went back to her bright garments and lost herself in her fantasy world which had become so pleasantly real. Amy barely was aware of the knock at the door until Gerry had said, "Come in." The blue jacketed waiters entered with their wheeled serving wagons.
The first wagon had two silver wine coolers. In each of the coolers silver top bottles sat.
"Champagne!" Amy said excitedly. "For me?"
"Naturally."
The next cart contained a ring of small white icing covered layered cakes. Each had a number on it. Each number was in a different color. The numbers on the cakes went from 1 to 10. On each cake, under each number, were the initials A.T. in red candy chips.
"Gerry, that's wonderful. One cake for each design!" Amy said in a voice filled with happiness. "No one but you could be so thoughtful."
Gerry laughed. The third cart had trays of dainty sandwiches on them and a silver coffee pot set above a small alcohol flame to keep it hot. Gerry signed the bill the waiter presented to her. In a moment the blue coats had vanished. They were alone.
"Ladies and gentlemen!" Gerry announced, getting to her feet and stripping the silver foil from one of the champagne bottles. "Today marks the formal opening of the new Jeri Fashions teen line show. Applaud, please." Amy complied. "The new line, the best we have ever offered to America's darlings, is designed by Amy Twain-the new queen of fashion! Applaud, please!" Amy had already begun. "We are fortunate today. We will not only see the Twain designs but the great lady Miss Amy Twain will model each original herself. You, dear audience, will toast each Twain triumph in genuine imported bubbly." Amy, delighted with Gerry's fantasy, applauded spontaneously. "And now, ladies and gentlemen, the show begins."
Amy skipped quickly into the bedroom, threw off her dress and stepped into the new one. Then she walked out briskly and displayed Amy Twain model number one. As she paraded around the room Gerry commented.
"Please note, ladies and gentlemen, the closely fitted bodice and the peppermint striped skirt.
Young, daring, flirtatious but always innocent. Amy Twain Jeri Fashions."
Gerry filled two glasses with pink bubbling wine and gave one to Amy. "Well, that was a complete triumph! They went wild for it. Especially the buyer from Boston. You're a success, darling, a complete success. Drink up!""
Amy laughed and tossed off her wine. "Wonderful wine! More, Gerry!" Gerry nodded and poured. "And cake number one!" Amy remembered. "We must have some of that!"
Gerry Reagan looked at Amy standing there in her young blonde glory with pink champagne in one hand and a wedge of layer cake in the other. "Miss Twain, if we are to continue this show I think that you'll need a dresser. Do you mind if I serve?"
Her mouth filled with cake, Amy shook her head vigorously to indicate that she was not opposed to the offer of help. Gerry rested her wine glass and put down her almost untouched cake. Amy felt the short length zipper in the back zip down. She heard Gerry say for her to, get her hands up in the air. She responded, raising her arms with the cake in one hand and the glass in the other. She felt Gerry at her skirt bottom. Her thighs felt cool as the dress skirt rose. As Gerry pulled upward, Amy found that she had to crouch down a little to let her assistant get the dress over her breasts where the action stopped.
"I'm stuck," Amy giggled.
"Naturally," Gerry said, her breath, it seemed to Amy, had become strange. It seemed to her that Gerry was breathing in almost quick anxious bursts. "I'll just get these items out of your hands, dear, and then we'll proceed." Amy felt Gerry's hand take the glass away and the cake. Then the dress lifted away. She was in her see-through Condon wear. "Hurry, hurry!" Gerry urged returning to her chair. "The audience is waiting."
"Instead of my running into the next room to change, you just close your eyes, all right?"
"Great idea!"
Gerry did the announcing of each Amy Twain design. She also helped Amy get out of her dresses. She also made sure that the champagne was poured for each toast to each triumph.
After the sixth triumph Amy wobbled. "Gerry," she said. "I think I'm woozy."
"Oh, I think I've let you have too much wine. Poor dear!" Gerry came quickly from her chair and took the champagne from Amy's hand. "Let me get you out of that gorgeous dress. I'll make you nice and comfy, darling."
"I'm drunk, you know, Gerry? I'm sloppy drunk on that pink pop."
"Well, I can't say that you are absolutely the first. Champagne is kind of sneaky, isn't it. First, you're there and then you're not. Hands up now, my baby." Amy put her hands up weakly and the dress came upward and over her head. She dropped her arms. "All right, now lean on Gerry and lets get you into the bedroom."
Amy felt herself sinking on the bed. She sighed at the luxury of it. "Oooh," she squealed, "Gerry, I feel so sexy."
"Really, do you, darling? Let me get your stockings off. I think I'll have to get a cold rag to you, dear. There are other appointments and the flight back."
"I don't want to go back," Amy sighed, "I just want to be drunk and feel urges."
Gerry undid her stockings and rolled them down the lithe tan legs. "Sit up a moment, dear? I want to get your bra off. You'll breathe better," Gerry said matter-of-factly as her hands knowingly found the clasp. The bra slid away down into her arms into Gerry's hands. Through her half-open eyes Amy watched the expression on Gerry's face. It seemed to her that the hard, executive face had become softer. There was a look of eagerness about it. Gerry's lips were soft and trembling. Her eyes seemed especially large and staring. Oh, I'm drunk, Amy Twain thought. She closed the slits of her eyes and looked up into the pink rooms of her eye lids. She was humming a song. Was it out loud? She wasn't sure. It didn't make any difference. She continued humming. A waltz, she was humming a waltz; how strange!
She heard Gerry walking. The water in the bathroom sounded. Gerry coming back. The weight of Gerry alongside her on the bed. The touch of the damp cloth on her legs. Not cold, yet tingling as it touched. The cloth rubbed gently at her ankles. It moved lovingly along her calves. The dampness settled like a kiss on her thigh, moving lightly. Then the other thigh. Amy felt a pulse, which had been so discreet, suddenly become insistent. She could hear herself sighing. She threw her arms outward, spreading across the large bed. Her hips arched, rocked upward into the air where she knew Gerry Reagan sat.
"Enjoying yourself, darling?" Gerry's voice, husky, urgent, asked. "You are so beautiful, my dear."
Amy's hips subsided into neutral. A control over herself had pushed its way through the pink champagne clouds. She was frightened. She wanted to open her eyes but she did not dare. Maybe, she thought, if I lie absolutely still Gerry will go away. Sleep. I'll be asleep.. Amy ordered each of her muscles to be quiet and relaxed. She ordered her breathing to be regular and deep. The weight of Gerry was still on the bed.
Something else now. What? Gerry's weight had shifted forward. Yes. That was it. Amy could feel her breath on her skin. Amy continued to be asleep. Gerry's lips touched the nipples of her breasts. It jolted like an electric charge. Gerry's mouth drew her nipple inside of it. Amy's eyes opened. She sat up quickly and pushed Gerry back.
"Gerry!" Amy yelled. She covered her breasts with her hands.
It occurred to Amy for the first time that Gerry Reagan sitting on the bed with her was absolutely nude-not even panties. She had a dark, hard, lean athletic body. Her shoulders were especially broad and her hips boyish. Her breasts were quite full and the deep red nipples were smooth and erected.
"Come now! Are you implying that you didn't know about me? No gossip? None of the girls tell you that they had slept with me? Of course, Inga would have showed you photos of herself with me except for the fact that I don't permit that sort of thing. The act is splendid. The black and white memory of it might be dangerous. Isn't that strange! I thought you knew."
"I did not know any such thing!"
"What difference does it make, darling. You were enjoying it. Every muscle of your beautiful body danced to my touch. And there is so much moremore than you can imagine."
"I'm not ... that way," Amy protested softly.
"Are you sure?" Gerry asked with a gentle smile. "We are all a little that way. Anyway, sweet, since we are here-in the middle of nowhere and ready for love-why not try it once? If it doesn't appeal to you, give it up. Who will know?"
"I will."
Gerry laughed and found her cigarettes. "I must apologize, I had completely forgotten how recently you have come to the city from ... Regina, is it? I just rushed things a bit, you see."
"Gerry, let us forget the whole thing. I promise you that I will forget it and everything will be the same again."
"Okay, honey," Gerry said. "Why don't you let me just give you a nice massage. It'll help you relax and fall asleep."
"You don't have to, Gerry."
"But I want to. Just he still, close your eyes, and relax."
Amy turned on her belly, eyes closed, head still spinning from the champagne. Gerry knelt beside her on the bed and began to rub her bare back with both palms.
"Feel good?"
"Mmmmm," Amy sighed. "Real nice."
Gerry worked slowly and deliberately, using the ball of her hand, then her open palms, then her fingertips to stroke Amy's back. She pushed her blonde hair away to get at her shoulders and massaged them gently.
Working her way down Amy's back, Gerry drew the tight flesh between her fingers, released it, drew it in again, soothing the tired muscles. Amy was purring on the pillow as Gerry pressed against the small of her back, then patted her buttocks playfully as she moved her hands down to Amy's thighs.
Amy was breathing deeply, moving her body back and forth slowly as she enjoyed Gerry's work. The older woman massaged the supple flesh of Amy's thighs, the tight calves, pressing up occasionally against Amy's buttocks. Her flesh was so smooth, so flawlessly tanned and unblemished, smelling faintly of body oil. A light down of blonde hair flecked the deep groove of her spine.
"Let me just slide these off," Gerry said, already rolling Amy's panties down her legs.
Amy let her remove her panties, then giggled when Gerry slapped her ass again playfully.
"You've got a beautiful set of buns, honey," Gerry said softly. "You're modeling material, you know."
"Mmmmm," was all Amy murmured.
Gerry's hands traced the contours of Amy's calves, then brushed over the back of her knees and up between her tan thighs. When her hand accidentally touched a few loose hairs of Amy's bush, the young blonde stirred uncomfortably on the bed.
Gerry's heart was pounding as she bent over slowly and planted a soft kiss on Amy's ass, then on the small of her back, then a third on her thighs. Her fingers skipped upward along the legs, then, as they reached Amy's cheeks, slid between them and rubbed against her warm, dry cunt lips.
"Gerry, please...."
"Relax, darling."
Gerry slid her index finger along Amy's cunt, gently, slowly, back and forth along the unseen lips. Amy stiffened for a moment, then, as Gerry moved her finger along her cunt and rubbed her clit, the blonde sighed deeply and shook her ass.
"Oh, Gerry!"
Gerry could see that Amy's resistance was crumbling as she enjoyed the caress on her clit. Gerry began working her finger along the gash, stroking the clit now and then, then steered her index finger into Amy's cunt from behind and pumped a few times.
"Gerry, please, I don't ... I think I'm...."
"Shhh, darling," Gerry soothed. "Just relax and let me make you feel good."
Gerry worked the finger in and out slowly, watching Amy's hips beginning to move around on the bed. She bent over and placed another gentle kiss on the soft buttocks. Amy arched her back slightly as if to give her more room, and Gerry took advantage of the move by sliding her finger deeper into her cunt.
Now Gerry leaned down, still working her finger in and out, and kissed the backs of Amy's thighs. Then her lips moved to her buttocks, then licked gently just at the edge of Amy's pearly crack. She could smell already the sweet aroma of Amy's cunt as her nose neared it.
Amy was breathing quite deeply now, moving around on the bed. Gerry was sure she was in her power now. She blew a hot breath on her ass, then licked along the side of her crack until she was millimeters away from her straggly blonde cunt hairs.
Gerry knew there was no longer any reason to go halfway. She slipped her hands under Amy's hips and flipped her suddenly over on her back.
"Gerry!...." Amy began.
But before she could finish, Gerry dove between her legs and pushed them apart, then thrust her face into her crotch and pressed her lips over the blonde-fringed doors.
"Oh, Gerry!" Amy blurted out, arching her back in surprise, "that feels so...."
She never finished. Gerry reached in with two fingers and pried open Amy's dewy cunt lips. Her clit protruded plainly, quivering, gleaming. Gerry shot her tongue out into the slice and worked it back and forth, from the bottom all the way to her clit at the top, squeezing the juicy pink morsel between her fingers to make it stick out farther between Amy's lips. When she closed her lips around the clit, Amy stiffened and let out a low moan.
Gerry ate her hungrily, shooting her tongue into the channel, twirling it around the clit, sucking, licking, kissing, biting. Amy squirmed under the caress, reaching out to stroke Gerry's hair, urging her on gently.
"That f-feels so n-nice...." Amy stammered, her eyes closed, her head shaking back and forth slowly now as Gerry lavished all her talents on her wet cunt.
Gerry held on to Amy's hips as they began to shake, devouring her clit and swallowing her cunt juices, then slid a finger back into Amy's sopping pussy and worked it in and out in time with her tongue.
Amy's belly was rolling with lust as Gerry looked up into her face. Pushing her lips deeper into the burning crotch, she reached up and stroked Amy's sides, massaging the creamy hollow of her waist. The round, pert tits sliimmied like mercury on her chest. Gerry lunged farther and fondled them lovingly, pulling on the hard, goose-fleshed nipples as her head began to rock from Amy's slithering hips.
Amy's breath was loud and quick now, her cunt oozing with the thrill of an upcoming climax. Gerry sprawled out between Amy's parted thighs, still feasting hungrily on her cunt, grinding her own pussy against the mattress to stifle her building lust.
"Oh, Gerry!" Amy screamed out, "I think I-I'm ... Oh, I am!"
Amy began to kick her legs madly, bucking her hips in wild abandon as she soared into a violent end. Gerry pressed her lips against the quivering cunt and sucked Amy's pussy lips, clit and all, into her mouth, shaking her head from side to side.
Love juice streamed into Gerry's mouth as the young blonde wailed and writhed under her caress. Gerry held on for dear life, sinking her fingers into Amy's dancing breasts. And then, Amy began to quiet, her back straightened, and her buttocks bounced against the bed. She was panting deeply.
Gerry knew she had to work fast, before Amy's passion ebbed. She rose and straddled the young blonde, then lowered her ass to Amy's belly and pushed her cunt into Amy's face.
"Go ahead, sweetheart," Gerry urged. "Don't be afraid. Do it to me."
"But I don't know...."
"Do it!"
Amy was still catching her breath as Gerry thrust her dark-haired pussy against her face. Amy's nose slid between Gerry's cunt lips, and she could smell the aroma of her lust.
The older woman took Amy's head between her hands to guide her, staring down to watch her work. Amy licked out tentatively, along the length of the wet gash.
"Yes, darling!" Gerry sighed. "That's it!"
Amy's tongue brushed over Gerry's large, dark clit, and Gerry shook madly, her tits quivering, her nipples huge and hard.
"Put a finger in!" she ordered.
Amy slid a slender finger into Gerry's cunt and worked it in and out slowly, still licking carefully at Gerry's clit. Within a few minutes, Gerry was moaning loudly, almost bouncing up and down on top of Amy as the young blonde brought her closer and closer to her orgasm.
Gerry thrust her hips forward when she felt Amy's hand on her ass, her fingers sinking into the soft flesh. Amy's eyes were closed. Gerry patted her head, then caressed Amy's tits. Amy opened her eyes when she felt the older woman suddenly leap off her, stretch out, and he down on top of her.
Amy's arms closed around Gerry's back as their bodies pressed together, tit to tit, nipple to nipple.
Gerry leaned down and kissed Amy on the lips, tasting her own pussy juice on Amy's mouth.
Still kissing her, Gerry reached down into her own pussy and spread her lips, exposing her raw, throbbing clit. Then she pressed her cunt against Amy's, and dark hair mingled with blonde, two pulsing clits rubbed together as one, two hips began shaking, and two women began gasping in pleasure.
Gerry moved her hips slowly to rub her clit against Amy's, and the blonde caught on quickly. Soon their hips were moving in unison, gliding back and forth, up and down, one clit pressed tightly against the other. Again Gerry pressed her lips against Amy's, this time driving her tongue deeply into the teenager's mouth.
And then, Gerry took off on a screaming orgasm, slithering over Amy's body, rubbing her tits against Amy's, fluttering her clit over the youth's red morsel. Her legs opened and closed, her arms shook limply, her wails blasted into Amy's ears. When she was finished, she collapsed on top of Amy, fighting for breath.
Amy lay still, with her eyes closed, until Gerry rolled off. When Amy opened her eyes five minutes later, the older woman was lying on her back beside her, eyes closed, seemingly asleep.
Amy sat up. She could hardly believe what had happened. No, she couldn't deny that she'd enjoyed it. But she knew that Gerry had tricked her, had taken advantage of her, and that she'd probably want to do it again. If not that night, then another. Amy had fallen into the Gerry Reagan trap.
When Amy rose from the bed, Gerry didn't stir.
She was breathing deeply in sleep, her tits rising and falling with each breath. It seemed hard for Amy to believe that ten minutes earlier, she was eating that woman's cunt, and enjoying it.
Gerry Reagan. She always got what she wanted, Amy said to herself. Even me. And now everyone at Jeri would know about it.
She hurried into the bathroom and turned on the shower, wanting to wash the smell of Gerry Reagan from her body. Then what was she going to do? Go back to bed with Gerry? What choice did she have?
Under the cold shower, her body quivering, she made up her mind. She would not go back to Jeri Fashions. They could keep her designs. She had to get away from them. Amy Twain, still naked, packed her clothing.
When she had dressed she realized that her bra was in the other room, as were her shoes and stockings. She had brought a minimum of clothes for the overnight trip. As she slipped her dress over her head, she thought she could buy shoes in the lobby of the hotel.
In the elevator Amy had the feeling that she was naked. It was not because she was half-clothed, she thought. Then it occurred to her, the Condon bra through whose open windows her nipples were accustomed to poke was missing. It felt as if Condon had suddenly taken his protective hands away and that everybody was staring at her breasts. She crossed an arm over her chest to shield herself. Then she felt completely silly.
CHAPTER NINE
From the expressions on the faces of his people, Condon knew that something was wrong, very wrong. He walked briskly through the reception room of the House of Condon. When he pushed open the first door he knew what had taken place.
Framed pictures had been torn from the corridor walls and smashed. The linen wall coverings were torn and burned. In each of the offices, typewriters and dictating equipment had been hurled to the floor. Fires had been set right inside filing cabinets. At her desk Estelle Fetucci was pale and drawn.
Condon looked at her, lifting her chin up with a finger. "Everything, Miss Fetucci?" he asked. She nodded. "My drawings?" She nodded again. "The dresses? The originals?" He accepted her affirmation and walked toward his own studio and went inside.
Here the shambles were complete. Even his sweeping teak desk. Aside from the torch, they had put an axe to it. The windows to the balcony had been smashed. He walked through the frame. He moved the shards of jagged glass to one side with his shoe. Condon spotted a bit of cloth and reached down for it. It was a handkerchief. He wondered if Sari had dropped it under the orange moon or if she had come back with a Zukor-Reagan delegation. It didn't matter.
He leaned against the parapet and looked down at the city below. It still crawled in the same way. The cars blasted their horns at the smoke filled air. The bits of colored metal shapes on wheels ran about like the traditional blind mice. Except that these numbered three millions-rather than three. Condon felt weary. The idea of having to start all over again appalled him. The idea of surrendering to Snakes, Incorporated appalled him even more.
The urges of violence overtook him. He felt his scar twitch. If he had Zukor before him now, he thought, he might take great pleasure in chopping him to pieces. He could feel his hands breaking Zukor's bones, chop by chop. Condon shuddered at the stupidity of his own violence. What was this all about anyway-a bunch of dresses for a lot of new-breasted kids? What did it mean? Money to Zukor and Reagan, of course. Money and power. Power and sex. Sex and perversion. But to him, to Condon, what did it mean? A creative amusement which bored him now.
He lit a slim cigar. He remained about on the balcony for a long time. Long enough to light up a second cigar. Behind him as he leaned on the stone parapet, he could feel their presence. Slowly, he turned about.
The entire staff seemed to be standing there like a small army. The seamstresses. The office girls. The artists. The designers. The models. The supply room people. The porters. Everyone. All the faces were grim. Mallory wondered what they wanted. Their pay, he presumed, and who could blame them?
Miss Fetucci broke the mass silence. "Mr. Condon, we think that what happened here is rotten and awful."
"Thank you for that marvellous speech Estelle but sympathy will do us little good...."
"Mr. Condon, I'll thank you not to interrupt. Also, will you stop pretending you're the strong, silent type!"
"Miss Fetucci...."
"Please shut up Mr. Condon, dear...." Elly Petitpierre piped. "The lady is trying to say something."
Miss Fetucci turned to Elly. "Thank you, miss. Now, Mr. Condon! We are shocked at what has happened. But we do know this. We are going to see that it makes no difference at all. We are going to stay right here and work around the clock until everything is ship shape and on schedule...." Then Miss Fetucci faltered. "I'm speaking for everybody, Mr. Condon. We'd like to help you."
"Why?" Mallory asked feeling a little bewildered.
An Irish brogue cut the ensuing silence. "Because, Mallory, darling, we love you and we think you are the most of all in this all for nothing world." It was Ruth Kilgore.
Condon got no further opportunity to talk. The porter, reinforced it seemed by a regiment of porters, had taken over. "Everybody out of this room! Everybody off the balcony! You there with the cigar in his face, move so's we can get at the glass." The porters swept all before them and Condon, like the others, was jostled aside.
Mallory Condon did as he was told. Moved out of command, Condon decided the best thing for a deposed general was to take a walk-which he did very promptly.
Without thinking of a destination, Condon found his feet walking almost straight west toward the river. He smiled when he became aware of it. He was walking toward his home neighborhood. It was a magnet. Whenever there was trouble he wanted to think through, he found himself going home.
The city changed as he walked. The tall buildings became progressively smaller until they had become the typical three and five story tenement structures. The glamour, if that's what it was, of the center of the city with its shops and its illusion of youth and quickness, melted. The shops became little stores filled with anxiety. Smiles which were almost standard dress for mid-town slowly vanished. Weariness took the place of energy. It was old here, he thought; the houses, the stores, the wharfs, even the people.
Condon's street, a grey gulley cutting between red cliffs, greeted him. Stone stoops, iron railings, store fronts with peeling paint. In the black topped road, the painted shapes of bases which were intended for stick ball; a painted scoreboard to which faded chalk still clung. Pop art, Condon said to himself. The garbage cans, overflowing, still waited for the Department of Sanitation to take them away.
Always last on someone's schedule. A bent old woman passed by. She looked at him with a half sign of recognition. It was Jim Yabkow's mother. She had become very old.
How contradictory it was! All this should depress him. This street, the memories, the human wrecks, should drive him away in sadness and pity. Yet it exhilarated him. His blood raced at the sight of it. This was his street, his neighborhood, his place of origin. He felt light. A smile spread across his face.
He remembered when he was a teenager. How he longed for a woman! What a dream it was to make love, what a torment it was to have to wait. As he passed the home of one of his first girlfriends, he could remember how just the touch of her hand in his could gorge his cock with lust.
At the time, he recalled, to be grown-up was to have fucked women. Now he was a man, and he'd realized his wildest dreams. He could have any one of a score of beautiful models. In fact, he had to fight them off. Why? Had his work taken over his life? Why didn't he take advantage of the situation and fuck every last one of them?
An older woman passed him on the sidewalk. What a dream it would be to most men to be in his position. The youngest, ripest, sexiest girls in the city were at his command. When was the last time he'd dated one of them? In the past few weeks, there'd been only Sari, Valerie, and the sexy Amy. But he hadn't exactly had them under the best of circumstances. The years would fly by, and he'd look back on these days and wonder why he didn't fuck three of them every day. Was he out of his mind? Why not? They were old enough to know what they were doing, and he certainly wasn't responsible for them. They wanted him, every one of them. And Goddamnit, he laughed to himself as he headed back to the office, I'm going to have them!
The odor of burning still made itself felt in the corridor of The House of Condon. He pushed the door open and walked in. Everything was purring. The girls at the desks were at work. Estelle Fetucci was very crisp, very much in charge, and Mallory gathered that she was recompiling the major part of the fiscal records by calling customers, clients and suppliers to get copies of material originally sent to them. The glass and the debris had vanished. One of the typists was marching through the offices and studios with a deodorizing bomb in each hand. The air now smelled of three things: fresh pine, peach blossoms, and burnt wood.
In his own office everything was clean. The glass doors to the balcony had been replaced. There was a new teak desk. How, he wondered?
Some psycho-chemistry had taken place. The fire, the loyalty of his people, the visit to the neighborhood: all had combined into a resolution. Now he did want to start all over again. To what end, he did not know. To the general end of living, he conjectured. After all, he was alive and the business of being alive was the business of motion. Do something. And he felt very much like doing something, even if it was beating Zukor and Reagan.
Condon pushed the intercom switch down. "Send in my teenage dolls, Miss Fetucci. Tell them to call their mommies. They will be spending all night with Mallory Condon."
"Right you are, Mr. Condon," Miss Fetucci answered crisply and that startled Mallory Condon more than anything else that had happened that day.
"I think that hotel clerk was a bit curious," Elly said as Mallory led her and her two model friends into the suite.
"I told him we were going to do some shooting," Mallory replied, "but the jerk didn't notice that I don't have a camera."
"Beautiful room," Marie Holmes said as she entered.
"Yeah, real nice," Ruth Kilgore added. "And look at that bed!"
Mallory was feeling light-headed as he sat down on the edge of the huge bed. He'd tried to line up all four of his "dolls," but Cicely had other plans. What the hell, Mallory figured, if three didn't satisfy him, four wouldn't either. They'd stopped off at a restaurant for a few drinks, and with Mallory ordering, no one asked to see the girls' proof of age.
He had to laugh when he remembered how excited Elly and Maria had been when he told them, pointblank, that he wanted to take them up to a hotel room and fuck the living shit out of them.
"Oh, you won't do that to us," Elly had chuckled. "I think it'll be the other way around."
And now, they were in the room, Elly and Maria were still raring to go, and he doubted if Ruth would stay out of the action for very long, even if she did appear a little less eager than the others. . "Wait until my friends hear about this," Elly was laughing as she sat down beside Mallory on the bed. "All the girls want to get into your pants, Mallory."
"I've had the hots for you for so long," Maria added. "Why'd you change your mind?"
"It's a long story," Mallory smiled. "Does it matter?"
"No," Elly giggled.
"Then why don't we get started?" Maria said.
"I'm ready," he shrugged.
"Should we draw straws?" Elly laughed.
"No need to," Mallory replied.
"But which one...."
"All three of you," Mallory grinned at Ruth, who was still standing. "At the same time."
"Oh, brother!" Maria burst out laughing. "We'll kill you!"
"We'll see about that," he answered, leaning back on the bed. "Why don't you girls take off your clothes for a start."
"You've seen us naked so many times before," Elly said.
"Yeah," he winked, "but not this way."
"I'll go first," Elly said.
Ruth and Maria sat on the bed with Mallory as the brunette stood up to strip. She pulled her T-shirt over her head, revealing a pink Condon bra that was barely filled by her firm, teenage breasts. Before she reached back to undo her bra clasp, she slid down her jeans and bared her slender thighs, her pink matching panties. Mallory could already see, through them, her thick brown bush, her firm buttocks quivering as she stripped off her jeans and then her panties.
Elly pulled off her bra and bared two tits tipped with very long nipples. Her whole body was evenly tanned, as if she sunbathed in the nude. Then, as Elly walked to the bed, smiling at Mallory, Maria stood up and began to strip off her clothes too.
She peeled off her blouse first, then unhooked her bra and slid the straps from her shoulder. Her tits were much bigger than Elly's, quite hefty, in fact, and her nipples were already swollen with excitement. He watched her suck in her stomach as she opened her tight jeans, then gazed into her tan, flat belly as she peeled her jeans and panties down her legs. Her legs were sleek and long, her bush was perfectly blonde, and frizzy. Her ass was wider than Elly's, more fleshy, it quivered as she stepped to the bed.
Ruth rose slowly and turned her back to the bed as she undressed. Mallory was watching her ass as she removed her skirt and then slid down her panties. Her buttocks were perfect, her back slender and split by the groove of her spine. Her black hair hung down over her shoulders, she had to push it out of the way to get at her bra strap. When she was naked, she turned. Her tits were high and round, and very firm looking, her nipples short and thick, her aureolas dark and wide.
"I've stripped so many times in front of you," Ruth said as she returned to the bed. "But it feels like this is so different."
"Your turn, Mallory," Maria tittered.
He rose and stripped quickly. All three girls watched him eagerly as he peeled off his shirt and slacks, then turned to face them with his fingers crooked in the band of his underwear. His cock, already hard, was bulging out through the material, his pink cockhead poked through at the top of the briefs.
"Wow!" Elly gasped.
He pulled down the briefs, his cock snapped back against his body, gleaming, pulsing, the cockhead swollen and his balls taut underneath.
"My God!" was all Maria could say.
He stepped toward the bed, prick flailing before him, and all six eyes were still glued on that long, fat tool. His heart was beating fast, adrenalin surged through his body. He had a feeling this was going to be an evening he wouldn't soon forget.
"Wow, that's a big one," Ruth murmured. "I heard, but I never thought...."
He sat down between Elly and Maria on the edge of the bed, Ruth rose and sat down on the floor near his feet to stare at his prick.
"Don't be bashful, girls," Mallory said, eyeing Maria.
But it was Elly who reached first for his hard cock, wrapping her thin fingers around the shaft and squeezing.
"Wow, it's hard!"
Maria reached in next, taking hold of Mallory's cock as it left Elly's hand. She stroked it a few times before letting go.
"It sure is."
Elly reached in again, taking hold of his prick and stroking it gently. Her thumb rubbed against the rim of his cockhead. Then she slid her hand down to the base of his cock, jerking it softly and jarring his balls.
Maria watched for a few moments, then she too reached in for his cock, wrapping her hand around the organ just about Elly's hand. Now they both worked together, moving their loose fists up and down his piping-hot shaft, while Elly's fingers reached down from time to time to stroke his balls, and Maria's thumb nudged occasionally his swollen crown.
He spread his legs wider, gazing down at his cock as they caressed it. Then he reached out with both hands, moving into Maria's crotch and Elly's at the same time. The brunette spread her legs immediately, Mallory edged a finger along the wet gash and then slid it smoothly into her cunt. Maria sighed as he rubbed her clit, then poked through her blonde mane and steered a finger inside her.
Mallory stared at Elly's red-tipped fingernails as she jerked him off, moving in time with Maria's strokes. The blonde's hands looked much paler next to Elly's, and her nails were shorter. But he could feel that Maria's cunt was sucking him in deeper, flexing around his finger, while Elly just leaned back and let him slice his finger in and out.
Ruth was staring in wonder, watching Elly and Maria stroke his cock, watching him slide his finger in and out of their cunts. Already it seemed that Maria was breathing more deeply, stirring her hips as Mallory brought his finger deeper and deeper into her cunt and rubbed her clit, which by now was bulging from between her wet cunt lips.
He looked at Ruth's luscious tits, her nipples, then at his cock. It seemed like paradise. Maria and Elly were both caressing his prick, and his fingers were buried in their cunts. Six tits danced wonderfully, beckoning him, and he had to wonder which one of the girls would claim his first load of jism.
Suddenly Ruth moved forward, kneeling in front of him, between his legs. He knew what she wanted to do, and so did the other two girls. They made room, sliding their hands down his cock, and Ruth leaned forward to slip his cockhead between her moist lips.
Now Elly fingered his balls, and Maria stroked the base of his cock, while Ruth's kiss moved down to the midsection and back again. Her tongue shot out, twirling around his crown, and he felt a shudder pass through his body from his head to the tip of his toes.
He still worked his fingers in and out of Elly and Maria's cunt, watching Ruth work. He had to admit that, no matter her age, she knew how to suck cock. He watched her lush lips slide down, felt her tongue curling around his shaft as it entered her mouth, felt her tits pressing and shaking against his legs when she leaned forward to take more of him inside her mouth.
But Elly's work on his balls was bringing his gism dangerously close to his cock, and he had no intention of stopping the party this early. He let Ruth plunge onto his prick a few more times, worked his finger in and out of Maria and Elly's cunt a few more times, then slid the fingers out and pushed Ruth gently off his cock.
He wanted Maria first. He knelt up on the bed and pulled the blonde into his arms, crushing his chest against her heavy breasts. She embraced him, running her hands up and down his back as he kissed her and screwed his tongue into her mouth. Her hard nipples pressed against his chest, and her breath blew quickly into his mouth.
Mallory was kneeling, kissing Maria, when he felt fingers exploring his buttocks. He knew it was Elly. He turned and embraced the brunette, squashing her flat breasts against his chest. Now it was Marie who fingered his ass, her thin fingers slipping into the crack and trailing down to his asshole, then nudging his balls as they swung between his legs.
He was shaking all over now, unsure of which way to turn. But it was Maria that he first urged onto her belly, then lifted her hips so that her ass was in the air. Kneeling behind her, he gripped his cock and rubbed the crown along the crevice of her ass. "Oh, M-Mallory...." the blonde whimpered. Breathing deeply himself, he moved closer to her upturned buttocks and steered his cock through her lean thighs. He rubbed his cockhead against her wet, blonde-fringed cunt, and Maria buried her head in a pillow to stifle her screams. He reached under . her body and palmed one of her tits, then slid one hand down to guide his cock to her cuntal doors.
Her buttocks were trembling as he eased his fat tool into her body, slowly. Then, as she stiffened, he lunged forward hard, clapping his hips into her ass and driving his cock all the way into her snug pussy.
Slowly, he began to pump into her. He held her hips for leverage, pulling her ass backward as he lunged forward. His rod sliced into her cunt at a perfect angle, the crown reaching deeply into her. When he looked down he could see his cock glistening with her cunt juices as it emerged from between her cheeks, then disappearing again as he lunged and jarred her body forward.
Elly was not going to remain out of action for very long. She crawled around on the bed and slid her head under Maria's hips. First he felt her warm breath blowing on his prick as it slid from Maria's cunt. Then he felt Elly's warm lips against his balls, closing around the swinging sac as he continued to thrust steadily into Maria from the rear.
Maria groaned when he ripped his cock from her pussy.
"Don't stop!" she cried out. "I don't intend to!"
He rubbed his wet cockhead along her ass crack. He took hold of her buttocks, poked his prick into her hole, shook his hips, and then, holding his breath, lunged forward with all his might and drove his hard pipe deeply into her tight asshole.
Maria's head was buried in the pillow again, but he could still hear her screaming. He pulled back slowly, then lunged forward again, slapping into her buttocks. Now when he looked down he could see his prick emerging from between her pink doors, then disappearing again as he ripped ruthlessly into her once again.
Elly was kissing his buttocks now, stroking his balls. He closed his eyes, still screwing into the blonde, as Elly's fingers ran along his crack. When one digit pressed against his asshole, his heart skipped a beat.
He stopped pumping for a moment when Elly screwed her thin finger into his asshole. Her other hand was still working on his balls. Then he resumed his strokes, knocking Maria forward with each thrust, his head spinning as Elly screwed her finger around in his bunghole.
But he wanted Ruth now. He tore his cock from Maria's asshole and then fell to the bed. Quickly he reached for Ruth, pulled the raven-haired beauty on top of him.
She raised her hips and reached down to steer his cock to the doors of her gash, then closed her eyes, swirled her hips around, and dropped sharply to his body. She and Mallory both let out a moan as his prick drilled upward into her drooling cunt.
Her splendid breasts danced above his eyes, he reached up for a handful of the bouncing mounds as he lifted her into the air with his hips. In seconds, it seemed as if Ruth was already nearing her end.
Now Elly climbed on top of him, straddling his face and bringing her cunt down to his lips. He felt her warm thighs against his face as he smelled her sweet aroma. She was whimpering even before he began licking at her slit.
With his fingers he pried open her cunt lips and shot his tongue up and down, then sucked her clit into his mouth and lashed it with his tongue. She was wailing, she too seemingly soaring toward her end.
Ruth was bouncing like a marionette on top of his cock, slapping her warm ass into his body each time she dropped. He let out a groan when he felt Maria's lips suddenly at his cock, her head between Elly and Ruth's body and her tongue licking at his cock each time Ruth lifted herself and let half of the long tool slide out. of her twitching pussy.
He clamped his lips snugly around Elly's delicious clit and swirled his tongue at the juicy morsel, pumping with his hips to toss Ruth on top of him. When he opened his eyes he saw Elly's tits quivering above his head, and behind her, Ruth shaking her head back and forth as he thrust upward and bounced her on his prick.
Ruth came first, screaming at the top of her lungs as he pumped fiercely into her cunt. Elly was close behind, almost tearing her hair out of her head as she thrust her pussy into his face and shook from head to toe. He tasted her pussy juices streaming into his mouth as he ate her, felt Ruth's cunt suddenly become much wetter. He could hear his cock now sloshing noisily up into her channel each time he pumped and she clapped her ass into his hips again.
Quickly he tossed Elly off his face and pushed Ruth from his cock. Maria was already on her back, legs parted in invitation. He dove between them and sliced his aching rod deeply into her wet hole.
She locked her arms around his neck and shot her hips upward to meet his strokes. Her cunt flexed around his prick when it entered her, like a fist. He pumped wildly, longing to empty his balls into her warm channel.
But Elly wanted more. She lay down beside them and began kissing his neck. He turned and kissed her on the lips while he fucked Maria with all the speed his hips could muster. The brunette sucked on his tongue, gasping for breath through her nose, then Maria did the same when he turned to kiss her.
Shpping his hands under Maria's ass, he dug his fingers into the soft flesh and pulled her hips upward to meet his strokes. Their bodies clapped together loudly, quickly. Suddenly he felt a hand on his ass, sliding into his crack. He knew it was Ruth.
Spreading his cheeks with her hands, Ruth lapped once along his hairy slice. He shook from head to toe, still lunging into Marie. Then Ruth wrapped her lips over his rear door, blew another breath into his body, and began worming her tongue in and out of his anus.
Gism shot into his prick, he pulled his lips from Elly's mouth to gasp for air. Maria was screaming and groaning now as she sailed into her orgasm, bouncing up and down on the bed under him when he felt his cock stiffen inside her. This was it.
Elly's lips were sucking on his balls, Ruth's tongue was snaking into his asshole as his cock filled with seed inside Maria's tight cunt. She was screaming still. He groaned hoarsely, shuddered, and sliced into the blonde again. His cock exploded, a hard spurt of gism splashed into her creaming channel.
Maria was wailing as she felt her pussy fill up with gism. He slammed his hips into hers at top speed as she writhed in the final throes of her orgasm. Elly was still sucking on his draining balls, Ruth's tongue was still twirling inside his bunghole. His orgasm seemed to last no longer than any in his life, leaving him totally breathless by the time he collapsed on top of the young blonde.
"You're really good," Maria finally gasped.
"I'll say, Mr. Condon," Ruth added.
"I think you can call me Mallory now," he laughed, still gasping.
"I want some of your come, too," Elly giggled, lying down next to him.
He took her in his arms, Maria pressed up close to him on the other side. Ruth sat nearby, absentmindedly rubbing her cunt as she waited for more action.
It didn't take him long to get hard again, especially after he watched Ruth and Elly engage in a torrid sixty-nine. This time it was Ruth who tasted his gism, coming wildly just as he erupted in her cunt and Elly tongued her clit with her head between his legs.
Elly got her turn just after midnight, sucking on his cock while he watched Ruth and Marie stroke each other's cunts. His gism spurted right down her throat, and she drank it in greedily.
"God, I don't believe it!" he blurted out when they were all lying side by side on the bed again.
"Did you like us?" Elly asked.
"Stupid girl!" he laughed. "Stupid question!"
"We're not finished yet, are we?' Ruth asked.
"I think I am," he gasped, laughing at Ruth. He'd always though Elly was the hottest of the trio, but now he could see that even if he were alone, he could never outlast the black-haired girl. She was again rubbing her cunt.
"Are you really, Mallory?" Maria chuckled, reaching for his cock and sliding her head down to suck him. "We'll see about that."
"No, let me do it," Elly said.
"If this is a dream," he chuckled, "please, don't wake me up!"
CHAPTER TEN
The next few days were the busiest ever at Condon's office. Each night, the windows of the House of Condon were ablaze until well after midnight. The sewing machines whirred. Typewriters clattered. Long distance phone lines were kept open so Mallory could stay in touch with the various mills which would be turning out the Condon teen line.
The greatest aid for Condon came from his teeny boppers. Together they remembered and helped Mallory reconstruct the best of the designs. Interestingly enough, memory failed regarding the weaker or less interesting designs. This, Condon thought, was wonderful. He called the method psychodesign. He thought the forgetting mechanism was a great way to get an absolutely truthful appraisal of what he had been creating. He was amused by the low batting average he had made. The girls had failed to remember more than eighty percent of his work. But what a great saving, he thought; and what a great strengthening of the dresses with which he'd be in the market!
There was time for play, too. Each night when Condon finally did call it a day, he took one of the young models home with him, though there was no repetition of the wild foursome in the hotel room. He didn't think his heart could take much more of that. Besides, he promised the girls, when the designs were finished, when the House of Condon was back on its feet, there would be plenty of time for that.
There was one curious development. Two days after the fire, Mallory received a postcard with the simple message: "Understand it now." It was signed Amy Twain. He wondered what it could mean, but he didn't have time to investigate. Before long, he figured, he too would "understand."
In the meantime, there were only twenty-four hours in a day and thirty-four hours of work to do. A week after the fire, things were beginning to shape up, the end was in sight. And then came the unexpected visit from the last person on earth Mallory wanted to see.
He was in his office with Elly and the other girls late one night, going over a few designs, when the intercom buzzed.
"Yes?" Condon said impatiently, taking pins from his mouth.
"William Trask Zukor is outside. He wants to see you. Looks very angry, Mr. Condon."
"Does he really, Miss Fetucci," Condon said not bothering to hide his surprise at Zukor's arrival. "You just keep him waiting for a long time, Miss Fetucci, and just when he looks like he's going to bust-send him in."
"Yes, sir, Mr. Condon." Miss Fetucci said and clicked off.
Mallory turned to the teeners. "Girls. We've got a visitor. So in a little while I'm going to ask you to disappear."
"Mr. Zukor has come here to see you?" Cicily Akers asked almost in disbelief. "Is that so surprising?"
"Well-he is Mr. Big in teens," Ruth Kilgore said. "They say he can make or break anybody in this business."
"So they say," Mallory agreed. "So they say."
"Did you ever hear about his yacht, Mallory?" Elly asked.
"The high seas orgy craft, you mean?" Condon cross-queried as he lit a cigar. "Oh, yes, I've been invited ever so often."
"But you didn't go?"
"Nope."
"I did," Maria Holmes said bitterly. "The man's an ape. I hate him." She regarded the silence in the room. "Zukor is a dirty ape, and a liar! I didn't get anything out of it. I gave, but I didn't get. So I hate that oily bum."
"All right girls," Condon said after a moment. "Get lost."
They walked from the room in a ragged file. Elly at the end turned to him: "Good luck, Mallory. Kill him!" She ducked the box of paper clips Condon threw in her direction.
Zukor came into the room with his head down and his thick wet cigar dead in his dark-haired hand. He looked about the room suspiciously. His eyes darted from the walls to the desk to the windows.
"What are you looking for, Bill? A fire?"
"That's why I came, Mallory. I heard you had some trouble. I came the minute my plane landed. If you need any help I'm here to give it to you."
Condon could not suppress his laugh. "Thanks, Bill," he finally managed. "The situation is normal, all fixed up. Now what can I do for you?"
"For me? You for me? Nobody can do anything for me," the irritated Zukor said.
"OK," Condon said, his face becoming severe and cold. "Now get out!"
"What?"
"Out-you oily ape, out! You cost me a lot of time," Condon hooked his arm through Zukor's and began to pull him forcefully toward the door. "The next time you try to put me out of action do a better job!"
Zukor ripped his arm out of Condon's grip. He did it with a strength that surprised Mallory; his eyebrows rose up. "OK, you punk, let's get the gloves off!" Zukor's small eyes had become bright and excited. "If I wanted to ruin this place I would have fixed it so you couldn't walk into the joint again. I gave you enough damage so I could come up here and offer you a hand. And here you are, creep, spurning my friendship!"
"Keep talking, I'll apologize when you finish."
"Look, bum," Zukor said and stabbed Condon's chest with a heavy forefinger, "at the beginning I was ready to back you. You, you creep you, you had to compete with me! OK, you got a right."
Condon smiled broadly at Zukor's angry face.
"Thanks, Bill."
"Compete, compete, Mallory-but cheat?" Zukor said and he seemed pleased with the look of confusion which Mallory now presented to him. Zukor embroidered: "Yes, cheat is what I said Mallory!"
"All right, I'll bite. How?"
"Amy Twain."
"Amy Twain. You cheated on Amy Twain. Jeri Fashions conducted the Golden Thimble Award and we discovered Amy. And Amy belongs to us not to you. That's cheating! You have no right to Amy."
"OK. Agreed. I have no right. I have no Amy either. What in the world have I got to do with Amy?"
"Don't lie now, Mallory. This is gloves off! I won't say you shouldn't fry to take her but you got caught stealing."
"You're crazy. Now get out."
"Mallory, my boys trailed Amy here. She is here."
"You are off your ever loving rocker, Zukor buddy! Get out."
"That's your final statement?"
"I hope not, Zukor. Pick up your paunch and move out."
Zukor's gold lighter flashed up to his cigar and he puffed furiously. "Condon, we've got you beat, my friend. We have fifteen Twain designs in production. Ten are close to delivery stage. So what can you do with Amy? Nothing. Zero. What it is is the principle. Nobody steals my people without appropriate punishment."
"Like what?"
"Like another rip on your face. Like a broken back," he said this softly and blew a thick cloud of smoke into the room. He lifted up his heavy arm and crooked his finger toward the window. Condon heard the glass slide on its aluminum runner. They came in. Two. Three. Their feet became still. Now the clatter of high heels behind him. Now still.
Condon's arms tensed, his grip on the teak desk edge opened and closed slowly, becoming harder, becoming almost metallic. The cords in his neck swelled. He felt a flow of blood pump into his scar. It tingled. He smiled. Without turning around Condon said: "Is this the first time you've been to the House of Condon, Miss Reagan? Or did you steal something once?"
"My first visit, Mallory. I came because I very much want to see you worked over."
"Amy Twain, huh? Wouldn't she sleep with you, Miss Reagan?" Condon listened to the quick movement of her shoes. Her nails scraped at his scalp as she pulled hard at his hair. His braced back allowed no movement of his head. He ignored her attack. He looked at Zukor. "All of this because you think I stole Amy Twain?"
Zukor nodded. "We know," the man said. His eyebrows arched up in what Condon read as a signal. The feet behind him rushed.
Condon swung about and chopped across the first neck moving with a hard karate palm edge. A man whose face he had no time to note fell like a sack of flour.
The light grey suit of a second man pressed against him. Condon concentrated at the knife hand he held away from him. Quickly, he turned the wrist back, the crunch of the bone gave Condon a twinge of nausea. He saw the man's face now. It was filled with terror. He kicked up. The man screamed. Condon, holding the broken wrist tight, whipped the man into the opposite wall. For a moment, he merged with the wall like a splatter of mud. Then he slithered down.
The third man was backing away now. Condon lunged furiously toward him. In range Condon used the desk to vault toward the terrified face with a two footed kick. The man collapsed in a chair piled with paper. The chair went over with the force of the man's fall.
Condon turned to Gerry Reagan. He took her elbow. "I am going to be busy, Miss Regan. Please make an appointment the next time. Goodbye." He guided Gerry to Zukor's side. Zukor's astonishment had given way to rage. He turned suddenly toward Gerry Regan and smashed the back of his hand across her face. She touched the corner of her mouth where a trickle of red flowed. Zukor turned quickly and walked out of the room. Gerry Regan, empty eyed, followed.
Condon wearily blew out his breath. His muscles relaxed. He flipped on the intercom. "Miss Fetucci, have some of the porters come in here to clear away some debris."
"Yes, sir, Mr. Condon!"
"Oh, yes, baby, also call the cops!"
By four A.M. the cops had come and gone. They accepted the robbery theory Condon offered. Any other theory, he thought, would be too complicated. The police would not believe that it had been Condon alone who had dispatched the intruders. Wearily he explained his black belt karate status, which also failed to impress the lieutenant in charge. Finally, to make a point Condon asked that two of the cops attack him with all their force and ability. They did. A moment later the lieutenant agreed that Condon's explanation was logical and valid.
He had sent the staff home. They were dead. They had given all they could. The teen models protested loudest, but they knew they were done for a while. He was alone now. He was tired. He was unable to assess the situation. Who had won and who had lost? Did the House of Condon defeat Jeri Fashions? Did justice triumph in this case? Will teenage America get the garments they deserve? Who cares, Condon thought wearily, who in the world can possibly care? Why in the hell did he decide on this teenage crap?
He heard a sound. Feet. Flat-heeled shoes. Man or woman? Outside the door to the dressing rooms. His muscles tensed. Slowly he rose from the chair and walked silently toward the closed door. He pressed himself against the wall and he waited. He drew in a long slow breath and held it. He could hear his heart pumping. The door knob turned slowly. Condon lifted his hand across his chest, the hard karate edge of his palm facing outward, ready to strike. The door opened.
Condon dropped his hand and exhaled. "Amy! I almost decapitated you!" The girl turned to him. She was trembling. Dirt streaked her face. Her platinum hair was matted. He looked down. Her skirt was torn. A heel was off her shoe. There was a deep scratch on her left leg.
"Now who hit you?" he asked.
Her young face turned up in a tearful grimace. She put her arms about his neck and she began to cry. "Oh, Mallory! They tried to kill me! She blubbered and then became perfectly incoherent.
"Here, baby," he said softly and stroked her back. Her crying got deeper. Her breasts heaved and sobbed against his chest. "I think we'd better clean you up, baby. You are heading for the showers."
When he had her in the bathroom, Amy merely sat on the stool and wept. She no longer looked eighteen. Ten, maybe, he thought. Without thinking, Condon began to undress the crying Amy Twain. Her shoes, her ripped hosiery, came away in his hands. She stood up at his bidding and he lifted her dress over her head. He was familiar with the Condon bra and he unhooked it. He turned his eyes away from her golden breasts-a matter of self defense. "Preserve me," Condon said as he looked up toward the ceiling. As quickly as he could, he stripped off Amy Twain's see-through Condon panties. He pushed her into the shower enclosure, turned on the water and sighed a great sigh of relief.
While Amy Twain showered, Condon both calmed and conversed with her. The calming was easy. The shower did that. Able to talk, Amy told Condon about the men who had followed her home. She didn't know who they were. She imagined that Zukor and Reagan had something to do with it because she had quit, run away. But why did they want to hurt her? After all, they had all her designs except one-a green and peach organdie thing which was still on her pad. They already were in production on everything else. She had seen it herself. Why would they want to hurt her?
"How did you get away from the thugs?" Condon asked.
"They were breaking down my door, Mallory. I mean actually, physically breaking it down! So I went out the window, up the fire escape and across the roof tops," she turned the shower off. "Can you hear me, Mallory?"
"Yes, what happened then?"
"Oh, I finally got down in the street. Dirty and everything. But they saw me get into a taxi. I didn't know where to go."
"So you came here and they followed.
"Yes. I hid in the ladies room."
"And they were gentlemen and wouldn't dare look in the ladies loo...."
"The ladies what?"
"Loo. The English word for John."
"Oh, no. They came in," she hesitated, "there was a trash barrel there and I got inside it and I covered myself with ... garbage."
She burst into tears again. Condon burst into laughter. He reached into the shower stall and turned the water on full force again. It was all cold this time. Amy yelled and got out naked and dripping. Condon threw her a bath towel which she promptly wrapped about herself.
A half sandwich was left and some very cold, murky coffee which Amy devoured avidly. She was seated in Condon's leather chair. In between bites and swallows Amy still managed to talk. Condon had pulled a straight back chair close to his desk and listened as Amy babbled. He listened and smoked his Mexican cigar.
"It is a kind of mystery, isn't it? Jeri is in production. They have me beat hands down unless I can get out in the market with equally good designs at the same time. I may do a few things to match you, Amy, but I am too late! Then why in the world do they try to destroy me? And you, why you?"
"I have no idea. Except that they are beasts. I never should have entered that contest. If I could I would throw that Golden Thimble Award right into Zukor's face." She had recovered enough to be angry.
"The Golden Thimble Award! Well, it did get you out of Iowa and it did get you a job."
"Fine thing! They were supposed to train me-not use me as chief designer."
Condon pushed the chair back. He stood up. "That's it! No contract! They have no agreement with you about designs!"
"What does that mean?"
"It means, Amy, that a court injunction will put Jeri right out of business," Condon shouted. "That's why they went mad when you quit. It suddenly occurred to them that they had nothing without you. And they thought you had come to me!"
"But I did."
"Yes, you did, didn't you?" Mallory said and he leaned far across the wide teak top and kissed Amy gently on the lips. He watched her great green eyes close in response. "Do it again, Mallory."
Condon slid across the desk top. He put his arms about her tan shoulders. He kissed each eye and then her mouth, lightly. "Can I offer you a deal, Miss Twain?"
"Fair and square?" Amy asked without opening her eyes.
"Yes. I need a partner. I think I may want more free time ... to do more things. Would you accept half of the House of Condon, for a price?"
Amy's eyes opened quickly. "A price?" she asked and her voice showed her edginess. "What price? How much? What's the gimmick?"
"No gimmick. For real. Half the House of Condon for a kiss."
"No," Amy said and her eyes closed half way. "Not for a kiss. I don't like the price. I don't like it at all."
Mallory brought his lips to her ear. "What price have you got in mind?"
"I'm not sure," she said. "Start bidding."
Condon's mouth moved down to Amy Twain's mouth. It hovered there. She could feel his breath. Her lips moved slowly across that infinite inch and touched his. Then Condon pressed her to him, his mouth hard and violent and yet burning and loving. Her lips parted. Her mouth opened. Mallory's tongue slipped in and became still. She wanted it to move. She made it move. Her tongue butted at his. Her tongue explored all of the sweet, dark redness of Condon's mouth. She touched at his tongue and it moved and caressed hers.
"Is that the price?" he asked in a husky voice.
"Higher. Go higher," she pleaded. Her head was back. Condon could see her throat throb. He pulled her out of the chair. The bath towel was held to her only by the fold she had made. Condon put his fingers in and pushed it apart. It fell.
Her head still leaned back on her neck. Her arms hung loosely at her sides. She barely breathed. A woman of gold, Condon thought, a sun-woven gold. In all of that silken skin, no fault appeared to his eye. Her shoulders were strong and, he had to acknowledge, those of a genuine Condon type woman. Her breasts. He paused in his thoughts. How many of these great delights had he fondled? How many had become fever in his fingers? But like the breasts of this girl, this woman, this Amy Twain? The nipples were swollen to a point of bursting. The pink of them seemed to throb like living coals. He reached a hand to touch one. Amy shuddered and pulled his hand back when he tried to move it away. She moaned. She opened her eyes. She stepped toward him and pulled his head down. His mouth covered each nipple in turn.
"I'm going to explode, Mallory. Please. Let's make love," she said in a voice which was almost a whisper. Her eyes darted about the room. "Where?" she asked frantically.
Mallory looked out to the balcony. The chaise lounge was gone! It had not been replaced! Condon searched the room feverishly; and then his face lit up. Eight tall bolts of cloth stood on end against the wall.
He went to them quickly and, with the strength of passion and his great physique, he lifted each bolt over his head and hurled them bouncing and rolling across the floor: unravelling great roads of cloth of brilliant color. Pink silk rolled out. Green satin crisscrossed it. Yellow satin. Purple silk. Black. Black and white polka dots. Red and black stripes. White silk. In a few minutes, Mallory Condon had transformed the room into a sensuous nest of color.
Amy looked at the riot of hues. Her green eyes flashing, she stretched her hands out to Mallory who was reaching for hers. He led her to the center of the color.
Mallory's hands stroked her long back. Mallory's hands stroked her thighs and hips. Mallory's hands ignited her skin. Mallory's mouth, like a phantom, moved from her eyes to her hair, to her mouth, to her shoulders, to her fingers, to the nipples of her breasts which now strained between pleasure and pain. His mouth and his hands explored all of her throbbing body. Her hips rocked in the burning air. The colors of the cloth burned her feet. "Now, Mallory, now!"
For one single long moment she stared at Mallory Condon naked. He was not a dream now. No fantasy now. All of him perfectly pieced together in the kind of perfection reserved for gods.
He lifted her and he placed her down on the soft colored sea he had made for her. Then, from his great height he came down to her. The man, the woman, became color and part of the silks and satins.
Amy had' never heard her voice sound out loud in love, but it did now. Then for a split second, he lost his senses entirely and heard his own sound moan distantly like an echo.
He shoved her golden legs apart and kissed her tenderly on the belly, on the soft bed of tan just above her blonde bush. His tongue curled in her navel, then moved downward.
"Oh, Mallory!" she sighed, eyes dropping closed as he carried her away with his caresses.
He sank his fingers into her thighs, near her crotch, and shot out a finger from each hand to pry open her cunt lips. Amy let out a soft moan when she felt his touch on her pussy, then stiffened when she felt his breath blowing over her open doors. Then his tongue slid over her slit, softly, up one side and down the other, then up again until he was nudging her clit with the tip of his tongue.
Her eyes were still closed, her head was shaking back and forth when he pressed his open lips against her cunt and shot his tongue into her channel. His tongue moved like a fluttering bird inside her, then slashed up to her clit and flailed at the pink kernel. Her hips were bucking now, he was holding onto her thighs, sucking loudly as he drank in her juices.
Amy reached out blindly for his cock. Mallory brought it closer to her by kneeling between her legs, and she took it in her small hands and squeezed it, then stroked his balls and felt him suck in his breath while he continued to feast on her pussy.
She took hold of his leg and pulled, urging him to move closer. He swung his body around until he was lying beside her, his head between her legs, his cock inches from her face. She embraced him around the hips as he nosed his way into her cunt again, and she slung a leg over his shoulder to open her pussy to his caress.
A shudder shook her body when his tongue found her gash again and sliced into her. She pressed her hands against his dark, narrow hips and pulled his body toward her. His cock rubbed against her face, she opened her eyes and steered it toward her mouth. She closed her eyes, opened her mouth, and held her breath as she felt the warmth of his prick entering her.
Blood beat fiercely through his shaft as her lips moved down the member. Slowly she rose to the cockhead, then slowly slid down again, taking as much of his prick into her mouth as she could. But then, when she had him almost in her throat, his tongue found her clit again, and she let out a muffled groan of pleasure.
His hips were bucking in excitement, pushing his prick in and out of her kiss. She lay still, letting him move into her, using her fingers to caress his balls. And her lips were moving too, swirling around as he sank his fingers into her ass and pressed his face against her pussy.
Amy screamed when he closed his lips around her clit and began sucking, twisting his head as if he were trying to tear the morsel from her body. His lips were still around her clit when he eased a finger through her wet cunt lips and edged it into her body.
Amy gasped as she plunged too quickly down his shaft, then groaned again when he twisted his finger around in her cunt. He pushed her legs apart farther, then took her by surprise by lapping all the way from her clit down along her gash to her asshole.
Her body shook as he parted her ass cheeks with his hands and licked along her hairless crack. He moved all the way to the small of her back, then returned along her slice. His lips pressed against her hole, she felt him pulling her buttocks apart and then cried out in delight when his tongue swirled through the gates and snaked down into her bunghole.
His prick popped out of her mouth, she closed her lips around his scrotum, working his balls back and forth with her tongue as she continued to shake. His tongue shot in and out of her asshole, moving along her crack from time to time, sliding down to caress her cunt at other times. Still his finger pistoned in and out of her cunt, bringing her ever closer to her end.
"Mallory, darling," she sighed as she paused to catch her breath. "You taste so good!"
His balls dropped from her mouth, she licked her way along his shaft, then took his crown in her mouth and slid her tender kiss down the shaft. She felt it tense, then flex again as she returned to the cockhead. She knew that a few more caresses would send his gism spurting into her mouth.
"Do it to me now!" she bleated, shivering all over as he continued to caress her cunt and ass. "Hurry!"
Mallory swung his body around quickly, she shot her legs open to accept him and then closed them around his back as he lowered his hips toward hers. She groped for his cock, he took it in his hand and rubbed the warm crown along her wet cunt lips.
"Mmmm," he mumured as he kissed her lips. "You're so wet!"
He propped himself up on his elbows and stared down at her pussy as he steered his cock through her doors. He could see the pink, glistening doors through the tangle of her blonde hair, could see them parting as he inserted his crown. Then, he watched his long, gleaming manhood slide into her bush, his balls pressed against her body, and he had filled her to overflowing with his warm flesh.
"My God!" Amy cried out, shaking her head back and forth. "It's so ... so ... oh, darling!"
He was still looking down at her pussy as he eased his cock back through her channel. The shaft emerged, wet with her moisture, he twirled his hips to twist the rod around in her hole and then drove it back into her sharply. She gasped, then gripped his ass with her fingers and pushed him down. His hips clapped into hers, his cock bored deeply into her, and then both groaned as his muscular chest crushed down on her shimmying tits.
Mallory began pumping quickly now, slicing his cock into her with such force that his balls slapped into her body hard enough to bruise them. She threw her hips up to meet his strokes, pulling him down with her hands against his buttocks as if she were trying to stir him to work even faster. Amy had never imagined such fury, never imagined that she could experience such pleasure.
And as he slid his hands under her body and took hold of her buttocks, pulling her up to meet his strokes as he drilled into her, he too was amazed by the thrill of her love, he too felt he was reaching places he'd never been before-and wanted to revisit often.
It seemed she was close to fainting from the violence of her passion when she felt herself climbing into an orgasm. She screamed wildly, shook her hips, beat his back with her hands, scissored her legs open and closed as she rose to her peak. She squeezed her cunt around his prick as she reached her chest, then soared down the other side like a roller coaster passing the first incline, and was soon climbing up the next incline toward a second climax.
He continued to thrust, drilling his hard cock into her cunt and sailing his balls against her ass, as she rose toward another end. And then she was coming again, wailing in his ears, clawing at his back, flailing her hips, and almost weeping with pleasure.
She came a third time before she felt his cock stiffening inside her body. Mallory groaned as he screwed back into her tight cunt, she screamed as she felt his prick reach deeply into her channel and explode, sending a torrent of hot seed into her cream-filled hole.
His strokes were still quick and hard as he poured his nectar into her cunt. She trembled as his warmth filled her, then came again as he spent his passion.
He kissed her on the lips when he stopped thrusting, they lay together on the floor as they fought to regain their breath. His cock remained hard, and remained buried in her snug channel.
Then they made love again, wildly, loudly, from every angle Mallory knew and a few he'd never dreamed of. Mallory was limp with fatigue and covered with sweat by the time he came inside her cunt again, he lay on top of her for a few moments and then rolled off, still tingling. Amy lay beside him, smiling, wanting to sing out like a bird with happiness.
They looked up at the ceiling where they lay tangled in the cloth of many colors. Mallory looked at Amy's relaxed face and her happy dancing green eyes. She turned to him. "Mallory?"
"Yes, darling?"
"If we are partners-does that mean we spend lots of time together? I mean when we finish working at the end of the day. Sometimes ... very often, is what I really mean, ... can we...."
"Partnerships, I always say are based on perfect cooperation. Each partner must find ways of making the other happy. If you want something from me ... you just beg for it."
"Mallory Condon!" Amy shouted and began to pound his hard naked chest with her fists. "Mallory Condon, you are a tease! I hate teasing, Mallory...."
But his mouth had covered hers and her struggling slowly ceased. Condon drew her hard against him.
When they had finished, the sun had begun to rise. It flooded into the large studio home high above the city. The light of the day set the great lengths of satin ablaze. Amy Twain and Mallory Condon, unaware of the sun rise, slept at the crossroads of a world they had just created.
