If Mai hadn't been so positive as they'd driven through the gates of the vast estate, started up the winding, evergreen-shrouded approach, Libby certainly wouldn't have believed anyone was at home at the huge, rambling mansion. She'd have thought Mr. LeGarde's mysterious "party" was so much hoax, another one of his nasty tricks.
Even as they neared the house itself, saw all the windows dark, she still had serious doubts. But as they wheeled around the coach house, found a large parking lot in the rear, saw the half-dozen or so cars parked there-Cadillacs and Continentals and Jaguars all, not a Chev or Ford among them-she was assured.
Party-her drink-clouded mind rejoiced. Mai wasn't lying. They were going to swing and never stop swinging. Good old Mai wouldn't let this delicious, woozy feeling in her brain fade, go by the boards. He couldn't! She felt so good!
Libby shivered as Mai opened her door and a frigid blast of December air clawed its way to her knees, mauled her bare legs above the black stockings Mai had insisted she wear tonight. She stepped from the Continental, pulled her lovely mink jacket tight around her shoulders, giggled as Mai embraced her, hurried her forward, squeezed and stroked her ungirdled buttocks as they went up the walk.
They paused at the door, waited until a small peephole flipped open and dark, piercing eyes stared out at them. Then the door swung open, and Mai was guiding Libby into the dimly lit vestibule. Libby fought to focus her eyes, to assess the hovering female, a heavy, floor-sweeping cloak over her shoulders. She was perhaps forty, somewhat on the puffy side, but still lovely nonetheless. Yet there was something menacing in her gaze.
"Mai," she whispered. "What kept you? Dorcas is waiting. He's becoming impatient."
"Sorry, Renata. But things do take time." He sent a sidelong glance to Libby. "Renata, meet Libby. Libby, this is Renata."
The woman's smile was icy. "Hello, Libby." Then to Mai: "They seem to be getting younger all the time, Mai. You sure she'll be ... willing? When the time comes?"
Mai's grip on Libby's arm was unnecessarily harsh. "I'm sure she will. She knows which side her bread's buttered on. Right, Libby?"
The girl smiled woozily. "Anything you say, darling."
The Renata woman dismissed them imperiously. "Go ahead, Mai. I'm sure you know the way. I'll activate the burglar system, close the main gate." An ugly snicker escaped her. "We wouldn't want anyone interrupting, would we?"
Mai led Libby down the cavernous corridor, took her down a short flight of stairs. Muted, sonorous, slightly discordant music carried up to them. They stopped before a heavy, paneled door upon which a white, cabalistic symbol was painted. "Now remember what I told you, baby," Mai said. "No matter what you see here, you aren't to cause a fuss, understand? Just be still, do as you're told, no matter what. Understand? No matter what? I won't have you embarrassing me."
"Yes, dear," the girl replied with muzzy docility. "I'll mind ... do everything you say."
Whereupon Mai gave three very staccato raps. Seconds later the door was opened by a man who was, like Mai, dressed in evening clothes. Wordlessly he admitted them.
The music was louder in the room, there was a musky, sharp odor in the air, an unusual incense that quickened the pulse, awoke an unbidden feeling of evil within Libby. The large room, lit only by feeble candles sparsely placed, was, if anything, even darker than the rest of the house. Libby stood in blind dependence, clung hard to Mai's arm, tried to adjust her eyes to the murky gloom.
And when she did, intoxicated as Mai had purposely worked to make her, she couldn't help but feel a sudden spearing of terror. Party? she wailed inwardly. This is no party-
There were sixteen people in all, nine men, seven women, all of them formally dressed, the women in exquisite gowns and shoes and hose, their faces and hair impeccably done. The men were in tuxedoes. The scent of expensive perfume cut through the cloying incense. As Libby's vision cleared, she was able to see the women better. She became aware that they were all older, in their mid-thirties and early forties, leaving Libby the youngest woman in the group. She panicked, wondered at this discrepancy, at the reason for being in this scary room.
The room was weirdly conceived. There were no chairs, no furnishings of any kind. There was only the raised, upholstered and heavily cushioned platform, a semicircle that afforded room to sit, sprawl or lay as it suited the guests. The floor was heavily carpeted; Libby felt like she floated as she followed Mai, took a place on the sumptuous bench. The others regarded her darkly; no words were exchanged between them or Mai.
Libby barely had time to orient herself when Mai left her, went to a long table to one side, a table lavishly stocked with glasses, with myriad bottles of liquor. Returning, he handed Libby a squat glass of what tasted like straight gin. Bitter as it was, she welcomed it, sipped it avidly. Once more her addled senses fought to assimilate these weird surroundings.
At the far end of the room, where it was totally dark, she discerned curtains, like a theater. The curtains, made of a dense material, were drawn, gave no clue whatsoever as to what they concealed. Libby became more puzzled, drank even faster, felt the happy heat and stupor siam her anew.
Abruptly a hiss of expectancy went through the room. Simultaneously a gong sounded behind the curtain. Mai caught her arm, squeezed very hard. "Remember," he rasped, "no fuss...."
Then the curtain was slowly drawn, and Libby distinguished the small arena below and to the front, the silky, black hangings behind the block of marble that somehow resembled an altar. Shortly the darkness was split as the woman, Renata, her black cloak and cowl totally covering her, entered, a long taper in her hands, and began to light the squat, deformed candles to the back of that altar.
Libby sucked in her breath suddenly, felt her eyes would pop out of her head as she saw the ghastly symbols upon the surface of that marble block. Mai clenched her wrist cruelly, reminding her.
The prone shape of the perverted artifacts, twisted in some unspeakable pottage, were all astounding enough, making Libby's heart race. But the huge frog, spread-eagled, upended, its white under parts gleaming vilely, was even more alarming!
But all that was nothing compared to the totaly nude woman who lay on a second tier of the grisly altar, flat on her back, her hands at her side, her legs straight before her, seemingly in a deep trance. She was a young woman, her black hair combed out long, her body painted with a white paint, nails violently carmined, her nipples painted red also. And there, on her abdomen, was painted that same squiggly symbol Libby had seen on the door as they'd entered.
Libby had the strange feeling she was floating, that she was out of control, that she'd faint at any moment. She wanted to break into terrified yelps. But paralyzed as she was she did nothing. Mai leaned to her, hissed, "Steady, baby."
Now the gong sounded again, and everyone stood. From a side room the female acolyte, Renata, entered carrying a candle. Only she was a different Renata now, the cape and cowl gone, wearing only a black brassiere, black high-heeled shoes. The garments had been altered; the points of the brassiere were cut away to let her hard, crinkly nipples pop out, the panties had been slashed in a deep vee.
Libby stiffened, felt her heart falter as she remembered the scene Mai had made before they'd left the apartment. He'd demanded she put on mutilated black lingerie, stockings, garter belt and shoes-perfect replicas of those that Renata now wore. Instantly Libby's nipples puckered, burned beneath her gown. Her body tingled and ached.
But if this wasn't bad enough, more frightening was the apparition following Renata. This was a tall, gross man in a black, silk robe, carrying what seemed to be a book, defiled and tattered, turned face down on its portable lecturn. The man's head was totally bald, carefully oiled and shone evilly as he leered cruelly at his pervert congregation.
The book was paced on the altar, the would-be-priest turned it over, set it upside down on its stand. Then he hawked loudly, spat gustily on its pages. He turned to the others, undid the tie at the throat of his robe and threw the robe aside to reveal that he was wearing only a short black cape at his shoulders, mockery of a surplice. Otherwise, except for the leather boots he wore, the thin G-string at his waist, he was totally naked. His paunch quivered with his every movement.
Now he raised his arms, revealing himself further. "Shall we pray?" he boomed.
Instantly Libby knew what travesty would happen now. Even at her tender age she'd heard allusion to the impending sacrilege, she had a vague idea of what the Black Mass was. She was terrified; she wanted no part of it. This would mean eternal damnation of her immortal soul. Yet, frightened as she was, she could do nothing to stop them, to escape this hellish rite. Mai had warned her!
She was suddenly brought from her stunned trance. "Shall we pray?" the priest thundered again, looking squarely at Libby. Mai dug her with his elbow, cursed. Staring wild-eyed about her, Libby saw that everyone was now stripping away their beautiful, expensive, civilized garb. Her stomach tumbled as she saw the women, their panties and brassieres like Renata's, wearing black stockings and garter belts, seemingly a decreed uniform, as she saw the men, more naked than the priest, in just their socks and shoes and similar G-strings, all eagerly disrobing, heedlessly throwing their clothing aside.
Now, appalled, her brain spinning, she had no choice but to comply. With trembling fingers she began to run her zippers, undo snaps. A moment later she was down to essentials. She shivered convulsively, swayed as she waited for the rest of the vile rite to unravel.
She turned to Mai, whispered, "I can't do this, Mai. This is wrong. Please, don't make me go through with this."
"Silence!" he rasped, his hands hurting her terribly. "You'll go through with this. All of this! Or else...."
Libby gasped with pain, fell away as she felt the mind-numbing hopelessness hit her like a ten pound sledge. Dumbly she turned to the altar, resigned herself to the diabolic parody. And, the alcoholic daze fading, she groped for her drink, greedily sucked at it, wild to have these horrors blotted from her brain once and for all.
The priest prattled mockingly through the Creed, substituting Satan, Lucifer, Beelzebub, and more frequently the strange name Asmodeus, using every opportunity to revile the true meaning and intent.
Libby did not attempt to understand why these people had come here, knowing to commit blasphemy. They were here, they had come willingly, this rottenness must certainly fill some need in their pointless lives. You don't have to understand, she scolded herself, you just have to endure. That is your punishment for all this other.
Her eyes fluttered, her pulse raced as, mesmerized, she watched the vile things the priest did and heard what he said at that grisly altar. He prepared a concoction that looked like animal blood, he pierced the toad with long pins, he abused the body of the entranced virgin on the back altar, pinching and poking her, inscribing evil symbols on her breasts, her legs and body.
The tension mounted as the madhouse ritual went on; Libby could feel a current of restlessness and evil generated by those around her as the Mass neared its end. Indeed, the gin regenerating haziness in her brain, she felt an unwanted excitement of her own.
Now the gleaming-pated priest turned, revealed a further variation of the black rites. "Asmodeus demands a penitent," he intoned, "a human sacrifice, before he confers the grace of his holy self. Who will sacrifice himself to Asmodeus?"
Instantly at least six men and women jumped up. "Me," they called. "Take me, choose me, let Asmodeus pick me!"
The priest's eyes glittered. He hesitated only a moment. "You, unworthy scum," he growled, pointing at a bull-shouldered specimen, his face choleric from drink and excitement. "You, Laird. Asmodeus has spoken."
A rapt, sick smile on his face, the man went forward to the draped wall behind the altar, the black hangings decorated with weird symbols, a six pointed star dominant among them. Pulling the drapes aside, he revealed the concrete wall, chains and manacles hanging from it, others, apart from these, laying on the floor.
Instantly the priest left the altar. Renata assisting him, they bound the volunteer's wrists and ankles, pulled on the chains until the body was spread-eagled, heavy on the steel bracelets.
Instantly everyone was pleading for the opportunity to punish the trussed-up victim. The priest made a show of deliberation, finally chose a tall, blonde virago, thin and beautiful, her body exciting in the evil uniform.
"All praise to Asmodeus," she intoned, hurrying forward, her buttocks gleaming evilly as she ran.
Seemingly from nowhere the long, coiled whip appeared, was held just out of the woman's reach. "Down, filth," the priest snarled. "You forget your manners. Honor Asmodeus in his fleshly incarnation for favors shown."
"Forgive me, master," the amazon intoned. And without a moment's hesitation, she fell on her knees before him, her fingers groping at his body, unashamedly tearing away the last concession to modesty. Then, a blissful smile on her face, she stretched, reached, conferred a most self-debasing homage. "Tell me when I have pleased," she muttered.
The base rite went on and on, the man shuddering, his smile growing more exultant by the moment. As acknowledgment of his pleasure he repeatedly slapped the kneeling female's back and buttocks with the coiled whip.
Until finally, when he could stand no more, he gave her a particularly vicious cut, pulled away. "Enough, filth. You may punish the victim."
Instantly the woman rose, took the whip. "Thank you, master," she called. Then she unrolled the snake, snapped the kinks from it. Then with no more ado, she drew back her arm, began to lash Laird with all her strength. At this the penitent, moaning in pain though he was. still showed sick delight and rapture, begged for more.
"Harder," he gritted. "Make me worthy of Asmodeus Harder .. "
Libby shuddered without stop, finally had to force her eyes away as slow dribbles of blood began running down the man's form. It was then that Mai leaned to her, whispered, "Isn't she something? Sometimes I'm so proud of her."
"Who?" Libby gulped. "That woman, you mean? Who...?"
"That's Monika, my wife."
Libby gasped. "Your wife? You mean she knows about this, she's actually...."
"Of course," Mai purred. "This was all Monika's idea. She's the creative one. She got me started. Oh, look! Isn't she beautiful? Isn't she evil?"
Libby couldn't think straight. This was just too much. Dazedly she handed him her empty glass. "Please, Mai. Can you...."
"Of course." Without once taking his eyes from the flogging, he went to refill her glass.
Libby drank hard and fast, fought to control her shaking hands. "Does she know about me ... about us? Won't she be furious?"
"Silly child," Mai chuckled. "Of course she knows. I tell her everything, she returns the favor." He pointed to a youngish man, looking somewhat green about the gills, to their right. "That man there. He's Monika's present lover. A very liberal boy indeed. Matthew Cape. I told her he's too young for her, but she insists." He reached for Libby, tweaked her. "Runs in the family I guess."
Libby permitted the attention, not moving except to shake her head slowly, try to stop the insane spinning there, drunkenly, almost completely out of things.
Shortly the victim, babbling gleefully, a masochist gratified, passed out. And the sacrifice to Satan was over. At the priest's signal, Renata and Monika hurried to unshackle him. He was left lying on the floor while th rest of the ceremony went on around him.
Next the priest pushed his acolyte to her knees, demanded that servile homage from Renata-his wife-now. This subservience she gladly performed, stopping only when the man forcefully pushed her away. Then the travesty of the sacrament went on. And the cult members were crowding forward, kneeling in a weaving line before the altar to receive the monstrous communion.
Each member drank from the cup, took the coarse host upon which was inscribed an evil picture. Holding the vile stuff in his mouth, each advanced to the altar, kissed the naked woman's body, made great show of spitting out the potion. Then they returned from the altar, took their places once more.
Libby and two others, a woman and a man, not official members as yet, sat in numbed silence, watched with gaping eyes. Libby was surprised to find her second drink gone. She marveled that she felt so little sensation in her hands, so little emotion in her heart.
What happened after that was always to be a nightmare of the vaguest sort to Libby. Shortly thereafter her mind blanked out almost completely, it seemed that only the most fleeting of pictures and sensations were etched in her memory.
She did remember the ritualistic mumbo jumbo as the three initiates were brought forward, were forced to kneel before the priest, their sponsors hovering behind them. She remembered being asked if she wanted to accept 'Asmodeus as her god, become his disciple forever. She remembered Mai twisting her hair, prodding her until she finally forced the extorted "Yes," until she repeated the evil litany after the priest.
She remembered the novitiates' version of communion, the scalding, burning drink they were forced tfl put down. The liquor, she learned later, was absinthe, 180 proof, a potion that definitely knocked down any remaining wall of inhibition and decency.
And when the priest ordered her to show her humility to him, forcefully brought her head to him, she resisted only a little, felt a weird release in surrendering her soul to him, the degrading act being supreme testament to that loss.
The debasement had seemed to last an eternity. And when she'd finally been released from the ugly chore-
She'd knelt there, weaving, watching as her sister convert, Suzanne, had performed the same homage.
To her right, Maynard performed for Renata, acolyte and high-priestess, as she sprawled on a ceremonial chair, whimpering and gasping her pleasure. More greedy than her husband, she'd kept the male applicant at his penitence much longer, had screamed at the end, had announced a shattering deliverance.
Things had become progressively more vile from then on. Libby remembered crawling the length of the room, undoing the leather thongs on every man's body, showing her humility to the cult by honoring each and every one of them. That seemed as though a forest of bodies had fluttered before her, as some had sat, some had lain on that cushioned shelf with Libby attending them.
Behind her, the man named Maynard had pushed the other females back onto that stage of lust, had shown his obedience to the cult's rule of life.
At the end she could barely remember how he'd thrown her back, had defiled himself before her too. The sensation had been piercing, maddening. She'd screamed and twisted when the man hadn't been content just to humble himself, had insisted on delivering her in that abnormal manner besides.
Then the debauchees had commenced to drink again, in real earnest .this time. The cultist depravities became excuse for full scale orgy.
There were other things that happened which Libby was afraid even to think about, let alone put into words.
Had that woman, a dark-haired amazon, actually captured her, crowded her into a dark corner, guided her through that twisting sea of naked arms and legs and backs? Had she lent herself to that perversion willingly, had Libby even attempted to reciprocate?
Had the men, one after another, the priest first, taken her without stop, in an endless parade until her body was sodden and limp, until she was unable to move any longer?
Had she seen that woman and man, twisting on top of Asmodeus' altar?
Had she seen the men tie Monika LeGarde with those same manacles, had she watched them line up, take turns with her?
Had she seen the hypnotized female on Asmodeus' altar dragged to the floor, turned face down by the high-priest, treated that vile way?
She could never be sure. For, the acts becoming more and more insane with each passing minute, her own heathenish impulses coming to the fore, liberated, Libby had returned to that liquor table once too often, had, in the very midst of a session with a total stranger, passed out.
The slightest trace of memory was left; she had faintest recall that the man, cursing, had wrestled her to her front, had made his attempt that way.
Beyond that all was blackness.
CHAPTER TWO
While the demonic orgy was taking place at the Dorcas Savage country place some ten miles outside of Kendall Park, another orgy, of milder nature, yet no less surprising and revealing to its participants, was evolving in the luxurious, yet functional bedroom belonging to Dr. and Mrs. John Porter, at 1223 W. Dorchester in Kendall Park itself.
There, the good doctor and his wife had returned from a small house party shortly after one. Both-had consumed more liquor than usual, and now found some of their stodgy inhibitions temporarily routed.
John Porter, at forty, was still a moderately virile man, and unlike so many doctors who let their constant involvement with malfunctioning human bodies affect their personal lives, he was still fond of a twice weekly passion session with his wife. And though he often looked at some of the prettier nurses at the hospital and clinic with more than fatherly interest, he'd never approached any of them for fear of jeopardizing his career.
Home cooking, he conceded, was the wisest course.
But tonight, his sensuality strongly piqued, he entertained some very exotic thoughts, sensed fleeting panic to think he was getting old, that he and his Ione had never really been frenzied, chaotic love partners. He was extremely sorry to admit that he'd always been pretty much of an uninspired lover. And while he often suspected that Ione harbored hidden resources, untapped passions, he'd never put her to the test.
But tonight, undressing while Ione opened the bed, folded the bedspread as she always did, remembering some of the wild stories that psychiatrist nut had told at the party, his exotic yearnings weren't so easily quelled. That thing about the woman who needed urgently, always set the alarm clock, allotted herself a certain number of sessions, who enjoyed, if she could get that, a little sadism on the side. That thing with the needles-did such people actually exist? Or was Kodjeski just pulling his leg?
Now John Porter was naked, watching Ione, still in her party dress, as she finished her chores. The drinks blurring his discrimination, he suddenly saw his wife as a vastly desirable woman, he longed to run his hands on her stockinged legs. But that was something she didn't tolerate, maintaining that reeked of fetish and perversion.
By all rights he should have put on his pajamas. But still he sat, watching the way the light glistened on Ione's silky rear, on the piquant cones of her breasts. She was really, even at thirty-seven, quite a dish. Her dark hair gave her a smoky, trampish look.
By God, he marveled. Talk about wanting!
At that moment Ione turned, saw John's nudity. A flicker of a smile formed as her eyes fled over him. "My, darling," she purred in a rare sultriness, "what do we have there?"
"We don't have anything," he kidded. "I do. Are you interested?"
She blushed, partially turned away. "John, you know I don't like that kind of talk. What's happened to you?"
"Don't worry about me," he plowed on boldly. "Worry about what's going to happen to you."
"Now, John, stop that."
He reached out, grabbed her skirt by the seat, pulled her back. "John, be careful. You're wrinkling my skirt."
"I'll wrinkle more than your skirt before I'm through." He pulled harder, slid his hand beneath the skirt in back, let the hand sweep to her front, to her knees, then her upper legs. Ione jerked, tried to escape. "John, now stop that! Can't you wait until we get to bed?"
"In bed? Is that the only way you like things? You act like love is something sinful, something to be done under the covers. Hell, we've only got a few more good years left us."
Her struggles diminished, a slow shiver went down her legs. "John, what's come over you? You've never...."
"Never mind." Abruptly his bands came up, tugged at her belt, then her zipper. "Just let daddy have his fun."
She fought his hands. "I told you to stop, John. I'm quite capable of undressing myself."
"Maybe you are." A stern edge formed on his voice. "But tonight I want to do that. Stand still."
"John, now stop. You're being impossible."
His hands became rougher. "Stand still, Ione!" he spat. "Before I really get mean. I said I want you this way tonight."
"This is ridiculous," she said as he rose, pulled the gown over her head, took the frilly slip away with that. Then she stood in just her brassiere, panty girdle, stockings and sabre-toed pumps. "John, you're embarrassing me."
"So what? If this is what I enjoy." His hands slid along her legs. "You know, baby, you are one exciting package of goods. Even after fifteen years." His hands moved, tickled her brazenly. "No? No tingle at all?"
"John, now stop. You're treating me like some trollop." Yet she became strangely quiescent, she made no move to pull away. "I'm not used to being treated like this."
"Mea culpa," he said. "My fault. It's about time." He reached up, caressed her breasts, found the nipples already hard beneath their nylon cages. "Maybe youfd enjoy being treated like a trollop for once. Stand over there, honey. Model those silkies for me. Show off that frame. You should really be proud of that. You're quite something."
A strange light came into Ione eyes. "Do you really think so, darling?" She pulled in her stomach, stood away, breathed deeply, brought her breasts to full thrust. "For an old woman?"
"You're no old woman." He grunted softly, winced. "Baby, those boobs! Those magnificent boobs. I ache."
The woman swayed, trembled. "You've never called them that before, John. Say that again."
"Boobs. Big, loud, exploding boobs. Baby, have I got a yen! There, like that, turn around, give me that profile. Those legs, doll. In those pumps. God, I like that. Turn just a little more. Oh! Bend your knee a little. Wow! What you're doing to me!" Ione turned, giggled. "I can tell what I'm doing to you." She shuddered again. "John, what are you doing to me? I feel so strange, so wild and funny."
"Good, that's the way a woman's supposed to feel when her stud gives her the once over. Turn, baby, turn."
The exotic pantomime went on for a long time, until John Porter could stand no more. Then he ordered his wife to stand before him. Surprising even herself, she willingly did. And as his hands roved over her silk-bound body, as he ignited a molten warmth, the woman let herself go, she joyfully let herself sink into fantasy. She'd never felt like this, so weak, so pliable, so subservient. So much like a lust-hungry woman.
The sensation of losing her wits intensified as her husband removed her bassiere, kissed and touched her nipples, as he peeled off her stockings, her girdle and panties. Then, putting her shoes back on, he had her model further for him, he made her hold her breasts with her hands. Gradually the last restraint and embarrassment faded. She wanted to be a wanton for him, a pawn, a slave if need be. And of her own volition Ione brought up her hands, toyed with her nipples, made them taut, felt the ache beneath her hands.
"I feel so strange," she repeated sibilantly. "What else, darling? Tell me what else you want me to do. Anything, darling."
"Here," John husked, amazed himself at the insane yearnings driving him, at the lust to improvise, do things he'd never done with a woman before. To purge himself of some of his darkest desires. "Come stand over here. Let me get my hands on that frame. Baby, I want you bad."
She smiled blissfully, moved to him. "Here I am, darling. Do anything you want to me. Tell me what you want." She shuddered as if chilled. "What's happened to me?"
"That thing," he murmured, " ... you do in the mornings sometimes. That exercise I caught you doing once...." Ione grinned devilishly, backed off. "You mean this one?" And she brought her arms up, made a square arch across her face. Catching her elbows, she began flexing her upper arms, an action that made her breasts bob and gyrate, made them firm up, the nipples getting hard again. "You like?"
"I like," John grimaced. "Too much. Oh, baby, more. Faster. Make those boobs dance."
"My pleasure," Ione teased. And the gorgeous globes jerked and swung more rapidly, excited the man all the more.
"Come here, baby," he grated finally. "Let me at those."
She swayed toward him, a temptress smile on her lips. "Yes, lover man. Anything you say."
For long moments Dr. Porter sat with his wife standing before him while his hands slid on her smooth, lean back, the pert, vibrant mounds of her rear, on her trim, lithe legs. Then as Ione leaned, held her breasts with her hands, offered them to his upraised lips, each in turn, she amazed herself further by manipulating them herself, knowing the most incredible sensations.
John felt a shudder slam his very vitals. His hands reached for her legs. Instantly Ione adjusted^ gave him room to operate. And as his lips swirled about the turgid rosettes, his hands found another occupation, stroked and tickled in perfect rhythm to that other torture.
And Ione went berserk, let herself sink into a flaming sea of passion the like of which she'd never known before.
And finally even these attentions weren't enough. Wanting to possess her, to own her very soul, to prove that ownership, John Porter involuntarily began to pinch the flesh of her legs, of her buttocks, other areas. Deriving a tremendous charge from this minor sadism, he seemingly intensified his pleasure.
"John," she whimpered, twisting, "you're hurting me." Yet she made no move to draw away from him.
"I want to hurt you," he gulped, not really knowing what he was saying, what that was he wanted. "You deserve to be hurt. For cheating me out of this all these years."
"That isn't my fault, darling. You were never strong and masterful like this before. You never made me want to behave like this, be a pagan." Then as his bands became even more cruel, as his teeth nipped, as his lips pulled and pressed, "John, my precious man."
Abruptly an awesome spate of trembling possessed the man. "John," she breathed. "What-what?"
"Darling," he groaned, pulling her down onto his knees forcing her onto her front over them, "forgive me. I can't help myself. I want to spank you. I have to."
Now that was Ione's turn to shudder. "Oh, baby," she sighed. "I feel so funny. Yes, darling. If that's what you want. Spank me. Spank your little girl. She's been so naughty."
Forcefully he arranged her on his bare knees, felt one of her hands reach for him. In return he placed his left hand strategically, used a special balance hold. Then he raised his hand, began slapping her lovely, pink buttocks, timidly at first, then harder and faster The smacking sound of the blows seemed incredibly loud in the room, spurred him on. Ione twisted and jerked with pain, she used her hand brutally. "Yes," she seethed between clenched teeth, "like that, darling. Don't be afraid. Hurt me, hurt your bad girl. Harder. Ow, that hurts." Her hand moved faster on him. "But a good hurt. Keep on, baby. Punish me.
Then, finally, her voice blurred with tears, "Darling, my masterful darling. I've never felt like this before. I'm wild, I feel evil and dirty. Oh, why haven't you been like this before? When I think of all the years we've wasted."
She twisted more savagely. "More, daddy, more. Oh that hurts. Tell me ... please...."
"Tell you what?"
"Tell me what you want. Command me. Make me do other things for you. You devil, make me more evil than I've ever been before."
"Things like what?"
Abruptly she slid off his knees, cowered before him. "You won't think badly of me, dear?"
"No," he replied gravely, frightened himself now at how far things had progressed, had gotten out of hand.
"Things like this." And she slid her lips on his legs, let them top his knees. "Tell me," she whimpered. "Command me."
"Yes," he gritted. "Kiss me. Kiss me, damn you!" He moved his hand, indicated. "Here too. This is what you want isn't that, baby? Well I want that too. Here. Kiss."
Then, as her lips moved, he knew the first warm touch.
All too soon she stopped. And Ione looked at him pleadingly. "More, darling? Do you want more."
"Yes, baby. Yes. I want more."
"Then tell me. Command me." Her voice became gutteral. "In plain words. Very plain words. Tell me what you want me to do."
A flash of victory and supremacy piercing John Porter, he put his hand on her hair, guided her. And in very plain words he told his wife just what she must do.
And nearly went out of his mind at the ferocity and dedication with which the lust-struck woman obeyed his command. Now and then, when he thought he couldn't stand the nerve-searing sensation any further, she paused to look at him imploringly. "Slap me," she said, "spank your naughty girl if she fails you. If she doesn't give you pleasure." Then she moved to her mind-unhinging love chore anew.
When John Porter could stand no more of the obeisance, he solemnly led her to the bed. Placing her on the sheet, he went to extinguish the lights.
He was barely in bed when Ione crawled to him again, her voice clogged with desire for deviation. "Command me, darling. I want to please you so dearly."
Again he told her frankly what he wanted. She rose up on the bed, and he tolerated the agonizing sweet pain as long as he could. Then, adrift in a passion fever himself, he turned her body, arranged her legs.
"No, darling, "she protested. "This is my gift. You don't have to...."
"I can't help myself, baby," he choked. "I want you this way, too."
His lips had barely grazed her when Ione screamed, twisted wildly on the bed. "Darling," she sobbed, "that's magnificent. Yes, more, drive me wild, turn me into a wanton, a tramp, your hoyden...."
Minutes later she screamed chaotically, clenched her fists, held him there until the fever had subsided, all the while ministering to him avidly, gratefully, savagely.
Then, finally, when they disentangled, she said, "Slap me, darling, pinch me, bite me, if I don't please and satisfy you."
Now Ione Porter did something she'd never done before in all their fifteen years of marriage. She moved as he took her, clamped her arms tight around him. "Darling," she sobbed. "This is marvelous. I can appreciate you so much better, every single bit. My stallion, oh! Oh ... "
Their bodies attacked. And as the inevitable warmth and fury mounted, both knew they'd stumbled on a mystic secret of love, both knew their love would never be humdrum, never be the same again.
A minute later there was no time for words. Only for screams and groans of deliverance.
At the same moment that John and Ione Porter were discovering this new facet to the other's personality, in another part of Kendall Park an entirely different sort of discovery was taking place. This was in a curiously masculine apartment belonging to a mixed-up female of twenty-eight named Peggy Clinton, a girl who dug things with guys only when she was pressured, but who would much rather perform her bedroom calisthenics in the arms of another woman.
This was a great pity, for Peggy was a beautiful, magnificently endowed blonde, a vision in heels and silk, a woman who put her bras to the supreme stretch test every time she put one on, who had the sassiest rear and hips this side of St. Louis. Needless to say, it was part of her peculiar character that she loved to lead men on, turn them off cruelly at the most crucial of moments. Also, she was expert at using force in that brushoff if her contemptuous smile, her scathing words weren't enough to do the job.
Tonight Peggy had company, the kind of company she most especially enjoyed, in the form of one Vicki Dugan, who was Peggy's special project for December. And January and February too, if Peggy had her way. It would take at least that long to really get to know Vicki, explore the ramifications of her uninhibited sensuality.
The girls were on the outside of three brandy Manhattans, working on their fourth. Each was, at that moment, far beyond the bounds of decorum, shyness and restraint. The lights dimmed in that ultra-modern apartment, a very weird ritual was taking place. Peggy was in the process of revealing the most aberrated of her inner quirks.
Vicki was naked on the couch, her body flushed from too much drink, from the attentions of her more experienced mentor. Her dark hair was tousled from her exertions, perspiration lay in heavy drops on her upper lip and forehead, her muscles twitched. She was a beautiful woman. Her skin was ivory-clear and smooth, the aroused tips of her breasts contrasting provocatively with her creamy complexion.
But now, drinks or no drinks, Vicki was very perturbed as she wryly surveyed the fetish items that Peggy had draped on a nearby chair, was insisting on dressing Vicki in, items like the fine glace leather brassiere, specially altered, the matching black, leather panties, also exotically altered. Then there were the full length leather boots, with exaggeratedly pointed toes, the dagger-sharp heels fully five inches long. "Why?" she rebelled. "What jolts do you get out of a psycho stunt like that, honey?'
"What's that to you?" Peggy said. "If I dig this, I dig this. So what's the harm? Please, Vicki. You'll look so lovely in them. I'll give you the loving of your life if you put them on for me."
Time was fleeing and Vicki was much excited. The brandy, Peggy's maddening kisses, conferred on all the right places, had done their work well. And Vicki wanted to get with things, she wanted to get into that bedroom, douse the lights, take care of some very maddening pressures. Besides she was tired of arguing. Peggy had been at her for half an hour now; she'd used some very ingenious methods of weakening Vicki's defenses.
Thus she finally capitulated. "Okay," she sniffed. "If that's what you want. But this is not my style. Real kinky stuff." She put down her glass, raised one pretty leg indolently. "Go ahead, honey."
"You sweetheart." Peggy all but cringed. "You beautiful sweetheart. You'll like this, I know you will."
And with that she was up, fitting the long boots to Vicki's feet and legs, pulling the laces tightly, so the smooth black leather fit her like a second skin. The evil boots came all the way up to Vicki's knees, coating her calves in an alluring sheen. Even before the boots were fully laced, Peggy was kissing them, rubbing her cheeks along their lenths, stroking them with shaky fingers.
"Beautiful," she purred. "Baby, you don't know what soft leather like this does to me. I go ape over this."
She began to kiss and stroke Vicki's leather-bound legs anew, but Vicki shoved her away. "Let's get on with things, huh, hon? Don't keep me hanging like this.
Two more minutes and I'll have to take care of things all by my lonesome."
"Vicki! Don't talk like that. That hurts, that really cuts. Don't you have any soul at all?"
"Lots of soul," Vicki said acidly. "But damned little patience. Hurry with those things, will you?"
Peg made an elaborate ritual out of putting the leather panties on her female love partner; she lingered over them as she zipped them, again she kissed and caressed.
At least until Vicki couldn't stand much more of that. Then she pushed Peggy away once more. "Get with this, damn you!"
The leather brassiere, the tips cut away so Vicki's nipples could protrude in the center of those cones of black leather, was finally applied, adjusted for perfect effect. And Peggy couldn't keep her hands, her lips away from those sensitive, exposed nibs.
After some urging Vicki got up, walked back and forth across the room, turned and posed herself in all sorts of suggestive, extreme positions. Peggy sat entranced on the couch, her hands supporting her heavy, aching breasts while she took in the eerie style show. "You're beautiful, darling," she sighed viscously, breathlessly, "so maddeningly beautiful. I want you so bad."
"Well here I am," Vicki laughed.
"Not yet! Oh, please, be patient with me a little longer! Walk some more for me. Oh, those boots, the way the light shines on your breasts. Oh, baby, I ache so ... "
Vicki chuckled lewdly. "You ain't the only one." Then, despite Peg's protests, she whirled, ran toward the bedroom. "Come and get me, honey," she called.
"Damn you...." Peggy choked back frustrated tears. "You've got no heart at all."
In the darkness they lay in a twisted knot, Peggy the aggressor, Vicki on her back, exultantly passive, letting Peggy initiate the full procedures. , It seemed that Peg would have lingered at those boots, kissed them all night, she would have hovered near the stony caps of Vicki's nipples until dawn, had not Vicki become ugly, insisted that the torrid affair be consummated.
Reluctantly, wanting to prolong the exquisite, fetish love forever if she could, Peggy turned on the bed, let her lips slither. When she lingered on that leather surface too long, Vicki's hands wound in her hair, dragged at her. "There," Vicki cried as things began, "that's what I've been waiting for all night. Whew! Baby, you really know how to love a doll. Oh, that stings and burns! Wowee!" Her hands became cruel. "Oh go, dolly, go. That's magnificent. Yes, like that. Oh, you little devil!"
"Hold my breasts," Peggy instructed. "Play with them. Pinch the nipples. Good, good."
And when Peggy's passion became full-fledged, when she derived as much pleasure in giving as Vicki did in receiving, she still didn't forget the leather she so dearly loved.
"Baby," Peg gasped as her lips swirled, "Yes, harder now. Yes, harder."
And as Vicki's body-convulsing victory arrived, she groaned her exquisite deliverance.
CHAPTER THREE
Libby Ashton slept fitfully, like one drugged, until almost mid-afternoon of the next day. Several times she came partially awake, thought to get up. But always the booming, horrendous pain, the revulsion in her brain, deterred her, made her dig her face into the pillows, as if by sleeping she would find that oblivion where such things as conscience and shame didn't exist.
But finally, at 2:30 P.M., her stomach rolling and rebelling, suffering the hangover of the century, she couldn't forstall sickness any longer. She bolted for the bathroom. There, agonizedly kneeling over the toilet, she vomited nonstop, kept coughing and gagging even after there was no more to bring up.
Doggedly she forced herself to her feet, fell toward the lavatory. The pain in her head felt like someone was pincering her skull with ice tongs. She clung to the edge of the tiled counter, stared at her naked body in the immense mirror. Instantly she wanted to gag anew, to scream at the haggy apparition that stared back at her. Her long blonde hair was a rat's snarl, her eyes were pink, swollen, the lids dark and discolored. Her skin appeared mottled, her lips were dry and cracked.
Then she saw the scratches on her breasts, she saw the bruises on her arms, on her legs. And specially on her shoulders, where the men, in the full grip of bestial passion, had bitten her. Instantly she slumped, seemed to shrink inside herself. It was as if her skin had sagged, fit her too loosely.
Dear God, she called to herself, her brain seemingly shriveling, that didn't happen! All the other rotten things I've done-they were bad enough. But this, that pervert's carnival last night-I dreamed that, I only imagined-
Instantly the thoughts died. Stop it, you damned fool kid! You infant! You didn't dream any of that. That all happened! If not, where did all these bruises come from? How come you ache in every bone in your body, how come you burn and sting in places you've never stung before?
And Libby swayed, nearly fell, so deeply did the loathing penetrate her. Her eyes locked on the mirror, and she realized she looked thirty years old. And she had turned seventeen only six months ago-
God, God-what was happening to her?
She turned, fought her way back to the bedroom, to the rumpled bed. Though wanting desperately to fling herself into it, to burrow into the pillows, she did not. Instead she stood looking down on the man sprawled there, totally naked, his age, his grayness, his decayed flesh all too vulnerably displayed. This man-this lecher parasite-her lover!
Mai LeGarde was a man of fifty, of medium height, of fairly controlled weight considering years of extreme dissipation. His dark hair was grizzled, thinning badly at the temples, his face was pouchy, sallow. The mat of hair on his chest was graying also, as was the hair on his legs. His chest was flaccid, there was a sizable paunch below his waist.
All in all, he was a very repulsive specimen. Her appraisal caused Libby's stomach to tilt dangerously. With this man, she wailed, with this slug, I've done those things? I let this animal drag me to that place last night, get me drunk, made me perform and degrade-
Dear God! Where's this all going to end?
Glimmer of a memory came to her, a memory in which she saw herself with all those men again, conducting that barbaric self-defilement. And her stomach heeled over, nearly betrayed her again.
Now Mai shifted on the bed, groaned, rolled onto his stomach. And Libby saw the livid, scabbed scratches that criss-crossed his back, further testament to the night's savagery.
An awesome shudder split her. Slowly, resolutely she turned, retreated to the bathroom. There's only one way out of this, she told herself, only one solution.
If Mai hadn't awakened when she was being sick, then he wouldn't awaken now. And by the time he did-
It would be altogether too late.
Libby closed the bathroom door, steadied herself against it. Dully she surveyed the sumptuous room, the gleaming tile and chrome, all the refinements that money could buy. The full length mirrors, the vanity, the semi-sunken tub, the ornate shower stall. The room that had played its small part in her downfall.
Once more she looked at herself, shuddered as if someone had tugged the end of her spine. Hag, hag, she called at the disreputable image. Pervert-pervert's playmate!
And the total despair crushed her, drove her to that final act of contrition. The only way, she raged, the only way"!
Now she opened a drawer in the vanity, drew out the pack of razor blades. A steely determination hit her as she drew one out, unwrapped it, tested it on her finger. Two slashes, one across each wrist, and this crushing guilt would be lifted from her forever.
She stared at herself a last time in the mirror, inspected her sore, discolored breasts. Could that have been so? Only a month ago they'd been fresh, virginal, no man had ever touched them? No lips had ever clung there? And now-
She dropped her head, let a few soft sobs break from her throat. And now, after all those men, they were tainted, diseased beyond repair. For the briefest moment she thought to use the razor there, slash those pink tips off by way of extreme penance.
But she did not. Instead she went to the tub, crouched on a rug beside it, slowly turned the faucet, let the water run silently. Now she lowered her wrists into the warm flow, turned them so the blue veins were exposed. Drawing in her breath sibilantly, she brought the razor blade up, poised it.
Now, inch by inch, she began to lower it to those pulsing veins.
Fast, she lashed herself, do it fast. It won't hurt that way. Not until it's too late. Do it, now! Be brave!
At that moment the door behind her came silently open, and a haggard, angry face peered into the bathroom. Instantly, instinctively, Mai LeGarde flung himself at the distraught child, grabbed her hair, flung her back. "What in the hell do you think you're doing!" he growled, slapping her, tearing the razor blade from Libby's grasp.
The pain in her scalp, the suddenness of his attack, jolted her, and she screamed, couldn't think straight for a second. It seemed her head had been pulled off her shoulders. Immediately she rolled onto the floor, shrieked hysterically.
Near disaster averted, LeGarde having lived through other such tragic scenes before, he could afford to be calm, pretend gentleness. "Please, baby," he soothed, trying to lift her, "don't ever even think about a thing like this again. Why, Libby, why? Haven't I been good to you, helped you, given you everything your heart could desire? Why can't you understand that I'm not evil, that the things we do aren't evil? I love you, baby, I want to do what's right for you."
For a long time Libby couldn't talk. She only shrunk from Mai, curled herself into a misery-racked, weeping ball. "No, no, no," she choked. "I don't want that, I don't want any more filthy things like last night. I want to be decent, to be clean again."
Mai chuckled. "Isn't that kind of late to think about such things as decency? After all the things we've pulled together? You were a pretty apt pupil as I recall. You really dug some of those stunts."
"No, Mai." She fought his hands. "Don't talk about them. Don't remind me. I don't...."
"You don't want to remember, do you, baby?" he soothed mockingly. "You're sick and you're tired. You get a shower, get some sleep, things'll look brighter afterward. C'mon, I'll take care of my baby, I'll get her all cleaned up."
Too weak to resist, Libby let him raise her. She leaned on him, went on sobbing hysterically. "You won't make me ... make me go back to that place?" she choked. "Never, never?"
"No, Libby doll," he purred in a syrupy, insincere tone. "Never again ... only if you say yes. C'mon, into the shower. Daddy'll take care of you, get you clean and fresh again."
All fight and rebellion gone, shaken to the roots at realization of what she'd almost done, Libby let LeGarde take full charge, she let him run the water, lead her into the shower stall. And there, the hot water setting her body afire, she surrendered to his care, she let him soap her body, cleanse her, feeling no qualms at having his hands lave her. After all, this had happened so often.
Then he was sudsing himself, scrubbing the residue of last night's orgiastic party from his body.
Libby felt better, she felt her morale rise slightly as the man hovered over her, gently toweled her body.
He lingered at her breasts and buttocks, took special pains with her. Then he led her into the bedroom, made an obsequious ceremony out of putting on her one of her prettiest, most expensive silk nighties.
"Here, baby, you get into bed, rest. You'll feel better after while. Sleep, honey."
"What are you going to do, Mai?"
"I've got to get home, check on Monika and that kid lover of hers. For all I know they might be in the same bind I am." A harsh smile formed on his lips. "Or even worse. You never know about that Monika. The ideas that nutty broad gets sometimes...."
Libby looked up from the bed, the covers in disarray, her breasts plainly visible through the sheer pink nylon of her gown. LeGarde's eyes, as he dressed, were on her, new lust was reborn for them. Then when he was ready to leave, he walked to his teenage mistress, knelt beside the bed. In slavish adoration he pulled the covers back, slid up her nightgown. Without a moment's hesitation he dropped his head, kissed her. She fought him when he pulled at her.
"Let me, baby," he menaced, "let me. Daddy always gets his way. Don't fight him."
Libby groaned, went limp, let him do as he wanted. But when his lips became to greedy-"Please, Mai, stop now. That hurts ... something awful. After last night...."
The man rose, re-covered Libby. He laughed briefly. "That right, honey? Those naughty mans really gave my little baby a real going over, didn't they?"
Please, Mai...." she said, her eyes haunted, "promise me. You'll never take me to that place again."
"Anything you say, dolly," he placated her. "But you'll find out one of these days. There are worse things. If you think last night was bad, you should check on the things they pull in merry old England. The kinky set runs that place. It's wild over there, real wild. Those limeys really know how to live. Satisfaction of the senses is everything to those birds."
"And that's what you want? Satisfaction of the senses?" , He shrugged. "What else? When you've lived as long as I have, my dear, you'll find that life has very little else to offer. Ambition, success, creativity, wealth, they mean absolutely nothing. And when a man has the money to cater to his slightest whim, when he has innocents like you, babies who should be trained how to live, who have to be fought from scratch to ditch those Puritan inhibitions and phony moral standards...." A sensual smile twisted his lips. "La dolce vita ... What else?"
"You frighten me sometimes, Mai. I don't want to be frightened, but I can't help it."
"That's okay, baby. Just so long's you don't get so frightened you try that suicide stunt again." His eyes became hard, cruel. "And if you do get the notion, please, Libby, don't take it out on me. I've been damned good to you, remember that. Take your little razor blade and cut yourself up some place else. Not here, in my pleasure palace."
Then he smiled strangely, wheeled. Picking up his over-coat, he started from the elaborate, $400 a month apartment.
And Libby was left alone, with her sick misery, with the most desperate, guilty thoughts. And though she huddled under the covers, tried to sleep, her mind was too busy; it reeled and canted crazily, the ugly pictures kept coming back. And in total summation she wondered-How did I ever get into a mess like this?
Then, as if to prove something to herself, like a small girl looking out to see if her Christmas bike is still safe in the garage, she staggered up from the bed, went toward the massive closet across the room. Sliding the doors open, she stood shakily before the array of gowns and shoes and coats hanging there. And instantly she pinpointed the crux of her downfall, knew exactly how her head had been turned, how she'd been so easily converted to a life of vice at the tender age of seventeen.
The dresses were expensive, alluring, adult creations all of them; they revealed her precocious figure to best advantage. They made the most of her lush, high breasts, of her long, flaring legs, of her narrow waist, of her voluptuous buttocks and hips. The shoes were all witchy items, conceived for allure, meant to pique their giver's fetishist fancy. All high-heeled, pointed-toed; patents, metalized, soft kids, they made her legs lovely and seductive.
Libby shuddered in mixed pride and apprehension as she surveyed her treasure trove. For this, she thought, I sold my soul. For the mink coat and jacket that hung at the closet's far end, for the drawer upon drawer of the most exotic lingerie imaginable, stockings, brassieres, panties and garter belts of the most shocking designs the specialist houses had to offer....
And yes-she fought to avert her eyes, not see the leather and latex garments that hung almost out of sight there, evil,, clinging things, leotards, capri pants, panties, brassieres, even the vile boots Mai loved decking her in-even these had helped seduce her, keep her seduced.
Still, sick and degraded as she felt, that flow of pride and accomplishment still fought to surface as she surveyed her exquisite, expensive things. The clothes, the perfume, the embryo collection of jewelry, even the fetish items-What other girl of seventeen could lay claim to a ransom like this? Hers, all hers! Mai had given them to her in payment for her body, for her subjugation to his will. How many other girls had done as much for a hamburger and a chocolate malt?
The ball of cold steel was in the pit of her stomach once more. Somehow, Libby told herself, it didn't seem right. Not right at all. There was still something sick, something rotten about the whole thing.
Suddenly she was slamming the dresser drawers shut, she was running back to her bed.
There, huddled and shivering again, she tried to trace things back to the very beginning. And as much as it hurt her to remember her parents, her neighborhood, the skimpy complex of church, school and home that had formed her barren life in Parmentier, she couldn't, at this moment, rout the thoughts. She remembered a Thomas Wolfe title, felt even colder inside to realize its most penetrating meaning. You Can't Go, Home Again. True, how true!
Had things at home been as bad as she'd made out? she wondered now, doing some savage soul-searching. Or had her childish sense of injustice merely worked overtime, had her willful character been at the root of all her difficulties with her father, with the school authorities? Hadn't she always, since she'd been a baby, been spoiled, hadn't she always had her own way? Wasn't she still a spoiled child?
Libby had been a beautiful girl all her life. There had never been that ugly duckling transition from gawky child to beautiful adolescent. She'd always been admired, sought after, catered to, by men and women, boys and girls alike.
Intelligent in a superficial way, Libby had read many things that were beyond her years, she'd over-romanticized as to what she thought life should be; gay, romantic, luxurious-a never-never land of material comforts and self-indulgence. She was mad about new clothes, about new cars, about new furnishings, the sort of things which her shoe-factory-foreman father was hardly able to afford. During her last few years at home it had seemed that Libby and her father had constantly been at odds over their opposing values.
If things were impossible at home, they were equally so at school. Here, Queen of the Walk in every way, dressed beyond her parents' means, thanks to a doting mother, blessed by a bountiful Mother Nature, given a premature ripeness and luxury of body, her face and hair beautiful, she was envied by every girl, lusted after by every boy. But Libby had little to do with the loutish Parmentier boys', she condescended to a few dates, teased the lads unmercifully, delivered absolutely nothing. And holding herself aloof, she'd daydreamed of the time when she'd escape her hokey environment, flee to places like New York, Los Angles, Chicago, meet the dashing, fabulously wealthy Adonis worthy of a voluptuous, magnificent creature like Libby Ashton.
Thus it had come to pass that, after a particularly vicious quarrel with her father, during which he dared to slap the inviolable princess across the mouth several times when she became too sassy, Libby had put her long fantasied dream into action, had taken her meager savings, $16.48, had packed a suitcase, had run away. She had come to Kendall Park, a dazzling metropolis of 500,000 souls, some 200 miles from Parmentier. There she'd been certain, she'd never be found no matter how hard her parents searched for her.
But dreams are made of very fragile stuff, are extremely difficult to implement. Expecially when the runaway is as green as Libby was, hasn't the slightest idea of what practical exigencies go into a successful break for freedom.
In Kendall Park she'd panicked, had checked her suitcase at the bus terminal. And no Prince Charming standing in line, awaiting her at the station, she'd gone to a rock-and-roll movie to plan, think things out. It was at the bus station, near midnight, as she hovered outside, afraid to reclaim her things for fear the police might be looking for her, that she'd meet Mai Le Garde, had asked him to go in, claim her suitcase for her.
Things had happened blurringly fast after that. LeGarde, scouting for just such a victim, had handled the rattled child with consummate ease, had thanked his pagan gods for delivering such an ingenue into his hands. The older man had seemed kindly and warm, had on Libby's confidence at a candlelight dinner at an exclusive club. This treat, along with his courtly manners the ride in the ultra Continental, had swept the child off her feet.
And when he'd suggested she sleep at his apartment that night just until she had time to formulate her plans she had readily consented, had been sure she'd found a true friend in this heartless city.
Admitted to the magnificent apartment, surveying the expensive appointments and decor, actually knowing total luxury for the first time in her life, Libby had been bowled over, became a sitting duck to the professional lecher. And before the next hour was out, with the aid of some sweet sherry he'd coaxed her to drink, he'd wheedled the truth from Libby, had gone on to get her stupid drunk. In this condition, considering her awe of this Midas, that had been no great task to seduce her.
LeGarde had moved skillfully, had praised, flattered the girl outrageously, had kissed and caressed her. She'd fought only briefly when he'd touched her breasts, skittered his maddening fingers on her knees, let his hands creep beneath her skirt. Disturbed though she'd been, she'd also been thrilled; a strange desire had been ignited deep within the innocent's psyche.
And when the man had learned that no boy had ever touched her, he'd been beside himself with trembling, aching lust. He'd promised her the sun and the moon. And a gold chain to wear them on besides.
She'd been numb with wonder and bemusement as LeGarde had made a slavish ceremony out of undressing her, throwing her garments away, promising her new, fabulously expensive things in their place. She'd nearly gone wild when he'd spread her naked body full length on the enormous davenport, had kissed and caressed her everywhere, from feet to golden hair.
Afterward he'd shown her the fantastic bathroom, had put her into that scented, steaming bath, had made further ritual out of bathing her. Libby, wild with lazy, permissive passion by then, had submitted, had played the worshipped goddess role to the hilt, had wallowed in sensuality.
There'd been more to drink after that, her seducer still in a silk robe, lying on that beautiful bed with her naked form.
"No, no...." she'd recoiled, breaking from her voluptuary trance, when LeGarde had begun kissing her nipples, when he'd played, let his hands tickle and madden her. "Please, I didn't mean that I'd...."
LeGrarde hadn't answered, had only continued his frenzying attentions. Until, weakened by wine, by mounting rapture, she'd forgotten to fight any more. Then, as he'd arranged her on the bed, her knees steepled, had crawled across the bed toward her. When he'd kissed her knees, had let his lips slither. When his hands had held her for that scorching, maddening touch, when the pressure had threatened to make her explode-
"No, no," she'd wailed. "Don't do that! That's wrong, that's evil. I've never done anything like this. Stop, oh stop."
"This is not evil," he chuckled, never missing a touch. "Only what you think is evil is evil. And I don't think this is. Lie still. Let me worship you, let me teach you about love, about sublime love."
He'd made the agonizing, nerve-knotting adoration last for what seemed hours to Libby, until there was no resistance left, only that soul-hollowing desire to know the rest. To know what that was those men in the novels did to their women, to really know the meaning of those vague descriptions. Whatever that was, she'd desperately wanted that at the moment.
Then he'd moved from that torture place, had gone to a drawer, had brought back a large white, silk handkerchief, the same handkerchief he retained to this day as a souvenir of that first night, which, now and then, he still used as part of his fetish rituals with her. Arranging her on the bed, he'd placed the silk cloth under her buttocks, had blathered continually about her virginity.
She'd screamed, had recoiled in terror when Le-Garde had finally stripped off his robe, had revealed his masculinity to her. She'd seen pictures, she'd seen small boys naked in her time. But she'd never dreamed that a man, excited by a woman, could be like this. "You aren't...." she'd choked, "you won't ... Oh, please...."
He'd chuckled fiendishly, had enjoyed her horror, her amazement, immensely. "My little virgin. You're going to give me this gift. You won't be sorry. I'll be good to you, I'll treat you like a queen. Don't be afraid, please. I don't want to hurt you. But I have to. That's the way of man and woman. Oh, angel."
Then he'd caught Libby, thrown her back.
She'd sobbed and gasped, she'd begged him to stop. "You'll kill me," she'd wailed.
"I don't think so," he'd chuckled. And with a last brutal force, had slowly taken her.
If Libby had shrieked at that moment, that was no babbling groans that had bubbled from LeGarde's lips as he'd continued. His laughter had been delighted.
Their bodies had moved for an eternity that had seemed, the pain gradually deserting the expertly aroused child, turning to overpowering lust, to the realization of her true femininity. And as the man had worked faster and faster, as he'd gritted and choked in his throat at his joy with her virgin state, the warmth and sensation had overwhelmed her, had made her feel like she was falling apart.
She'd screamed again and again, had sunk into a deep, whirling pool of sensation. In the distance the man had chuckled and choked and glorified her, had continued to force his attentions upon her.
Now, abruptly, Libby broke from her introspective trane, shook like a wet puppy, brought herself back to the present time.
The sickness was back, and she moaned softly, huddled into a tighter ball. The remembrance was still so fresh in her mind. And yet it seemed like a decade had passed since she'd first surrendered to Mai LeGarde. So much had happened to her in those days, so much to make that first night look like merest child's play by comparison.
The things her wealthy benefactor 'a publishing magnate, easily worth $10 million' had done for her, had made her do for him-the evil variations, painful and delightful alike, he'd taught her-the improvisations he was constantly thinking of, the promises of future twists-
How long? she groaned to herself. How long? Then she reconsidered. Perhaps Mai was right. He had been good to her, he had given her the worldly treasures she'd always hungered for. She did have the easy life. Why should she rock the boat? Tough up, she commanded. You'll live, honey. You'll live good. Like the queen you've always wanted to be.
She snuggled into her covers, felt drowsiness mount. I am tired, she conceded. And sick. If I get some sleep I'll feel better, I'll be able to see things in perspective again. I'll realize just how lucky a kid I am.
It was as Libby Ashton thought these confused thoughts that she dropped off again, sank into a dreamless, recuperative torpor.
While, at that moment, at 1223 W. Dorchester, preparing for her husband's homecoming, Mrs. John Porter, had just stepped out of the shower, was now dried, sat at her vanity, powdering and perfuming and deodorizing, implementing all those female artifices that make men act like such fools in their presence.
It was a smug, bemused Ione Porter who conducted her beauty rites, appraised her fleshy, yet trim-enough figure in the mirror, felt renewed stirrings of desire in her loins. As she reviewed the previous night's happenings, marveled at the paganism John had triggered within her, the reciprocal eroticism she'd unleashed in him. Instantly she felt herself twinge in a very erogenous area, she clamped her legs tightly together, slid them uncontrollably, wished the masterful man was here at this moment. She'd tear the surprised dear limb from limb.
Already she was preparing for the long night ahead, she had evolved some very original ideas. If John thought she'd been a wanton last night-
But if she was to be fresh for the onslaught, she thought, rising from the vanity, going to the already opened bed, lying nakedly on those sheets, she had to have an hour's nap. She pulled up the covers, squirmed to warm the sheets.
Then as afterthought she brought out the copy of Fanny Hill John didn't know she possessed, turned to where she'd left off last, began to read. And moments after, the author working his unfailing magic, her sexual desire became full blown. She began to finger her breasts as she read, she teased and twirled her nipples, made them go hard, then soft.
And as her sensuality was doubly inflamed, she began to stroke her waist, she let her hands drift lower, she let them wander over her own flesh. Then, adventurously, lasciviously, her fingers went further.
Shortly the book fell aside. And an extremely impassioned female was twisting on the bed, her soft sighs gutteral at first, becoming louder, more anguished now. Sweat broke out on her forehead, she drew her lips back over her teeth. The sounds emerging from her throat now were more like yips than anything else.
While at Peggy Cintron's apartment, both of the Lesbian playmates, rousing from a recuperative doze, were in the grip of a very experimental passion. In bed, Vicki was sprawled with Peggy, was kissing her lovely lips feverishly, was letting one hand clench and rile a gorgeous, vibrant breast.
And though she enjoyed this arousal, still Peggy wasn't completely satisfied. "I don't like that, honey," she protested. "That hurts, it isn't doing anything at all for me."
"Give me time," Vicki gritted, moving her body faster on Peggy's. "Don't be such a Janie-one-note."
"But this isn't natural. I could love you so much better than this my own way. Please, Vicki...."
"Shut up, will you? You're spoiling my fun. I went along with you on that leather bit last night didn't I? Well humor me in this will you? If I get my kicks this way ... "
"Mmm...." Peggy sighed, "maybe you're right. I'm beginning to feel something now. Mmmm, good, good. You know how to take care of Peggy, darling. Oh! Do you know how!" , "I told you, didn't I? A little time, a little patience." Vicki pinched Peg's nipple. "Move, will you? You gotta give a little too, you know."
Peggy's body erupted beneath Vicki's. And as the two sets of legs twined and fought, as Vicki's back rose and fell-
The covers fell away, revealed the wide black straps that wound around Vicki's waist, that cut into her thighs just beneath her buttocks. A silver buckle gleamed in the dull afternoon light.
The bodies moved still faster. Peg's screams rose.
For a long time Mai LeGarde stood in the shadows, winding the motion picture camera, smilingly watching the aboriginal scene taking place on that enormous, slow-turning, round bed. As, unobserved, he watched the young man named Cape hang onto the mattress with all his strength, his mouth gasping, his eyes closed in heathen ecstasy.
While Monika, lost in her frenzied lust, hovered over him, her face hidden where her hair had fallen about it, thick gulpings breaking from her throat.
At that moment Mai stealthily moved to the control panel on a near wall, flicked certain switches, brought other slumbering spotlights to life, bathed the windowless love-chamber in glaring light. "If I may interrupt for a moment," he snickered.
Instantly the young man named Matthew Cape sat up, stared at LeGarde in panic. "Monika," he gasped. "What the hell?"
Her head came up from its wanton beachhead, she regarded Mai balefully. "Be still, darling," she hissed. "It's only my husband."
"I didn't mean to interrupt anything," Mai wheezed. "Go ahead. I just thought I'd like to record this interlude of domestic bliss for posterity." He raised the camera, focused it. "As you were...." he laughed.
"Monika," the man protested. "You going to let him...?"
"Don't be silly, baby. There's nothing wrong. It'll be fun. Wouldn't you love a memento of this afternoon?" Instantly she pushed him back. "Lie still. I'll take care .of this."
Immediately she was climbing over Matthew, she was fumbling with his body. They both sighed hoarsely as she lowered herself. "Isn't that wonderful?" she soothed.
She crouched upright over him, began posting, just as if she was riding one of her husband's thoroughbred stallions. Cape began to groan. Monika flung back her head, laughed shrilly.
"Perfect, perfect ... ," LeGarde gloated, moved closer to get a better angle. "Monika, you are an absolute gem."
CHAPTER FOUR
A week had passed, and as was their annual custorn, Mai and Monika LeGarde were throwing a Christmas party. A pre-Christmas party in fact, one of two they usually gave, "One for party, one for show...." as the memorably Pal Joey song goes. The show party-for Mai's business associates, for his publishing field cronies, for the money-making authors on the Viscount list, had been held a week ago. Tonight's fete was being held for their real friends.
Friends like Renata and Dorcas Savage, like Laird and Clayre Brittany, like Wyman O'Hearn and Veronica Hurst. Then there were Hal and Bernice Collyer, Rex and Janice Zorne, Cyril and Leah Franchi, Walt and Suzanne Degenhardt, Maynard Wilkie, all the friends who'd last got together in that basement hall at the Dorcas Savage manse not too long ago.
And yes, one mustn't forget Mai's mistress, Libby Ashton. Or Monika's lover, Matthew Cape.
There were also some relative newcomers, who had somehow gotten onto the giiest list, prospects who were being put to the initial test tonight, who would either ingratiate or betray themselves before the polite bacchanal had ground to its sordid close. They were Dr. and Mrs. John Porter, plus an obviously Lesbian couple named Peggy Cintron and Vicki Dugan whom Monika had unearthed somewhere, had insisted on inviting, declaring they'd add necessary spice and variance to their sinful soiree.
And now, at eleven o'clock of a nasty December night, the clan gathered in the sumptuous living room of the LeGarde mansion in fashionable Hilldale, a Kendall Park suburb. The superabundance of potent drink was finally beginning to take its toll. The music on the LeGarde sound system was now drowned out by increasingly hi-fi voices, by shrill female laughter, by hearty male guffaws.
The party party was ready to rev into extreme high.
Again, as at the previous meeting, the party was a white-tie affair, the men all conforming, the women dressed in the most elite, blatantly provocative ball gowns they could afford. And in this well-heeled crowd, there wasn't the least doubt that they could afford plenty. Almost every decolletage was as daring as the law would allow; some gowns were even cut sweepingly in the back, boldly displaying those enticing dimples flanking the spine.
Color and fabric were the keynotes, diamonds the accent. Pumps had been chosen to titillate and provoke; they were shimmering holiday slippers, witchy and pointed, some fanciful collections of mere straps and spit.
Monika LeGarde was radiant in a figure-hugging sheath, a ruffled flounce at one leg, where a split to above the knee revealed her black, lace patterned stockings, her metalized, red patent pumps, made her long, exotic legs alluring beyond description. Her blonde hair was done in a patrician upsweep, giving her a severe, very elegant air.
Not to be outdone, Mai had dressed Libby Ashton in a red, brocaded satin that clung to the tips of her breasts precariously, kept every male in constant suspense.. She wore matching red satin pumps, black stockings. A slit down the front of her gown allowed her lovely legs to be seen, twinkling in dusky allure as she walked, and the gown fell in a severe vee in back, showing off the upper slope of her posterior to perfection. At seventeen, as contrasted to the age range of the other women, she was easily the loveliest creature present. Lustful male eyes followed her every move, jealous female eyes as well.
The lovely gowns were perfect complements to the extravagant, luxurious setting in which the party was held. It was a tall, soaring cathedral-type room, the beams exposed, a fourteen foot Christmas tree, exquisitely decorated by a firm which dealt, in just such things, standing at the far end. The carpeting was a neutral gray; to walk on it felt like hiking across a sea of sheep.
The furniture, the lamps and pictures were modern, in impeccable taste. A monstrous fieldstone fireplace occupied one whole wall, with a blazing fire burning in it.
The setting was certainly suitable for the orgy that would shortly take place within its confines.
Hanky-panky of all sorts had already commenced, and more than one woman had been dragged to the dark nook where the mistletoe hung, had received much more than a kiss for her due. Libby had been dragged to that niche twice already, had felt a hand slide beneath her gown, gather her buttocks as bonus to the kiss, each time. But gay tonight, already tipsy, reconciled to her new life, she'd only giggled, slapped hands away.
At least she hadn't emerged from that woo-grotto pulling up the front of her gown, jamming her breasts back into that, as Janice Zorne had.
Mai had pretty much ignored her since bringing her here, and Libby, left to her own devices, had been circulating rather freely, had been getting to know the other cult members in a definitely more social way. Drinking watered down vodka, trying to keep from getting smashed before midnight, she'd learned much about the other guests.
She'd talked to Vicki Dugan and Peggy Cintron, and while she didn't suspect their particular frailty, she did notice the way Vicki had quickly become over-friendly, the way Peggy had watched her like a hawk, had finally drawn her away.
Her conversation with the Porters had established two things, that they were stodgy old-marrieds, basically decent and friendly, and they were decidedly out of their element at this party. She felt she'd like to know both of them better.
However she couldn't approach Dorcas or Renata Savage at all. They were formidable; memory of their part in the Black Mass the last time out turned Libby completely against them, and she got lost every time they approached her.
It was as she sat like a mouse in a corner, nursing her drink, unnoticed by Mai, Laird Brittany and Cyril Franchi, that she overheard one of the most hair-curling exchanges.
"Two, three bucks a time," Laird was saying as she tuned in, "that's what those guys paid her to lay the leather to them."
"Pretty expensive," Mai chuckled. He nudged Franchi. "I'm sure we can do much better than that."
"That flagellation bit must be getting to be boss kicks in England," Laird volunteered.
"Getting to be?" Mai said. "That's been a national scandal for years. Those birds have refined kinks to a fine art. I hear they've got Mass cults that'd make you talk to yourself. They get drugs mixed in with it. Things really go sky high."
"I hear they've even got codes, they advertise in the newspapers. Leather goods, rubber raincoats for sale. The kinks who dig leather or rubber, answer, make a date. Horse leathers means they like things while they're tied up with belts and such. Of course the streetwalkers advertise, offer to teach anything under the sun. 'Discipline' means flagellation."
"That's nothing," Cyril interjected. "I hear there's a New York sheet that specializes in that kind of stuff.
Just write in. Rubber, leather, silk, high heels. Lesbians, transvestites, men and women who want to be dominated, take your pick."
"That whole scene's gonna explode in those limeys' faces one of these days."
"Hell," Mai snorted, "they've got nothing on the New York groups. I understand there's one that's a death cult. They've done in a half dozen people already; there's no way the cops can get a lead on them."
"You mean they just murder one of their members?" Laird interrupted. "Spare me that."
"No, stupid," Mai snapped. "They go into some slum area, pick up a derelict, some two-buck hustler, whisk 'em off to their chapel. Use 'em as part of the blood sacrifice. No frogs or chickens for those operators."
"Sounds real ugh to me," Cyril said.
It was at that moment that one of the trio noticed Libby. A significant pause ensued, and when she looked up, she saw the threesome had drawn into a far corner, were again engrossed in their disturbing conversation.
Becoming more tipsy by the minute, Libby discounted what she'd heard, let the vile information sift into her subconscious. Blearily she looked about, saw she wasn't the only one who was getting high. Indeed, in the time she'd been group-hopping, the entire mood of the party had changed. Everyone was drinking determinedly, definitely wanting to become blotto, wanting to annihilate conscience. The women's faces suddenly appeared coarse and haggy, the men looked more flushed and bloated.
Another change was the obvious way the men and women now flaunted their sensuality, dared each other to be the first to jostle that stopper, unleash the first boil of evil from that magnum of depravity. This accomplished, everyone would pitch in, take over from there.
A case in point was the shocking exhibit Rex Zorne and Leah Franchi were putting on. They'd appropriated a corner of the room, and, both in their stocking feet, were doing a wild version of the twist to barely heard music on LeGarde's hi-fi. As their gyrations became more frenetic, as the liquor within them was jiggled to heady effervescence, an astonishing thing took place.
Rex calmly reached over, took careful, studied pains to roll down the front of Leah's gown, to release her fleshy, full breasts from their built-in brassiere. Although this brought startled, happy hisses from the onlookers, Leah was not upset at all. Her mouth curved into a lusty smile, she moved her buttocks all the harder, took delight in the way her heavy breasts bobbed and swayed in time to the music.
Gradually she slid closer to Rex, took his hands, placed them under the globes for support. In no time at all half the guests had formed a circle around the uninhibited dancers.
That was the signal everyone had been waiting for.
Soon less bold couples were beginning the opening movements of that sinful dance. In time they'd emulate their more courageous leaders.
Libby saw Dr. and Mrs. Porter standing off to one side, watching the performance with stunned expressions on their faces. Yet they weren't bolting; there was something of eager anticipation, a yearning to join in the naughty games, in their expressions also.
Peggy and Vick stood watching too. But their expressions were condescending. This was repugnant to them.
But if some people were hesitating, reserving judgment, Clayre Brittany and Hal Collyer were not. Avid to participate, sitting on a love seat in a far corner, they were kissing and caressing each other shamelessly. Even as Libby watched she saw Hal's hand slide down the front of Clayre's gown, disappear under her brassiere. She saw the way Clayre arched her body, twisted, as his hand worked.
Moments later Clayre herself worked down one side of her bodice, offered the firm, symmetrical globe to Hal. He twisted, dropped his head, took that dark, hard nipple to a kiss. Dreamily, carefully, with no shame whatsoever, Clayre let her hand fumble with Hal's clothing. A second later her hand disappeared.
It was then that Libby was interrupted, as a slightly mocking voice at her side said, "Enjoying yourself, Libby?"
Her head swung swiftly. Angry at the intrusion, she stared balefully at Monika LeGarde's lover, the young Matthew Cape. "And so if I am," she spat, "what's that to you?"
He smiled smugly, raised a placating hand. "Don't bite my head off." He watched what Hal and Clayre were doing now, smiled faintly. "Friendly couple aren't they? Looks like the party's gonna go after all."
"You sound like some kind of authority," Libby sniffed, strangely defensive. "Have you made every one of them?"
"Nope. My first in fact. Monika and I have only been hung up for four months so far. But she clued me as to what kind of blowout this would be."
"Four months? And are you looking forward to four more?" Libby couldn't understand her sudden antagonism.
He shrugged. "Never tell. Depends on how things go. One of these days Monika'Il get tired of me. Then I'll be quits with her."
"You sound rather regretful."
"Do I? That's hardly the case. How long you been with Mai?"
"Going into my second month."
"And you look forward to dozens more?"
Libby's eyes darkened. "I loathe him, I loathe what he's turned me into."
"Then why don't you cut out?"
"Why don't you cut out?"
"Touche," Matthew smiled gravely.
"Like what?"
"It isn't as easy as all that. Dear Mai has ways."
"Like what?"
"Like the things he gives me, the way he treats me otherwise. When he hasn't got love on the brain, I mean. Let's skip it, shall we?"
"You're a runaway, aren't you? Where'd Mai pick you up? At the bus station or the train depot? That's a specialty of his, you know. He digs Lolitas. More than anything else, I guess. Makes a big thing of love with them."
"You seem to know an awful lot about me. Monika tell you all that?"
"She doesn't tell me much. Except about love and fifty new ways to get taken care of. But I keep my ears open."
Libby felt resentful. "And since you know so much about my personal affairs ... how about you? How come you're involved in all this? What's Monika got on you?"
His face stiffened. He forced a smile. "Maybe I chose this for myself. Maybe I dig this extravaganza bit."
Libby sneered. "Come off that, buddy. With that old bag? She's forty if she's a day."
"Some of those forty-year-olds could teach you a trick or two. The way those witches put out, they act like every time's their last one. Besides, Monika's a well preserved forty."
"Maybe it's just that you haven't tried a young woman in quite a while."
"Could be. Are you volunteering?"
Libby's grin was snide. "Maybe. Check back when I'm good and drunk. I don't care what I do then. Later, when this party really begins to swing. Who knows, I might enjoy myself with a man who doesn't take all night to make things happen."
"You might at that. You do look lovely tonight. That dress ... those shoes."
Libby's look was sultry, veiled. Abruptly she switched the subject. "But I'm not finding out anything about you. You throw a damned good smoke screen. Level with me. What's Monika got on you?"
Again Matthew's face froze. "Let's skip it for now. Maybe some other time. There are more important things at present."
"Things like what?"
Matthew slid his soft hand on her back, let his fingers walk down her spine. And though Libby shuddered, she didn't repel him, even when his hand crept under her gown, clamped each buttock alternately, tickled and inflamed her. "Having fun?" she teased.
"Not as much fun as I'll have later. You game?"
"Better watch out. Mai eats little boys like you for breakfast." She drew away. "Get me a fresh drink if you want to do something useful."
"Yes, madame," he clowned. "What're you drinking?"
Suddenly Libby decided to go for broke. Feeling very wanton and hellish indeed, she thought she might as well make a real night of this. If this was the way her private, new world was made, why fight? "Hell," she said, "bring me a martini this time. A double."
Then Matthew was moving away, threading his way through the now more rowdy crowd. As he went Libby appraised him more carefully, found some of her animosity fading. He is a nice man, she thought muzzily. At least he's no relic like the rest of these creeps.
She judged Cape to be in his mid-twenties, a college graduate if his speech and bearing were any indication. He was tallish, thin, had a gaunt face, dark, brooding-and penetrating-eyes. His hair was almost straight, a slight pompadour at the forehead, a tawny mane. He gave the impression of having great savoir-faire, of being perfectly capable of taking care of himself in any crisis. But if this was so, how had Matthew ever gotten enmeshed in the perverted liaison with Monika? How come the stud-at-fee role he'd serve at this party before the night was over?
But there was scant time left for such introspections. For now the lid was truly off things. By one o'clock in the morning the kettle had finally boiled over.
Libby, blinking her eyes to focus them, saw Hal Collyer and Mrs. Brittany, Clayre .merely shielding her freed breasts with her gown, slipping off into the gloom, heading for a dark bedroom where they could see about extinguishing some very volatile fires.
On the makeshift dance floor, the twist session still went on. Four couples were there now, the women stripped to the waist, their gowns and breasts flapping in time to the revved up music. The originators of the excess, Rex and Leah, were in the very center of the group, Leah still not to be outdone.
For now she'd stripped away the offending gown and half slip, and danced in just her navy blue, iridescent girdle, her smoke-toned stockings. Her hair was disheveled now; she flung her shoulders back, made the tempestuous boobs stand out brazenly.
Even as Libby watched she saw another curious thing. John and Ione Porter, Mrs. Porter truly and monumentally stoned by now, stepped into the circle of dancers. "John," she heard the woman command thickly, "do me. Make me like the rest of those ... girls." A stupid smile on his face, the man never hesitated. Turning his wife, he undid her dress in back, unhooked the snaps of her brassiere, quickly lowered the entire facade of modesty.
"Souvenir," he crowed drunkenly, throwing the black brassiere into the crowd of onlookers. Then he and his wife began doing a shaky version of the twist, a look of pride, of lust, of emancipation, in their eyes.
Quickly Porter's hands came up, began twirling his wife's nipples as they danced. The crowd went wild. . There were other vignettes which Libby, though intoxicated, didn't miss.
Scenes like the one that Renata Savage was performing with Laird Brittany in what she thought was a murky, perfectly obscured corner of the room, but where flickering light from the fireplace caught them, made their diversion visible to any interested party. Renata stood before him, fussed with his clothing, finally moved her face to him. Laird's face was a mask of anguish and delight as his fingers clawed and twisted in the wanton's hair.
Across the room Veronica Hurst was furtively pulling up her skirt, was adjusting her girdle. This accomplished, she sat on Dorcas Savage's knees. Dropping her skirt in front as a shield, she settled herself. A second later her eyes closed, her lips puckered, registered an overwhelming delight. And when Savage's hands came around her, cupped and clenched her breasts, the ecstatic expression on her face became more intense. She moved faster and faster, becoming totally oblivious to her surroundings.
Matthew Cape returned with Libby's drink at that moment, again interrupted Libby's voyeur sport. "Sorry to take so long," he said, "but there's a mob at that liquor table, sloshing it down like it was going out of style." He glanced around, saw Savage and his frenzied playmate. "This is gonna be an orgy, and no mistake."
Libby sipped at her martini greedily, felt the liquor go to work, felt it muddy her thoughts, reinforce a dedication to dissolution. And seconds later, when she found herself in Cape's arms, when she found him gently, tremblingly kissing her, she thought nothing of that. She giggled throatily, said, "I never thought you'd get around to me."
He was cupping and roiling her breasts, his hands beneath her gown, his thumb and forefinger making the nipples burn, making her breasts swell and ache, when a minor disturbance at the room's main entrance distracted them.
"For God's sake," Matthew gasped. "Monika, what in hell...."
In deference to their hostess, awed by the evilly posed, shrilly-laughing phantom who stood there, there was a sudden vacuum of sound. The loud talk and laughter died, every eye wheeled to the far end of the room, tried to understand the meaning of the costume she wore.
Under cover of all the hubbub, Monika had sneaked to her bedroom, had peeled off her party pretties, had fought her way into her gleaming, black, latex suit. A one piece item that covered her from neck to ankles, the suit was zipped in the back, fit her like a second skin, revealed every ripple, every nuance, every indentation and curve of her body. The neck was high, the sleeves were long, all the way to her wrists.
To set off the maddening, alluring costume, she'd chosen a pair of laced, black leather boots that covered her legs all the way to her knees. The boots, in keeping with her kinky tastes, had sharp toes, equally sharp heels at least six inches high.
The light shimmered on the glistening latex, did the craziest things to Monika's body, made her firm, proud breasts stand out beautifully, upheld and outlined her taut nipples perfectly. There was a darker indentation at her navel, and as Monika pirouetted and arched, revealed her lovely back, her glistening buttocks, the light and shadows formed the most seductive valleys and promontories, the flames cast dancing iridescence upon that body, made Monika a high priestess of evil.
A collective, lustful sigh swept the group as, without a word, her smile preening and sultry, Monika let her provocative modeling become more wild. Several men -edged closer to her.
The costume was no surprise to Libby. After all, she had one of her own. She didn't doubt that most of the women present also owned similar outfits. She only wondered at Monika's purpose in coming down like this, modeling the getup.
Shortly, tiring of her twistings and teasings, Monika, her smile predatory, turned on Cyril Franchi. "You, Cyril," she commanded. "You like things this way. I choose you."
He blanched, tried to draw away. But Monika was too fast for him. Immediately her hands came out, began working at his clothes. "No," he gasped. "Not right here in front of everybody."
"Yes," she gritted, pulling at his buttons. "Right here. For everybody ... our new friends included. Don't be shy. We've played this way before."
"No, Monika," the man pleaded. "Not that again. Not with the spurs."
She laughed liquidly. "Yes, that. With the spurs This wouldn't be Christmas otherwise, would it?" Her hands were fumbling with his belt now. "Be good. Or do I have to ask the men to help me with you?"
"Do as you're told, Cyril," Dorcas boomed from where he still sat, Veronica Hurst momentarily still now.
The man seemed to crumple, Docilely he surrendered, let Monika undress him. And then he was naked, she was kneeling before him, making a slavish act out of kissing his legs, his knees. As she regarded him in that self-debasing way for the pain he'd suffer at her hands shortly, that seemed the very gates of hell itself had been opened.
The crowd hissed and mumbled as Monika made the humbling last and last. And finally, falling away from the inspired man, "The spurs, darling," she intoned.
Someone handed Cyril the spurs, sharp-rowled, silver things; he knelt before Monika, strapped them to her ankles. "The whip," she rasped.
A short quirt was handed to Monika. "Down, darling," she commanded, tapping him with the leather whip. "We go for a little trip now."
His face gray, Cyril did as he was told, fell to his knees. Monika climbed onto his back, brought up her knees, began digging the sharp spurs at the man, slapping his buttocks with the whip at the same time. "Go, horsie," she giggled. "Go!"
It seemed to Libby that she couldn't see straight, that the madhouse scene was blurring and swaying before her. And she realized she was very, very drunk. Her eyes never left the demented couple; it seemed she saw the spurs dig repeatedly, draw blood, she heard the continual whack of the whip on his flesh.
So engrossed was she, so sensually moved, that she never noticed when Matthew worked down the front of her gown, began to tease her with his lips. Even, minutes later, when he began removing the entire gown, she still didn't stop him, she still watched the mad scene.
Cyril had had enough. "I can't," he gasped, his chest heaving. "I'm all worn out, I can't." But still the whip rose and fell, the spurs dug and chewed. And Cyril forced himself. But finally he collapsed, fell in a heap in the middle of the floor.
As Libby lifted her legs so Matthew could pull the tight gown away, she saw Monika stand, a triumphant leer on her face. "You were good to Monika," she slurred, "real obedient. Now Monika'll be good to you."
Without a moment's hesitation the black eel that was a woman rolled Cyril onto his back. There, in full view of everybody, she lowered herself. Her head was thrown back proudly, she threw herself to variant motions of love.
Libby watched as long as she could. But now Matthew was pulling off her black, sheer panties. And Libby, clad in only her garter belt, her hosiery and evilly conceived pumps, was being thrown back onto the soft davenport, she was suffering Matthew's lips and teeth, knowing the touch of his maddening, groping hands. She was gasping and twisting nonstop.
As she gasped and hissed, tossed her head back and forth on the cushions, sank into that monstrous void of sinful surrender, she noticed that Monika's performance still went on, inspiring others to duplicate that. She saw men and women undressing everywhere, some taking care of their needs right in that living room, others migrating to other, more private rooms.
She giggled as she observed Ione Porter allowing Mai LeGarde to undress her, as the woman let him arrange her naked body on a long, high table. Now LeGarde was grabbing her knees. And, naked himself, he took her just like that.
John Porter watched for a time, a pleased smile on his face. Then, seeing that Monika LeGarde had finished with Cyril, was seeking fresh conquests, he started ripping off his clothes, went to her, threw her down onto the floor beside the depleted Cyril, moved to her, didn't seem to mind when those spurs began digging at him. He was far, far too busy with other things.
From a corner of her eye, Libby saw Peggy Cintron, the Lesbian, kneel beside Bernice Collyer, fling up her skirt. She saw the dazed permissive smile on Bernice's lips as Peggy hauled at her girdle and panties. But at the last moment a glimmer of modesty hit Bernice, and she pulled her skirt down. She didn't deter Peggy in the least.
Across the room, a bedazzled Suzanne Degenhardt, totally nude, was half on, half off an overstuffed chair, with Vicki Dugan doing similar honors for her. And when Suzanne began to shriek her addled response-
Libby was returned to reality. She became aware that Matthew Cape had had enough of prelude. And moving to her, his hand scrabbling with Libby's, he took her. Instantly Libby was screaming, babbling her exquisite delight.
And because Matthew was quite drunk himself, the love bout took an extremely long time. Libby remembered at least five separate glories of her own.
Matthew began groaning and choking. "Darling," he called, "you're magnificent. The most wonderful woman I've ever known. God, you're killing me! The things you do to me! You're driving me right out of my mind."
The praise turned Libby's head, inspired still another attempt. And as she strained toward that, "Damn you," Matthew called. A second later she knew that cataclysmic ecstasy once more. And the man relaxed.
She didn't remember too much of the rest of the party.
The booze had run out after a time. But the next time she'd wandered toward the bar with her empty glass, another full case had stood there. She'd poured herself straight gin.
Screams and coarse chuckles and curses came to her numbed mind from all sides. Matthew was gone, and she wandered alone through the house, stumbling over bodies, over thrashing legs wherever she went.
Finally, in Mai LeGarde's dark library, a screen was set up, a camera whirred. And on that screen a Negro man of enormous proportions was being honored by a white woman in a most servile way. And when the closeup shot showed him taking the woman, entertaining her for what seemed an eternity, when the camera closed in on the woman's ecstasy-distorted face, captured the twin rapture and agony-
"Ah, here you are, Libby," the stern voice said.
"I've been looking for you all over. I was beginning to think you were avoiding me."
She wheeled, saw the naked, shiny-pated man standing by her. Dorcas Savage. Libby smiled. "Yes," she said in a cracked, bleary voice. "I want you, Dorcas. I want you very much."
Then the looming black shape fell at her. And while the man worked at her, brought her to victory after victory, Libby, along with many of the other women on that same floor, never took her eyes off that screen, she fought to copy that lucky woman's every response.
Afterward another man took her.
But who he was she'd never remember. Everything after that was a complete blank.
CHAPTER FIVE
A very thoughtful, disconsolate Libby Ashton was alone at her luxurious love nest this night. It was eight o'clock and Libby had just returned from a solitary dinner, a somewhat alcoholic dinner. She had had three martinis, an order the waiter had never questioned. For in the clothes Mai had bought for her, her face and hair made up at one of Kendall Park's most elite beauty salons, she looked much older than her seventeen years.
And when one considered the debaucheries those eyes had seen, that body had experienced-
Small wonder. Libby looked at least twenty-two. Four days had passed since the party at the LeGarde residence. And while Mai had dropped in on Libby several times since then, while they'd indulged in passionate hors d'oeuvres, there hadn't been time or inclination for a full course repast. Mai still depleted from the orgy, Libby recovering consciencewise, they'd contented themselves with fleeting, minor diversions.
Thus the mainly alcoholic dinner tonight. For Libby knew that LeGrade had a gala in mind this evening. And it wouldn't hurt to take a good cargo of happy-juice to see her through the ordeal.
Many dark thoughts were at large within Libby's brain.
Thoughts like the worry over the amount she'd been drinking of late, an amount which wasn't good for a girl her age, a girl who couldn't hold her liquor. It seemed she moved in an alcoholic fog constantly, that she hadn't drawn a completely sober breath for days. And sleeping was definitely getting to be a problem. If she didn't have two or three good belts before going to her haunted, lovely bed-
Of course there was constant shame and remorse over what her beautiful, glittering, gold-plated life had become. And though she eternally justified her slide into depravity, told herself that this was the good life, the life she'd always yearned after, dreamed about, the temporizations just didn't sell. Time and time again she told herself that once she got used to her new role these damnable guilt pangs would vanish. If she could be strong and patient just a little longer-
She'd been thinking of Parmentier, of her parents overly much of late. Especially since Christmas was so near. And now, sitting in this sumptuous suite, clad in sheer, red peignoir and nightgown that had easily cost Mai $100 or more, a glass of gin and tonic in her hand, she was acutely homesick. She wanted to fling herself onto the bed, she wanted to cry her eyes out.
She wondered whether her mother and father-the police-were looking for her, whether they were terribly worried about her. Not once since she'd run a-way had she sent them a message, let them know she was alive, relatively well.
What would Daddy say if he could see me now? she thought. Dressed like this? Drinking? If he knew I was a rich man's mistress? The shame nearly choked her. If he only knew some of the things she'd done!
Suddenly the pain in her throat became intolerable, and her vision blurred. Wallowing in the choking heat of self-pity, she imagined her mother at home at this very moment, sobbing broken-heartedly for her lost daughter, praying for her safety. Mother, Mother, she wanted to cry out, don't fret. I'm all right, I'm all right. Don't waste your tears on me. And to her father: Daddy, forgive me. I was wrong, so wrong. As always you were right, you knew what was best for me. If only I hadn't been so selfish, if I hadn't been so headstrong-Forgive me, Daddy.
Now Libby did lapse into hot, choking tears. She put down her glass, burried her face in her hands, let the wracking sobs possess her completely. And after a time-
They wouldn't even know me now, she told herself, they wouldn't recognize me in these clothes, in this new fare and hairdo. She lashed herself for her sentimentality. What was the use of even thinking about such things?
She wasn't going back, she couldn't go back. Her parents wouldn't want her now, not since she'd become such an avowed degenerate. Her father wouldn't understand, he'd never forget and forgive.
Besides, she didn't want to go back. How could she ever adjust to that rustic little town again, how could she ever get used to not having everything she wanted, how could she leave all her pretty things behind?
And at that, as if in reassurance, she jumped up, went into the bedroom. She flung open her closet doors, surveyed her lovely clothes, her shoes, her furs like some suspicious Midas, tried to draw pleasure and quietude from knowing that all those things were hers, hers-
And if she had to go through hell to keep them-
Sucker! she metally flogged herself. You'd be a dope to give all this up now! Any woman who prizes her decency so much, who wants to cling to one man, be respectable, who wants to beg for money to buy a new pair of panties is nothing but a damned sucker!
A vicious snarl carved on her face, she fled the bedroom, retreated to the living room, lit into her drink with fresh vengeance.
Then she paused, considered another alternative.
Somewhere in this city there must be a place she could hide, there must be some kind of job she could do to earn her way until she'd decided what to do with her life. If, one night when Mai was away, she could take her nicest things, if she could flee this sin den, attempt to rebuild her life, become a decent woman once more-
It was here that she always got confused. For, indolent, self-indulgent child that she was, she didn't want to face the hard facts of life, she didn't want to venture out, jeopardize this easy berth. And rather than think out a plan, evaluate the practical contingencies-
It was much easier to drift, to grant mere lip service to her sense of degradation, to do nothing practical about it.
Now, at that exact moment, Libby was almost grateful for the sound of Mai's key in the lock. And though she feared the impending excesses, she feared her damning thoughts even more.
Pasting on a smile, she rose, ran to meet her lecher lover.
Now, three drinks later, Libby delivered to that euphoria where little she did mattered to her, they were in the bedroom together, both naked, rolling and embracing on the bed. Around Libby's neck was a diamond pendant, Mai's gift to her upon arriving. "You'll be real good to me for that, won't you, baby?" he'd wheedled as she'd let him clasp the necklace in the back. "That's a cool thousand dollars right there."
And, yes, Libby had grudgingly admitted, she'd just have to be very good to him.
Thus she didn't object as Mai now deserted his sick beachhead, released her from that torturing pain of his lips, went to the closet, opened that section containing the leather and rubber suits he'd bought for her. A shudder convulsed her.
This was what he wanted-
She pretended ardor, she smiled as he dressed her in the black, rubber leotard, identical with the one that
Monika had worn at the party the other night. And as he zipped her up in the back, pushed her onto the bed again, began running his hand on its shiny surface, from ankles to shoulders, as he delighted in caressing her through the thin rubber, got a charge out of having her nipples go taut against that black coating, Libby couldn't help but become excited.
Shortly he had enough of this, and going to the rack where he kept his dozens of pairs of special shoes, he chose a pair of black patent pumps, the heels fully six inches high. The shoes were agony for Libby to wear, but she endured them to please him. He took almost aberrated joy in putting them on her feet, kissing her arches, her ankles, even the leather of the shoes themselves.
Then, scant seconds later, "That's great darling," he hissed, sitting on the edge of the bed, his muscles knotting with delight and excitement, "that's what I like. Walk like that, parade those legs of yours. Make that sassy little rear bounce, those beautiful boobs sway. Baby, that's great, the absolute best."
He made her stand before the mirror, pose so he could see. The mirror revealed the trim lines of hip and waist, the voluptuous thrust of her buttocks, the narrowing flare of her upper legs and calves. He sucked in his breath, squealed joyfully. "Oh, you baby, you doll! You' drive me right out of my skull."
Fight as she would, Libby couldn't dispel the revulsion. The man was sick, absolutely sick.
Yet she stood before him for ten minutes more, she followed his every command, let him pose her, handle her in any incredible way he wanted. Gradually his expression became more demented, more sickly and pleading.
"My darling baby," he said at last, his voice snagging. "You'll do that, won't you? For Mai? He loves you so."
Libby's stomach kicked. "Do what, darling?"
"You know. With the whip? You'll punish me, be my mistress?"
Libby grimaced, felt queasy. "Please, Mai, not that. Must we?"
"I was good to you, dolly. That necklace, remember? Now you have to be good to me."
Libby resigned herself, gathered her strength. "Yes, darling," she murmured. "If that's what you really want."
"I do. It's been so long since you punished me. Please, mistress. Get the things. The whip, the rest...."
Slowly Libby went to the closet, where she opened the drawer in which so many of Mai's things were kept-his books, his films, the fetishes and torturing instruments, as well as the whip and chains.
"Kneel," Libby commanded as she walked back to Mai. "Hold up your wrists, pig." She remembered her routine well, improvised here and there. Every indignity she imposed made the masochist act that much more pleasurable to him.
"Yes, mistress," he cringed. He held up his wrists, chuckled as the steel manacles were snapped around his arms, as the tethering chain clanked and jingled.
Libby forced her legs to carry her backward, the whip, four feet long, unraveling on the floor as she went. "On your face, scum," she gritted. "Kiss the blessed whip that will scourge and purify you." Even as she uttered the rote words Mai had taught her, she wondered at the unreality of the whole scene, of the vile rites about to commence.
Le Grade uttered a pleased whimper, fell on his front, began slithering the length of the black snake, kissing that, caressing the leather, holding that to his lips. Second by second he sank into his trance, expunged a deep-seated guilt in this infallible way. "Now," he gulped. "Begin now, mistress."
Sucking in a deep breath, marshalling her strength, Libby flicked the whip, raised that. Now, with a sharp whack, the whip descended, wound around LeGarde's back, made him jerk and yelp with pain. The lash came up again, descended again.
A primitive lust was born for Libby. All at once the act didn't seem to distasteful; that seemed a purifying thing, a sensually exciting thing. It seemed Libby was purging herself, unleashing her own frustrations and shame, that she was avenging herself for all the things that had gone wrong in her lifetime. She let the whip rise and fall faster, she put more muscle into each swing.
LeGarde, no longer on his front, but in a ball now, his knees up, his back and side exposed, wriggled and twitched, his cries seemingly torn, like so much barbed wire, from his throat. And yet, painful as the scourging was, he still derived tremendous pleasure from that.
Still the whip sang, hissed and cut, turned the man's flesh into an idiot's checker board, drew blood here and there. LeGarde screamed muffledly, snickered at the pain.
And finally, when the red haze Behind Libby's eyes became blinding, when it seemed the scalding pressure would make her head explode, "Now, mistress," Mai whined. "Command me. Command this unworthy slave."
This was the part that Libby hated the most. And yet tonight, inordinately vengeful, she was ready for the pervert. "Approach me," she intoned. "Worship and revere me."
He crawled toward her, like a cowering puppy, he groveled at her feet. "Yes, mistress, yes."
"Kiss my feet, pig, show your adoration."
The fetish-bound man complied immediately, made a fawning charade of kissing her shiny shoes. "The soles now," she spat. "That's what you're fit for, animal."
Gently the man lifted first one foot, then the other, kissed the bottom of each shoe, lingered at the insteps. And when Libby was standing firmly once more, "Lick them now, swine. Show your worthlessness."
LeGarde beamed esctatically, groveled all the more, went over the shiny leather with his lips, spent long minutes at the toes, at the evil, sharp heels. Then, when his mouth rose, began kissing at her ankles, "Yes, slave," she chanted. "The rest now. Honor your mistress."
She swayed as the man lingered at her calves and knees, the rubber transmitting every touch with perfect fidelity, awakening a lust of the most stunning sort. And when he wasn't quite satisfactory-there was always the whip with which to drive him to even further frenzies.
He hesitated, looked at her, a monkey-like pleading on his face. She cut his back with the folded snake, slapped his face with her other hand. "Pig!" she snarled. "Don't stop! The rest now! You know what I want."
A rapt, demented smile cracked his face. "Oh, yes, mistress. Thank you, thank you."
Then his face a blissful mask, he aproached that ultimate humility.
The maddening caress was made, the awesome tickling began. Libby shuddered, swayed, fought for balance, as the man went absolutely insane, as he used his touch as an insanity-inducing instrument. His fingers clawed at her, he helped her balance. And the devil fires burned higher.
Now, as the most exquisite of raptures moved closer, hovered and taunted, Libby screamed, she howled, fought to hold him there. She awakened from her frenzy, realized she was lashing him with all her strength, driving him, exhorting him-
Afterward, as her passion faded, she found herself on the bed once more, she found LeGarde, a lazy, sated smile on his face, peeling the black rubber garment from her. Then the room was dark. He was moving to her, handling and caressing her outrageously.
"No, darling," she hissed as he attempted to turn her face down on the bed. "Not that ... not tonight. I'm so tired."
"Yes," he hissed, in dominance once more. "I need that. I was good to you, baby. The necklace, remember? You have to be good to me."
Libby shuddered from head to toes, let her body go slack, let him turn her. She fought to stop the tremors, but could not. She gathered courage, knew that after the first harrowing pain-This was something Mai had taught her, something that had nearly killed her the first time. But since, on those rare occasions when he wanted his love this way-
She'd be brave; she had to. He had been good to her, he'd given her all those beautiful things.
A long, anguished wail broke from her as the horrible pressure began, as she heard his sibilant snufflings and encouragements. Her body went tense in every cell and muscle.
Then, with a final move-She cried out softly, clung to her pillow, struggled to relax. The pain was less now-, "Good," the sadist gritted. "Is that good?"
"Good," Libby forced, knowing her assent pleased him.
"You like me this way?"
"I like you this way. Yes. Go ahead now."
He laughed again, began to move his body. Libby fought to make her mind a blank, caught the corner of her pillow between her teeth, bit down hard.
But at the end he took her in normal fashion. Despite her earlier repugnance, the games had done their work, and whether she liked that or not, Libby was receptive, her sensuality was piqued to hair-triggered intensity. That took only a few moments, a few seconds, and she was lust-ridden herself.
She wanted him, she wanted that exquisite release.
Even if she were with Satan himself, she had to have that purifying sensation, she had to have that moment in oblivion, if only to forget, in that brief interval, what an unprincipled tramp she was, to forget the depths to which she'd fallen, like some pervert's puppet.
Her arms came up, locked around his waist, she enjoyed his violent motions, not wanting for a single second, to lose that pleasure.
And when she began to shriek when her howls became fiendish, an eldritch wail of dissolution, LeGarde attacked her more viciously, began to laugh as though he'd just heard the funniest joke in the world.
Reluctantly Ione allowed her husband to forsake that fortress of sensuality, reluctantly she let him pull himself away from her. For a moment she clamped her teeth on him, made him lurch and groan.
Then he struggled up beside her on the pillow. "Did you ... did anything happen?" he asked.
"Yes, darling," she sighed deeply. "Couldn't you tell? I didn't want to let you go."
"I know. I just like to hear you tell me. Why'd you stop me just then?"
"Because I couldn't stand that again. I wanted you with me."
He chuckled proudly. "Like right now?"
"Yes, right now. Take me, baby. Take your old lady that beautiful way you do."
"Not an old lady. A wonderful, young lady. Young in spirit."
"I didn't think you'd want me ever again. After all those women at the LeGarde party."
"Are you ashamed, baby?" he asked gravely.
"No, not really. Unless you are. I guess I've always wanted something like that. I've always wanted to know what that would be like with another man."
"And? How was that?"
"Don't be jealous, baby. You know you're the man I love, the man who rings all my bells, lights up all my circuits."
"You're avoiding the question."
"They were all right. I really can't tell. I was too drunk, out of my head, to really know. That LeGarde man is clear in my mind. But he didn't have the finesse you have, darling."
"How many men did you have, darling?"
"John, we've gone over this so many times. Do we have to ... again? I told you before, only three. That I recall."
"I thought you might remember some others. Do you really mind talking about this? I'm not jealous. I rather enjoy that myself. I've always wondered about ... other people. Now I feel rather emancipated. That was something I had to get out of my system too, I guess."
"And if they call us again, ask us to one of their wing-dings again?"
"I suppose we'll go. I'd like to anyway. Who knows? We might learn lots of new things."
"And those girls you had, darling? How were they? How many?"
"I told you, three. That's all I was good for. And also like I told you before, that LeGarde woman was the best.
She's got muscles most women don't know exist. Present company excepted, of course."
"Who were the others?"
"Veronica Hurst. And that kid, Libby."
"How was she?"
"Nothing, absolutely nothing. She'd had too much to drink by the time I got to her. I guess every man there tried her before the night was out. She just lay there and giggle. Took everything, gave nothing."
Now Ione Porter shifted, let her hand scurry over her husband's body, clench and toy with him. "Whew, all this talk's got mama all steamed up. Doctor, how a-bout one of those wonderful treatments of yours?"
"You want to .try the pillows tonight? Like we talked about? I've wanted to try that for so long. But I've always been afraid to mention that to you."
She hugged him fiercely. "Darling, yes, any way you want me." She stifled a sob. "We've wasted so much time, precious. Love me now. Before I don't even need you."
She let him place the two pillows. And when he began, "Darling," she groaned with pleasure, "where'd you find this one? What have I been missing? Oh, that's magnificent."
Porter worked more diligently with his wife. "You sweet witch," he groaned. "You wanton. You gorgeous hussy."
"More," she whimpered. "I can stand that kind of talk all night. Tell me...."
Both bodies flew in a flurry of motion. And once, when John made a mismove, "Did I hurt you, baby?"
"No," she laughed lewdly, proudly. "Not at all. Don't worry."
Once more the bodies were in full flight. Once more the inflaming words, the cries and sighs mounted.
Peggy hadn't wanted to bring the new girl, Charla Hollister, to their apartment. But Vicki, eternally promiscuous, had insisted, had threatened to go off with Charla if Peggy didn't capitulate.
And now, in the cloaking darkness, the three of them, very drunk, sprawled on the rug. Soft music played on the radio.
They were all naked, rolling, and twisting and groping on the floor, their lips, their hands on the wildest missions. Vicki had been possessed of an innovationary idea, so that now, their bodies arched, their backs drawn into an acute bow, all of them were lying on their sides.
"Together," Peggy giggled, completely taken with the idea now. "Let's keep posted. Let's try to bring things off at the same time. All three of us."
"Wonderful," Vicki laughed. "And you think I have some wacky ideas."
Charla dug with her hands, cried like a wounded animal. "God, Vicki, the things you're doing for me. Am I glad I found you girls!"
"Get with us," Peggy chided. "You talk too much."
Charla got with them.
CHAPTER SIX
The woman was stone drunk. A harridan of some fifty-odd years, dressed in outdated, baggy, dirty clothes, her hair a woolly, gray mop, a woman who'd apparently been on the bottle for years, she sat on the small stool midway between the altar and the platform on which the Black Mass devotees sat and sprawled. Her addled head bobbed incessantly, she looked about her with rheumy, unseeing eyes, comprehended none of what went on. She hadn't the vaguest idea of why she was there.
If she had, if terror could have pierced that alcoholic topor, she would have screamed and fought and clawed, she would have bolted from the hell chamber as fast as her spavined legs could carry her.
But nothing, no thought, no frightening debauchery was about to penetrate that wine-rotted brain. She was happy; she was warm, she had an almost full bottle of gin to comfort her when she got bored. And sitting there, nodding, talking to herself, she continually lifted that bottle to her lips.
Libby Ashton should have known what was going to happen in that cabalistic room before the night was out. She should have suspected immediately upon entering, upon seeing the derelict sitting there, so out of keeping with these elite, exquisitely dressed women.
But Libby didn't realize. For she too, was completely out of things. She too was polluted. She'd commenced drinking immediately at four that afternoon when Mai LeGarde had called to inform her they were going to visit the Dorcas Savage estate again that January night.
As always Libby had fought for resolution enough to flee the shame apartment once and for all, to break with this decadent life. But, as usual, her resolve had been too puny, her determination too feeble. Thus she'd turned to the cut glass decanters at the portable bar, had begun making herself Manhattans one after another.
By the time they were admitted to the Savage residence, Mai had virtually to carry her in. Her eyes wouldn't focus, her legs were so much limp rubber.
Still he insisted she enter the black chapel, even if she couldn't participate. The mere humiliation and subjugation of his victim wasn't enough to satisfy his twisted desires He wanted to drive her to the brink of sanity, be the omnipotent force in her life, be giver and taker of life, wreck her completelymentally, morally, spiritually.
And when she was a crawling, degenerate derelict like the woman who sat on that stool, then would be the time to dump her, seek a fresh victim.
Now, in that gloomy, candle-lit cavern, all cult members present, Libby beside him in weaving, unseeing stupor, he smiled smugly, let his hands slide over her body nonstop, looked forward to the orgy that would take place once the Black Mass foolishness had been dispensed with.
Tonight, in defiance of accepted practice, LeGarde had decided to flaunt the cult aberrations. Wearing skintight leather breeches, a leather pull-over shirt, he'd insisted that Libby put on the matching ensemble he'd bought for her. She wore an equally tight sheath of leather, a garment that molded and accented her lovely breasts, her luxuriant buttocks, its shimmering folds seemingly pointing, like arrows, to all her tantalizing accessories. At that moment Mai sat with his hands sliding, falling over her leather contained breasts, he let them climb those luscious promontories again and again.
Still Mai hadn't been a total rebel. In deference to the rites he'd made Libby put on a leather brassiere and panties, both garments butchered. She also wore the black stockings, the garter belt, the shoes with the six-inch heels.
Now, bored with the mumbo jumbo that Dorcas was going on with he slid his hands on Libby's legs. And when she paid him no attention, he showed his proprietorship by working the leather skirt up, an attention which Libby, staring straight ahead, didn't notice either.
The Black Mass was in full progress. Dorcas Savage was sonorously booming out the ritual with conviction.
The scene, even though Libby wasn't aware of it, was the same as before, with the mock altar, the hypnotized virgin on the second level, the upside-down frog, the large effigy of the bloated-faced Asmodeus.
As Savage went through the ugly motions, there was an expectant sneer on his lips. For tonight there were new thrill-seekers, new initiates, John and Ione Porter and the two Lesbians, Peggy Cintron and Vicki Dugan. His smile became broader as his thoughts wheeled ahead, to that derelict hag, to the blood sacrifice he'd offer to Asmodeus before the night was out. He'd never have thought about such a triumph if it hadn't been for that Mai LeGarde. What an innovator!
In the congregation, partially drugged with liquor, John and Ione Porter were having strong misgivings about accepting this invitation to view a Black Mass. But proud of their "liberal" badge, they were determined to stick it out to the last. It had all been evilly fascinating thus far.
Peggy Cintron also suffered doubts. But her friend Vicki, sensualist and adventuress to the last, was encouraging her, was telling her that this was the craziest-an absolute blast! What harm, what harm at all?, But of course these two couples couldn't begin to what part the drunken woman down front would play in the weird rites. If they had, they might have made every effort to escape while there was still time.
The members of Asmodeus' congregation had long ago stripped down to their uniforms, the women in the mutilated brassieres, panties, in black hose and heels, the men wearing their usual minimum. Libby had hardly been aware of the call to prayer, hadn't noticed when Mai had taken care of her divestiture himself. Nor had she noted his continual manipulations as his boredom had mounted.
He'd been momentarily distracted as Veronica Hurst had been tied to the wall, had been mercilessly flogged by a sadism-ridden Cyril Franchi.
But now, Libby was partially reviving. She could almost navigate on her own as Mai dragged her down to the altar. Tonight there was added variation. Besides the chewing of the doughy wafer, the sipping of the bitter concoction in the chalice, they were obliged to kiss the slimy skin of the just-killed frog as well. And finally, to proceed to the altar, pay homage to that figure lying there.
The Porters and the two Lesbians sat glued to their seats, watching every move with rapt, staring eyes.
The evil service came to its conclusion shortly thereafter. And if he hurried the initiation of the four new converts somewhat, he was to be excused. For the drunken woman was weaving dangerously on her stool, was beginning to rave in thick maunderings. They'd best get on to the main event as quickly as possible.
Still the Porters, Vicki and Peggy were hardly slighted. Their sponsors-Monika LeGarde in one case, Walter Degenhardt, one of Kendall Park's most prominent lawyers in the other-had seen to it that the recruits were dressed in the prerequisite uniform, had given them enough to drink beforehand so that they wouldn't back out at the last moment.
Now the foursome approached the altar, Monika and Degenhardt herding and encouraging them. They knelt before the leering priest, repeated the ugly vows of obedience after him. They were forced to drink the potent cups of absinthe, were rendered insensible to what would happen next.
The alcoholic fog clearing little by little, Libby was able to focus her eyes enough to see what transpired next before the altar. Renata sprawled on the ceremonial chair again, received John Porter's show of obedience and humility. Dorcas Savage wound one hand in each female convert's hair, forced and guided her so she could render that supreme homage to him. As Libby watched, she saw how Ione Porter accepted the subservience with little or no fuss. Vicki and Peggy were more reluctant, Peggy especially, and had to be forced with more vigor.
Then when Savage was satisfied, Monika and Walter led the novitiates back into the room, indicated that the rule of obedience extended to the cult members as well, became the first in a long, expectant line. Still Peggy and Vicki rebelled, but were persuaded in the end.
The perverted initiation rite began, the female members grumbling at the three-to-one ratio, feeling that the males were getting the best of the deal by far.
Those not being attended by the recruits became restless, returned often to the liquor table to replenish their drinks.
And still Libby couldn't begin to understand why that mumbling, cracked-voiced harridan sat in the middle of the room.
She was abruptly jogged to her senses, looked down to see John Porter fumbling with her knees, a dazed, libertine expression on his face. Still numb, she resisted him, until Mai laughed, threw her onto the upholstered platform. He chuckled as Porter began to minister to Libby, asked her to describe her sensations to him. He was just becoming insistent when Vicki Dugan came hobbling toward him, began her attentions to him. He had sensations of his own to worry about then.
Libby twisted and thrashed, dug her nails into the cushions, as John Porter avidly continued his task, made that a labor of love where this gorgeous blonde was concerned. Drunk as she was the sensations rocked and maddened Libby just the same. That was all she could do to keep from screaming as he went on and on.
Until, abruptly, Leah Franchi, becoming impatient, pulled the man away from Libby, appropriated him for herself.
The initiation went on and on.
Until at last, the melodious gong sounded again, called attention to the altar. Seeing the demonic look in Dorcas Savage's eyes, Libby sensed chilling fear.
"Asmodeus is dissatisfied," he boomed, stilling everyone instantly. "We have all become lax in our worship, we have become more interested in our pleasures than in those of our holy Asmodeus. In his anger Asmodeus has demanded further sacrifice."
A muffled questioning went through the group. And when an expectant hush had once more settled upon the cult-
"Asmodeus demands the supreme sacrifice." The priest paused for effect. "He demands a blood sacrifice."
Libby instantly stiffened, shook her head, tried to clear her thoughts. Blood sacrifice? From somewhere in ancient history she remembered someone talking about such an atrocity. Where? And as a coldness settled upon her, chilled her heart, she began to remember. Instantly her eyes focused on the huddled woman before the altar. And' she understood. The things Mai had told Laird and Cyril that night at the party-
Instantly she clawed Mai's bare arm. "No," she hissed. "They aren't going to ... not with that old lady...."
LeGarde's eyes were malevolent. "Be quiet!" he spat. "Yes, that's what's going to happen. A blood sacrifice. This has to be! Don't interfere or you'll be sorry."
Libby struggled to gain her feet, to make her feeble protest against this crime. But Mai locked his arm around her neck, flung her back. "Be still, damn you!" he rasped. "There's nothing you or anyone can do to stop this now. Dorcas is determined." He laughed shortly. "So am I."
Instantly Laird and Wyman were advancing on the liquor-numbed crone. Rex Zorne, in case there were dissidents, moved to block the room's only exit. This thing was to be done; the woman's blood was to be on everyone's hands. In their mass guilt the cult's bonds would be drawn that much tighter around each individual member.
The besotted creature began to cry and moan when the two men dragged her to her feet, wrested the bottle from her. Her muddled protests became even louder when they began to wrench her rags from her, to reveal her sagging, gray body, her discolored, ragged underwear. And when this too was ripped from her-
Franchi and Brittany dragged her forward to where Dorcas had already cleared the altar of its artifacts, leaving only the frog to look down on this ultimate desecration. Then they were lifting the now blubbering woman, placing her flat on her back on the cold marble slab. She fought them weakly, her voice a rusty creak, a sobbing lament.
Franchi pinned her wrists to one end of the altar; Brittany held her shaking legs.
And then and there, before the total significance of this monstrous deed could fully register on the diseased minds observing the ceremony, Dorcas chanted a barely intelligible litany, a mumbo jumbo in which blood sacrifice and Asmodeus were constantly repeated.
Seemingly from nowhere the wide-bladed dagger, a glistening, cabalistically inscribed thing fully twelve inches long, appeared. The priest held it high in both hands, chanted more gibberish, offered this sacrifice to Asmodeus.
A second later the dagger was poised, point down. Then, another second later, it rose and fell. Once, twice
-three times. The woman shrieked loudly, her cries scouring Libby's soul. The hag fought with her last remaining strength, her body flopped and strained. Then, blood invading her lungs, she choked, cried out no more.
Instantly, before the hypnotic mood should be shattered, Dorcas handed the dagger to the waiting Renata. She advanced, plunged the dagger to the woman again. Now she gave the knife to Laird, who stabbed the woman again. Then it was Cyril's turn.
Before the hysteria had totally faded, everyone in the room, recalcitrants and enthusiasts alike, had come to the altar, had taken a turn at symbolically plunging the dagger at the butchered body. The two Lesbians fought to escape, but Degenhardt bullied them. Mai LeGarde literally carried Libby to the altar, forced the knife into her hand, guided her arm as it raised, once, twice-gashed the woman's breasts.
For a time afterward a sullen, frightened silence settled on the group. But that was before the liquor that everyone was desperately swilling down took hold. Once their brains were anesthetized, once irresponsibility took hold again, the devil chapel became the site of an orgy without equal. Every person present, wild to blot out the memory of the slaughter, let drink, let sensation work their ugly magic.
Libby didn't want to drink. She wanted to flee this pestilent place with all her heart and soul. But Mai forced more liquor down her throat, saw to it that the old irresponsibility was reintroduced.
And after a time Libby didn't care. She didn't care at all. She could look up at the altar, see the woman lying there, her body gashed, blood running down the base of the altar, forming in puddles on the floor, and think nothing of that. She could laugh and cavort as gaily as any of the others.
For now the apex of depravity had been reached, the last restraint and inhibition residing in any of their souls had finally been routed. They were actually and truly disciples of Satan now. And what harm now in conducting an all-out debauch, in lending themselves to any and all excesses the human mind could evolve?
Now Libby giggled and screamed as the man-what was his name-she couldn't remember-pulled off her pumps, began kissing and nibbling her feet. Another man was removing her panties, handling her, preparing to take her.
In the distance she saw Vicki Dugan and Leah Franchi tangled in a Lesbian knot.
She saw Rex Zorne forcing a protesting, screaming Peggy Cintron, she saw him raping her in the most brutal manner imaginable.
Someone had tied a naked Suzanne Degenhardt about the wrists, had hoisted her, via a concealed pulley, three feet off the ground. And while she hung and whirled there, screaming in maenadic rapture, John Porter was gleefully lashing her with a long whip that curled completely about her lovely, once white legs.
Monika LeGarde was standing beside Maynard Wilkie. She saw his hands reach up, lock on her buttocks. Then he was drawing her down to him. Ione Porter was after Mai LeGarde again; she was taking up the subservient ritual once more, avidly and voluntarily this time.
And everywhere else-twisting, lurching bodies, hysterial mistral of passion as women screamed and laughed, as men cursed and groaned. That was a scene from Dante's Inferno, from Hieronymus Bosch, a scene to shrivel the brain.
But then Libby had no time for further observation of the lunatic happenings about her. She had some very lunatic happenings of her own to contend with, as one of the men with her took her with one bestial lunge, while the other man removed her stockings, began to tickle her feet.
Libby screamed and laughed in insane alternation, felt like she was going to explode from the fantastic opposing sensations building within her.
Still the two men continued to torture her.
It was at three-thirty that following afternoon, just after Mai LeGarde had considered it safe to leave the very distraught child alone, had fled the apartment himself, that Libby Ashton, feeling more dead than alive, fought her way up from the bed.
Doggedly, possessed of a superhuman determination, she showered, dressed, applied heavy make-up to camouflage the results of the previous night's carnage. And now, her spirit crushed, she went to her closets, picked those few things she felt she could dare take without risking LeGarde's supreme wrath, without having him hunt her down.
She took one piece of expensive jewelry, some pretty lingerie, several dresses, three pair of shoes, hosiery, a daytime wool jacket. And at the last, her heart pounding savagely at her audacity-the full length mink coat.
Moments later, desperately fighting the dogging sickness, she let herself out of that apartment for what she vowed was the last time.
Then she was racing down the hall.
Running away once more.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Libby found a grubby rooming house on Kendall Park's west side, where she rented an equally grubby room. And feeling very alone and frightened, wanting to have time to think, rest, regain her equilibrium, she decided to hole up, hide, before making another move.
The room wasn't much, one in a warren of six such rooms that a very hard-boiled, very mercenary Mrs. Slocum rented out in the upstairs of her sprawling, ancient mausoleum, a wreck dating back to the 1850's if one was to judge by the antiquated plumbing, by the way the winter wind whistled through the windows. There were a bed, a dresser, a table, some flimsy chairs that had obviously been rescued from the city dump. All this magnificence-Libby had winced upon being shown the room-for only ten dollars a week!
And afterward, her desperation, Mrs. Slocum's high-pressure methods forcing her to take the room made Libby sick at heart to compare this rat's nest with the comfort, modernity and luxury she'd just left. Immediately she wondered if she'd done the right thing, if she hadn't jumped from the frying pan into the fire.
Tired, deathly hung over as she was, there wasn't much time for such doubts. As soon as she'd paid Mrs. Slocum, from the $56 "pin money" she still had left of LeGarde's generous weekly allotments, she undressed, went right to bed, slept like one of the dead.
It was some time after midnight when a banging in the next room had dragged her up from a nightmarish sleep. And sitting stock upright in bed, she listened, made out the female cries, the male chucklings and mutterings, decided that the man in the next door. had brought that night's pickup home with him. Again her lonely vulnerability hit her.
She needn't have felt alone, for her neighbors provided an interesting diversion, kept her company for at least an hour after that. The male, finishing with a cursing, proud, flourish, sought to get some rest. The woman, not having received her due as yet, wasn't about to let him. And using all sorts of inflammatory language, mauling her reluctant lover unmercifully, she finally fell back on the unfailing way by which a woman can revive a man.
Libby had tossed and turned, her senses acute, wondering about this "better world, this more "mora!" world shed chosen, as the man had groaned and hissed his pleasure, had encouraged his paramour in a very frank way. And finally, the bed had commenced to creak again, to bang against the thin wall, the woman had begun to choke and gasp, describe her nearing ecstasy in a very graphic, crude way.
Somewhere, midway through the performance, Libby had fallen into a blessed sleep.
Libby crept from that room only to take her meals at a nearby lunch stand. Otherwise she spent what remained of that week end locked in. sleeping, thinking, trying to bolster her ego, pampering herself, trying to erase, with make-up, the ravages the past months had introduced into her pretty, youthful face.
She scanned the newspaper want ads, sought to find a job she might apply for without putting herself into double jeopardy, a job where there would be few questions asked about her past, where she would not be apprehended, hustled back to Parmentier; a job where she wouldn't be exposed to the public overly much where Mai LeGrade couldn't find her. Also she made up a personal history, looked up the name of a Kendall Park high school to make her application more believable.
And bright and early on Monday morning, quaking in her boots, she sallied forth in search of a job.
Something much suspect in her manner, she scored zero on her first four factory applications, was given a polite but firm brush off. It was then that Libby fell back on her alternate list.
Thus it was she came to be employed at Callison's Stationery and Office Supplies. This was very much of a going nowhere, hole-in-the-wall emporium on a side street off Madison Drive in one of Kendall Park's most marginal neighborhoods. And though it was a small operation, there were times when Mr. Larry Callison had to be out, needed someone to oversee things in his absence. If she could get along on a dollar an hour, be at the store from nine to five, Monday through Saturday-
Libby swallowed her disappointment. Fifty dollars a week! Why Mai had given her more than that just for-She killed the rest, decided to take the job, mainly because there'd been a minimum of questions asked, because Mr. Callison had seemed to be an inoffensive, nice man, because the work was easy.
She'd started the very next morning.
However, by Thursday, Libby had discovered there were certain glaring drawbacks to the job. One was that, while the work was easy it was also maddeningly dull and unchallenging. She waited on the store's few customers, she took care of stock, she ordered and inventoried, she dusted and arranged displays. But most of the time she just stood around. And if there was one thing she didn't need, it was to have time on her hands, time to think, to compare and weigh her new life against her old one.
After the hectic excitement of her life with Mai LeGarde, after the constant attention, the gifts he showerd her with, the aura of luxury she'd been surrounded with, it was terrifically hard to adjust, to go home to that barren, ugly room at night. Her life suddenly seemed the most pointless of rounds-a treadmill to oblivion.
Second was the fact that Larry Callison wasted little time in revealing his true colors. For if Libby had time on her hands, the shop's boss had an equal amount to squander. And when men have time to waste, there is, invariably, one pursuit in which they'll waste it.
Libby found that out late Wednesday afternoon.
She was in the back room on a small ladder, balancing precariously, pad and pencil in hand, inventorying the different business bonds in stock. And suddenly the squat, balding, thirty-eight-year-old man was back there with her. Instantly Libby was alert, the expression on Callison's face, the heavy silence out in the store, warning her.
"Hi," she said guardedly, counting boxes.
"Hi, Libby," he said nervously. "Keeping busy?"
"Yes, Mr. Callison. Is there something? I can let this go."
"No, Libby. There's nothing. I just want to look at you a little while. Take in those gorgeous, long legs of yours. Real pretty pumps you got on today."
Libby flushed. "Really, Mr. Callison...."
"How many times must I tell you, kid? Call me Larry. Anyway when we're alone, and there's no customers. Times like now."
"I just can't get used to it ... Larry."
"There,"
"he soothed. "That's more like it. Like I was saying, pretty shoes. And pretty legs. You don't mind if I watch, do you?"
"Mr ... Larry ... you're embarrassing me. I don't think...."
"No harm in just looking, is there? You're such a beautiful girl, Libby. You know that's why I hired you, don't you? Cause you're so easy on the eyes. You're even helping business. The guys come in just to get a look at you."
Libby swayed on the ladder. "Stop now, Larry. What would your wife think if she could hear you talking like this?"
He shivered, let his face contort into a tough grimace "To hell with my wife. She doesn't count. She hasn't for years. I'm just the guy that brings Home the pay check to her." His voice caught strangely. "You know, Libby. I could really go for a girl like you. I could be good to you, make your life real nice."
Libby caught the edge of the shelf for balance. "Really, Larry, you shouldn't be talking like this. I don't like this. Not at all."
Suddenly there was a rush, the sound of a frustrated gasp. And all at once the man was behind her, wrapping his arms around her legs in a fierce hug. Instantly he was sliding his face, his lips on her stockinged legs, he was gulping thickly in his throat, burying his lips against the concavity behind her knee.
"Larry!" she gasped. "Mr. Callison."
"Please, please," he choked, "let me, Libby. You're so beautiful, so wonderful. I've dreamed that someday a girl like you ... I've dreamed all my life ... wanted...."
For the briefest moment Libby felt a tearing pain, a piercing sense of pity for the man, a yearning to give herself to let him fulfill his pitiful dream. She swayed, felt tremors of excitement claw at her as the man slavishly kissed her legs, as he whined and gasped at the permitted adoration.
But then Callison became over-confident, he let one hand slide along her leg, high under her skirt, let his hand press and caress her bare leg above her stocking top
"Oh!" she gasped. "Now stop that! Please, Mr Callison." But he didn't stop. Lost in his insane trance, his lips roving nonstop on her silky legs, he became even bolder.
And Libby, twisting and teetering on the stool, trying to escape, suddenly lost her balance. Then she was in the man's arms, fighting him, his hand, under her skirt, becoming more cruel by the second.
A moment later Libby broke free. "Let me go!" she squealed. "What if a customer came in now?"
Callison moved more determinedly, his eyes lust-glazed. He dropped his head, tried to nip those tossing cones of her breasts through her sweater. It was then that Libby swung, slapped him open-handed across the face with all her strength.
"Mr. Callison. What's wrong with you? This is impossible. I don't want anything like this. I just want a job, nothing like this. I want to be a good girl...."
Almost immediately the man was snapped from his lapse, his face became frightened, regretful. "I'm sorry, Libby," he mumbled, not looking at her. "I didn't mean to get like that It's just that you're so lovely, I...."
Then he was hurrying away, retreating into the store.
A very much shaken, puzzled. Libby attempted to straighten her clothes, forced herself to go back to work. She decided, as she drove herself to concentrate on the interruped inventory, that this wasn't going to work out.
She'd have to start looking for another job. She'd finish the week here, collect her piddling salary, try again elsewhere.
She and Callison didn't exchange another word the rest of that afternoon.
The interlude stirred certain indefinable longings for Libby as she sat alone in her room that night. She couldn't help wondering what wild things Mai was doing; she wondered about that woman they'd murdered. Had the police found out about her, about the evil rites conducted at the Savage estate?
And while the introspection served to reinforce her determination never to sink back into that morass again, still she felt jittery and dissatisfied. She surveyed the tawdry room, she thought of the pitifully few possessions she had left-she'd pawned the mink coat, had taken a terrible beating on it-made mental inventory of the oceans of lovely things that still remained at the apartment.
That made her feel even more dissatisfied and edgy.
On Thursday Mr. Callison studiously and guiltily avoided her.
But on Friday there was a subtle change in his attitude. He was more friendly, a strange, bullying smugness in his manner. Alone in the store at mid-afternoon he squeezed past her as she wrapped a parcel, touched her suggestively in the process. Later, as she arranged stock, he stood behind her, began caressing the nape of her neck. "Beautiful, beautiful," he hissed.
"Please, Mr. Callison!" She wheeled, slapped his tickling fingers away. "I've asked you not to."
He hadn't been contrite this time. Instead he'd leered, looked directly into her eyes. "There's time, Libby. All the time in the world. You'll get to like me." Then he sauntered off, a cat with the canary grin on his face.
And Libby couldn't help but shudder.
By eight-thirty that night she was like a caged animal in her scabrous room. She paced, fidgeted, wished she had a drink. It was hard for her to believe that only a week ago, at the Savage mansion, those heathen things had happened. And though she wanted to fight the thoughts, her dissolute life was too deeply inbred a thing.
If I can just get out, take in a movie or something, get my mind off things, she thought. Maybe risk just one drink-
It was at that moment that a soft tapping sounded on her door, and she froze. Instantly thought of LeGarde came to her. Had he found her?
Tremblingly she went to the door, opened it a crack.
Instantly the door was pushed open, and a whiskey-reeking Larry Callison crowded in. "Surprise, honey!" He chuckled. "Big surprise!"
With rapid, furtive motions he wheeled, locked the door behind him. Then he faced Libby, leered, showed her the half fifth of whiskey. "Party, honey. We're gonna have a party."
"Mr. Callison!" she gasped. "What are you doing here? Get out! Do you hear? Get out of here. Before I call for help."
He snickered, moved toward her, stalked her. "F'r-get that, baby. You ain't gonna yell for nobody. Only for big Larry here. Like later. You got too much to lose, Libby doll."
Her heart jammed up into her throat "What are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about a little snoopin' I been doing, kid. Like when you played high and mighty with me the other day. Larry don't like that. All his dollies tumble for him. But fast. Or else."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Don't you, Libby? I checked on that school, kid. They've got no record of you ever graduating. Then I made a cute phone call to the police department. Yes, they've got a bulletin on one Libby Ashton. From Parmentier. They didn't like it at all when I hung up on them quick like."
He paused, regarded her mockingly. "You follow, honey? We play some games for the old king here? Unless you want I should make another phone call. I figure you don't care much about goin' back to mama and papa. How about that, sweetie? You be good to me, I'll be good to you."
Libby fell back, sick to think of having that man touch her, kiss her, finally take her to bed. "You dirty, rotten...." she started.
"Ah-ah," he taunted. "Be nice. Or Larry won't be nice to you. He'll be mean, real mean. C'mon, Libby, let's get friendly. A li'l kiss for a starter. C'mon."
Then he had her in his arms, he was crushing his mouth on hers, pressuring and grinding, the whiskey strong on his lips. His arms tightened cruelly, and when she fought, he bit her lips, forced his kiss deep.
While he kissed her, defiled her thus, his arms dropped, his hands clutched her buttocks.
For a moment Libby though she'd vomit.
But then he pulled away. "Oh, baby," he seethed, "am I going to love you. You are real prime, real mint. You little pig. You little pig." Again his hands slid on her legs, veered, clawed her, hurt her. Then he pulled away, laughed.
"Easy Larry. Don't bruise the merchandise." He released her, turned, surveyed her room. "What a dump. You got some glasses? We gotta have a drink first, Libby. Then we have some fun." His eyes pierced hers. "That right? We have some fun? You gonna cooperate? Like a good little girl?"
Larry, knowing full well he had the upper hand, took every possible advantage of her. He forced her to drink with him, chuckled ad nauseam as the whiskey did its ugly work, made her more responsive to his crude advances.
By then he'd made her strip off her dress. And now weaving slightly, Libby stood in the center of the room wearing only an expensive black brassiere, panties, garter belt, stockings and one of her nicest pairs of pumps. "Oh, baby, that gets to me. The boobs! Those legs. Where'd you get silkies like that? You were a dead giveaway, Lib, the first day you came in. No buck-an-hour clerk wears clothes like you wore. I knew there must be something fishy somewhere. And when you wouldn't play ball with your kindly old bossman...."
"All right!" Libby gritted. "So you knew. So you know everything. Let's get with things. Take what you want, damn you!"
"Anxious, huh?" he leered. "That's what I like to hear. Only first, we play. Isn't every day I get my hands on a young broad like you. A doll with boobs like grapefruits, with a rear ... legs like you got, sweeties. Draw back those arms, Libby. Make those boobs pop out. Wow," he choked. "Oh, wow!"
And for the next ten minutes he forced the sickened, frightened girl to pose for him, to turn, arch her body, her knees, submit to his trembling caresses. He forced her to strip off the brassiere, hold her breasts for him, rile the nipples. He made her peel off her panties. But when she moved to undo the evil garter belt-
"No!" he commanded. "Leave that, honey. I've got a thing about those silkies. Over here, you little minx."
And now Libby was forced to. stand before him, let him handle and touch her wherever he pleased. He made her offer her breasts with her own hands to his greedy lips, suffer that swirling torture, while his cruel hands tortured elsewhere.
And finally, "Now, baby? We do that bedsheet tango?"
She dropped her head, nodded. "Better than that, honey," he prompted. "Tell the old king. Tell 'im you want him."
"Yes, Larry," she forced. "I want you."
"How bad?"
She knew what kind of parody this could become, if she didn't quickly humor him, nip the quirk in the bud. "Yes, Larry. Real bad. Something awful. I burn and ache from wanting you."
"Wanting what?" he cackled. "You. I want you."
"You can talk plainer than that, kiddo. C'mon, give!"
"I want your...." She paused, finally forced out the gutter word.
But even that wasn't enough, for now the man grabbed her buttocks with one hand, maddened her futher with the other, made her shake and tremble. And insisted she go on with the foul recitation, got tremendous charge out of the words he put into her mouth.
But that was all for the best. For when the lights were out, when Callison took her in his brutal fashion, tossed her back, wrenched at her still stockinged legs, he was too badly excited; his own body betrayed him prematurely.
He moved at her cruelly, chuckled when she groaned in pain. There was no finesse, no gentleness in his onslaught, just sheer bestiality.
"Hurts huh, baby?" he taunted. "Bet you never had a man like me before did you? You ain't no virgin I can tell, but you're not too far from that. Who was the other? Some clumsy, half grown schoolboy? Nothin' compared to me, was he?" He clawed her harder. "Was he?"
"No," she gasped. "He wasn't, he wasn't."
Still Callison worked at her, still he inflicted hurt and indignity, chuckling when she groaned and hissed. "Get with this baby," he warned. "Roll with those punches. Give us a little action or we'll be here until "Wow. Wow. Wow...."
Libby shammed passion, began moving in reply. She even went so far as to feign cries of ecstasy, she replied to his increasingly more vile promptings without hesitation.
This final self-defilement put the man over the brink, made him groan coarsely, made him say some very hair-curling things. Made him, seconds later, fall exhausted.
"I was good, wasn't I?" he gasped finally. "A real prize stud. Tell me, damn you!"
Libby told him, everything the sadist wanted to hear.
"You weren't so bad either. For a kid."
But if Libby thought she was finished with the man, she was mistaken. For now he was at her breasts again, bitting, making her nipples sting and go taut. He took her hands, made her touch him, until he was revitalized.
Then the rotten travesty of love was recommenced, the same verbal indignities were forced from her. Seemingly the thing went on and on, Libby sickened, feeling nothing. Until, with a maximum of vocal and physical commotion, "Go, witch, go! I can tell things are starting to happen. Just a little more. Yes, like that. Go go ... "
Now he squealed like a stuck pig.
"This is only the first, honey," he gloated, looking at her as he dressed. "We've got lots of goodies like this ahead of us. Every chance I get I'll visit you. And don't try anything, see? Or I'll go to the police, tell them where to look."
He paused at the door. "See you at work tomorrow, babe."
Then the door was closed. Then she heard his scuttling footsteps on the stairs.
And she rolled over, shuddered convulsively, buried her face in her pillow. What's the use? she raged. Is this what I get for trying to break with my ugly past, for trying to live a decent life? These chintzy surroundings? No money? No pretty things? An animal like Larry Callison and all his filthy stunts?
What are the odds? If I'm going to be a pig to the whole stinking world, why shouldn't I sell myself to the highest bidder? And this cruddy room, that Callison slug just isn't what I'll settle for. If I'm going to have silk on my back-
Panic at thought of being seized by the police, taken back home, having to face her parents smashed her then I've got to get out of here. Back to Mai. If he'll have me If he'll forgive me.
Then she was up, grabbing a robe, preparing to go down the hall, clean up as best she could. She'd get dressed. There was a pay phone downstairs. If she could just get in touch with Mai, make him take her back-
I have to, I have to, she wailed as she broke into the hall.
LeGarde opened the door to Libby at her first timid ring, hurried her inside the apartment. Locking the door behind him he turned sternly to regard the bed-draggled specimen cowering before him.
Then she flung herself at him, let her body slide, she knelt before him, wrapped her arms around his legs. "Forgive me, darling," she sobbed. "Forgive me. I was out of my mind. I didn't know what I was doing."
It was then that she noticed, for the first time, that LeGarde was clad in his skin-tight black rubber suit. And her eyes opened in wonderment, she looked up at him, saw the cruel smirk on his face.
His hands wound in her hair, twisted viciously, made her cry. "In the bedroom," he spat. "Get undressed."
Like a docile lamb Libby did as she was told.
He moved to her in the darkness, handled her body in an indifferent way. Then he lay beside her, rolled onto his back. "Show me," he rasped, "just how sorry you are. Then I'll see about forgiving you."
All rebellion flogged from her, she rose to her knees, crawled to him. Wild to please she did everything he commanded her to do. She kissed his body from head to toe, she caressed the slippery suit wherever he commanded. Then she discovered the extent of his readiness.
He laughed thickly. "Show me how sorry you are," he repeated.
Libby never hesitated for a second. Gratefully, greedily, an avowed disciple of Satan now, she began.
But things were to be different tonight. For as the subservience went on and on, as Mai twisted and lurched, made no move to take her, "Darling," she sighed, "don't you ... want me now? Don't you want my body?"
"No," he chuckled, "you're doing just fine. I'll have you this way tonight. All the way." His hands caught her in her hair again. "Penitence, baby. Show me how sorry you really are."
Sick to her soul, aware that her total spirit had now been crushed, Libby adjusted her position. If this is the price I have to pay, she thought, then I'll just have to pay. She became saracastic, cynical. This is life, stupid, she castigated herself. You have to pay for what you get, nothing is free.
How had Mai said that once? La dolce vita? The sweet life.
Now, as LeGarde turned and twisted, as the choking, pinched cries and squeals ruptured his throat, Libby worked faster, used all the evil techniques at her command.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Away from depravity for so short a time, Libby fell back into her libertine routine easily, became an avowed, amoral and indolent sensualist. Conscience dulled once and for all, there was little to shock or repulse her now. She moved through all the ordered roles like a mindless automaton. As long as she had luxury, good food and drink, so long as she had her pretty clothes and shoes and furs-
The world could rot for all she cared. Three weeks had passed; it was early February now. Remembrance of the last cultist meeting at Dorcas Savage's mansion, the murder of that innocent woman, had faded, had become less real, certainly less nagging o Libby. There had been no further summons to that demon's conclave since that ghastly night, for which Libby was grateful. She could take the black rituals or leave them.
Also there'd been no hue and cry about the missing woman. Her abductors had chosen well. A zero in the eyes of society, the hag had never been missed. Who could tell whether her quiet grave in the Savage woods wasn't a more pleasant resting place than the plot the city might have alloted her? At least, intoxicated as she'd been, she'd never known what hit her, she had, in all likelihood, died happy. Stone drunk.
Thus one meaningless, self-indulgent day alter another fell away. And in her robot-like state, Libby was happy, transformed almost completely, bearing no resemblance whatsoever to the frightened little girl who'd come to Kendall Park at October's close. Now, unfeeling, resigned, conscienceless, she was a confirmed cynic, a hardened convert to lechery and voluptuary pleasures.
There were few thoughts of home and parents any more. Compassion annihilated, she felt nothing toward her mother and father. When she did remember them, she assumed that they were now reconciled to her disappearance, seldom thought of her, damning testament to how warped and inhuman the girl's basic feelings and standards had become!
There were rare times when guilt invaded. But very rarely, very feebly. She had but to think of her interlude at Mrs. Slocum's rooming house, the way the world, in the form of Larry Callison, had greeted the Prodigal Daughter, and she was restored, glad for her exalted, if evil, environment. These times she almost welcomed debauch; it seemed supreme reassurance.
And this February day, warm and snug in her pleasure dome, having recently returned from a gourmet lunch at Lascarde's Milano, curled on her luxurious chaise longue, garbed in lounging pajamas and over-blouse of expensive gold lame, matching gold lame pumps on her feet, Libby Ashton-the new Libby Ashton-felt very expansive, very pleased with herself. Soft music played on the ultra-deluxe hi-fi stereo Mai had recently bought her, she seemingly didn't have a care in the world. At least none that a few drinks wouldn't kill.
Her sensuality piqued by her privacy, by her exotic costume, she let her reveries encompass some of the diversions of these past weeks.
The vision coming most readily to mind at the moment was that of the prolonged night at Mai's home, of an orgy conducted in that excess-equipped bedroom, on that round, revolving bed, with those spotlights beaming down, the wall to wall mirrors reflecting diorama of debauch, the twin movie cameras whirring throughout the sweaty performance.
Libby and Mai, Monika and a massive Negro, hired for just that night, had disported themselves outrageously on that bed, had drunk themselves into an irresponsible torpor, a daze in which there was nothing that could be considered evil. Excess had followed excess.
Even now, reminiscing, Libby shivered involuntarily to remember that black lover named Dade. Seemingly insatiable, an avowed innovator, he'd lasted for what seemed an eternity. And where she'd once thought that Mai was a magnificently built male--Just the thought of Dade made her heart pound.
She recalled another night when Mai, in a punitive mood, had forced her to repeat that same homage she'd paid the night she'd returned to him, had bought his forgiveness. Only this night there'd been a difference. He'd trained floods on the bed, had let his motion picture camera run throughout the entire program.
She recalled the big book of photographs she and Mai had studied together one night, later attempting to copy some of the more interesting variations. She remembered how she'd ached for days afterward.
She recalled a party at the Brittanys' a week back, almost exact duplicate of the LeGarde Christmas party. Mai had insisted she wear the most abbreviated bikini panties she owned, and he'd surreptitiously played beneath her skirt as the party had gained momentum. And, surprise, surprise, he had taken her right there. He'd nearly driven her crazy before Rex Zorne, suspecting what was going on, had yanked Libby from him, had exposed Mai to the delighted, hooting guests.
Suddenly Libby found herself trembling, felt a fine film of perspiration on her brow. Very definitely aroused, she noted how taut her nipples were, how they seemingly sent out silken tentacles to harden and draw each entire breast taut.
Mai, she thought. If you were only here right now! What a workout you'd get!
Almost as if in answer to her hope the doorbell chose that moment to ring. And praying that it was Mai, that he'd played hooky from work, she ran to push the vestibule button, allow the visitor to come up. After all, who else would it be? Only she, Mai and Monika knew of the existence of this lust pad.
Two minutes later, when the door buzzer itself rang, she loped to open the door.
And stepped back in surprise, a question jammed in her throat. Not Mai, but Matthew Cape, stood in the doorway.
"Matthew!" she blurted. "How ... did you get here? How did you know where to find me?"
"It wasn't easy," he smiled confidently. "You're secretive enough about this place. Even when you're loaded you don't let on."
"Then how...."
"Maybe Monika gets more loaded than you do. I got it from her a couple nights ago." He grinned lewdly "As well as a little something else. And being the curious sort, I thought I'd look you up."
"You know what Mai would do if he found you here."
"I happen to know Mai's in New York today." Libby was amazed. "He is? He didn't tell me."
"Monika again. Who knows, maybe she's playing cupid."
Libby was confused. "Is that why you came here?"
"No, not really. A social visit. Just talk, honey. You're a puzzler. I thought I'd like to know you better." Traces of lazy lust still alive for her, Libby said in sultry fashion, "Just how much better?"
He seemed rather embarrassed. "Just talk, Libby.
Honest." He appraised the apartment at length. '.'Quite a layout. Old Mai really sank a bundle into this playhouse, didn't he? I'll bet it's not as love-oriented as Monika's lair. The things that pythoness has got hidden in her closets! Little uglies nobody but me . .not even Mai ... knows about."
"Oh?" Libby challenged. "Maybe I could show you things here too. Mai's got a whole section of the closet full of ... ah ... kinky stuff. Want to see?"
"No." Matthew made a wry face. "God, we're awful! Imagine, sitting here comparing notes. 'My daddy's more evil than your daddy.'
Libby rose abruptly, stretched exaggeratedly, took delight in the way Cape's eyes hungrily roved her gold-sheathed body. "Drink, Matt? I can call you Matt? Matthew seems so ... kinda stuffy."
"Be my guest. Yes, I'd like a drink. Straight brandy if you have it. Warm, right out of the bottle."
Libby grimaced, said, "Sounds ugh to me."
"It gets the work done. And when you're carrying a demon around on your back like I am. The fastest way...."
Libby shrugged, went toward the bar, poured the brandy, took some sherry for herself. It seemed a safe, light drink.
Cape's lean, haggard face broke into a sardonic smile as he raised his glass, toasted, "Here's to sin."
Libby smiled faintly. "I'll have to drink to that. Seems I've got no choice."
They drank, fell silent momentarily. Finally Cape spoke. "How're things going, Libby? Are you reconciled? Or have you had enough of this kind of life?"
Libby wriggled her shoulders. "I guess I'll live."
"Ever thought about going home, facing your folks down, squaring yourself with the world again? It's still not too late, you know, no matter what you might think.
"Change the subject, will you, Matt? You think you know everything. But you don't. I'm afraid it is too late. Home's the last place I could go. Mai would find me there, he'd find ways to make me come back. Just some of those movies of him and me I let him take ... "
"They hooked you on that too? That's how I got snagged."
"That right? I've always wondered. You looked too smart to enter into ... things ... willingly. You want to tell me about it? Since you know me backward and forward."
"No harm, I guess. It's the oldest story in the world. Rising young chemical engineer, bachelor, very militant liberal, who thinks present day morals stuffy and puritan, seeks emancipation, feels he can cope with orgiastic love. And so I met Monika. And we started to swing. We made that mechanical bed of hers go round and round like a runaway carousel. And one thing led to another."
He sipped his drink, stared into space. "Then one night, all of us blind drunk, three gals and two guys in Monika's arena bedroom, we really let loose." He winced. "Only that wasn't half as much fun a week later, watching the things we did on that screen in Monika's living room. That was Clayre and Laird Brittany, that Veronica Hurst woman. Monika and me."
'And then," Libby interrupted, "when you balked at her next innovation, a print of that film was going to your boss, to your parents...."
Matthew seemed to shrink where he sat. "You've gone the route. I didn't care about my boss. But my mother and dad ... That'd kill them. I do have some small speck of pride and decency left. An infinitesimal peck, granted. So I knuckled under."
"So, now what?" Libby said.
"I don't know. At times I think she's going to let me bow out, find herself a fresh victim. But the way things have been going lately ... It's rotten. I can't help but think everything's going to get much worse before it'll get better. That witch's brew's fermenting, it's got to boil over, explode, one of these days. And when it does...."
A vagrant spear of hope impaled Libby's heart. "Do you really believe that? That part about them getting tired of us? I often wonder about that."
"Without a doubt it'll happen. These ghoul perverts thrive on new blood. They get a thrill from dragging their convert as low as they possibly can. And after that what's left? So they go scouting for new faces, new innocence...."
Cape said the last so ominously that Libby couldn't help trembling. "I don't know...." she thought aloud. "I really don't know how I'd take it, what I'd do...."
"Get out," he said with finality. "The first chance you get. Don't let them blind you with their glittering baubles, with...." he waved at their deluxe surroundings " ... this. You've got a life out there, you've still got a chance."
"And you, Matt...?"
"Hard telling. I've been Monika's gigolo for so long, I just don't know. Maybe I could get placed in my field again. Maybe I don't even want to." He forced a smile "Hey! What kind of a wake is this anyway? Let's live it up. Isn't this the good life? The life we both thought we wanted? Well now that we've got it, let's enjoy it. Swing, baby."
He held up his glass. "Another, Libby?"
"Yes," she said, struggling to shake off the gloomy mood. "Let's have another. Let's get cheered up."
Another hour passed swiftly, with both of them straining for a light-heartedness and gaiety neither really felt. But as two drinks became three, as tensions faded somewhat-
They danced in that sumptuous living room, they joked and laughed like two adolescents on a stolen holiday. And it came as kind of a shock to Libby to discover that she hadn't laughed-really laughed-in months. She felt very warm toward Matt, easy and dependent.
And not too long after, as the effects of their privacy, their nearness, their common plight, of the relaxing drinks, became more pronounced-
Suddenly Matthew shook, held her tighter to him than he should have, suddenly his hands were sliding on her gold-sheathed spine, to her pert, firm buttocks. "Libby, you little baby...." he sighed, letting his lips brush her forehead softly.
As quickly he pulled away, his face stricken.
"Libby, I'm sorry. I didn't mean...."
She was stirred deeply. It had been so long since a man had been apologetic, hadn't thought such liberties were his God-given right. Matt was so sweet, so contrite. Wouldn't that, if she should surrender, be an absolute novelty? To be wooed, and not forced?
"That's all right, Matt," she sighed. "I don't mind, really. If that's what you want. I mean I'm here, the apartment's here. That's what women are for. This isn't as if this were the first time."
He frowned. "Somehow I wish this were." He drew Libby tight again, kissed her ears, the slope of her shoulder. "God, this is incredible! I amaze myself! I thought Monika, all those other perverts, had killed this. Libby I want you, I actually desire you. This is pure and clean, not like that other ... liquor and lust-drenched ... when we chase each other like a pack of crazed vampires."
Libby shuddered, felt a torrid weakness, pressed herself even closer to him. "Yes, Matt," she choked. "I know. I feel like that too. I want you too, and that does seem clean somehow." She stifled a giggle. "This seems like a novelty, to actually want, to be wanted. I feel like a kid, like this was my first time."
"We'll be cool, honey. Real cool. No rush. We'll make things casual." He bent her head back, kissed her tenderly, his lips searching hers. "Are you sure, Libby?"
"Yes," she sighed, the weakness intensifying. "I'm sure. I want you, really and truly want you. Come on, let's go into the bedroom."
They put a long-play tape on the music system, poured themselves fresh drinks, pulled the blinds and drapes, darkened the bedroom. Trembling and anxious, Matthew sat Libby on the bed, immediately turned, began to undress. "Matt," she said, "don't you want me to ... too?"
"No," he said, naked now, moving to her. "Let me treat you like the lovely princess you are."
Libby, seeing him naked, seeing his lean, young body, the flex and play of his muscles, was struck by a sudden aching pain. Then, when she saw how excited he was, how such a man, she wondered at her excitement. For she'd had him before, she'd known Matt to be like this before. Then she knew. The liquor. Always before she'd been sodden with drink, her senses had been anesthetized. But now, alert and yearning-
"You're beautiful, Matt," she breathed.
"And you're out of your mind," he grinned. He walked to her, pushed her back onto the bed, arranged her golden limbs. He kissed her lips, her throat, he let his hands glide and flow over her breasts, her hips, her legs.
Then he began undressing her, slowly, painstakingly. "I want you now. The real you."
Libby went limp, let him have his way, flowered under his gentleness, under his ardent flatteries and sighs of adoration! She shivered at his warm kisses, on her breasts, her neck, her lips, and then-He kissed and nipped her, made her lurch and turn. A small yip escaped her.
Then he was gathering her entirely nude body into his arms, caressing her lips, driving her crazy with passion. When she felt his hand glide over her she gasped, instantly gave herself to his ardent caress.
Overwhelmed by an incredibly new, heretofore unexperienced sensation, feeling almost frightened. She thought, this is going to be different-new-so new!
She felt deserted as Matt pulled away, reached for his drink, handed her hers. This is no time to be stopping, she thought. But then, as he looked at her adoringly, as his hand slid back to that warm, slippery bottle, she sipped her wine savoringly, was glad for this break.
A strange smile on his face, Matt leaned her back, hovered over her. And never deserting her for a second, keeping up that maddening spiraling, he carefully poised his glass, let brandy flow onto her breasts, onto each nipple. She giggled at the tickling sensation, felt the liquid slither down one breast, flow down onto her ribs.
Instantly Matt leaned, began gently to kiss the brandy away, removed the alcoholic stinging, replaced that with another, more debilitating stinging. And she wanted to scream at the exquisite torture.
And his hand, all the while, never stopped its exotic ministrations for a second.
Abruptly he tired of the exotic attention, and the clean-up completed, he downed the rest of his brandy, nodded to her to do the same with her wine. Moments later the glasses were on the floor, rolling in slow, lazy circles.
And Matt was arranging Libby's body, he was lifting her. Even before Libby knew what he was doing, his hands were on her hips, he was pulling her to him. She sucked in her breath quickly as he fumbled with her, as his free hand forced her down, down-
"Matt," she intoned, "oh, Matt. That's wonderful. You're so gentle, so loving."
He smiled tenderly, reached for her golden globes. He gazed at them raptly. Libby began to pant as his lips flicked at the convoluted tips. Rasping gasps broke from her throat.
Then, as his hands gathered those lush, velvety globes pressed them together, arranged the nipples so they were together, when his kiss touched them, began torturing both of them simultaneously, Libby broke into a sweat, she whimpered like a puppy, she closed her eyes the better to enjoy that excruciating adoration. Without even being aware of that, she began to move much faster, to madden this beautiful lover in direct proportion to the dizzying delight he inspired for her.
"Darling, oh, darling," she sighed. "You're magnificent, magnificent. You know how to do me, how to take care of a woman. You lovemaster, you precious . "
A wild warmth overwhelmed her. She dug her nails at his shoulders, she shifted to let him capture her breasts even more. Then, just when she was at her wildest when she felt so close-
"No, baby!" she wailed, "not yet. I'm almost there ... wait!" But Matt didn't listen. Not spoiling that most fragile of sensations, his hands holding her, he shifted her torso, the instant recovery of cadence maddening, perfect.
Instantly her protests died as the graceful, almost effortless action regenerated the onrush of her pleasure. With a grateful, liquid gulping she clamped his back with her arms, pulled him close. She could feel his face against hers, the warmth of his breath against the concavity of her throat. In further concession to sensation, she pressured and spurred him on.
And unexpectedly the full onslaught of her culmination slammed her, made her scramble and ache, made her entire body go tense, every nerve; every iota of sensation was captured in that sacred, terrifying moment.
But she didn't loose maenadic screams of deliverance for fear the violence of her passion might rout this ecstatic mood, might cause revisitation of her own identity upon herself. She didn't want that. She wanted this new, purged, healthy version of herself to stay-to stay-Thus her cries of release were soft, musical, something innocent, something heart-breaking, a wealth of gratitude in each small breathing.
"You baby," Matt sighed to her ear, "you sweet baby." He paused briefly, let her savor her deliverance, gave her a brief rest. But when her arms locked and pressed anew-
"You now," she murmured. "I want to give that to you."
"You too," he husked. "You can do that, I know. Both of us, together."
They didn't talk through the rest of their love. Words, would have profaned the beauty of the ecstasy they shared. The only sound was that of their bodies moving and working, the rustle of the bed, the gasps of their breathing. And then, paradise yawned before each of them again. Their choking whimpers and cries, advance messengers of an imminent arrival, announced a glittering, monumental peak, a magnificence they galloped and raced toward.
It seemed the red haze behind Libby's eyes became kiln-treated, that the pounding inside her brain pressured, baked and transformed that glaze, turned that into bright, blinding gold. And as Matt moved faster with her, as his manliness became more apparent, the torrid pleasure became even greater, causing hairline cracks to form on that golden shield.
And the cracks grew more pronounced, crazed more wildly. And now the gold leaf was curling, peeling, turning into myriad motes of golden confetti. Finally, at that moment when she clutched and held Matt so tightly that every muscle, every bone in her body ached, seemed ready to break-
The confetti exploded, drifted slowly in her brain, skittered and danced, seemed beautiful, reassuring beyond description.
This time Libby couldn't control herself. She screamed. Kept on screaming, as she heard Matt's choking cries of completion meld with her cries.
Afterward Matt drew away, became sullen and cold toward her. When she attempted to get him to talk, when she told him how lovely their love had been, he turned even more surly. "Matt, darling," she wailed, crushed by his indifference, "what is wrong?"
Then he was up, gathering his clothes, running for the bathroom to dress. "Fine guy I turned out to be," he spat. "Cool and casual, did I say? Did that look cool and casual to you. God! That's all I need now. To get involved, to get hung up on someone. Talk about stupid!"
"Darling," Libby called. "I don't understand. What do you mean?"
"Forget it!" he rasped. "Forget what we just had ever happened. If you will, I will. Forget that, forget me, forget the whole stinking, rotten world!"
The door slammed behind him. And Libby, stunned, fell back, tried to figure what had gone wrong.
When Matthew emerged from the bathroom, fully dressed again, he barely looked at Libby. He wheeled, went toward the door. "Thanks, kid," he called back. "Thanks for nothing."
She called after him once more. But he ignored her. Now the outer door slammed. And Libby was alone in the apartment, totally, utterly crushed and confused with the memory of what had happened between Matt and herself other than on that bed. And on that bed also. For the briefest moment she'd sensed a feeling of rebirth, a faint glimmer of hope had illuminated that dead cavern of her soul.
And now?
She didn't understand, she simply didn't understand.
CHAPTER NINE
More days passed. and still Libby was unable to break from her coma of indecisiveness; she was content to let each day take care of itself, let LeGarde extort whatever ugliness he wanted from her, shrug in tough indifference at some of the new kinks he instituted into their relationship.
That thing with the ropes, for instance, when he'd spread-eagled her on the bed,-stretched her arms and legs, tied her. When he'd tortured her with his hands and lips-plus other impedimenta from his private little drawer-had brought her to peak after peak by these mechanical means.
At the end, after forcing her to do him homage, he'd taken her in normal fashion. Or at least, she conceded grudingly, as normal a fashion as a pervert like LeGarde could manage his treatment not only rankled, but also instilled apprehension within Libby, for her demon lover, had of late, become progressively more cruel with her. He seemed to delight not so much in the release as in the fact that with every separate event he demeaned he' further, brought her to new depths of depravity. And she often wondered if LeGarde was, as Matthew Cape had predicted, becoming tired of her.
That consideration filled her with mixed emotions. For though she wanted to be rid of the evil life LeGarde had forced upon her, she was still frightened, unsure of what her life would be without him. What would she do, where would she run to now? Her one sortie into the outer world had taught her a devasting lesson:
As a practically inexperienced child, she was simply not equipped to cope with that rough and tumble world, And though she didn't want this evil life, she didn't know how she'd manage without it.
Along with these reflections was the continuing wonder about that afternoon with Matt Cape, about the stunning, beautiful love he'd shown her. And further, about his angry rebuff, his hasty desertion of her. It was galling to Libby to admit that he'd never paid a return visit to the apartment, that, indeed, he hadn't even gone so far as to call her on the phone.
Normally some of these things wouldn't have bothered Libby. For busy with herself, with her shopping excursions, with her hours of self-indulgent primping, with her modeling of Her new clothes and shoes and lingerie, she could usually blot out such doubts. But when the phone didn't ring for forty-eight hours at a stretch, when Mai let two nights in a row pass without visiting her-
Libby felt she had due cause to be worried.
The guillotine blade dropped with a foreboding, heart-clutching hiss one night perhaps three days later. Libby and Mai, after having a splendid dinner at their favorite Lescarde's Milano, were leaving the restaurant. Libby noted the way he regarded the semi-dressed little gypsy in the check room, the way his eyes burned into her eyes, the way he watched her undulating rear, her shapely legs as she went to recover their coats.
Granted the check room girl was lovely, a curvaceous, big-bosomed creature of no more than twenty-two She had lovely, long legs, she was a dream in the spiked heels, the skimpy costume she wore. Her face was saucy, her eyes big and round, her mouth pouty and full, her nose was a charming, tiny bump. But there was no reason for that much attraction. Surely a man of Mai LeGarde's wide experience with women shouldn't be bowled over by that bit of teasing fluff.
But he was. For as they came out of the restaurant, as they settled themselves in Mai's Continental, he turned to her, said, "Quite beautiful, wasn't she? That check room child, I mean. I think I'd like to know her better. She'd be a wonderful addititon to our circle of friends, don't you think? Wouldn't you like to be instrumental in that capture, Libby?"
"Are you serious, Mai?" Libby was aghast at the idea. "How would I do a thing like that? Why...?"
"How? It would be the essence of simplicity. I've seen the way the girl looks at your clothes, your furs, your jewelry. Like a greedy little urchin. Perhaps you could become friendly with her, invite her to our apartment sometime, tell her how she might acquire such luxuries for herself."
"Mai, Libby blurted, "you don't mean ... that you re tired of me ... that you want to get rid of me?"
"Certainly not, Libby. I'm only thinking of our group. We need fresh talent. Perhaps some of the other men would enjoy an innocent like her." He looked at Libby sternly, open menance in his gaze. "Certainly you aren't refusing to cooperate with me, are you?"
"No, darling." Libby quailed before the look. "Only I...."
"Only nothing. Do as I say. Get friendly with that girl, hint that she can have pretty things too, if she can rid herself of silly moral taboos. You'll have to be very discreet of course. I'll tell you just what to do, what to say."
And Libby, her heart feeling like lead inside her, nodded woodenly, fought back tears. "Yes, Mai, I'll do it. Anything you say." And even though he denied it, she knew that she was soon destined for the discard.
There was further evidence of his growing disregard for her upon returning to the apartment. She could tell he'd spent himself that way. At the end there was science. He'd dressed her in her rubber suit, had treated her, garbed thusly, in a vile manner, Libby's face crowded into the pillow. The brutality had been satisfaction enough he'd spent himself that way. At the end there was nothing, nothing left for Libby.
And when Mai had left shortly after midnight, Libby had cried herself to sleep, had dreamed the most chilling of nightmares, saw herself passed from hand to hand. Suddenly her beauty was faded, she was old and haggard, and no man wanted her. Her body had betrayed her, would buy her no more of life's worldly treasures.
She'd come awake, had been appalled to find herself screaming at the top of her lungs.
Nevertheless she did as Mai had commanded her. For perhaps, even as second best, there was still a place for her in his life. And if not that, perhaps he had a friend. It was a comedown of the most degrading sort, to think that she was a factory reject at the ripe old age of eighteen.
For the next week, following Mai's detailed coaching, Libby was overly friendly with Silke Louret, as the check room girl called herself. There was always a smile at luncheon, at dinner, always a few carefully chosen words. She took cautious pains to dress to the nines, to show off her jewels, flash the exclusive labels in her coats. Sometimes she even commented on the day's outfit, called Silke's attention to it.
Then, four days later, she played her trump card. Inquiring as to the girl's hours, she invited Silke to the apartment for tea one afternoon. Silke eagerly accepted. Only there was no tea; they drank martinis instead. And once the gin cut in, the "girls "could let their hair down, really get down to specifics.
Libby discovered that her protege was just twenty-one, that she was alone in Kendall Park, had come from downstate for the same reasons as Libby-to seek the big time, the golden "opportunity". And confronted with reality with a big bang, she had settled for the menial job at Lascarde's Milano. Had she been custom built, Silke couldn't have been more perfect for what Libby-and Mai-had in mind for her.
Of course Silke had wondered how a mere kid like Libby had acquired so much material wealth, was jealous and avaricious. More than this, Silke regarded herself an eminently more beautiful, more desirable woman than Libby on every possible count. And this wasn't mere ego, for the constant drinking and physical dissipation, the cancer in Libby's soul had taken their toll. She was becoming more faded of late. So, Silke thought, Libby could amass all these lovely things, reign in an opulent apartment like this one-
But she quailed when Libby hinted at the price tag attached to all her "pretties."
"You mean you actually sleep with that old man?" she gasped. "How can you? I mean, if you could find a young, handsome man, maybe then...."
"You sleep with all the young, handsome men you want," Libby replied, emboldened by drink. "And all you'll get out of that is young, handsome men."
Silke flushed, twisted her fingers. "But I could never do a thing like that," she said, "You'd be surprised what you can do," Libby replied. "I used to feel that way too. You'd be surprised what you can get used to in time." She flashed a diamond necklace at Silke. "With kickers like this, you learn fast."
Greed overcame modesty with Silke. She asked. "But what kind of things do men like that expect? I mean if I should agree to meet his rich friend? Do they get nasty? Do they keep after you all the time?"
"They're harmless old dears, really," Libby lied. "They're so tickled to have a young, pretty mistress, they treat her like a queen. Every time you turn around it's something else. Furs, jewelry, dresses, shoes...." Libby pushed this selling point hard. "And frankly, they're not much in the bedroom department. They run out of gas awful fast. Fizzles, every one of them. You could even have a lover on the side, I suppose."
Silke sighed. "You make that sound so easy."
Libby shrugged. "You asked me, I told you. It all depends on your attitudes, on what you want out of life. And if you're willing to fork over for what you get. Maybe you want to end up with some factory worker in a two-by-four house, with a pinchpenny income, and a half-dozen bawling brats hanging on your skirts. That's not for me...."
"But it seems so wrong. It's immoral," Silke persisted.
Libby knew how to derail that line of reasoning. "You really want to see something? Come with me." She took the woman into her bedroom, opened her dresser drawers, showed her the massive banks of lingerie, hosiery, blouses, sweaters, accessories. She showed her the sumptuous bathroom, her cluttered vanity. Then, as a clincher, she slid open her closet doors, revealed the rows of gowns, the coats, her stacked shoes. 'Maybe your virtue's worth more than that," she challenged.
"But mine isn't."
For long moments Silke Louret stood frozen before that impressive display-the fetish items previously concealed-with her eyes popping, her venal little heart racing. "My God, my God" she breathed.
Libby had presence of mind enough to remain silent.
And as they came out of the bedroom, Silke still awed and preoccupied, Libby said, "Think it over, honey. Like I said, there's no hurry. It's just that my friend noticed you. He's got somebody he'd like to have you meet. You can call it from there."
At the end, just before Silke hurried back to work, she'd squared her jaw, had declared. "Sorry, Libby, but that scene's not for me. I'm not that kind of girl. I'm just not interested."
But seeing the hungry look in her eye, Libby knew she was interested. "Don't make any snap decisions, Silke," she said. "Sleep on it. I'll be checking back."
As it turned out, Silke apparently didn't get much sleep for a few nights. On Thursday of that week, catching Libby after lunch, she tremblingly whispered, "Tell your friend yes. I think I'll ... give that ... thing ... a whirl. Tell him to make the arrangements, get in touch."
Despite the cold revulsion she felt, the sense of despair, there was still a small spear of excitement and victory inside Libby. She'd played her role like a pro. If nothing else, she could always be a procuress.
The evil rendezvous was arranged for the following Tuesday night. Mai, beside himself with anticipation, coached Libby constantly on the role she'd play in the cold-blooded seduction. And as Libby had suspected all along, Mai wasn't grooming Silke for another man in their group; he wanted her for himself and himself alone. And no amount of pouting and tears on Libby's part could dissuade him.
"She'll be a diversion," he soothed. "Some one to toy with, to take up the slack those nights you're tired. You'll still be number one with me, baby, you know that. The apartment'll be yours. Sure, I might bring Silke here once in a while. But since when has either of us been possessive and strait-laced? You're the one that counts."
Then, an added sop, "Maybe you should circulate a little more, find yourself a stray stud or two. I wouldn't hold that against you." He'd chuckled. "I've got something else though. To hold against you, I mean. And while we're on the subject, how about that?"
Whereupon Mai had hurried her into the bedroom, had hurriedly taken care of things. But that had been a pitiful, lackluster performance, a sham from start to finish. Libby had been fully aware that LeGarde's mind had definitely been elsewhere.
And now, on Tuesday night, at nine o'clock, a very self-conscious Silke Louret, dressed in her most enticing black sheath, and dark hose, a pair of new, bewitching pumps on her feet, was seated in a chair only a few feet away from Mai LeGarde, engaged in one of the most weird interviews in the annals of modern male-female relations.
An especially potent martini in her hands, a forced coquettishness and siren allure in her eyes, she fought to conceal her nervousness, ended up by drinking her drink too fast. Libby, as Mai had sternly instructed, promptly refilled her glass. Silke immediately lit into this one also.
This made Mai grin with smug anticipation.
Silke, remembering certain instructions her juvenile sponsor had given her, purposely leaned forward at every opportunity, allowed the daring, low cut decolletage of her bosom, tempting and taunting the goggle-eyed man. And, the liquor cutting in on her jittery nervous system with a vengeance, Silke began to savor her Jezebel role, played it to the hilt.
As added bonus was the provocative, cut-away brassiere that Silke wore, an item that barely contained the caps of her breasts. Indeed, there were times when she held the leaning pose overlong, felt the nipples come loose, knew she was in full view of the lecherous man. Otherwise she made great show of crossing and uncrossing her legs, letting LeGarde see her twinkling, white upper legs, letting her skirt ride high to expose her midnight-sheened legs.
Libby, watching, felt revulsion. Mai's expression became hungrier by the minute, as his hands clenched impatiently.
Then, appraising Silke in this new, status-robbing role, she felt incredible jealousy. For the female was lovely; she was fresh and vital; she made Libby look faded in comparison. Her body was more mature, her breasts more lush and pointed, her hips and legs in the full bloom of female ripeness. Libby could easily understand Mai's consuming desire for her.
"You're a gorgeous girl, Silke," Mai was saying now, "I'm sure all of us are going to have some wonderful times together."
All of us?" Silke said timidly. "Is the other ... gentleman ... coming soon?"
"No," LeGarde soothed suavely. "Not tonight. This is our night to get to know each other. Actually Roy...." he fabricated a name from thin air " ... is rather fussy. If we should introduce you prematurely we might ruin your chances with him." He smiled disarmingly. "All right? Just a little social evening. You get to know me, I get to know you."
Brother, Libby thought acidly, her drinks getting to her also, the way he's gonna get to know you, honey. You'll be limping for a week.
Now, as Silke looked slightly concerned, he said, "Do be a good hostess, Libby. Silke's glass is empty."
Immediately Libby was up, running for the martini shaker.
By eleven Silke was very woozy. And in this condition she didn't resist at all when Mai sat beside her, began operating, fleetingly, accidentally at first, then more boldly, more excitingly. Seduction artiste that he was, he knew just how to handle her, he played her like the semi-innocent she was. So that when he finally began kissing her, embracing her, Silke was ready and impatient, she was inflamed, wanted attention, no matter who the man might be.
She sighed, smiled blearily, surged toward him, made a point of shoving her breasts against him, sliding her legs closer to his. If this harmless old coot was the liaison between her and her wealthy lover-to-be, perhaps she'd best humor him, let him have a few free kisses.
Of course Silke couldn't know what sort of professional lover she was up against. And before long, Libby continuing to bring those deadly drinks, she was twisting and sighing, she thought nothing at all of that when he slid his hands down the front of her dress, invaded the crowded cups of her brassiere. She kissed and twisted more eagerly, groaned in her throat as he unloaded those heavy melons, let his hands play.
Thus she was surprised when the man said, "Libby, I think it's time you went to prepare Silke's bath."
She protested, but only briefly. For now there was more drink, there was more of that delectable caressing. His hand tickled her legs, made her ache.
Then there was the bath in that heavenly bathroom, in that extravagant tub. She let the man strip her, hand her clothes to Libby-handmaiden now-she let him kiss her breasts. Then she was being submerged in that bubbly foam, she was dazedly watching Libby undress Mai. And everything seemed to be spinning crazily. But nice crazy. Exciting crazy. What was that madman going to do to her now? No-he wouldn't!
But Mai would. Kneeling servilely before the tub, exciting Silke further, he began to wash her. And looking at him through slitted eyes, feeling his hands slide and scrub, feeling his bold touch, assessing his magnificent masculinity, she wanted him very badly, she thought she couldn't wait. Those hands!
Mai sat back at the end, watched as Libby toweled the dark-haired vixen dry, took special delight in appraising those vibrant, surging breasts, in studying the long sloping lines of her body.
Libby felt only nagging shame as she was ordered to perfume Silke's body, her breasts, her legs, her back.
And Silke knew a warm tightening of her muscles, an incredible excitement at the exotic way in which she was being treated, prepared-
Then they were in that gorgeous bedroom again, Silke was swaying wonderingly before the seated man as Libby brought the leather corset, zipped and laced her into that. The corset was an evil creation, wasp-waisted, boned high in the bodice, seemingly forming half bowls upon which her breasts reclined, the turgid, brown nipples peeking over its smooth, black rim.
Libby knew more antagonism as she fitted the garment to her rival's body. Mai had never bought her a thing like this. That revealed his esteem for Silke. Now she knelt, worked the patterned, lacy stockings onto her legs, smoothed the black silk over their soft surfaces. Now she snapped them taut, brought the new black shoes with the six-inch heels, knelt to put them on Silke's feet.
Silke giggled, swayed, almost fell.
Things happened very swiftly for Silke after that. Mai carried her to the already opened bed, carefully laid her down. And though Silke wanted to protest at the light still being on, at the fact that Libby was seating herself close to the bed, obviously to watch, she didn't have the will left.
The naked man moved to her then, kissed her greedily, hurtingly. Then he let his lips slide down her shoulders, to her breasts. And his teeth began driving her out of her mind. While those hands-
After a time his lips wandered, slithered over the silken surface of that leather corset. He made sick show of adoring that voluptuary garment. But then, when his lips continued to move, when she knew, for the first time in her life, that maddening touch, she seemed to break out of her trance.
"No, no ... you mustn't! That's wrong. No man's ever done that to me. I don't want that. Please, Mai."
He smiled coldly at her. "Your prissy desires hardly matter any more, my dear." He looked away. "Libby, if you'll assist me."
Woodenly, Libby rose, went to the end of the bed, grabbed Silke's nylon-glossed ankles. The ingenue struggled madly at first, as Mai let his lips commence that mind-shriveling attention.
Then, as the ultimate wonder of the rite possessed Silke, her body went limp. But still Libby stood ready, her stomach tumbling, waiting. Moments later, as the desired effect hit Silke, the legs thrashed again, she screamed, sought to reject him. It was then that Libby made manacles of her hands, held the wailing female, until, at last, this was over.
Then, remembering her role, Libby went to the closet, brought out the movie camera. "No...." Silke cried as the light bar flashed to life, as the clicking started. But LeGarde held her tightly, continued his servile adoration while Silke thrashed and screamed anew.
Moments later she screamed for another reason, as the man took her. LeGarde chuckled viciously, worked even faster, let her know him brutally. And though that was agony for Silke at first, shortly she adapted, and, in the full sway of sensuality, she began to enjoy that. She began to move, to reciprocate his motions.
Still the spotlights burned down, still the camera whirred as the bodies twisted and fought and attacked.
Until finally Mai looked at Libby. "Enough, my dear. We've got enough footage now. Perhaps you'd better leave us now. There might be some things you'd just as soon not see."
Feeling very sick indeed, Libby didn't need to be told twice. Glancing back a last time before extinguishing the lights, she watched the evil figures, one in black leather and silk, the other only in human skin, wrestling like they wanted to murder each other. Then she fled the room, slammed the door.
Out in the living room, sucking down a martini like her life depended upon it, she felt very mean, very low and crawly indeed. Shortly she heard the inhuman screams begin to break from Silke's throat. And she knew what Mai was doing now, that horrible, bestial thing. Remembering her first time, her heart went out to the poor child she had delivered into this torture chamber.
Suddenly she was drinking even faster, fighting to shut out those wails, the sound of LeGarde's cackling.
And while Libby was purposely drinking herself into a witless stupor, there were others in Kendall Park who were doing the same, John and Ione Porter, and their "liberal" friends, Dave and Tina Osgood. Dave and Tina of the ten years of marriage, David Osgood of the thirty-two lean years depended heavily on John Porter's approval to establish his pharmacy in the clinic Porter ruled with an iron hand.
David Osgood, sodden with drink, now watched as Dr. Porter kissed his petite red-haired wife on the davenport, ran the zipper on her dress, bent her backward, farther and farther. Tina, surprisingly, giggled sultrily, assentingly.
"I've always wanted to swap wives," Porter gloated, peeling the dress from Tina's shoulders, already groping at the brassiere snaps. "I'm glad you two are such good sports. God, won't we have a ball? The times we're gonna have. I got some people you two jus' gotta meet. People who do things in a flashy, big way. Wild, babee."
David Osgood was shaken as he saw how easily his wife, his pure, prudish wife, surrendered, helped Porter slide off her panties. Momentarily, he was on the verge of rebelling. But then Ione was at him. He started as she clasped him boldly.
"C'mon, baby doll," she slurred thickly, "in the bedroom. I'll show you some tricks you never saw before." She rose, never let go of him. He had to follow her.
He nearly fell as he stood up. He let Ione lead him. He looked back once, saw that Porter was naked now, saw him fall at his wife, take her with one practiced attempt. He felt dull pain as he saw how Tina giggled with lascivious delight, how her body erupted into motion.
Then they were in the dark bedroom. Ione was tearing at his clothes. Even before he was totally unclothed she was pushing him back, falling with him. Tricks had she said? This was one trick he'd never experienced before.
David groaned, did some surrendering of his own.
CHAPTER TEN
The depraved arrangement between Mai and Silke having reached the point where the pervert ghoul virtually owned her body and soul, where she un-questioningly obeyed his every command, she arrived at the apartment at seven o'clock that evening, delivered herself to Libby's experienced hands.
It unnerved Libby to see how, in two weeks time, the woman had subtly changed in both appearance and manner. There was a hardness in her face, an unmistakable cynicism in her eyes. She had, so far as Libby could see, come to grips with the trap into which she'd blundered, had become resigned to her life even faster than Libby had. And while Silke was still devastatingly lovely, there were traces of disintegration in her features, lines about her eyes and mouth, indications of debauchery's inroads.
Most disconcerting was the dark, haunted look in those eyes, at times fixedly fanatic, like the eyes of a person on the verge of insanity.
And yet if she blamed Libby for becoming her Judas, she didn't let on. She was mature enough to accept full responsibility for her capitulation to vice. She was pleasant with Libby, she feigned constant flippancy and unconcern. If this was the way the game was played-This, after all, was the only mask left on the rack. For if she and Libby were in this together, if they were sisters in sin, both mistresses to LeGarde, if they'd both participated in trio lust with him on that bed, they'd taken their turns at being onlooker and handmaiden-
How could enmity of any sort exist between them?
Silke moved like a mindless zombie this night, made little or no fuss as Libby innaugurated the drinking, said, "Get with that, honey. You'll need all the booze you can hold to see this night through." And later, when Libby got her into the bathroom, saw to her ablutions herself, the whiskey already numbing her, she still didn't protest.
She was mildly curious. "What kind of thing's this going to be? Mai said something about some kind of ceremony out at somebody's country place. I was going to be initiated into some kind of a club. What's this all about, Libby?"
"Never mind." Libby tried sidetracking her. "This is just a party. A kind of orgy. If you can drink enough you'll be able to get through the evening. Don't worry."
Seemingly Silke was content with the answer. She'd been docile as Libby took her to the bed, hurried to fix fresh drinks for them.
But Silke had become restive, had rebelled as Libby began dressing her in the cult uniform which Mai had provided for her. She'd questioned the aberrated butchery that had been committed on the stiff, black silk brassiere and panties. Looking at her exposed nipples, she'd sniffed, said, "Why'n hell bother? All the essentials are waving in the breeze anyway."
Libby shrugged, forced a smile. "Because we do what Mai says, that's why."
A mixture of hatred and fear exploded in Silke's eyes. "Yeah. I guess that's reason enough."
Then, the drinks beginning to get to them, they went to the long closet, shared by both of them now, chose their most revealing gowns, the most ridiculous shoes. Not too much later, beautifully gowned, they appraised each other, made mocking comment. "Damn," Silke smirked, "you look like Satan in high heels."
"You don't look like Little Mary Sunshine yourself," Libby retorted. "You'll probably get raped the minute you walk through that door."
"What door?" Silke coaxed. "Please, Libby, give me a clue. Let me know what's gonna happen to me."
"Skip it," Libby sneered, starting for the living room. "You're going to join a cozy little social club. Tonight you get your membership card. That's all there is to that. C'mon. Mai'll be here in an hour. Let's get a snootful."
Libby, feeling a terrible guilt for her part in helping recruit Silke, hit the liquor even harder than the initiate. She had greater cause to lapse into that memoryless limbo than Silke did.
And when Mai did arrive to take them to the Dorcas Savage estate, both girls, had done admirably. Both talked thickly, both wove when they walked. Mai had to support both of them as they came outside, started toward his car. He smiled, shrugged. Perhaps, in the long run, that was just as well.
There'd been no Black Mass rites for over a month. The entire cult uneasy over the murder of the derelict harridan, Savage had decided to lay low, let time do its healing work. Tonight, all the members present were in an eager mood, they were hungry for diversion of the rankest sort. And since there were three new novitiates, things would really swing before dawn showed its face again.
Silke between them, her expression stolid at times, disgusted and rebellious at others, Libby and Mai Le Garde watched the mock rites listlessly. So far as Mai was concerned, only the vile games afterward mattered. For Libby the evening was just something to be seen through, another payment to be made on her counterfeit security. Both were more interested in getting Silke through as best they could, Mai looking ahead to the tyro's participation in the orgy to follow.
Also Mai sized up the new couple the Porters had brought with them tonight, feeling a definite yen for the tiny, taut-bodied redhead between Ione and John. She looked like the kind who, once the restraining halter was removed, would enter into the lust games with wanton abandon. He wanted to be on hand when she started tossing that largess around.
There was little or no variation in the Mass tonight, for Savage was eager to get that over with also, to be done with this sham concession, with this sop to conscience. For if these sensualists could blame their excesses on Satan, not themselves, they could live with themselves, bring themselves to debauch after debauch.
Dorcas Savage was beginning to have strong doubts about the perverted rites. The murder at the last Mass had shaken him more than he cared to admit. Degenerate, unprincipled voluptuary he might be, but he still suffered from mortal fears. If the police ever got wind of this-More frightening, if his disciples should ever begin to desert him--
Thus he put brisk enthusiasm into the service, he bawled the opening refrain loudly: "Shall we pray?"
And turning, he was delighted to see how eagerly his "congregation" responded, to see the rapidity with which they removed their clothes, paraded themselves in their lust-inciting costumes. He felt a glow of pride to think that he had emancipated these inhibition-ridden fools, had showed them their true potential for sensual enjoyment. He delayed in turning back to his altar, let his eyes run greedily over the women in their surging black brassieres and panties. He smiled to see that some of the men were already aroused.
The Black Mass went on.
The "communion" time arrived. And all the members advanced to the altar, went through the tiresome routine, none wanting to admit to the others that this facade of evil had become a crashing bore. Wouldn't initiation time ever get here? And afterward-that most social of social hours?
It seemed that more of the members were in a buzzing state of excitement as the Mass dragged to its wearisome close, that there was a constant scurrying between the liquor table and the modified platform upon which they sat or sprawled.
It seemed as if everyone present was lusting after new, more sensational demonstration of heathen excess.
But now interest was suddenly recaptured. And-the sacrificial flogging put aside this night so the real "business" could be enjoined-the initiates were being herded toward the altar.
Libby and LeGarde, having forced more drinks on Silke in the interim, half led, half carried the semi-drugged woman to the altar, forced her to kneel Ione and John Porter proudly brought their candidates, the petite redhead very woozy by now, forward also.
The incantations were spoken over them, the bleary responses were prodded from the converts. "Asmodeus is power, Asmodeus is love, Asmodeus is obedience, Asmodeus is...." the pitiful Silke intoned, no word of what she was saying registering on the numbed brain.
Now they were forced to drink the vitriolic absinthe, they were welcomed into the cult by its chief minister.
Then the highlight of the evening-the rite of obedience and humiliation.
Dorcas Savage stared down on the two women, felt instant stimulation as he saw the converts' sponsors whisper to their ears, tell them what subjugation was expected of them now, as he saw the rapt, elated smile on Tina Osgood's face, the frightened, defiant pout on Silke Louret's.
He beckoned Renata. She knelt before him, revered him briefly, showed the female postulants just how this thing must be done. Then, quickly, she went to her chair, prepared for David Osgood.
"Honor the earthly incarnation of Asmodeus," Dorcas boomed. "Show your serville obedience."
Almost immediately Osgood hobbled toward Renata, his wife drew close to Dorcas, stretched her body, flung her head proudly.
A low hiss, like the swell of an expectant sea, broke from the throats of the people behind them.
A sudden change, a slight mental breakthrough became evident in Silke as, seeing the ugly obesiance her fellow candidates were conferring, she became restless, defiant. She fought to regain her feet, to stagger from this sin den. But Libby and LeGarde, ready for just such a rebellion, grabbed her hair and shoulders, made her be still.
"No, no," she hissed. "Don't make me. I can't do this. Please, oh please."
Dorcas noted this threat to his authority, looked away from his delighted savorance of Tina's menial duty. Instantly fear, then dark anger, formed in his eyes. This upstart must be brought to heel immediately, he decided.
With a brusque movement he dislodged Tina, moved away trom her Ione Porter helped her, led her back to the others, where the men were already forming a ragged line.
"The candidate is rebellious?" he challenged Silke. "The candidate does not wish to honor Asmodeus? Perhaps she wishes other punishment?"
"No, master," LeGarde hurried, digging his fingers into Silke's shoulder, making her moan with pain. "The new member is willing. Forgive her reluctance."
Savage approached Silke, offered himself. "Good. Then let the worthless pig show her obedience." He leered smugly as LeGarde and Libby forced Silke forward, jerked her head back. Savage moved closer to her now.
But still Silke fought them, her eyes partially lucid, dark with outrage. She averted her head, refused to go through with the sick thing. "No!" she rasped. "I won't. 'This has gone too far. I don't care what happens to me. I won't do that. I can't."
Savage's face contorted with rage, as he realized that this refusal constituted a first assault on the fortifications of his authority. He decided that this mutiny must be quelled immediately. "Renata!" he hissed. "The lash!"
He turned to Silke. "You refuse, pig?"
"I refuse," she wailed.
Savage signaled LeGarde. "Hold her. Her arms and legs."
"Damn you!" LeGarde cursed her. "Come to your senses. Do as he says, before it's too late." He twisted her wrist, viciously jerked her down onto her face.
"No," she wailed. "Never."
"Libby!" he spat. "Her ankles."
Suddenly the room was deathly quiet. Every eye was zeroed in on the unexpected happenings at the altar. Dorcas bounded down the steps, uncoiling the heavy, black whip.
"Attend me, all of you!" he shouted. "See what happens to one who will not bend to Asmodeus' will! Mark her punishment!" Then he stood over Silke. "For the last time! Will you honor Asmodeus? Will you honor his earthly priest?"
Silke didn't answer. She only gasped, fought all the harder. At least until the first cut of that whip whistled through the air, until that braided leather sliced her buttocks with a sickening whack. Silke loosed a blood-curdling scream, her body rose and fell.
"Relent!" Savage roared. "Now, before it's too late!"
Still Silke was silent.
Once more the whip rose, fell with a splatting thud, carved a red welt across her lower back. Again she screamed, her body bucked and fell. "Relent!" Savage roared.
Again and again the black snake curled, gathered momentum, came crashing down, on her back, her buttocks, her legs. Until, after the eighth stroke-
"I will...." Silke gasped. "I'll do ... anything you say. Only ... no more. Don't hit me any more."
A collective sigh of relief and vindication broke from the transfixed audience as Silke, released, struggled to her knees. "Yes," she gasped. I ... oh ... yes ... "
A victorious smile on his face, Savage arrogantly moved to her. Mai and Libby helped to brace her. Again the crowd muttered its ugly appreciation as Silke forced herself to begin the rite of obedience. Dorcas closed his eyes in enjoyment, he chuckled softly to announce his pleasure.
And because this victim had defied him, he made prolonged servitude out of the act, he forced her to remain overlong. Then, abruptly, he pushed her aside. "Enough!" he shot. "Go, show your humility to your fellow members."
Then Silke was being led down the steps by Mai and Libby, toward her angry, waiting tormentors.
And there, where Tina and her husband happily engaged in their show of humility, she was brought to a stop before Laird. He vengefully grabbed her by the hair. "There, you damned troublemaker," he spat, "how do you like that? Good, isn't that?"
The pain of the lashing, her hopeless plight still strong in her mind, Silke forced herself to see the vilification through, as Brittany kept her at the act longer than he should have. But when he released her, flung her toward the waiting Rex Zorne, when he kicked her in the bargain, something snapped in Silke's stunned brain.
She clawed Rex's hands, she broke free, stood in the middle of the room, defied them all. Her intoxication partly routed by rage and pain, she spoke in a clear, ringing voice. "Kill me, you perverts!" she screamed. "Kill me, force me! Because that's the only way I'll do these filthy things any more! You think you're powerful, you think you're right to play these heathen games. You think your wealth, your twisted concept of right and wrong lets you desecrate your lives!"
"Shut up!" Dorcas Savage roared, running down the stairs, the whip in his hand.
She paid him no attention. "Well you're wrong, all of you. You're dregs, ghouls, vampires ... corrupt sensualists. You're hell bound, every one of you, doomed. You're perverts every one. Perverts of the lowest, most crawly kind! You're...."
She never finished the rest. For at that moment the whip cracked in the gloom, wound completely around her waist, cut and dug, pulled her backward, off her feet. Instantly, Renata and Cyril were gripping her wrists and ankles, were holding her to the floor.
"This pig has defiled Asmodeus!" Dorcas roared, making a gigantic production out of his rage, fighting to get his converts back in line. "She must be punished!" He nearly sawed her in half pulling the lash away. Immediately he began whipping her again, cursing her, simultaneously lashing the cultists to an animal frenzy besides.
He was eminently successful. For, badly shaken by her words, by the jarring truth of them, the cultists wanted to find a scapegoat, shrug off their true guilt. Silke's disheveled beauty, the vehemence of her charges had threatened their rotten morality, had cast her in the guise of avenging, accusing angel. Her prophesy of doom and damnation had unsettled them, broken their sense of unity. And before a serious schism should develop, before defectors would step forth-
Mai was the first to realize this, to perform some positive act to heal that threatening split. He flung himself at Dorcas, seized the whip. "All of us!" he howled, "all of us must punish this violator. We must all take a part in this. Asmodeus demands it." And with that he raised the whip himself, lashed Silke twice with it, full strength, vented his spleen and fears on the helpless girl.
Immediately he handed the whip to the next man in line, Walter Degenhardt. And he, caught up in a vindictive frenzy, lashed Silke also. Then he surrendered the whip to John Porter.
Before they were through, every man present had wielded that lash, had mortally wounded the screaming woman.
In the end even this wasn't enough. For remnants of her dark, accusing beauty still taunting them, they turned her onto her back, took turns brutally raping her, each making the attack as painful and ugly as possible, while Silke kept passing in and out of consciousness.
The guilt becoming more oppressive by the moment sensing impending doom, they received little comfort from the nonstop defilement of what once had been a beautiful human body. Thus they all turned to the liquor on the side table, they all drank like the fanatics they were, tried to blot out the hideous remorse and fear that clawed and pincered their brains.
And before long an orgy of monstrous proportions, an orgy to make the mad Nero roll over in his grave, was underway. The entire room, from altar to back, was a sea of twisting, turning, crawling human bodies, all naked, all engaged in the most foul variations and excesses known to man. Everywhere one looked one saw the dizzying motion, replica of Coney Island on a July Sunday, only all the grapplers totally nude.
And when a man finished, when a woman became disgusted with her slowpoke partner, there was an immediate shifting, a trading, a seeking of more vile sensations and releases. There was incessant change and experimentation.
Libby, her guilt crushingly acute, making her feel like her brain would split at any moment, drank raw whiskey straight from the bottle, kept drinking until she fell onto her face.
She knew nothing more until she broke from her daze, found a strange man with her. Feeling nothing in her drunken state, she began to giggle.
Not three feet from her, Silke, utterly deserted, breathed her last. And when she shuddered that final time, died, there was nobody sane or sober enough to even note her passing, let alone mourn. The whipping, rape, shock, the very hopelessness and outrage of the human condition, had all combined to still that brave, if foolhardy, heart.
And while that once breathtakingly beautiful body became cold, the uproar intensified, the saturnalia became more incredibly heathenish. The shrieks and laughter resembled a banshee wail, gave foretaste of hell.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
This cold afternoon in mid-march, having risen from her drugged sleep less than an hour ago, Libby Ashton sat in her bedroom, shoulders slumped, staring wearily into her vanity mirror. Appraising the haggard condition of her face, the coarseness of her complexion, the dry, disheveled mop of hair, she wanted to sob in frustration.
Here she was, a girl of eighteen, and she looked like this! And yet, looking past that haunted visage, beyond those dark, lined eyes, in reality she was a woman of fifty, a woman whose eyes had looked upon a lifetime of depravity, whose body had been assaulted by forces much more destructive than those puny advances of Dame Time.
Libby scowled, swayed slightly. Her mouth puckered in distaste at remembrance of how much she'd drunk last night. The liquor, along with all the sleeping tablets she'd been taking, had finally induced blessed sleep, had kept her doped out until two P.M. this afternoon.
Tiredly she brushed back her stringy hair, touched those puffy swellings beneath her eyes, and wanted to scream at the transformation these few months had wrought. Dead inside, no hope, no anticipation, no joy in the new day stirring within her, Libby pulled herself up. A sharp pain stabbing deep inside her brain, she moaned, went toward the bathroom to attend to her daily- and so utterly useless-toilette.
A half-hour later, showered, made-up, her hair combed and brushed in halfway acceptable fashion, dressed in her usual lounging garb-slacks, pull-over blouse, cashmere cardigan sweater, dainty flats on her feet-she began moving about the apartment, attempted to set the mess she and Mai had made there last night to rights. She nibbled at some toast as she worked, sipped at black coffee she'd had presence of mind enough to prepare for herself.
But as the food churned and tumbled dangerously in her stomach, the loginess and lack of energy weighed heavy upon her, she remembered her pep tablets, went to the bathroom, swallowed her daily quota. Doing so, she sneered at the foolishness of the act. It seemed that lately she'd been taking more pep pills to bring her from the drug-enforced sleep, more sleeping pills to break the back of the jitter-creating pep pills. And in between the eternal drinking. It seemed a vicious circle of the worst sort.
But, she sighed, what alternative was there? No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't forget Silke Louret, she couldn't forget that monstrous night, the horrible way she'd died. And more upsetting, she couldn't forget her own ugly and elemental part in bringing Silke to that end.
And when the memories piled up, when the guilt became too heavy to bear, she wanted to scream, to run, never to stop running. She wished she were dead, fantasied that easy out, yearned toward it with an almost physical ache and longing. If only she were brave enough, if only she had the courage to make herself commit the act. She'd thought of jumping from her apartment window, of poison, of using a razor blade on herself as she'd once-in the dim reaches of history-tried to do.
But in the end the sum total was always the same.
Chicken.
Now, to abort the damning thoughts, she sought to revive memory of last night, here, with Mai LeGarde. But she could conjure up only the haziest recollection. She'd been drunk of course, she'd let Mai do whatever he wanted. That was all so hard to remember, had all run down into a faded, watery sameness.
Had they gotten into their rubber suits again? Or had she worn Silke's leather corset? She had vague memory of a vicious argument; her jaw ached where he'd most likely slapped her. Or had they watched those ugly movies again? Perhaps the reels of film Mai had taken of her and him, of Monika and Matthew Cape. Or had they been of that fearsome tangle with them and the imported Negro man? Then there were various reels he'd taken at the height of his Christmas party, at the Brittany party. Others, others, others-Always others.
Had they lain in the gloom, lent themselves to barbaric practices? Had they attempted to emulate some of the more weird, sickening things on that screen?
The sado-masochistic thing with the whip was out, had been ever since Silke's murder. And though LeGarde would never consent to admit that Silke's death was involved in his reluctance, he had, nevertheless, shied away from any of their usual preversions where flogging was involved.
Had they argued about Silke again last night?
Though almost two weeks had passed since that night they'd never really had an exhaustive conversation about the way Silke had died, Mai had never seemed to take the tragedy seriously. And when Libby, grief-stricken, had insisted, he'd turned very callous indeed.
"So what's the fuss?" he'd shrugged. "The damn fool deserved what she got. She wanted all the gravy, but she didn't want to pay the price. Just like lots of people in this world. She wanted all the pretties, but when that came to really putting out, she got cold feet.
"One of your dilettantes. So who'll miss her? She was a sucker, a patsy. A real nothing, just born to be taken for a ride, to be used. Silke's gone, but there'll be another along one of these days. And when she shows up we'll go to work on her just like we did on Silke.
We're a matched set, Libby. We were made for each other. We dig the way the scene should go, don't we?"
And that had been a very sobering consideration indeed, to realize that she and LeGarde were birds of a feather. And further-was she one of his "suckers," one of those people born to be used?
Again she fought to sidetrack the dooming thoughts, to remember about last night.
Then a glimmer of remembrance came to her mind. The bathtub! That's what they had done, a thing which had become an increasingly recurrent desire with LeGarde of late. Perhaps that was a Freudian slip, a subconscious wish that his soul be cleansed of taint, that drove him to this wrinkle.
Yes. She remembered now. There had been that ceremonial scrubbing of her body. Then she'd scrubbed him. Then, in a fresh change of water, only their heads and shoulders protruding from the thick froth of fragrant bubbles, they had laughed and played, stopping often to sip at the Rob Roys on the tub's rim.
LeGarde had become rather silly, had talked of submarines lurking in those waters, of sub chasers obscured by the bubble-bath foam. He'd insisted Libby go scouting. And when she found that lurking danger-
"You know how to destroy them, baby," he'd gloated. "Hell, if anybody knows, you do."
Uncaring, nothing touching her now, Libby had proceeded to destroy. Mai had clung to the edge of the large tub with both hands, had grimaced and shrieked.
Afterward they'd played further. And though the sensations of making love under water were pleasant enough, only Mai, in the end, had gained the ultimate delight. Try as she might, Libby hadn't been able to find sufficient arousal.
Ever since Silke.
Fizzle, fizzle.
The commotion hardly seemed worth the trouble somehow. So she'd taken to shamming excitement of late. And there was further indication of Mai's own decline, for at any other time he'd most certainly have detected the phony ardor. His mind, too, was on other things.
Again there'd been no hue and cry from an outraged public. Silke had been as unimportant a person as the west side derelict the cult had killed; nobody, thus far, had missed her. But given a few more weeks, her parents, wondering at the lapse of correspondence, might begin inquiring.
But too late. For Dorcas, LeGarde and the others had, long ago, muddied the trail, made it impossible for anyone, let alone Kendall Park's bumbling police force, to trace her. To all intents and purposes she'd simply vanished off the face of the earth.
And case closed.
At least until next time. Perhaps one of these days the cultists would make a big mistake. And then-
But Libby couldn't afford to wait. For daily the guilt she felt became more intolerable. It seemed the refrain boomed incessantly inside her brain, grew hour by hour more loud, more maddening. My fault, my fault-
All my fault. I killed Silke. I delivered her to be butchered. My fault!
Small wonder she began drinking again that afternoon, just as soon as her tortured stomach could hold down more of the conscience-killing potion.
And the guilty remorse hammered, hammered.
Another week passed. Things got no better for Libby, and the drugs became more indispensable to her catatonic existence, pep pills to wake her up, to keep her moving, liquor to dull her brain when she was awake, more sleeping pills in the wee hours to let her fall into a light doze.
And while memory of Silke's death took on an unreal quality, sometimes slipped out of focus completely for hours at a time, invariably it returned to haunt her.
The knowledge that she was sole queen of all she surveyed in this apartment, that all these pretty things were hers, that she'd never again have to share them with Silke, was small satisfaction indeed.
She passed her days in relentless shopping, acquisition becoming raison d'etre with her. She bought clothes, shoes, jewelry, doodads for the apartment, records, magazines she rarely opened, paperback books she never cracked. And among these things were unexplainable, pointless purchases, things she didn't remember buying, had no earthly use for, items like a set of kitchen measuring cups, a gold-plated shoehorn, a pair of sturdy hiking shoes, a Swiss music box. All of these, surveyed later, only served to convince Libby that she was certainly losing her mind.
She spent hours trying on her new clothes, modeling before the mirror, matching accessories, jewelry, posing in countless different lingerie ensembles, trying to reassure herself that she was still beautiful on the outside, that she was young and desirable. What ugliness was buried inside did not matter. If she could just reclaim her physical beauty, gild the lily-
To this effect she also spent countless hours at her vanity, working at her make-up, trying creams, new shades of lipstick and eye shadow, sampling new perfumes, fighting to climb into that dream world in which she was young, beautiful, innocent and untainted again.
And one afternoon she broke from such a trance, reckoned that she'd been shaping her eyebrows with eyebrow pencil for what must have been hours.. She found the countless, dark curving lines drawn on her forehead, on her cheeks, on her chin and upper bosom everywhere but on her eyes.
She screamed hideously, dropped her head, sobbed wrackingly over her dressing table, the cries being wrenched from her very vitals, sounding like hawking barks.
Libby was terrified. Terrified as she'd never been before in her life.
And when she'd regained control, had washed away the damning testimonial to her breakdown-
The bottle again.
It was at nine o'clock the next night that Mai put in one of his increasingly infrequent appearances, found Libby in an alcoholic torpor, in a very vulnerable state. Thus Libby thought little or nothing of the fact that LeGarde wasn't alone, but had brought a friend, a slight fortyish male named Allen Viking.
"Mai?" she said. "What's this? Why a third wheel?"
He introduced his friend. "No harm," he assured her. "I've known Al for a long time. Just ran into him, thought maybe he'd like to have a little fun too." His look became menacing, as if he dared her to object. "You mind?"
"No...." She shrugged, too far gone to care. "I don't mind. What's one more or less?"
"That's the girl. See, Al? Didn't I tell you she's a good sport?" He waved airily. "Be my guest. Don't be afraid of Libby. She'll do anything you say."
"Don't hurry me, Mai," the dirty-eyed man said, letting his gaze slide over Libby's black, chiffon cocktail dress, over her black-sheathed legs, to her bewitching shoes. "Let me get to know the li'l doll first. Isn't she the cutest li'l thing you ever saw?"
His words were music to Libby's ears. Instantly she felt warmer toward the man, her ego was pumped up slightly. How long, she thought, since Mai's told me I looked pretty? She bobbed her head tipsily, played the coquette. "Thank you, kind sir," she said.
"Those gorgeous legs," Viking went on. "That body, those pretty boobs...." He turned to LeGarde. "Mai, you ol' dog. You mean you been keeping a lovely package like this stashed away, not letting any of us know?"
LeGarde grinned broadly. "Find y'r own, Al. That's what I always say. She is gorgeous, huh?"
Woozy as Libby was she couldn't detect the derision in the men's tones, she couldn't see that she was actually being demeaned. Taking the flattery at face value, she smiled, blossomed beneath the appreciation. Then she was up, walking toward the bar, putting an exaggerated sway into her walk, delighting at the way the newcomer's eyes bugged out as he appraised her bouncing buttocks. "What are you boys drinking tonight?"
Libby didn't recall when the lights were turned down, when the soft music was put on the hi-fi. All she knew was the soft reassurance of the liquor, the flattery of Al Viking, the adoring, hungry look in his eyes. She knew she was enjoying herself for the first time in weeks.
And when Al began kissing her, began sliding his hands on her breasts, cupping and rolling them, when he worked the silk of her expensive slip along her knees, tickled her maddeningly, she didn't mind at all. If anything, she moved her body, her legs, to abet him. She didn't even mind having Mai sitting across the room, like a smug, fat toad, watching the sin charade, a permissive, pleased smile on his face. She wanted to giggle. If he didn't mind, she didn't mind.
She shivered luxuriously, felt real desire reborn for her. Seconds later, when Viking fumbled with the zipper on the back of her gown, she pulled away, wobbled up, stood before him in brassy pose. "Allow me, honey," she slurred. "This is my line."
Without a moment's hesitation she peeled away the dress, then the slip, stood in a wicked, black ensemble, the taut brassiere reflecting shards of light at the man, her sheer, lace-trimmed panties hugging her form.
As she stood there, she felt immense pride as she saw the way Viking's eyes bulged, the way he dug his nails into his knees.
"Oh," he cried softly. "You devil, you li'l devil."
Then Libby let her body go wild, began to sway with the music, made great show out of puffing her breasts, arching her back, moving with mock urgency. "You like, honey?" she taunted. "You like Libby?"
At that the man's face distorted into a lustful grimace, his hands fell, slid on his legs, he rocked back and forth on the davenport.
Now she began to strip away the rest of her clothes, to put on a tease show to end all tease shows. The brassiere hung on her fingertips, she rolled her shoulders, made the aching globes bob and rotate. Then the filmy garment fell, her hand toyed with the waistband of the sheer panties.
Then, inch by inch, the panties were rolled down her hips, in a teasing strip. Viking sighed more loudly. "You like my pretties?" she asked. "You like the pretty things Mai buys for me?"
"Yes," he gulped. "God, yes." LeGarde snickered in the background.
Finally Libby leaned, worked the bunched panties down to her ankles, revealed herself in just the garter belt, the evil stockings. Advancing to Viking, she pulled one foot free, offered him the other, to which the tangled flimsy still clung. "Souvenir, baby," she husked.
With greedy fingers Allen Viking pried the garment loose, caught her ankle, began kissing her shoes, her nyloned legs. "You angel," he said. "You lovely angel."
Libby's confidence and sense of well-being were even further reinforced; she felt worth-while, like she counted for something again. If only for this-she thought.
But she pulled away laughingly. "'Later, honey," she taunted. "Don't rush things so. Libby needs another drink. We all need another drink."
The madcap party went on, Libby getting terrific charge out of parading her nudity like this, delighting in the way the Viking man's eyes followed her every move, feeling queenly for his avid attention.
Finally she made the final overtures. "Wouldn't you ... ah ... gentlemen like to make yourselves a little more comfortable? I mean...."
"We know just what you mean, Libby," Mai smirked. "Suppose you take care of that little thing for us. Maybe Al's never had things that way before." Libby teetered, looked at Viking blankly. "Go ahead," LeGarde ordered. "Him first. He's company, after all."
Giving the request no further thought, Libby went to Viking, knelt, began unlacing his shoes. He sighed, leaned back to enjoy the divestment.
"Now me," Learde said when his friend was sitting totally nude on the davenport, an eager smile on his face.
Docilely Libby went to Mai, repeated the process with him. Then, standing, glancing first at one man, then the other, she chuckled, said, "My, aren't we pretty? There's certainly nothing shy about either of you, is there? Talk about being eager...."
"Nothin' shy about you, Libby," LeGarde said. "C'mon, let's get this show on the road. You can start with AI, there. Show him how you really drive a man out of his skull."
"You mean...?"
"That's just what I do mean, darling. Don't be bashful. God knows you've done that dozens of times."
"But ... I ... "
His voice rose. "Don't give me no static! Just do as you're told. That's all right, I said."
Libby, too stupid with drink, still wallowing in that addled self-deception, believing she was adored, winning favor and respect in these men's eyes felt no repugnance at the request. If this was what men liked, well, she was here to please. She swayed toward Viking.
"Great!" Viking gasped as her hands found him. Feeling proud of her ability to confer so much pleasure, Libby attacked him eagerly, applied herself skillfully.
And that was so; she did nearly make Viking pop his skull.
So involved was she with her task that she didn't notice when Mai moved to sit beside Viking. But suddenly, "Enough, baby. Now me. Daddy wants his turn too."
She looked up dazedly, focused her eyes. "Yes, Mai, darling. Anything you say. Right now?"
"Right now."
Immediately she moved away from Al. "C'mon, Mai," he protested. "I was just beginning to enjoy myself."
"Shut up, Al. Don't be so greedy. You'll get yours. There's enough for everybody." Then as Libby began, "Wow, honey. I'll never get tired of that. That seems new every single time."
Later there were other innovations, as Libby hovered halfway between both men, attended them alternately, felt a growing desire as each man ministered to one of her breasts with inflaming, teasing hands. But finally Mai had an entirely new idea. "Hey, Libby, doll...."
She paused in her labors, looked at him. "What, Mai?"
"Do you suppose," he leered, "if Al and I arranged ourselves, you could...? I mean both of us at once?"
Libby felt a queasiness in her stomach. Some of her alcoholic torpor was instantly diluted. "Is that what you ... really want?"
"Yeah," he snapped. "I wouldn't ask would I?"
"I don't know. I suppose. I can try."
Viking giggled lewdly at the suggestion. Then, as Libby worked, they both began chuckling.
And though she couldn't do what they asked, still they refused to release her from the task. "Keep trying," Mai mocked her. "You know the old saying, if at first you don't succeed...."
Libby, humoring them, anxious to get this part out of the way, continued to attend them, to strain to amuse them. She began to tremble.
It was then that the men forgot even their crude tact, let down their masks, revealed the true arrogance and cruelty in their souls. It was then they demolished Libby's addled confidence and sense of worth, made her see herself for what she really was.
"Look at that pig," Mai chuckled thickly, "she really goes for this kind of stuff. She dotes on this. If you told her no, she'd flip, she'd get sore as hell. Chase you all over the place. How about that, Al? Look at her go."
Libby paused felt the jarring pain pierce her soul, felt as low and mean as she possibly could. She attempted to pull away. But LeGarde slapper her, twisted her hair. "Ain't that so, pig?" he goaded. "You dig this, don't you? Say yes...."
He twisted her hair harder. "Yes, yes," she forced finally. "I do...."
"Then prove you do, pig! Get with things. Put some zip into this."
The pain constant, intensifying now and then, she forced herself to continue with the perverted humiliation.
At long last, when the mortification had further cut her alcoholic insulation, had irreparably maimed her soul, Libby was released, told to go into the bedroom, get ready. She did so without a murmur of protest, while Mai and his friend laughed and insulted her, refilled their glasses.
But if Libby thought her final vilification had been completed, she was sadly mistaken. For when the men walked to the bed they were quiet, conspiratorial.
She shuddered, called out, "What...? Mai, what are you going to do?"
"Surprise, baby," he gloated. "Wait'n see. Since you tried to take care of us together out there, that .-only fair, isn't that, if we do the same for you? So we thought a little and...."
She fought as they both grabbed her. She felt their hands scrambling at her, and realized what they were going to do.
She fought like a madwoman. "No!" she choked. "No, you can't! You'll kill me! You'll hurt me. Please, oh, please."
But the men wouldn't listen. Determined to befoul Libby in this total, degenerate way, they fought her hands, continued to do what they wanted.
Both released a triumphant laugh when they were successful. Libby froze at the appalling pain, began to scream at the top of her lungs.
Still they didn't hear, they showed no compassion whatsoever. And to further defile her, they let their hands turn to talons, they fought each other to abuse her breasts.
Libby screamed loudly and without stop until Mai jammed a pillow over her face.
Now, perhaps a half-hour later, Libby was alone in the apartment. And her soul scarred, defiled beyond redemption, she trembled, she sobbed wrackingly into her pillow from mortification, from the shattered hurt of her body.
And she realized she'd reached the absolute nadir. She could fall no lower than this. All her other degradations were as nothing compared to this.
She knew that she didn't want to live. There was no reason whatsoever to attempt reconciling herself to this miserable, barren existence. If this was the only use the world had for her, wasn't she better off dead?
This was more than any human mind could cope with. First the sellout of her body, of her standards Then the participation in the demonic rites. Next her participation in the murders, her double guilt in Silke's death. And now this abominable vilification, this descent to the depths-
She didn't want to live. She wanted to die, to return to that peaceful void from whence she'd come.
Thus it was that Libby stirred, went to the bathroom, found the bottle of sleeping capsules, poured all twenty-four tablets into her hand. Then she filled a glass with water.
A minute later she emerged from the bathroom, crawled into bed, pulled the covers up over her naked, trembling body. She settled back, fought to make her mind a blank. At this last moment she mustn't remember those ugly things, only the few good things her brief life had held. She thought about home, about her parents. One fleeting thought of Matt Cape broke through. And with it, drowsy remembrance of that spiritual breakthrough, of that magnificent liberation. What had that meant?
A half-hour passed. And the drowsiness built. She felt so tired, so blissfully at ease. So peaceful. Her arms and legs felt heavy, like clubs of concrete. She couldn't move her head.
Far, far in the distance it seemed she heard some noise, a soft, muted banging, a more shrill insistence. Seemingly it grew louder. But she couldn't be sure, she couldn't concentrate any more. She let herself sink and slide. She wanted to giggle at the delight of the sensation. Just like she was going down that slide at school when she was a little girl.
Only now there was a black, yawning, fearsome pit at the bottom of the slide. She was going toward it, faster, faster. No matter how hard she tried to stop herself, she couldn't. Now she'd left the slide, she was tumbling and spinning, going head over heels. The blackness rushed up to meet her.
Mommy-Daddy-she fought to shriek at that last moment. Help me! Where are you! Mommy, Mommy-
CHAPTER TWELVE
As Libby floated up from those watery, suffo-cating depths, as she squinted against the bright light, she heard a familiar voice repeat over and over again: "Thank God, thank God ... She's coming out of it. Nurse, go bring the doctor."
A strange exultation filled her, and she smiled, struggled harder to come up, out of the deadening trance. But at the last moment, just as she was verging on full consciousness, she suddenly felt weak, paralyzingly sleepy. And she relapsed, let herself sink once more. She sighed, embraced that peaceful slumber, felt so warm, cozy, at peace.
But moments later she was fighting to break again from that enfeebling embrace. She could see glimmers of light ahead once more.
The first person Libby saw as she opened her eyes, shook herself to lucid wakefulness at noon that next day, was Matthew Cape. He sat perched on a bedside chair, an expression of concern and relief on his face. And something more, deep in his eyes, she noticed as she looked at him intently, a look of unwavering affection and devotion. The look warmed Libby, made her heart swell. "Matt," she sighed. "What...."
He was up instantly, pushing her back onto the pillows. "Be careful, Libby. Don't overdo," he cautioned. Instinctively she realized she was in a hospital.
"Matt ... what happened?"
"Don't you remember?" He smiled gently. "Perhaps it's best if you don't. You took too many sleeping tablets. You were just about to check out. I happened to be in the neighborhood, I caught you, called the emergency squad just in time." He gathered her in his arms, touched his forehead reverently to her cheek. "Oh, thank God."
Now remembrance of the things that had driven her to attempt suicide hit Libby with a hammering intensity, made her break into a spasm of trembling. "Matt, it was terrible! The things they made me do ... the rotten things they did to me...."
"Don't, Libby." He hugged her hard, pressed her back. "Don't think about them. Don't remember. Try to make your mind a blank. Forget those things ever happened. They'll never get another chance to torment you like that again. I'll see to that."
"What do you mean, Matt? Has something happened to Mai?"
"Not yet it hasn't. But it will. Before another twelve hours is out. I swear it will."
"What ... what's happened? Matt, why did you go to my apartment last night?" A fervent plea glittered in her eyes. "It wasn't an accident, was it?"
"No, no accident. I was coming to talk to you, to try to talk you into clearing out with me. I'd had it, I wanted out. But I just didn't want to. leave you all snarled up with that bunch of perverts."
The wild hope leaped in her bosom once more. "But why, Matt? Why were you concerned about me? I don't understand...."
"I know this'll sound crazier than hell...."
"Yes, Matt?"
"The truth is that I haven't been right in the head ever since that time when you and I ... that afternoon I visited at your apartment, and ran off half crazed. Libby, I don't know if it's love. I guess I wouldn't know love if it slapped me in the face. But I think...." He exhaled a great sigh. "Libby, darling, I'm in love with you. No matter what's happened, I need you, I want to marry you."
Libby's heart caught in her throat, and for a moment she couldn't say a word. "You can't mean it," she choked finally. "Not after all the rotten things I've done. Oh, Matt, don't mock me."
"I do mean it," he said, wrapping her more tightly in his arms. "I don't care what you've done. Anything you've done, I've done worse. We'll have to learn to accept that, put those thoughts out of our mind. I've been empty, a bloodless shell ever since that afternoon with you. But I didn't know how to come to you, tell you. I didn't know how to break out of this thing with Monika."
"Are you sure, Matt?" And she wondered at the glowing happiness that soared and mounted within her. She felt like she'd never existed, never really been alive before this moment. And if he could forgive, if all this could be put behind them-
"Yes, darling," he said, sincerity breaking his voice, "I'm sure. I need you. I love you. I need you for a cornerstone, something I can build what's left of my life on. We need each other. Can't you see? We're the only people in the whole stinking world who can help each other. Really help each other."
"Yes, Matt," she breathed, wonder illuminating her wan face. "Only ... Say that again."
"Say what again?"
"Tell me you love me."
He kissed her eyes, her parched lips. "I love you, Libby. I love you, love you...."
She clung to him with all the puny strength she had left, felt her eyes drown in her own tears. "Yes," she sobbed. "I'll say it too. I love you, Matt. I was like you. In love and I didn't even know it. Dear God, we'll have to learn to live normal lives all over again. We'll have to learn how to live."
They kissed again. When Matt withdrew this time his eyes were grave, troubled. "Matt? What is it?"
"It's not going to be as easy as all that, he said. "We aren't going to win out just like that. I mean, we're going to be separated for a while. Months, years maybe."
"What are you talking about?" She started as if she'd been slapped. "Not when we've just found each other."
"I'm going to talk to the police. In fact I've already called them. There's a detective on his way right now."
"I don't understand, Matt. This is all happening too fast for me."
"In a nutshell, darling, these Black Mass things can't go on. Innocent people can't go on being trapped into their evil games. Those murders have to be avenged, the murderers punished. Otherwise they'll get worse, there'll be more and more of them...."
He made Libby look at him. "You want some other kid like you getting mixed up like that?"
"No. But I ... "
"No buts about it. Someone has to blow the whistle on those animals. And if we're involved, if we get a prison term out of it...." He shook his head. "Can't you see, baby? We have to do it. No matter how much we'd like to sneak away, shake off our responsibilities ... The cops are going to be asking all kinds of questions anyway. Why lie? Why not level, take those scummy vampires down with us?"
Libby squared her shoulders, looked at him levelly. "Yes, Matt, I can see. Now I can. But how...?"
"Monika was out cold when I left her last night. And knowing just what I was going to do, I helped myself to a bunch of those films of hers, the ones that'll identify every one of those psychos. Before I left your apartment last night I grabbed some of Mai's choice reels too. They ought to stand up in any court of law in the land, no matter how much power people like LeGarde or Savage or Brittany wield in this city. I'll take the police out to see Dorcas, show them that cute rumpus room of his. I'll crucify them. And us as well."
"But wouldn't we get a shorter term? For turning them in, giving all this information...."
"Could be. But don't count on it. I'm going to work every angle I can, of course, but the important thing to remember is that no matter what happens we'll have each other afterward. I'll be waiting for you."
"And I'll be waiting for you," she said gravely. She stiffened. "Yes, Matt. You're right. We have to do this. It would haunt us the rest of our lives if we didn't. We'd never be really right with ourselves."
They kissed again, and he shuddered as he held her. Libby let silent tears flow down her cheeks. It was so little to hope for. And yet, when had her life last held any hope whatsoever?
It was truly a hope, a dream, worth having.
"I love you, darling," he repeated as he drew away.
"And I love you, Matt. It's the strangest, most beautiful feeling. I love, love...."
At that moment a crisply uniformed nurse led a plainclothes detective into the room. A woman, obviously a police department stenographer, was close at his heels.
Libby closed her eyes, clung to Matt's hand tightly as he began to talk. It's for the best, she told herself repeatedly. For the best. It's the only right way, the only decent way.
It had been an eternity since she'd known what decency was.
And when the detective and the stenographer were seated, were ready, Matt said in an authoritative, firm voice, "First off, sir, I'd like to report a couple of murders. And more important, the existence of a Satanist cult in Kendall Park. If we move fast we can catch every single one of them red-handed." He paused, admonished the secretary. "And you, miss, get all these names and dates and places down correctly, no matter how shocking or incredible they might seem."
He looked down at Libby briefly, forced a reassuring smile. She felt a surge of warmth fill her
"I'll start from the very beginning," he said then.
And Libby held his hand even more desperately now, as the flood of names, of dates, of addresses, poured forth in a damning, ominous, endless flow.
