Chapter 1
"JASON, I KNOW SEVERAL GIRLS WHO'D BE delighted to let you screw them."
Jason McIvers lay naked on their king-sized bed. He lay lengthwise, his ankles crossed, and his fingers laced over his chest, moodily watching Cherry remove her make-up. They had been married five years ago, during her second year in college, and now, for the first time, their marriage faced a crisis which could prove catastrophic. A numbing misery stole over his lanky, big-boned frame, as his eyes followed the deft movements of the ravishing young creature he loved so much his heart sometimes ached from just thinking of her. Perhaps it wouldn't be so bad if she didn't feel exactly the same way about him.
Bitterly he cursed to himself. Goddammit, why did this affliction, as the psychiatrist called it, have to happen to them? Why not to somebody else? Why him and Cherry, for cripe sake?
His eyes devoured her neat, succulent nakedness as she rose from the dressing table and came to sit beside him on the edge of the bed.
Cherry McIvers had one of those petite, superbly molded figures that made men turn and stare; a figure that made men turn and stare; a figure that made lust stir in their loins; that made them enjoy being male animals. Her cone-shaped breasts thrust up and out proudly, and below them, her body tapered to a flat, tiny waist. Then it flared gently into narrow, almost boyish hips. Her complexion was of that creamy, flawless texture women envy and men hunger to touch.
Her hair, short-cropped and softly wavy, was a deep, lustrous brown-nearly the shade of her eyes, except that her eyes had gold flecks in them and the same shade exactly as the fleecy triangle of hair shielding her cute little pussy.
Jason remembered in vivid detail the first time he'd ever gotten into that cute little pussy. It was on their wedding night; and, at eighteen, Cherry was still a virgin. His size had caused her considerable pain and discomfort at first, but, brave little trooper that she was, she'd never complained. Within a week her demands were equal to his own.
"Don't worry about it so much, darling." She leaned toward him, rested her weight on one elbow and took his limber, lifeless cock in one dainty hand. Thoughtfully she turned it this way and that, inspecting it as carefully as if this were the first time she had ever seen it. "The psychiatrist said the affliction could vanish any day-any second, even."
"He also said it might take weeks or perhaps months."
"Jason, I'm so sorry," she whispered, tears brimming her eyes. "Could I have done this horrible thing to you-to us?"
"Now wait a minute." He forced a smile. "If you start feeling guilty because of all this ... I'll cut the damn thing off."
She smiled in return, wrinkling her nose at him. "Don't you dare think of such a thing. Dr. Goldberg said that variety could very well be the answer. Perhaps we should join that friendship club Stan and Marsha were telling us about."
Suddenly her head dipped. She took the end of his weapon between her ripe lips, and began tugging with gentle force, laving with her hot tongue as she did so. Jason watched, unmoved. The first time she had done this, shortly after their marriage, his huge cudgel had bucked upright to rigid attention. Now-nothing. Not a goddam thing.
The trouble had started a month ago. They had been making love right here in this room, on this very same bed. Cherry's legs were snuggled around his waist, her arms about his neck when he heard her breathing shift, the way it always did seconds before she climaxed. Then it happened. His rod lost all tension. It went limber. While it was still buried to the hilt in her greedy, smoldering belly it went limber as a wet noodle.
The following day he had gone to Dr. Alan Harris, the McIver family physician. Tests were run, specimens taken, analyses made. A week later, the kindly old doctor-the same one who had brought him into the world twenty-nine years ago-had given him a report.
"Jason, you're healthy as a horse. You've got a heart .strong as an ox; your E.K.G. proves that; your blood pressure is perfect; your basil metabolism rate is precisely what it should be. I can't find anything wrong with you ... certainly nothing which might prevent your getting an erection with Cherry. Does she know you only have this problem where she is concerned?"
Jason nodded. "It's got her worried sick. I'm afraid she might start blaming herself."
"Have you been with any other woman lately?"
"Dr. Harris, I have never been unfaithful to Cherry."
"But you do get an erection when you imagine yourself making love with another woman. Is that correct?"
"That's right. Since this trouble first began, I keep a half-hard-on most of the time, but when Cherry and I get in the bed it goes limp."
"And you're sure Cherry knows that even if you can't make love with her, you could with another woman?"
"I'm sure. I told her. We have no secrets from each other."
"Here ... " Dr. Harris handed him a business card. "This is Dr. Raymond Goldberg, one of the finest psychiatrists in the country. I'll call him for an appointment. I want both you and Cherry to see him."
"Cherry ... too?"
Dr. Harris nodded his gray head. "Cherry, too." That was three months ago. Since then, once each week but going separately, he and Cherry had visited Dr. Goldberg. This afternoon they had spent two hours in his office. This time they were together, at the psychiatrist's request.
Dr. Goldberg was one of those unusual individuals whom it is impossible not to like. He was a round little man with a round little nose; he had understanding and intelligent eyes that peered at them from behind large, thick lenses. His movements were quick and sure, reminding Jason of a curious sparrow.
He and Cherry sat, side by side, facing the doctor across the desk of Dr. Goldberg's inner office.
"I am tempted not to send you a bill, Jason," the doctor had chuckled from behind his steepled fingers when they were comfortably settled. "Yours and Cherry's weekly visits have become a privilege for me. In thirty-some-odd years of dealing with my fellow human being, and his mind, I have seldom encountered a case where a man and his mate were so deeply, sincerely in love-so selflessly devoted to each other. In today's world it is a rare and priceless thing indeed."
Jason felt Cherry's hand steal over and squeeze his affectionately. "Is there any hope for my husband's ... affliction, Dr. Goldberg?"
"Certainly. And only because you love each other so devoutly do I have the two of you here together in my office this afternoon. Otherwise, I would give you my analysis separately and let you lie to each other, thereby possibly bringing on further complications."
"But ... " Cherry began.
Dr. Goldberg held up a hand. "Let me finish, please. As I said, there is a very definite hope for Jason being relieved of his affliction. I think the two of you, together, can easily overcome the problem." He paused, looking froh one to the other, then continued slowly and with great emphasis. "The only question remaining is-will you?"
"We will!" Cherry blurted so promptly Jason was startled. "I will ... " Tears edged her voice. "I'll do anything in the world to get Jason well again."
"We'll do it," Jason said firmly. "It makes no difference what it is ... we'll do it."
"Cherry, would you knowingly allow Jason to sleep with another woman? To make love with her?"
She hesitated only a moment. "Yes. If it's necessary. When I said I'd do anything to help Jason get well, I meant exactly that-anything." Her small chin thrust out in defiance as she glanced at her husband. "And I do mean it, darling."
Jason looked at his wife, frowning slightly. Could she love him that much? Goddamit, he didn't want another woman. He wanted Cherry.
"And you, Jason," Dr. Goldberg continued. "Would you let Cherry sleep with another man, knowing they were going to make love?"
"But ... " Jason wasn't sure he'd heard correctly. "But how is that going to help me?"
"Let me put the question another way. Would you rather Cherry sneaked around behind your back and made love with another man ... or would you rather know when she did it?"
"I'd rather know when she did it, but ... "
Again Dr. Goldberg held up his hand. "Let me explain. Both of you must know that in the three months you've been coming to see me that I've learned things about you that possibly you don't even know yourselves. Am I correct?"
Cherry nodded. So did Jason, wondering what the doctor was getting at.
"Let's see." Dr. Goldberg scratched hasty figures on a pad at his elbow. "You have been married five years. By assuming sexual intercourse is possible twenty-five days out of each month, we find it possible fifteen-hundred days during that five-year period. The average couple of your age group would enjoy sex, roughly, one thousand times in five years.
Jason, do you have any idea how many times you and Cherry have had sex during the past five years? I'm basing my estimate on information the both of you gave me separately."
"It's more than a thousand," Cherry said.
Jason nodded. "Much more."
Dr. Goldberg shook his head as if he were having trouble believing his own figures. "It's much more than five-thousand times," he said thoughtfully. "Jason, do you know that during sexual intercourse Cherry more often than not reaches a climax two, and even three, times to your once?" He looked at Cherry. "That time you flew to Hawaii for your friend's wedding ... how many times did you climax that morning?"
Cherry's eyes were on Jason when she answered. "I stopped counting when I reached twenty-one. But we hadn't done it for a whole day."
"She told me about that," Jason said. "I went several times myself."
"So you told me," the doctor mused. "And all in less than an hour. Are you beginning to understand what I mean when I say I've learned something about both of you since you've been coming to see me-that possibly you didn't know yourselves?"
"For instance?" Jason asked.
"You're over-sexed-both of you. That's a layman's term, of course, but it gets the meaning across. Actually, your bodies' chemistry is geared for frequent sexual relief-for very frequent sexual relief. And without going into the complications of the id, the ego, and the super-ego, or any other Freudian terms, as a competent psychiatrist let me tell you this:" He jabbed the air in their direction with a pudgy forefinger. "Your bodies will get the relief they're accustomed to, either with each other or With someone else, or those bodies will fight back."
"How ... fight back?" Cherry was all attention.
"Perhaps I shouldn't tell you this, though it isn't a breach of professional ethics, but each day patients come to my office suffering some way or other because they either stubbornly refuse to accept, or are unable to accept, sex between male and female as normal, necessary body functions. They have meaningless worries, fears, tics, hair loss, nervous disorders-I could list hundreds of ailments, all of which would vanish entirely if they accepted the sex act as essential to a happy, well-rounded existence."
"You mean Jason and I might develop some of these ailments if our bodies don't get sexual relief as they need it?"
"Worse than that," Dr. Goldberg told her pointedly. "You may come to hate each other."
"Oh!" It was a tiny, distressed squeak as Cherry sat back in her chair, her large brown eyes on her husband. "I'd rather be dead."
The doctor looked at her kindly. "My dear, Jason cannot get an erection to make love with you because his body is fighting back now; it's rebelling because he is not doing, in plain terms, what comes naturally. His affliction was not brought about because he fails to accept sex with you as normal, but because he is unknowingly ignoring an instinct in the male animal as old as man himself. Without being conscious of doing so, Jason is suppressing a vital instinct which nature herself built into the male human being. Or perhaps I should call it need, instead of instinct."-
"What instinct ... what need is it, doctor?" Cherry's voice sounded small and far away.
"The need for more than one woman to make love to."
"Is that why you asked if I'd object to Jason making love to another woman?"
Dr. Goldberg nodded. "You see, man is a far-ranging sexual animal who-likes to walk wide and crouch at the knees, so to speak, spilling his seed into any female available. Nature put this need in man for the propagation of the species-and not only in man, by the way, but in lesser male animals as well.
"It has been said that man is the last animal on earth to be domesticated, and that woman has set for herself the task of doing it. About this I don't know. I do know this, however; Jason's inability to get an erection and make love with you is because he is unconsciously suppressing this instinct-this need."
"And if he did go with other women, doctor, how long will it be before he can make love with me again?"
"That I can't tell you, Cherry. It could happen any time. Any second. Or maybe a week. Even months, perhaps. There is too much yet that we don't know about the human mind."
"Why did you ask me if I would object to Cherry making love to another man, Dr. Goldberg?" Jay-son leaned forward in his chair, placing his elbows on his knees.
"Because Cherry has been used to a vigorous, lusty sex life with you. To discontinue that sex life abruptly will cause her body to fight back-to rebel, in some way-just as yours has. I have a young woman patient whose husband was recently killed in an automobile accident. She refuses to participate in sex, saying she is determined to be true to her husband's memory. In another two years she'll be in an insane asylum."
"Oh, Lord!" This time it was Jason who sat back in his chair. His little Cherry? In an insane asylum? He'd rather see her get gang-banged by a dozen different men every night of the week. Of course he knew the doctor was using an extreme case to drive his point home but-hell!
And then Dr. Goldberg had risen to his feet, holding out his hand, a "warm smile on his round face. "I don't think there's any need for either of you to undergo further analysis, Jason-Cherry. You're young, you're intelligent, and above all, you're deeply in love. I think you will handle this problem the way it should be handled."
That had been this afternoon. Now he and Cherry lay naked on their king-size bed in the bedroom of their luxurious home; she was making one more desperate effort to stir life into his limber cock. Her glossy, brown hair moved rhythmically as her hot lips tugged and her darting tongue laved with patient determination. Her efforts afforded him a wonderful sensation, but his weapon remained relaxed. Nor could he feel any reason inside him to hope it might stand up later.
Cherry's most meaningful comment since leaving Dr. Goldberg's office had been that she knew several girls who'd be delighted to let him screw them. This comment had told Jason that she accepted the doctor's diagnosis of his problem, and was willing for him to follow through with the doctor's suggestion.
Well, Jason told himself, he could do nothing else than grant her the same privilege. If she allowed him to go with other women, it was only right that he allow her to go with other men. These last three months had been anything but easy on Cherry. He knew that, for they had been equally difficult for him. Each time her pants got so hot she could stand it no longer during the past three months he had done the same to her that she was doing to him at the moment. Such was wonderful for variety, but as a steady diet it was a poor substitute for the real thing.
"It's no good, darling." He placed both hands on her head. "It isn't going to stand up. You might as well stop trying."
"I believe you're right," she said, withdrawing to lie down beside him. "I should know that by now-but I just keep hoping." She moved her thighs apart slightly when he put a hand on her pussy, waited breathlessly until his thumb and forefinger maneuvered their way into the top of her cleft, and moaned softly as he began massaging her tingle-toggle. "You know you're going to have to nurse me down there, Jason," she said tremulously.
"Of course," he told her. "Get a pillow."