Chapter 7
Any pipe-smoker will tell you that no matter how many pipes he has collected-no matter how carefully he has selected each pipe and smoked it, there is always one, possibly the very one he thought to be the best of the briars, that simply turns out to be the worst.
It is a disappointment.
It will not break in.
Sue Sills was decidedly the rarest of females in Big Bert's collection, and yet the only one in that collection who refused to be broken. Big Bert had not even had the opportunity to smoke that rarest of specimens-although smoke is hardly the word; but you get the idea.
To say that Big Bert was exasperated with her profound lack of success in this direction would be an understatement: she was beside herself, especially with the fresh taste of her victory over Cindy Martin. Cindy was resting contentedly in the bag with Hannah and Martha and the rest of them, while Sue still held out with dogged determination. It didn't matter how she worked the bitch, how she cursed her and rode constant herd on her shapely butt, The girl didn't want to play ball. It was an affront to Bert's authority; Sue seemed simply unimpressed by her roughness, the imposing figure she created so successfully in the eyes of the others with her boots, her outer shell of all authoritative leather. What else can I do? she wondered. Beat hell out of her for no reason? Of course not. There had to be at least token submission on Sue's part-for her to spit in Bert's face, or even worse, remain untouched, would be davastating.
Of course Big Bert didn't think in terms quite as articulate as these: but this was the sum and substance of her inflamed mind as she viewed her failure with the Sills chick.
She would simply have to clamp down.
Yet she had been warned by Phineas Plane about the Sills girl, with words to the effect that Farley Brock would be nosing around, coming by to see his client, and under law, there was no stopping him. And if she sang long enough and loud enough, Brock might take some stock in what otherwise would seem preposterous claims. It was a hairy question, but one that Big Bert could only partially appreciate.
She wanted that girl.
And somehow, she'd have her.
Period. .
The girl had been in for almost six months now, and still wasn't moving. Big Bert had heard (without being seen) conversations between Sue and Cindy, and knew the latter wasn't giving her any encouragement-quite the contrary. But still, the damned little female wouldn't budge.
These were the general thoughts in Big Bert's massive head as she began her day. It was now mid-December, and as she strode arrogantly across the familiar expanse of ground toward the gate and the prison itself, she decided, Today's the day when I make her jump. She didn't know how, but she knew she'd succeed.
She walked into the corridor, making sure her boot-heels rang loudly enough for them to know she was on her way She was fully conscious of the effect it would have, that it always had on her charges. It scared the crap out of them, created a tension that she kept tightened and finely tuned all day long.
It was part of Pain.
You couldn't see it, or touch it, but it could be felt-it weakened, it lowered the resistance and resolve of them all. All except for the Sills broad.
"Let the birds out," she told the other guards under her, as she walked directly to the cell that held Cindy and Sue. She stood and looked at the two women, smiling without humor.
"How you feel today, Cindy? Have enough rest yesterday?"
"Yessir," Cindy said right away, and Big Bert saw how astonished Sue looked on hearing sir. Evidently the bitch had forgotten that morning when she'd been stood on and puked her guts out before she finally said the same word herself. That was it. Pigheaded, stubborn, couldn't remember from one minute to the next.
It would be changed.
"Good. After breakfast, suppose you go to the library and pick up a few books for me, huh? You know what. I like-and take your time. I don't want you bringin' me any junk."
"Yessir."
The intent was obvious to Sue. She was being made to see how easy Cindy was going to have things from now on-how easy she herself could have it, if only she would fall into the bag with the others.
"You, Sills, do her work while she's gone. And yours!"
Sue glared at the big dyke, and said nothing. "You hear me, bitch?"
Sue nodded, her lips clamped tightly together. "Godammit, you better say somethin' or I'll give you somethin' to say!" Big Bert exploded.
"I heard you."
"Like to do another push-up for me, Sills?" Sue remembered immediately the experience; bile rose into her throat and her stomach felt queasy from memory alone. She wouldn't, couldn't go through that, not for anything, and damn it, she thought, you had to compromise on the little things to save yourself from getting hung with the big things "No, sir."
"Damn, tryin' to get you to open your mouth is like suckin' blood out of a rock, ain't it?"
They all stepped out of their cells and formed a line, as they did every morning, seven days a week. You did everything in lines, like in the army, only there was no feeling of comradeship-nothing of what you'd call esprit-d' corps. Just a body of sullen, disconnected people thrown together by an outside authority.
Sue plodded along behind Cindy, with her head down. She watched the slow, undulating movement of the buttocks, the sway of the hips and straining of thighs as they all moved with strange harmony. She wondered idly if she moved the same way. This morning, she wasn't hungry at all. Her stomach rebelled against the thought of cold, greasy food slopped into a dish like so much crud. Usually, she blocked these thoughts out and ate with detached indifference, as if someone else were eating the food. But this morning the thought of the slop sickened her profusely. She would have the coffee, the milk, and maybe a hunk of bread, she decided as she plodded in formation. That would be all.
When they got to the mess hall, they took their seats with the usual indifference. Someone went and brought back the odious food and put it on the table. Big Bert added to the pleasantness of the situation by standing like a black cloud over them as they ate.
Sue poured her coffee. Then her milk. She decided the hell with the bread, it was stale. Pouring some of the milk in the coffee, she began to drink it, taking short hesitant sips. At least it was freshly brewed; you could overlook the few grounds floating around in the cup, she thought.
"Not hungry today, Sills?" Big Bert's question was definitely not solicitous. She hovered over Sue threateningty; peering down at the cup and glass in front of her.
"No sir."
"Isn't our food good enough for you?" The other prisoners tittered. "It's not that-I just can't eat this morning," she answered.
"But it's not healthy to go without your breakfast; you've gotta lotta work to do today, and you gotta have food in your belly. I'd eat somethin' if I was you."
"Thanks, no." Sue took a sip of coffee, raising the chipped, white cup to her lips.
"I can't have you gettin' sick on me. Now eat somethin'."
Someone passed her a bowl of oatmeal. It sat in front of her, vapors rising into her nostrils, turning her stomach. Damn it, she just wasn't hungry, why was Big Bert making such a big deal over her appetite? Since when did the bastard give a damn for her welfare?
She took a spoonful. It was impossible. The cereal was vile; she put down the spoon and took another sip of coffee, feeling the eyes of Big Bert focused sharply on her.
"I'll ask the chef to fix you somethin' special," Big Bert sneered, walking away. Sue breathed a visible sigh of relief when the guard sauntered over to another table to harass the prisoners there, even though they weren't her own. But all the guards were scared of her, too.
Cindy got up from the table and walked out of the dining room with one of the trusties. Sue knew she would be spending the morning, possibly most of the day in the quiet sanctity of the library. Cindy had it made.
When Cindy disappeared through the door with her companion, Sue turned her eyes back to the coffee-then it was time to get up and form a line to march back to the cells for squaring-up.
She made up her bunk, brushed her teeth and doused her face in cold water. In almost six months, she had not yet gotten used to doing all these things after breakfast. After she had made her bunk and swept out the cell, and finally, cleaned the sink and small mirror, she stood waiting for the next line that would form to go to work.
"Make up your partner's bunk for her!" Bert snapped, as she came careening around to look inside the cell. Quickly, Sue made it, and the guard walked away after throwing her an unusually hostile glance.
It was going to be a bitch of a day, Sue thought. More so than usual. It didn't take a sleuth to figure that out. Silently, she braced herself for what she knew would be a tedious, endless day, made more so by the graces of Big Bert.
For a week, she had been on a stamping machine that hammered up and down with tremendous force on pre-cut pieces of metal. After the stamping, they were trimmed, then painted. The result was state license plates. The machine was always set up in advance so that the letters and numbers changed automatically as the stamper moved, like a rolling rubberstamp. The operator had to keep a careful eye on the number of rectangles stamped so the set-up girl could come by and reset the machine. It was not difficult, just tedious, and required absolute concentration.
There was a difficulty this morning.
Cindy had been the set-up girl. She was gone, cooling it in the library, while Sue now had to set the machine up before putting it into motion. She had done it once before, and it had taken her a long time. It was taking her an almost equally long time now, as she fiddled with the upside-down-and-backward numbers and .letters.. All the other machinery had gone into motion, and she alone remained still, intent on the setting up.
"Runnin' outta energy already?" Big Bert asked. Sue looked up slightly, saw the pair of glistening black boots near her. As her eyes continued up the figure, she saw the breeches, the leather jacket, and finally the tough, sneering face without make-up or humor. God, she's ugly.
"I'm setting up the stamper. Cindy was supposed to do it." This by way of attempted explanation.
"You been" fiddlin' with it for ten minutes, Goddamn it!" Bert snarled.
"Cindy takes longer," Sue pointed out. What she intended to say was you couldn't ever do it in just ten minutes-that it took at least thirty, sometimes longer.
"You fink," Big Bert said, "you rat-fink! Ain't you even got any loyalty for your cell-mate?"
"I wasn't-" Boy, she's really looking for it today, isn't she? Just anything I say, and man, oh, man!
"Stop givin' me your cheap lip!" Big Bert turned around and called, "Martha, get your femme butt over here, quick!" The femme butt got over there quick. Like, lightning-quick. "Set up this machine; Sills and me got an errand to do."
"C'mon," she told Sue, who walked woodenly behind the guard. They went through the entire plant and out the back door, to the shed where the oil drums were kept. Sue watched her unlock the barred wooden door, and step aside. "Go on in."
She stepped in.
Bert stepped in behind her, and locked the door with a decisive click.
"Take off your clothes."
"What-?' Incredulous. "Peel it off-quick."
Big Bert's menacing tone made Sue respond automatically. She stripped naked and stood in the chill of the dusty, petroleum-smelling room. With nervously roving eyes, she watched Big Bert pry the top off one of the fifty gallon drums, filled with heavy black machine oil "Hop in." She pointed to the drum, and Sue could hardly believe what she was being asked to do. llncontrollable spasms shook her body as she thought of her white, naked flesh sinking into the black, stinking liquid. She trembled more and more convulsively.
"C'mon, get in!" Bert ordered, moving menacingly closer.
"I can't!" Sue shouted, "I don't care what you do to me, I can't!"
Big Bert threw her head back and laughed.
"Ain't you got enough energy? I told you to eat this morning, but no, you had to turn your snotty little nose up at our good food-you ain't worth that good food, you know that? You're garbage, woman. You're crud. You're lucky to be alive and fed and have a roof over your head. Now, damn it, get inside that drum before I throw you in!"
"No!" Sue screamed; her voice had risen to hysterical notes.
Big Bert's body became a blur as she moved in fast: her arms had gorilla-like strength in them, lifting Sue's comparatively frail female figure up over her head as she kicked and squirmed like a helpless insect between the fingers of a maliciously grinning, all-powerful boy And dumped her into the drum of oil.
The liquid closed over her, turned her pretty, white skin black, stung her brutally-fumes enveloped around her head and made her nauseously dizzy. Liquid gook trickled into her crevices-between her legs, her buttocks. It was fire. Fire and brimstone and pure Hell as she squirmed helplessly in the confining roundness of the drum, screaming wide-eyed, disbelieving, as Bert sat on top of another drum and laughed hysterically.
Goddamn if you ain't a sight!" she shrieked. "Miss Special all black and dirty. Hell, now you look as cruddy as you are," she concluded with a sneer.
Sue thought of Cindy, and wondered if she had gone through anything like this. Maybe she had-maybe she'd done something even worse, but that was doubtful. Nothing could be worse than this-this pain, this filthy gook soaking into her pores, that laughing animal watching her as she struggled in the drum. It was Hell.
"Come on out, if you want," Big Bert said calmly as she sat on top of her perch. Sue lost no time climbing out of the mess, and when she stood naked and dripping on the floor, Big Bert fell back into shrieking, howling laughter. "Damn if you don't look like the gingerbread girl! Now lay down on th' ground. Quick, quick!" Big Bert shouted.
Sue was beyond fighting. Sobbing, she sank to the ground and lay on her stomach; gritty, stone-impregnated dirt from the bare ground dug mockingly into her tender, slippery flesh.
"Roll! Roll around in it!"
She did that as well. What was the use of fighting back any more? She thought sadly. What was the use of fighting at all? She could refuse, and something worse, much worse, could happen. If she refused one thing, something else would happen, something that would make her regret not having obeyed an earlier command. After all, it was what had happened today. She hadn't eaten breakfast, so there was this. Surely eating repulsive oatmeal was preferable to-this! Why couldn't she be like Cindy?
As she rolled, she saw the boots casually poised above her-they were so clean, those tubes of polished leather-far cleaner than her own, pain-racked besmirched body. Dirt bit into her, tortured her shamed flesh, and the tears rolled down her dirty face, "Now, you are crud! You're as cruddy as you're supposed to be," Big Bert shouted. "Get it? Ain't you a crud?"
Sue sobbed.
To think it, to feel it was one thing; but to say it? To admit a lie to her tormenter, who wasn't even human?
"AIN'T YOU?" Big Bert screamed. Sue saw her hop off the drum and move toward her supine body, the boots treading carefully through the dust and grit of the ground.
"Yes, yes!" she cried, and rolled away.
" 'Damn right," Bert agreed.' 'Now get cleaned up and go back to work. I don't wanta see an ounce of crud on you when you go into the shop. I'll count to sixty."
Sue listened to her count as she looked at her watch.
Desperately, she looked for water.
She didn't see any. There wasn't any, and for a moment she threatened to go berserk with utter panic, until she saw some rags lying in a distant corner. She ran to them and picked up a handful, rubbing them against her body.
"Thirty."
She rubbed grit into her flesh, and winced with pain. And the oil wasn't sliding off. It was like trying to remove oil-base paint with soap and water. What was she going to do? What, what?
"Thirty-five."
Kerosene.
She say it lying behind a drum, and quickly ran to it. It was going to hurt, and the thought of rubbing the stuff on her already-tormented flesh made her quiver. But she knew now that Big Bert could make things steadily, increasingly worse. It would be nothing more than a steady progression of depraved invention.
"Fifty."
She soaked a rag in kerosene and dabbed at herself-the pain was excrutiating, but the oil thinned, dissolved and slid off her skin, which was pink with abuse, grey with traces of oil that lingered in her pores.
"Fifty-eight."
Almost off. Just a little between the breasts, the legs-soon, soon, if she could just....
"Sixty. Lemme see you," Big Bert strode over and eyed the trembling, crying woman critically. "Not bad. I wouldn't wanta sleep with you, but hell, I don't have to." She laughed shortly, and told Sue to put her clothes on.
For the rest of the day, she moved painfully, and at lunch time saw Cindy, who appeared fresh, almost happy. For a brief moment, they exchanged glances. Cindy looked at her with undisguised pity, then turned away.
Why can't I be like Cindy?
She was only kidding herself, she thought dismally. Mr. Brock would never get anywhere with that appeal, and she'd rot for ten more years. And it was damned obvious that she wasn't going to last for any ten years at this rate.
Better maybe to just play the game. Staying alive and in one piece wasn't going to be accomplished by being the big brave heroine. Cindy would do the rest of her time standing on her head now. What'd she have, something like three months if you figured in good behavior? Big Bert would probably recommend her for good conduct, knowing that if she didn't, she'd just make trouble for herself. Once a con was on the outside, she divorced herself as much as possible , from the memories of the inside. Big Bert knew that. But that didn't help her, Sue realized. why not like Cindy?
It was true that Farley Brock had not gotten anywhere with digging out new evidence for Sue's appeal. But he felt as though he were on the brink of getting somewhere. He had given up altogether on Hardin, and instead had checked out the name of the judge on the Board of Directors at the bank where he and Sue Sills had worked.
He wasn't surprised when he saw that the name was spelled H-A-R-R-I-S. In fact, he would have been somewhat disappointed if the spelling were different. Of course it was Harris, he thought; who else? Harris. Ely Harris, who virtually ran the state. He'd been the one to get Gouly the governorship, Halbright the Lieutenant-governorship, and so on down the line. There wasn't a man in the state who didn't owe Harris something, somewhere along the line, both in and out of politics. This, of course, meant business; where would business be without politics? Road-building contracts, building-contracts, bank-financings-all tied somehow to political masterminding and palm-greasing, which inevitably included Harris. Harris took it from both ends. He knew who wanted to buy, who wanted to sell. The buyers bought through him, the sellers bought the information concerning who wanted to buy from him. Harris had his proverbial cake, and ate it more hoggishly than can be readily imagined.
Harris was not a savory character.
For years, he had been a shrewd, untouchable kingpin of corruption, and people (the woefully few honest ones) had resigned themselves to an indefinite reign of power. But Brock had linked Harris to the bank, a matter of public record. Now he had to find a closer connection between Harris and Hardin and somehow peel away layers of information until the stinking guts of Sue Sill's frameup was exposed. Until then, he couldn't conceivably appeal a new trial, which ironically had to be done through Harris, as well.
Farley Brock lit a cigarette, and moved restlessly in his chair. Outside, it had grown dark. Where did you hit a guy like Harris? How did you start?
There was one way of finding out.
He picked up a telephone.
"Hello," a feminine voice answered after a few rings.
"Lil," he said, "Farley Brock."
"Hello, Farley. Haven't heard from you in a long time-I'm disappointed," she said sulkily. It had been months since he'd seen her or talked to her.
"I've been like a rat running in a cage. Look, could I see you soon? On business?"
"How do you define business?" she asked coquettishly. "Like the last time?"
Subtle as a pile-driver, he thought. Still randy as a brood mare in the middle of spring! It occurred to him that if he had to pay for information that way, it wasn't the worst thing in the world, provided she had information to give. If not, she had other commodities to give.
"Come on, Lil, this is serious. When can I come see you?"
"Good old Lil-when Farley needs her, she's around."
"Damn it, Lil, you're bandying around with a per son's life."
"Come for dinner, Farley." As she made the suggestion, Brock looked at his watch, It was after five. He could clean up and be there by six if traffic weren't too atrocious.
"Expect me in an hour," he said, and hung the receiver on its cradle.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, he had heard Phineas's name thrown around in conversation. Phineas Plane was hardly a name you could forget altogether. He couldn't quite remember where and when he had heard it, or in what connection. But he had heart it, long before he had gone to the prison to visit Sue Sills. And upon meeting the man for the first time, he had smelled rotten humanity. You could have a cold, and smell his kind of garbage.
He knew he was on the close track of something.
How important it was, or what the results would be, he had no idea, but within the last two months, Farley Brock had tossed the books out of sight and memory-only blind luck and intuition could net any results now.
Lilian Reardon (once upon a time Hardin, if you've forgotten) looked as good as before, when she met him in the library, the same room in which she and he had locked in embrace, and....
Forget it, Brock, he told himself.
Tight, tapered slacks molded the curves of her buttocks and hips as she rose to greet him. Her legs looked impeccably slender, yet lush and ample, tapering off into perfect calves-the cuffless slacks stopped a trifle above her ankles, and they too were trim and tailored. Lilian was sex with sophistication, capable of throwing the latter mantle off and plunging into thorough-going animality. You would be proud of her in public, say at a cocktail party, and damned glad to have her in bed, Farley thought. But she was bitter, too prone to dwell on the gross ironies of life.
"You're looking healthy, Farley," she smiled. Brock saw her even, white teeth, her sensuous, red lips curled back to reveal their stone-like perfection.
A hell of a fine-looking hunk of horseflesh, he thought.
"You aren't exactly repulsive yourself," he said with a short laugh. "Pour me a drink. I'm lots more complimentary after I'm unwound."
"There're better ways of unwinding." She smiled, flicking her body from side to side.
"Don't be so abrupt. It doesn't become you. Bourbon on the rocks."
"A woman in my position can't afford to think of coming on like Vassar, Farley."
"You can afford more than you think." He watched her pour the bourbon from an antique, probably priceless deccanter; she handed him the glass, and as he held it out, she dumped two ice cubes into the drink. Her hand touched his.
"Tell me what I can afford," she said.
"You can afford to save fun and games for later, and tell me the answers to a few damned important questions. I know you can afford that, Lil."
"If it's about Howard, I haven't heard from him since the last time-since he was staying at the crummy motel in Virginia Beach."
"No, I wasn't thinking of that. I went to visit my client a few weeks back-"
"Howard's mistress," she broke in. Still a trace, a wide trace of female bitterness there, he thought.
"Mistress!" he snorted. "A young chick who got swamped with your ex-husband's charm-a two-week roll in the hay that she thought was love or something. Stop this mistress gambit, and listen."
"I'm sorry. Go on." Lil sat next to him on the couch, and they faced one another in conversation.
"I saw her. She told me some pretty disturbing stuff about what was going on there. I thought she was stir; I've seen it before. I asked her cell-mate if it were true, and she said Sue was nuts.
" 'But I don't think Sue is nuts, Lil. And if she isn't, and I can't get this appeal into gear, God help her." He shuddered visibly, and swallowed some of his drink.
"So she mentioned a conversation she had with Howard last summer, about connections and politics and who you know and all that. It turned out that some judge was on the Board of Directors at the bank where Howard and she worked. I checked into it. It was the People's Friend, Harris."
"That's no big secret," she answered. "Everyone knew that."
" 'That isn't the point. The point is this; did Howard have any connection with Harris that you know of? That could be very important."
"Yes, but I thought everybody knew that, too."
"I didn't. What was the connection, Lil? Think, for Lord's sake, think hard!"
"Howard was a rising young star at the bank. It was Judge Harris who got him the job in the first place, and recommended him for the promotion. I thought you knew that."
"No." Brock took another sip of his drink. The glass rested in his hand, empty. When Lilian took it from him to refill it, he was hardly aware of it.
"Howard and Judge Harris were thick as pea soup," she said. "At first I was disturbed about it-back when I had faith in Howard. I didn't like the idea of him aligning himself with a crook like Harris, no matter how influential. But after awhile I figured what the hell, you play ball according to the rules, even if you don't like them a whole big bunch."
"Did they talk business?" Brock asked.
"That I wouldn't know-but they talked money-big money, like in the millions."
"Hmm. How about another drink?'
"Bring it to the table; dinner's ready." Farley followed her to the dining room, watching the undulating motion of her buttocks, the twin spheres surging against the tight-fitting slacks.
He couldn't imagine a better meal.
But the food was good, and he ate with more appreciation than was usual for him. Afterward, over dessert and coffee, they talked about Howard and Judge Harris again.
"Farley, I hope you get what you want," Lil said.
"What do you mean, 'what I want'?' he asked, looking fixedly at her.
"The appeal. The verdict thrown out. All that."
"It's not a matter of what I want," he told her, "it's a matter of what's right."
"Okay. I worded it wrong. I hope it works out for everybody concerned."
Farley smiled ruefully, thinking he was much too quick to bristle and take offense.
"I'm jumpy," he said simply. Lil smiled archly at him and linked her arm into his. As they walked toward the study, he felt her hip bump gently, insistently against his.
"Tension, Farley-no good for you. You need to unwind." Lil had a way of making a simple remedy sound like heaven.
"I know. But who the hell has time for golf and the beach and all that?"
"Every man should have time for this, Farley."
She kissed him.
Her lips brushed gently against his for a moment before the final, clinging possession. Her arms slipped around his neck, and she stood on tiptoe to meet him fully while his hands ran slowly up and down her back, feeling the arch as it swept deeply inward, then out again to the sharp flare of fleshed buttocks.
Quite a hunk of woman, he thought. She was right; everybody should take time for this sort of thing once in a while. With Lil, you didn't get tensed up with worry, because she didn't bog you down with obligations and binding relationships. You just went one time, and didn't bother coming back for round two until you were ready. It was his style, his preference.
Her perfumed breath blew hotly in his ear, reminding him that he should be doing precisely the same thing to her; women liked that sort of thing, he knew. He did it. He felt her quiver as his breath entered the shell-like delicacy that was her ear; when he nibbled the lobe gently, she quivered more, and moaned audibly.
"I remember how well you play," she whispered, "don't let me down."
Her voice was husky with desire, and she clung to him like honey now, her lips sticky-moist with warmed-over lipstick and passion-droplets of saliva. Farley ran his fingers through her hair, tickled the sensitized skin along her neck just below the line where the nape ended.
"I try not to disappoint," he answered, just as huskily. But what was the use of talking, of threatening, of promising? They were two adults, he thought.
Why not play like big people?
No conflict there. Lil obviously had the same thoughts on the subject, because they closed in on each other again, kissing deeply, passionately, their tongues meeting this time, their breathing coming shorter, shallower, more convulsively as their bodies warmed over like liquid fire, inside and out.
Her breast felt like a soft, inverted bowl. It fit right into his hand, fit there perfectly, its nipple straining to be known through its cloth barrier.
"Unbutton me," she whispered. Lil stepped back slightly to give him working room, and as his fingers peeled open her light sweater, it became shockingly apparent that she'd left out what most women would never leave out.
A bra.
Her breasts filled his eyes with their beauty, their voluptuous curvature and defiant, uplifted posture, the red nipples resting delicately bud-like in the center of white, hill-like mounds. He put his hand around one of the nude beauties, and the effect was altogether different. She shuddered more violently.
"I love it when you touch me like that," she groaned. ' 'Don't stop."
He looked into her eyes.
They were smoky and narrowed with passion as she looked beseechingly at him. Their eyes remained smilingly, passionately fixed on one another's as Farley squeezed her other breast, pressing his flattened palm against the burgeoning, hot-red nipple.
"Ooh!" she moaned, with a slow, gasping sound. He placed both hands on her, each cupping a magnificent breast, lifting them, hoisting their feathery weight.
"You are beautiful," he whispered.
"Don't talk, Farley. Don't waste your energy-I" She fell against him, her naked breasts pressing, flattening in his palms while her knee worked feverishly between his legs and her lips burned hotly, wetly into his. Her whole body became a flurry of purposeful, passionate movements.
The room was hot.
Uncomfortably so.
He felt as though he were choking. Lil backed off slightly while he loosened his tie. Then he reached for her again, to embrace her. With slack-jawed, hot-eyed countenance, she looked at him and said, "Why stop there, Farley? We'll just interrupt ourselves again I"
The woman had damned solid logic.
After all, why? It was a pertinent question, and one that needed no answering other than direct action. Looking at one another with that same smiling, challenging expression, they undressed, throwing their clothes toward a chair, never taking their eyes away from each other. When he saw her naked, he gasped with disbelief. Her breasts took on a new dimension in conjunction with the rest of her. Her arms were solid, slimly fit, as was the rest of her. Yet she was replete with curves-a female greyhound with indescribably nice touches of femininity. Her ribcage stood out prominently; her belly was slightly, pleasingly rounded inside a thin-nipped waist, and her hips and thighs swelled hourglass like-then she tapered inward once more, into slender calves and ankles.
He watched Lil raise her hands.
Something, a pin or two maybe, came loose in her hands, and her luxuriant mass of hair tumbled down, way down over her shoulders, spilling and trailing behind her. White-skinned and shiny-haired and smoky-eyed, she advanced toward him.
"You're awfully huge," she said, with her eyes fixed unmistakably. "A woman could faint with pleasure, just thinking about you-" She stood within inches of him. He smelled her; an indefinable admixture of perfume and raw, musky sex. Then she touched him.
Grasped him with two tiny, anxious hands, filling them with himself, "Farley!" She sank slowly to her knees and kissed him; Farley's reaction was inevitable. He jerked, feeling quite weak as he stood over her, swaying to the ecstatic tune her lips, tongue and hands played.
"Lil!" His hips surged into gentle, helpless motion against her, away from her, against her, as she moaned and filled her yearning mouth with him, "llmm," she hummed. Her hands moving to stroke" his legs and his buttocks, were hot and moist with perspiration as they pulled him unbearably to her. He strained, and felt the hot warmth of her mouth melting him, making the liquid passion become more bubbly, more boiling, and he knew that if she didn't stop instantly, that second, he would explode joyfully and leave her burning with the madfever-itch of unfulfilled passion.
So did Lil.
With uncanny timing, she released him; and stood. She pressed her naked breasts into him, caressing him with feathery fingers while he bent his head downward and nipped gently, evocatively at her nipples. He listened through ringing ears to her joyful, delirious whimpers as his teeth sank into the peripheral, red flesh-moved downward to the soft, yielding rotund of belly-downward to the dewy, starving thighs "You don't have to, darling-!" she whimpered, and even as she said it, she knew she wanted him to, wanted him to as he had wanted her to kiss him that way, and she had. Now he did. She felt dizzy and jelly-legged as her feet trembled, her legs trembled, her thighs and hips shook beneath the delicious impact of his warm, willing lips. He nuzzled her rapaciously, and she felt herself moistening with woman-heat for him.
For him alone.
Weakly, feverish-hot, she sank to her knees level with him and put her arms around his neck.
"Baby, I want you!" she cried. Tears were in his eyes. Tears of unashamed lust. "Now, baby-now, please!"
She didn't have to beg.
He too was on fire for completion, could stand it no more; as he pushed her over onto her back, he fell between her wet thighs briefly enough for her to clamp them possessively shut, with unmistakable intent: to tell him, right now, you're mine.
Lil whimpered joyously as he pushed her thighs apart and lifted them. She lay there, staring dreamily, hazily at the ceiling. For a moment, his face, his .eyes, his lips blocked that view of the ceiling. Then she saw nothing, for she closed her eyes as soon as the mounting crescendo of his joy-thrust entered her waiting, starved female flesh, and meshed with it. She was caught up now with his whirlwind passion, and together they entwined one another, trapping each other in a tangle of arms and thighs as he moved deeper and deeper inside her.
She breathed loudly, in huge, fish-like gasps as he lunged forward with wolf-like hunger and greed, moving slowly, deliberately, knowingly, stroking the walls of her with maddening precision.
"God!" she whispered incredulously. She clung to him, moved against him and heard her belly slapping softly into his while he pressed down on her, pinning her buttocks into the soft turf of carpeting.
Suddenly everything was speed; speed and crashing surf and lightning and tempestuous explosions as his teeth sank into her lower lip and her nails dug hotly into his back like spurs and her heels drummed hysterically into his buttocks.
"Farley!" she shrieked, and then suddenly, was limp. Her eyes melted, dilated, then slowly became normal as they gazed peacefully at him. Lil smiled. They smiled at one another. Slowly, they drifted into sanity, into here-and-now.
"Relaxed? Unwound?" she asked.
"You sound like a commercial," he laughed, ruffling her hair between his fingers.
"If I only could advertise," she smiled.
"Would you be that promiscuous?" he asked seriously. Her eyes lost their smile, their humor, as she looked at him with more directness than ever before.
"The TV'd be closed-circuit, darling, from my side of the bed to yours."
Farley was silent.
Damn it, he thought, this isn't what he'd wanted, and deep inside, he knew it wasn't what she'd wanted; not after the pains of a divorce from a no-good bastard like Hardin. She wasn't ready for another emotional burning, he wasn't ready for settling down. Yet, it was beyond their control-they each sensed they'd shared something more than a roll on the carpet. Much more. They'd given something to one another, something irreplacable. That was the feeling at the moment.
" 'I won't press it, Farley," she said, seeming to know his thoughts. "But don't be ashamed to ask, when you want to." She smiled wanly, and he returned the smile.
"It was good Lil. It was fine."
"Yes, it was. Now you go home and think about your mission. And if I can help-"
"I know," he said gently, and kissed her breast. It was a tender, gentle gesture; she closed her eyes tightly for a moment, then opened them. They glistened slightly-maybe from the smoke of their cigarettes of earlier.
Maybe.
But Farley Brock knew damned well that wasn't it as he drove home that evening. His mind whirled crazily with Sue Sills, Harris, Hardin, their connection-Phineas Plane, and damn it yes, Lil Hardin, now Reardon. How many people could a man concern himself with, allow to enter his life, before he crumbled?