Chapter 6
Karen had just finished dressing when the phone rang. She looked at the clock on her vanity table — it was too early for Bill to be calling. Maybe somebody selling magazine subscriptions, she chuckled, reaching for the receiver.
Mrs. Hodges... Mrs. Bill Hodges?
"Yes... who's this?" she answered cheerily. Their bills were all paid and there was no one she didn't care to hear from.
My name is Crosby, Karen... You don't know me, but I think we should have a little talk. It's about your husband... and my wife.
Karen's voice hardened to a cutting edge. "Oh? I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about. You must have the wrong party."
Oh no... you're the right one. I even know what you look like. Young and pretty, red hair... you see, I've checked on you these last few days. Now, could we have a little talk.
I'll...
"What is this, Mr. Crosby? Some kind of trick?" she shot back, upset at the implications. "I'm going to hang up and call my husband. He'll... "
"He'll do nothing, Karen. You see, he's with my wife at this very moment. And they're both naked, Karen... I don't have to spell it out for you, do I?"
"I... I... " Say nothing, my dear... There's a car coming for you, a dark blue Rolls Royce. It's my car and my driver, Higgins will be at the wheel. He'll bring you here... You'll be quite safe, but if you're worried, there's a telephone in the passenger compartment. All you have to do is dial the mobile operator and notify the police if you suspect this is not on the level. I'll see you very soon... Good-bye.
Karen stood motionless for a long time, staring into the humming telephone receiver as if it were a crystal ball that could give her some answers. Her mouth hung slack and she shook her head slowly from side to side... was this some kind of cruel joke? Who was this man and how did he know who she was and what she looked like?
Just then there came the rich sound of an expensive air horn from outside in the parking lot. She crossed to the window and looked down on the roof of a luxury limousine... a baby blue Rolls Royce, just as Crosby had told her.
Without thinking, acting merely on her gut-level instincts, she hurried downstairs and outside to the car. The chauffeur's window was down and people from the other apartments were staring curiously at this expensive sedan that had come for her.
"Uh, I'm... "
"Yes, Ma'am, you're Mrs. Hodges. I was given a description by my employer, Mr. Crosby. Would you get in, please?" he asked, still behind the wheel.
"Oh... yes. Yes, I'll get in." She glanced around for the telephone; Crosby had been right about that too. There was a multi-channel mobile telephone neatly installed in the right armrest.
God, wherever this dream is taking me... let's get on with it! Karen had heard Bill talk of these millionaires' homes, but she had never seen one close up. From the highway they were merely beautiful, but unobtainable, like photos projected on a distant screen.
But here, within the gates, they were like the stuff old movies were made of, the dreams of a nation caught by the balls in a depression. Everything was larger than life, realer than real, and Karen walked about like a kid in her first candy shop, eyes wide and innocently curious.
Higgins drove her to the front door, but she caught a quick, shocking glimpse of Bill's truck parked in back as they drove along the shrub-lined driveway... My God, what if he was telling the truth? What if Bill really was with his wife... naked!
"This is Mrs. Hodges. She is expected," Higgins said with perfect English enunciation to an older woman in a maid's attire who greeted them at the front door of the palatial home. She nodded and answered in an accent still laden with French.
"Of course, Mr. Higgins. Right this way, Madame." She stepped aside courteously for Karen to enter and then led the way. Nothing on the outside, despite its richness, could have prepared her for the house's interior.
They first crossed a marble-floored foyer, complete with enormous potted palms and antique wicker furniture. That room alone was larger than their whole apartment. But then came the main room, whatever you called it in a place like this. Living room hardly seemed adequate; it was more like the Grand Salon. Richly paneled in dark, expensive woods, the walls were adorned everywhere with spot-lit oils and luxurious tapestries that looked as if they had come from some medieval castle — and probably did.
There was an enormous staircase curving from left to right, but the maid led her to a tiny elevator beneath the stairs. It was almost like entering a broom-closet, but it worked — in a few seconds they were silently whisked to the bedroom corridor above.
When the doors parted, a gray-haired man, impeccably attired like a clothing ad from Esquire — and old Esquire — greeted her with a warm welcome.
"Good morning, Mrs. Hodges... welcome to my home. I trust your brief trip here was a pleasant one?" he said politely.
Karen nodded in agreement — it was obvious that he was waiting for the maid to reach the elevator and leave their range of conversation. "Yes... now, it you could just tell me what this is all about."
Karen took a good look at this man who had so suddenly entered her life. She had heard of him, of course, as had everyone within miles.
Many Sunday afternoons she and Bill had driven along the mountain road, peering down onto the palatial grounds of the Crosby estate and wondered, like a thousand other weekend gawkers, what it was like in that other world.
He was not at all like she had expected -he was much older than she was, but certainly not the dottering old geezer she had imagined him to be. He was actually quite handsome, like a minor-league version of Cary Grant in his later movies.
He escorted her into an elegantly-furnished sitting room; through the opened door she could see the adjoining bedroom. It was a woman's room, obviously, and for a moment she wondered if her husband was in there.
Crosby seemed to sense the bewilderment in her pale green eyes and the look of confusion on her delicate young features.
"We're alone now... we can talk freely."
Karen glanced again into the adjoining bedroom.
"Oh, no, they're not in there... Caroline has him down by the pool."
She winced. "You make it sound like she has him on a leash or something."
"Caroline is quite capable of putting any man on a leash... any man, that is, but me. I've learned her ways and how to cope with them."
"Then your wife is not new to this kind of thing?" Karen inquired nervously, anxious to know the real truth, but afraid of rushing the inevitable. If Bill was with her, she wasn't sure she wanted to see it.
He smiled and a trunkload of painful memories surfaced in his dark eyes. "No, she's done this before... many times. But let me show you what I mean, Karen, May I call you Karen?"
"C—Certainly... but what do you mean, 'show me'?"
"In there... from that window, you can see exactly what is going on and you will understand why I called you."
Karen swallowed hard. "But I don't understand. Even if it is true, I mean about my husband. Why did you tell me?"
He laughed warmly and put his hand on her shoulder. Karen liked the feel of it there — it was fatherly and she felt strangely close to this man, like the father she never knew.
"Karen, my wife' is a man-eater of the worst kind. I only stay married to her because a divorce would be so sticky. You see, I have committed a few indiscretions of my own and I know Caroline would throw these up in my face at a divorce hearing. They were nothing like this... they were not dirty or seedy, but she would make it look that way and the papers would have a field day. I don't know you, Karen, but I know a lot about you. A man in my position has access to a lot of information, some of it legal and some of it not so legal. Anyway, I didn't want to see you become another of Caroline's victims... she has left behind quite a trail of broken men and wrecked marriages, believe me."
The pretty redhead smiled openly — she felt weirdly comfortable and secure with this man, and it puzzled her. After all, she didn't know him... this could still be some kind of trick.
But when he motioned her through the bedroom door, she obeyed without hesitation, unsure what she would see Or how it would affect her. There, in the half-closed window, was a pair of binoculars attached to a small mount that fastened with a clamp to the window ledge.
"Don't open the shutters any further or they can see us... just look through the binoculars and 'focus them for your vision... you can see for yourself why I called you."
Karen leaned close to the mounted binoculars and squinted into the eyepieces, adjusting the center focus knob until the distorted, squiggly images took form. She blinked, then blinked again, a gasp of astonishment hung in her throat like so much bad meat.
"M-My God... it is Bill! And... they're making love!" she breathed in disbelieving horror, her hand clutching to her breasts as she stared down at their secret rendezvous in undisguised fascination. It was like watching a gory automobile wreck — she found herself staring at the two of them, unable to look away though her stomach knotted in pain and her mind reeled with the agony of her husband's wanton betrayal.
Finally, she managed to lift her eyes from the binoculars. When she turned to face the husband of the naked blonde who was wrapped sinuously around her man, her eyes were watery with stinging tears.
"There, there... I didn't mean to hurt you, Karen. I only thought you should know. It isn't nice to be the only one left in the dark, you know."
She managed a thin, wavering smile of gratitude. "Y-Yes... I know."
He looked around as if searching for something. "Would you like something to drink, Karen? I know it's sort of early in the day, but it might... "
"You don't have to talk me into it," she interrupted. "I would love a drink... anything as long as there's whiskey in it!"
"Then excuse me a moment... I'll be right back." He smiled at her tenderly, like an understanding father. Karen felt much better, though the searing memory of what she had glimpsed through the binoculars was still uppermost in her confused thoughts. When he left the room, she found herself drawn to the binoculars again — like a moth to the flame that will destroy it!
Crosby returned with a pair of drinks, cool and inviting in frosted crystal tumblers.
"What's that... it's green," she said, puzzled.
"A specialty... chartreuse, and lemon and lime. There's a rather coarse common name for it, but I just call it a chartreuse cooler. It's quite good."
Karen took hers and sipped it cautiously. To her surprise, it was indeed delicious, with hardly an aftertaste of the highly potent chartreuse liqueur that was its base.
"How are the lovers doing?"
Karen blushed. "I looked again... they're still at it. She's, uh, on top... if you know what I mean."
The graying millionaire smiled, teeth sparkling. "Of course I do, Karen. Why don't you watch them some more. I think you should know everything, so you can confront the sly devil with the truth when he gets home.
"Oh, I don't know if I could," she said, flinching. "Bill's pretty rough sometimes when he gets angry. He'd really be mad if he knew I was spying on him."
"He'd be mad? I should think it would be more logical the other way around."
"Maybe... do you think I should?" Karen was already edging toward the binoculars and the peculiarly exciting image of her husband and that naked woman. She peered through the eyepieces again and could clearly see Bill's stiff, jutting erection disappearing deeply inside the naked blonde as she humped up and down on him. He was lying on his back on a chaise lounge, his hands on her breasts as she worked slavishly over him. There was a grin of contentment smeared across his face that Karen could see even from here... a smirking grin of deceit and adultery!
Karen watched with growing interest, her anger and hurt forgotten for the moment as they cavorted in the viewer of her binoculars like a pair of actors in a porno movie... only this was for real!
The German binoculars were incredibly powerful and Crosby leaned over her shoulder to show her the red button on the bottom... the power zoom!
"Watch... we can zoom right in on them. It's like a 3-D movie when you go in close." Karen watched in amazement, wondering how many times this strange, powerful man had sat alone up here in this room, his wife's bedroom, watching her wriggling and screaming in the arms of another man. How many times he had watched his pretty blonde wife come, her legs around a stranger's back, her breasts soft and bruised from another's coarse, ravenous touch.
The zooming-in took her breath away and she nearly took her eyes from the binoculars as suddenly, the double finder was completely filled with naked, sweat-soaked flesh... her husband's and Caroline Crosby's!
She felt his hand on her shoulder, innocently touching her, and it felt good, as though somehow she could draw on his fantastic strength and power. For this man Crosby was indeed a forceful man, a self-made millionaire from all the stories she had heard... and just being close to him seemed to bring her some weird and exciting sense of strength.
And when his hand started to move down her back as she leaned over, peering through the binoculars, not one pore of her being cried out to stop him... it was a natural event, the logical continuation of an innocent caress.
His hand moved over the small of her back and up and along the curvaceous swell of her pert young buttocks. She shivered as she felt his fingers knead delicately the soft girlish flesh of her bottom-cheeks, but she was not moved to dissuade him... his touch was not repulsive to her; in fact, it felt good there.
Suddenly, his hand darted beneath her skirt as she leaned vulnerably over the window ledge. His fingers tightened around a handful of her warm inner thigh.
"P—Please... " It was less a plea than an encouragement.
"Shhhh... don't talk, my dear... just watch through the binoculars," he whispered. Her eyes never left the eyepieces as his hands lowered her white sheer panties and lifted her skirt. She felt her body tingle with forbidden arousal as his fingers touched her in secret, private places... she was his!