Chapter 17

It was the day following my wild sex orgy with Ned.

Harry Peterson had just exited his office and saw me walking down the hall.

"Where are you heading?" he asked.

"I have a couple of patients to look in on," I replied, a little tersely.

"I'll tell you what. I'll meet you in the restaurant after you get done."

"I should be about half an hour. You may have a long wait."

"O.K., then I'll meet you there in a half an hour," Harry said, refusing to be dissuaded.

I walked away, saying nothing, knowing that I would comply with his request.

I went through my rounds, then met him in a half an hour.

It was approaching lunch time by then, and he offered to buy me lunch.

As I munched my roast beef sandwich, he looked at me and grinned.

"I think we ought to get together in my office right after we get through here," he said. "I have some games I'd like to play with you."

"You know, for a doctor, you sure don't seem to spend much of your time taking care of business. You're always playing games with either me or some other nurse."

"Oh, I manage to practice medicine as well," he laughed. "It's just that I need morale boosts, and these little games I engage in get that job done. But you ought to talk. You certainly get around yourself. How about Ned?"

"What about him?"

"Don't try and play it so coy, honey. You know damned well that you've been balling with him."

"How would you know?"

"You spend quite a bit of time in his room. I peeked in just once. You two were really going at it, baby."

"You seem to know everything about me, don't you?"

"I make it a point to know about certain people," he said.

"Why me?"

"Because you made it tough for me. You'll never know how many times I had a hard-on just thinking about you. I'd walk up to you and do my best to get acquainted, real friendly like, and then you'd shut me down. I didn't like it one bit."

"I'm sorry, but you didn't exactly act like a gentleman."

"You chicks really make me laugh," he chuckled. "I guess a guy has to go down on his hands and knees and beg before he proves himself. I don't believe any of this phony crap. I figure that the best way to get to a woman is just level with her. If I want a good fuck, then that's exactly what I'm going to ask for. I don't believe in beating around the bush."

"I guess you don't. But I don't happen to find your type of approach very appealing."

"I guess you want something romantic, like Hansel and Gretel," he said sarcastically. "Maybe you ought to go back to reading Grimm's Fairy Tales. Maybe that's the type of thing you expect to find in real life. If it is, you'd just better forget about it. That's the kind of thing that only happens in storybook tales."

"I never said I expected to find anything like that. It's just that I expect to be treated with a little bit of respect."

"That word gives me a pain in the ass," Harry chuckled, taking a long sip from his coffee cup. "I don't like it because too many times a broad will use it in a put-down way. By respect, what they're really telling you is that they don't want you to stick your pecker into them. That I don't buy. If they want to tell a guy to turn off, then why not come right out and say as much?"

"You have the wrong idea altogether."

"Oh, I do?"

"There's a difference between coming right out and telling him bluntly and expecting a little bit of consideration."

"With you, I'd have to spend so much time just getting acquainted with you that by the time you let me in your pussy, I'd probably be an old man."

"You mean I strike you as that much of a prude?" I asked.

"You sure did before I found out about you getting involved with the young guys. No, I just don't know about you. You still act cold around me, but you demonstrated enough warmth toward these young patients. Don't you dig older men like me?"

"As I said, Harry, it's your attitude."

"You liked the ass-fuck I gave you the other day?"

"I think I'm still hurting there," I shook my head.

"Then I guess it shows I've got an iron cock," he laughed. "You've got such a cute ass. I really loved fucking it. As a matter-of-fact, I look forward to doing it again. Do you look forward to getting it?"

"Not really."

"I'm going to have to do something with you," he said sternly. "I don't like your impudence."

"Maybe that's the big thing that I dislike about you. I don't like the way that you act."

"Aw hell, we're not getting anywhere with this line of crap," he said. "I was hoping you'd be a little more receptive this time. I guess I'm going to have to pull rank on you again. Remember, my dear, I have some tantalizing information that department officials would just love to hear about. Do you realize just how long you'd last if I told them you were balling young guys in their teens who are your patients?"

"You can spare me the gruesome details," I said with great sorrow.

"I think you'd better realize just how vulnerable your position is. I've taken a lot of guff from you, Joan ... probably one helluva lot more than I should. It's all just because I happen to dig your face and body. I really kind of wish I didn't, because then things would be so much easier. But I do, and when I want a certain woman's body, then that's it. I'm going to pull out all the stops to get it."

"Even blackmail," I nodded.

"As I said before, it's just a little arrangement. I refrain from telling certain things that could hurt you, just as long as you play ball with me. Now, let's go into my office."

He reached underneath the table and squeezed my left thigh gingerly. I knew what was coming. There was no way that I could forestall the inevitable.

It hurt me to know that I was being used, forced to put out in order to preserve my position in the hospital.

But there didn't seem to be anything I could do about it.