Chapter 1

"Got a couple of real little dolls in this new group, Joe," Vince Caldwell, the organizer-chief of the magazine sales crew said as he made highballs in his Evanston, Illinois, motel room. "Both of 'em teen-agers and built like the high-priced brand. A cute little blonde named Mazie, and another chick named Laurie Morgan that you gotta see to believe. They're both cream of the crop, but that Laurie, I'm tellin' you, Joe, she's enough to make your tongue hard!"

The big baldheaded man named Joe stood with his pants and shorts bunched around his ankles. Vince Caldwell's redheaded wife Sue sat in a chair fellating him while he looked out the window through binoculars, appraising the two bikini-clad girls Vince had mentioned. There were six girls and six boys, ranging in age from seventeen to twenty-three, in the crew Vince had just put together, but the man's eye was trained to pick out the best in girl-flesh at a glance, so he had no difficulty in spotting the two young beauties among the others cavorting in and around the motel's swimming pool. "Juicy," he said succinctly, reaching down with one hand and holding Mrs. Caldwell's head close to his hairy belly as he shot his load into her suctioning mouth and spasmodically working throat, "both of 'em."

Vince was standing by with their drinks when his wife patted Joe's rump and allowed his deflating penis to slip from her mouth. He waited 'til the large man had hitched up his trousers, then gave them their drinks and suggested a toast. "To two fillies and money in the bank. I think I'll be able to break them both and have them ready for you by the end of the summer, Joe."

"Sue," Joe said, caressing Vince's smiling wife's cheek, "I miss that hot mouth of yours, baby. If Vince doesn't treat you right, you've always got a place with me."

"Thanks, Joe." Sue laughed throatily. "I love you, too."

"We'll go out and look over the stock soon as we finish our drinks, Vince," the towering bald man said in a friendly but businesslike manner. "I won't need but one girl from you this time, though. Which one's got the tightest, hottest, man-eatin'est snatch- Mazie or Laurie?"

"Ask me in about a week," the magazine crew chief protested. "This is the first day for this bunch. I haven't had a chance to sample any of the tail yet. You sure you only want one?"

"One's all I need right now, Vince, but break both girls if you want to. Hell, you never can tell in my profession. By the end of the summer, I might need a dozen replacements."

Laurie Morgan had just surfaced after a graceful dive and was treading water in the middle of the motel pool when she felt fingers grasping her trim ankle. The curvaceous eighteen-year-old squealed and sucked in her breath a split second before she was yanked down into the water. Hands slid up her flailing legs and over the flare of her hips, then locked around her narrow waist and pulled her into contact with a lean, muscular body. Her vision blurred because of the water, Laurie recognized her fun-loving boy friend's face only an instant before he kissed her. She put her arms around him and returned his playful kiss as their embracing bodies floated up lazily through the water.

"You nut!" she laughed, flinging strands of curly auburn hair out of her face as they surfaced and she pushed away from him.

"Come on, honey," Tom Barringer said, "let's soak up a little sun."

The handsome youth of twenty swam off toward a corner of the pool's deep end, where his and Laurie's beach towels were spread out on the concrete apron. Laurie swam after him, and allowed him to help her from the pool. The attractive young couple lay down side by side, Laurie on her back, Tom on his side and propped up on his elbow.

"I've been thinking, Laurie," he said, toying with a corner of his towel and pushing back his wet, modishly long sandy hair. "Selling magazine subscriptions is a helluva way to waste a summer."

"Don't, Tom," Laurie sighed tiredly. "Don't talk that way any more."

"Why not?" he asked, stroking her arm and letting his hand brush the outer curve of her nearest bikini-clad breast.

Laurie pushed his hand away and sat up. "And don't do that, either."

"Come off the 'don't', sweetheart," Tom protested, also sitting up.

He put his hand on Laurie's nearest thigh, just above her dimpled knee, and she didn't object. She threw him a slightly exasperated glance and waited.

"Let's split, honey," he coaxed, rubbing the inside of her warm, silky thigh.

Laurie put her hand on her boy friend's, and prevented it from going higher. "We can't. Mister Caldwell said to stay by the pool until he called us in to start our sales training. He also said to mix with one another and get better acquainted. Why don't we mix with the others some more now?"

"You know what I'm talking about, Laurie. Going home. You and me. We don't need this."

"I need it. I want to go to college. My folks aren't rich, like yours. I have to pay my own way."

Despite the pressure of her small hand, Tom stroked up the inner slope of her creamy thigh 'til the tips of his fingers were nearly touching the mound beneath the triangle of Laurie's bright-red bikini bottom. "You're too uptight, baby. It's old-fashioned for a beautiful girl to work her way through college. You know I'll put you through school."

"Your hand, Tom!" Laurie whispered urgently, pushing at his wrist. "Don't! Someone might see!"

Tom tickled her vulva through the fabric of her swimsuit before Laurie scooted frantically out of his reach.

"You're awful!" she accused, blushing and glancing around embarrassedly, giving no outward evidence of the lewd thrill rippling through her well-developed young body. "I don't know why I put up with you, Tom Barringer!"

"Because I love you?" he asked with a grin, then chucked her under the chin and pulled her with him as he lay down on his side.

"Because I love you, I guess," Laurie murmured, allowing Tom to take her in his strong arms, even though she noticed a couple of the other girls in the crew watching from a distance. It embarrassed her for the others to see her boy friend embracing her in public, but it also gave her an extra thrill. Laurie didn't understand her added surge of excitement at being kissed by Tom in full view of virtual strangers, but she couldn't deny the perverse excitement it caused her. She clung to him and sucked his tongue madly for nearly a minute before she groaned and pushed him away. She sat up quickly and panted, "Stop it, honey! My goodness, right out in the open!"

Tom laughed softly and patted her knee. "To hell with this magazine bit. Let's go back home and play the summer away. I get enough bread from the trust fund my grandmother set up for me to keep us both in college, with no sweat."

"I won't let you keep me," Laurie said for what seemed like the hundredth time since she and the wealthy young man had become serious about each other. "I love you with all my heart, but I won't 'share a pad' with you until we're legally married."

"Let's go home," he persisted. "You don't want to sell magazine subscriptions, baby."

Laurie sighed. "I have to work at something, Tom. I have to earn at least a thousand dollars so I'll be able to start college this fall. I can't make that much working the counter in Mister Biddle's drug store."

"Bullshit," he muttered. "All you've gotta do to go to college is sleep with me."

"Tom!" she scolded.

"You know I'll marry you, Laurie. Just as soon as I get through school. I would right now, but Dad won't give his permission 'til I'm graduated."

"I'm not that kind of girl, and you know it," Laurie said, her voice sounding sharp because of her rising irritation. "If you want to go home, go, but I'm staying. You don't need the money and you don't want to work, but I do! I may be from a working-class family, but I've got my self-respect, I'll have you know. And speaking of self-respect, mine has caused me to wonder just why you signed on to sell magazine subscriptions."

"To be near you," he replied sheepishly.

"To be near me ... or to keep an eye on me? Don't you trust me?" Laurie demanded.

"Sure, I trust you, sweetheart. I just want to be with you, that's all . . . Well, maybe I am worried about you. Is anything wrong with that? I don't like the looks of this setup. And that Vince ... I don't know about him."

"Mister Caldwell?" Laurie asked, frowning. "What have you got against our boss?"

"Nothing yet. But I wouldn't trust him with you all summer, baby. I've noticed the way he looks at you, even if you haven't. Sooner or later, that dirty old man is going to try to put the make on you. I'd bet on it! It's him I don't trust, Laurie, not you, honey."

"Mister Caldwell isn't even forty, and he certainly isn't dirty, Tom! He's a nice man. For heaven's sake, you sound a little paranoid."

"Just the same, I'll be around if you need me."

"Damn it, Tom! You're making me angry! I'm not a child, you know! Go on home if you want to, and quit worrying. I'll behave myself, with or without you playing watchdog over me!"

"Did anybody ever tell you how cute you are when you're mad?" Tom quipped, teasing around her exposed belly button with the tip of his finger, then jabbing his fingertip into the little fleshy indentation. "Gotcha!"

"Stop it. Tom!" Laurie hissed, slapping his hand and jumping up. "You're impossible!"

Tom was suddenly looking past her, with a puzzled expression washing over his face. "Take a look at the goon type with Vince. I wonder who the hell he is!"

Reflexively, Laurie turned her head and followed Tom's gaze. "Goodness!" she gasped when she saw the bald man Vince was bringing toward the pool. "He is big!"

"Looks like an over-the-hill pro footballer," Tom commented as he stood up.

The two men, both dressed in summer business suits, stepped through the gate and onto the apron at the shallow end of the pool. The bald man towered above Vince, nearly dwarfing the average-size crew chief and chaperon of the dozen young sales hopefuls.

Vince Caldwell spotted the shy little blonde named Mazie reclining alone on a lounging chair, and steered the big man towards her. Mazie started to get up when she noticed her boss coming towards her. The small girl had her bare feet on the concrete and was sitting sideways on the chair, smiling up unsurely when Vince and the man with him reached her.

They were close enough for Laurie to see everything, but too far away for her to hear what they were saying. She could see Vince's mouth moving and thought how gentlemanly he was to take Mazie's hand and help her up.

Once the diminutive blonde was standing, however, Vince's actions weren't exactly gentlemanly. The thirtyish crew chief put his arm around the teen-age girl and gave her a hug that no one could have considered fatherly.

"Look at your nice boss, Laurie," Tom said, nudging her.

Laurie couldn't help but look. Vince had one of the flustered girl's breasts cupped in his hand, and Laurie could see him fondling it lewdly. She could also see poor Mazie blushing and squirming, but Vince wouldn't let her go. He gave Mazie's tittie a squeeze that turned the bashful girl's cheeks crimson before he let go of it and slid his hand caressingly down her bare midriff.

"The bastard can't keep his hands off her!" Tom snorted.

Too flabbergasted for words, Laurie looked on in stunned disbelief. Vince was introducing the shocked girl to the huge, smiling man, and he was letting his hand roam her belly and hip as if he owned her. Laurie simply couldn't believe her eyes when she saw her boss stroking Mazie's rear.

"My stars!" she gasped, and lifted her fist to her mouth. When she watched Mazie dancing and squirming frenziedly while the big man laughed and vigorously pumped her hand, Laurie realized with a very upsetting jolt that Vince had his finger stuck between the blonde's clenched buttocks and was goosing her like crazy. "What in the world does he think he's doing?!" she asked in a nervous whisper, chewing her knuckle.

"He's got his finger up her butt," Tom said, laughing despite his dislike of their cocky boss. "Can't you see?"

"I can see, all right!" Laurie groaned, feeling for Mazie, who had just been let off the finger but was still shaking all over. "I just don't believe what I see!"

With a mixture of dread and anticipation, Laurie watched her boss lead the massive man towards Gloria, a buxom brunette who looked stunning until she smiled and revealed her crooked, discolored teeth. But Vince didn't even put his arm around the full-bodied girl. He introduced her quickly and properly, and the men moved on.

"I don't figure that," Tom muttered under his breath. "If old Vince wants to sneak feels, I thought he would've given it to Gloria. Hellfire, she'd bend over if he asked her."

"Tom!" Laurie scolded. She was nervous and strangely excited now, as well as still being angry with her boy friend. "That wasn't a very nice thing to say!"

Tom shrugged. "Gloria isn't a very nice girl."

Huffing and throwing her boy friend an icy glance, Laurie moved a couple of steps away from him. They stood, separated by a few feet, watching Vince introduce the girls to the large baldheaded man. A little butt-patting and hugging was as far as Vince went with the other three girls, but watching him and realizing he would bring the man over and introduce her to him made Laurie edgy as the dickens. She couldn't help but wonder what Vince would try to do to her.

He'd better not try to paw me the way he did poor Mazie, Laurie thought. II slap his face good, boss or not!

"See you later, Laurie," Tom said, just as Vince spotted them and pointed, talking rapidly and confidentially to the man with him.

"Don't you dare leave me alone, Tom Barringer," Laurie said, half-pleading and half-demanding as she watched her security turn his back on her. "You come back here!"

"They're not interested in me," Tom said over his shoulder, sauntering off. "Haven't you noticed? Vince is only introducing the girls, not any of the boys."

An icy shiver darted up Laurie's spine as Tom's statement hit home. "Tom . . . please, honey!" she called.

But Tom, hoping that their boss would get fresh with Laurie and anger her to the point where he could goad her into quitting and going home with him, ignored her and walked away.

As Vince and the hulking man ambled towards her, Laurie shifted nervously from one foot to the other. She wiped her suddenly damp palms on her smooth thighs, tossed a strand of curly auburn hair from her face and smiled nervously. She felt her skin begin to crawl when they were three steps away.

Vince walked right up to the on-edge Laurie and put his arm around her waist, hugging her tight as he said, "And here's the prettiest girl of the whole lot. . . "

His fingers were like hot spiders crawling up her ribs. Laurie felt like screaming and running to Tom, because she just knew Vince was going to touch her sensitive bosom. I'll slap him if he dares! she determined. But he did dare, and she didn't have the courage to slap him. Laurie gritted her teeth when she felt his fingers close eagerly on her firm, upthrust right breast, most of it naked because of her skimpy bikini halter. Then he fondled it openly and vulgarly, with the ugly bald man watching through his beady eyes, and Laurie whimpered softly. She felt grossly humiliated, but her heart was thumping wildly and a bonfire was bursting into flames in her virginal loins. Dear Lord! What's wrong with me! her mind screamed as she realized with shame that she actually liked the rough way Vince was squeezing her tit right in front of the strange man's leering eyes. Just as Mazie had, Laurie wriggled and squirmed, but Laurie was doing so because of her incredible rush of sensual discomfort.

"... name is Laurie Morgan. What do you think of her?"

"She's a lovely child," the big dark-skinned man said, extending his hand toward Laurie.

Her head spinning with lewdness, Laurie automatically thrust out her trembling hand. As the man's hamlike hand swallowed hers and started shaking it, she was keenly aware of Vince's hand stealing down her side. She stood there, feeling like a slut, letting the giant pump her arm while Vince patted and cupped the right cheek of her soft, well-rounded bottom. She didn't do a thing to stop Vince. She couldn't. It was the most degrading moment of her life, and she wanted to die because of the screaming perverse thrill it caused her. She knew all the other kids were watching, and it made her head swim.

"Say hello to Mister Lovato, honey," Vince told her.

Laurie could feel his obscene finger pushing slowly but surely into the crack of her rump, and it sent a deliciously wicked sensation radiating out through her squirming body. "H-hello, M-mister Lovato," she panted.

"Mister Lovato is the regional director of our sales organization," Vince lied. "So, smile pretty for him, Laurie."

The suffering girl couldn't have smiled if her life had depended on it. Her arm was being pumped off by the big man while she felt Vince's lascivious finger insinuating itself between her buttocks, pressing her red bikini bottom into the crack of her creamy-white quivering behind right up to her sensitive anus itself.

Then it felt as if he were trying to stick his finger clear into her tiny, erogenous butthole. Laurie feared she was going to pass out from the scalding, ungodly thrilling shame which washed over her in great sheets, but instead she began jumping like an electrified jackrabbit and begging pantingly, "Stop! Oh, my God... don't, Mis-mister C-Caldwell. . . don't doooo that!"

Though it seemed like an eternity to Laurie, Vince continued her thorough goosing for only a few more seconds, with Lovato feasting his lustful eyes on the dancing, squirming, wriggling, hopping girl's large, flopping tits and delightfully quivering young flesh.

"That'll do it," the man whom Vince had falsely introduced as his regional director, said, and both the awful goosing and the vigorous handshaking ceased instantly. "You can relax now, Miss Morgan. Vince did that under my directions, and for a purpose, I assure you. We want pretty, unpadded girls working for us, but we also have to be sure they're good, proper girls. We can't afford any scandal in our organization. I hope you understand."

In no condition to think or question anything, Laurie heaved for breath and nodded weakly.

"Good girl. I'll be seeing more of you. Soon, I hope."

"Very soon, Mister Lovato," Vince assured, and the two men walked off together.

Laurie didn't hear the towering man telling Vince how he wanted her trained, but if she had, it would have chilled her feverish blood in a hurry. Thinking the man really was Vince's sales director, the lust-overwhelmed girl stood shaking in her tracks, with her eyes clenched shut and her small hands made into fists, her whirling mind drifting back to her fifth date with Tom, when they'd gone out with another couple and parked on a lonely road and . . .

"OH, GOD, MARK . . . HARDER, BABY . . . GIVE IT TOOO MEEE . . . OHHHH . . . JESUS, THAT'S GOOOODDD . . . FUCK ME, FUCK ME!!!"

Helen's lewd cries of encouragement rang hotly in Laurie's ears, turning her to jelly and making her suck Tom's tongue clear down into her throat while she lifted her hips to help him get her confining panties off her. Her steaming pussy was sopping wet, and it didn't matter a fig that she was a virgin. She wanted to be fucked more than anything in the world. The car was already bouncing rhythmically from Mark's and Helen's abandoned screwing, and Laurie yearned for Tom to ram his big thing in her.

"Oh, Laurie," Tom breathed, pushing her down in the seat and mounting her, pressing the taut-skinned head of his blood-bloated dick between the slippery lips of her tight, unviolated sex opening. "Baby . . . sweet baby!"

"Wait!" Laurie yelped. "Did you put a rubber on?"

"Piss on a rubber," Tom groaned, sinking his bulging glans partway into her hairy slit.

"NO!" Laurie yelled, her insane fear of getting pregnant slapping her raging desire down to manageable proportions.

Laurie hadn't let her boy friend put it in her that night, after all, nor had she allowed him the opportunity to light her much-too-short sex fuse again since then. But she couldn't help recalling that dangerous night as she stood by the pool shuddering with abject shame over responding so quickly and totally to Vince's crude, humiliating public fondling and goosing.

Oh, Lord God in heaven! she prayed silently. I'm so wicked and sinful! Help me, I beg you! Don't let me fall into temptation like Dorothy did! I'm as weak as she was! Help me!

Dorothy was Laurie's oldest sister, who'd gotten pregnant out of wedlock when Laurie had been an impressionable eleven-year-old. Indelibly burned into Laurie's brain was the scandal her sister's indiscretion had caused, the fighting and screaming in the home before Dorothy had been kicked out in disgrace. Though Laurie was now eighteen and wholesomely endowed with a strong sexual urge, she carried in the back of her mind a little girl's unrealistic fear of intercourse.

Laurie vowed she would never have sex before she got married, and because of her muddled emotions she wasn't sure she wanted to have it then, even. So far as sex before marriage was concerned, Laurie was like a girl walking a tightrope--with her healthy, sex-hungry body trying to pull her off and her incredibly uptight mind attempting to keep her walking the dangerous, slippery rope.

"It was all I could do to keep from punching that prick right in the nose!" Tom muttered as he walked up to Laurie and put his arms around her from behind. "Now that you know the truth about that Caldwell bastard, are you ready to pack your bag and let me take you home?"

"He did it for a reason!" Laurie whined, struggling to get herself under control.

"Sure, he did it for a reason," Tom groaned.

"He can't resist quality tail!"

"For heaven's sake, Tom! That wasn't it at all. Mister Lovato told me he ordered Vince to do it."

"What?!"

"Yes. He said they only wanted good, proper girls working for them! So, you see, it was only a test!"

"Christ, Laurie! You're not really that dumb, are you? And who the crap is Mister Lovato anyway?"

"Didn't you hear, Mister Snoop?" Laurie asked caustically, taking her confusion out on Tom without realizing it.

"Not all of it," Tom snapped.

"Mister Lovato is the regional director of the sales organization we're working for . . . and he doesn't want any scandal among his employees. So there!" the tumultuously upset girl snapped back before she flung her boy friend's arms from around her and dove into the pool to cool off.

"Goddamn you, Laurie," Tom muttered under his breath, and he dove in after her.

"Get away," Laurie warned, eluding Tom but swimming herself into a corner of the deep end. "Leave me alone! I've had it with you! I don't want to argue any more!"

He trapped her, backing her into the corner and putting an arm on each side of her, pressing his body to hers as he braced himself with his elbows on the pool's edge.

"Don't, Tom! I'm mad at you!"

"Why are you mad at me?" he demanded. "I didn't goose you—-Vince did! And how about that so-called regional director standing by and laughing while Vince gets away with a crude feel? That's directing? In a pig's eye, it is! If that sonovabitch ever touches you again, I want to know about it, Laurie! I'll knock his capped teeth out for him!"

"You're just jealous, Tom! Vince didn't mean anything personal by it! He was just doing his job, testing the girls!"

"Sure he was, the rotten bastard! Probably making a list of--"

"He's not a bastard!" Laurie insisted, her own guilt forcing her to defend Vince. "You wouldn't understand, but Vince is just a guy trying to earn a living! Would a bastard and his wife make a special trip to see my father, and risk catching the flu just to get his signature so I can work selling magazine subscriptions this summer and maybe earn enough money to start college? Would a bastard advance me fifty dollars to buy my uniforms? Would a bastard let you have a private room because you didn't want to sleep dormitory-style with the other boys? Would a bas--"

Tom clapped a hand over Laurie's mouth to silence her. Though the cost of his single room would be taken out of his commissions at the end of the summer, just like all the group's expenses and the fifty dollars Vince had advanced Laurie would be charged to each, respectively, he, too, was tired of arguing with the girl he loved. Her trusting innocence was part of the reason he'd fallen for her, so he figured he couldn't very well hold her naivete against her. The only thing to do, he decided, was to go along for the ride and protect her as best he could.

"All right," Tom said. "You win, honey. Old Vince can walk on water, and if Sue ever gives birth, I'm sure she'll be a virgin when they wheel her into the delivery room."

"You don't have to be sarcastic!"

"I said, you win. To hell with fighting. Let's kiss and make up," Tom said, and before Laurie could say anything else he locked his mouth to her parted lips and gave her the full length of his tongue.

At first Laurie tried to push him away, because she was angry and frustrated and terribly aroused sexually. And she didn't want him to kiss her right there in the pool, where everyone who wanted to look could see them. But Tom wouldn't be pushed away. He kept kissing her and rubbing against her until she forgot about being angry with him. His tongue was darting around inside her mouth, licking the smooth inner surfaces of her cheeks, the roughened roof of her mouth, circling her tongue and coaxing it to respond and, as always, she did respond.

Tentatively, Laurie allowed her tongue to lick back at Tom's once, twice, a third time, having to follow his snakelike organ as he drew it from her mouth, little by little. When she had only the tip of his persuasive invader left, she flicked it rapidly and clasped his narrow waist with her hands. They were underwater except for their heads and Tom's arms and shoulders, so she knew no one could see her holding him. Then his tongue retreated from her lips after leaving an invitation for hers to follow. She slid her arms around him, hugging him as she heaved a sigh and thrust her tongue all the way into his irresistible mouth.

Tom gave her tongue the kind of treatment he knew from past experience would get to Laurie. Gentle sucking came first, followed by light nibbling and gradually increasing suction. All the while, he was rubbing his rising penis against her belly and easing her legs apart with his knees. When Laurie whimpered and let her legs fall open, he laved the undersurface of her tongue with the top of his, sucking it hungrily and dry-humping her beneath the surface of the water, bumping his erection against her crotch and grinding it over the clefted mound of her virginal pussy through their bathing suits.

When he thrust his tongue back into her mouth and began pumping it in and out suggestively, she moaned through her nose and wrapped her legs around his waist.

"Take it out, honey," he urged.

"No!" she gasped.

"No one will know, Laurie. Take it out and hold it in your hand. That's all I'll ask you to do, baby." '

"I know you better than that, Tom! You'd better quit now, anyway! We shouldn't be doing this!"

"I like it. I'd rather rub it against you than put it in any other girl."

"That's because you love me," she cooed impulsively, hugging him with her legs and arms at the same time.

"Mmmm . . . yeah, baby."

"And I love you, Tom, a lot. . . but you'd still better quit!" she rasped. She could feel herself weakening, wanting to do much more than hold his penis--and it scared her.

"In a minute," he panted, rubbing the undersurface of his peter a bit faster against the hairy mound of soft, red-hot-sex flesh beneath Laurie's bikini bottom.

Seconds later Tom kissed her, and when he did he rammed his tongue down her throat and began shuddering and moaning. Then he broke the kiss and looked at her sheepishly. "I didn't intend to go that far, sweetheart. . . honest, I didn't."

Laurie smiled tensely and caressed his back. "Was it good, darling?"

"You better believe it, honey."

"And you'd better not ever screw another girl. That's why I let you go this far. Now, back off. I'm afraid you'll make me pregnant."

He laughed. "There's only a million-to-one chance that you'll be the world's second virgin mother."

"Better to be safe than sorry. Go wash your trunks while I swim you out of my system. It made me hot, too, you know. Only I didn't get any relief."

"If you'd let me put it in you, you'd get plenty of relief," he said, grinning, and kissed the tip of her cute nose before he pushed away from her and began treading water.

"The day my name is Barringer," she promised, and swam past him, not feeling anywhere near as confident and light-hearted as she hoped she sounded.