Chapter 8
Joe sat on the sofa in Annie's living room and reached down to scratch Jocko's chin. Yammering little mutt, he thought, but was unable to restrain a smile at the puppy's frantic antics. Jocko danced about at his feet, whimpering to be picked up. Well, there'll be no peace, Joe decided, so he gathered the tiny black poodle onto his lap. It was impossible not to like the cute puppy, but what really got on his nerves was when the little bastard insisted on making a threesome when he and Annie were in bed together.
He leaned back, letting Jocko lick his hands, listening to the peaceful, domestic sounds of Annie's puttering in the kitchen. What was he going to do? he wondered, wearily rubbing his eyes. No answer came. None seemed imminent despite these four days of brain wracking and soul searching. The dazzling blonde vision danced through his head again, her loveliness taunting him, pricking him with desire Oh Carla, why do I want you so? ... Again no answer.
He ought to have his head examined. Here he had a wonderful, beautiful, faithful woman, and he was just one step short of breaking her heart, destroying both of them maybe. Why, for god's sake? With Carla, he knew he was skating off on a thin-iced adventure that could wreak havoc on several lives. With Annie, he had everything a sane man could want. Fabulous sex, sweet, loving warmth, a tender thread of stability that could reel out into a happy lifetime's length. The great dinner Annie had cooked him this evening was a perfect illustration of his folly-Carla couldn't even boil water. All she had to offer was excitement.
Carla was like the driving rock 'n' roll music down on the Square. She spellbound you with her siren voice, even against your will. That's the way it was with Carla. Even against his will, against every instinct of better judgment, she was a magic, heady champagne that he must drink.
Annie came in from the kitchen bearing a tray laden with coffee and home-made cookies.
"It was a tremendous dinner, sweetheart", he said, patting at his full stomach. "You are one hell of a chicken fryer." How pretty and cute she looked in her baggy sweater and skin-tight black slacks. How could he be such a fool? Here, among other things, was peace. He ought to be supremely contented right now, a fine home-cooked dinner in his gullet, relaxing in old clothes, away from the din.
"I baked you some cookies, dariin'," Annie pointed out, setting the tray on the coffee table. "Hope you like 'em." She sat on the sofa some distance removed from him to pour the coffee.
Joe tasted a cookie. "Delicious, Annie." And they were. Oatmeal-raisin. Sweet thing, she knew that was his favorite kind. She also knew something was wrong, that was plain. Throughout the evening he'd been conscious that both of them were trying to keep things light and easy, like always. It wasn't working. The smiles between them had a forced quality, a sadness behind upturned lips. The golden girl was there between them. He almost felt Annie could look through his eyes and see Carla there, inside his head. He should say something, bring it out into the open, honest and above board. God knew things were no good like this. But what on earth could he say?
"Joe, darlin'", said Annie, settling into the sofa with her coffee, curling her luscious legs under her, a sober expression on her face. "Let's bring it out into the open now, want to?"
He shot her a surprised look. Obviously the suggestion had cost her some effort. Her sweet features were carefully composed, too carefully for naturalness. The blue eyes appeared to be trying to clear themselves of all expression as they gazed steadily at him. He saw sadness and fright behind them.
"Wha ... What do you mean, Annie? Bring what out into the open?" Oh, you're a cowardly heel all right, Joe Barnes. First class, double grade A. He felt like a sneaky kid. As though the cookie that was now turning to dry ashes in his mouth had been stolen from a forbidden jar.
"You know what I mean, darlin'. Something's happened, something's changed. There's a ... a silence between us. We sure can't be going on like this. I think whatever it is, we should talk about it, don't you?" Her face told him she dreaded what he might have to tell her.
He couldn't bring himself to. He said: "Annie, love, you're making something out of nothing. Why, I . .
"Is it another woman, Joe?", she broke in, fearful but persistent. "Have you found someone else, or are you just getting tired of me, or what?"
He hated himself for having brought the dark cloud to those happy blue eyes, for causing the crease that appeared now in the soft brow. Still he faked a smile and said: "Annie, Annie, come on. There's nothing wrong. It must just be a bad time of the month for you ... Hey, I know what's good for what ails you."
He laid his hand on her thigh, just above the knee, and moved it about strokingly. Her first reaction to his suggested cure for her troubles, was negative. She considered him sadly for another long moment, and he thought he saw tears glistening in the corners of her blue eyes. Her hand clasped his, arresting its stroking movements, and her head dropped.
The pained silence dragged on. No sound was audible other than Annie's deep, weary breathing and little Jocko's quizzical scurrying on the sofa between them. Finally, she raised her eyes. A weak smile hovered bravely about her lips.
She said: "Well then, why don't you kiss me?"
Joe moved rapidly to embrace her, yearning but unable to open his aching heart to this beloved woman. As he cradled her in his arms, he thought he heard a sob-like groan pass through her. When he pulled his head back to see, her eyes were dry. Dry, sad, dully bleak.
"Cheer up, Angel", he soothed into her ear, catching her lobe gently in his teeth, trying to capture a mood between them but not even convincing himself. "Everything's gonna work out fine."
Annie mumbled something inaudible. He couldn't make it out, but imagined he caught the phrase, " ... the last time."
He worked his hands on her back, sensing the ripe femininity beneath the baggy sweater. He sniffed the fragrance of her hair. Despite the intimate closeness, the rare desirability of her, his arousal was slow to kindle. Finally, the first flicker made itself felt as he slipped his moving hands beneath the sweater and stroked the smoothness of her bare skin.
"Kiss me, Joe", she bade again. As their lips met, his heart sank at the coolness of hers. Obviously she too was having some difficulty turning on, whereas her usual response to his caressing was quick and passionate. Could their love making have deteriorated so quickly into a hallow ritual?
He insinuated his tongue hesitantly between her cool lips as the kiss continued. Suddenly, as their tongues met, tentatively at first, he felt her passion explode in his arms She came to him hungrily, her mouth opening wide and wetly, growing torridly hot in an instant, her arms trapping him tightly about the neck. Her sudden ignition overpowered him as she forced him back on the cushions, jamming her firm curves hard into him, breaking the marathon kiss only to cover his face with hot tongue-stings and then rejoin.
Joe's own ardor struck at last and quickly matched hers. For the first time in days, he knew release from the guilty binds of his confused emotions. Now he was simply a male engulfed in the erotic closeness of an intensely desirable female. His senses came vividly alive, focusing on Annie as the coveted object of their gratification.
"See, I told you this would be good for what ails you", he reminded her teasingly. His eager hands unsnapped her bra beneath the sweater.
Annie did not reply, apparently preferring to continue her hot-breathed, tonguing attentions to his ear. Each wet jab at the orifice sent a new and stronger wave of need plunging through his body. His hand, he noticed, was beginning to shake as he forced it beneath her weight upon his chest and found the softness of a lolling breast. Annie raised up enough to allow him to cup the luscious vessel and ease it free of their compressed contact. As she stabbed him again wtih a deep-drinking kiss, he avidly explored the ripe heaviness of the breast. Cupping, stroking, kneading its swelling roundness, Joe heard and felt a gurgle of pleasure leap from her throat into his own, through the sweet, dark corridor of their kiss.
Struggling to a sitting position, he shakenly suggested: "Let's go into the other room, want to?"
Annie merely nodded, her blue eyes now glazed with passion, her moist upper lip fluttering with frank carnality. Joe stood and swept her into his arms. He carried her to the dimly lit bedroom and lowered her carefully, gently onto the bed. Standing, he quickly divested himself of his clothing and stood over her. Her eyes, as they had so often shown before at such times, flicked frankly down from his face and examined him for a long moment. When they returned to his face, they were filled with the same craving admiration as always. It moved him deeply for her to look at him in that way. Maybe he could get hold of himself yet, before it was too late, before he lunged headlong and irretrievably into the folly that was engulfing him these days.
"That's a cute outfit you're wearing, hon, but isn't it about due to go to the cleaners?", he ventured with sly tepderness.
For answer, Annie unzipped the side of her clinging slacks. Quickly, Joe seized the garment at the waist and slithered it downward over the lush curves of her hips, thighs, and calfs. Her panties were as rapidly disposed of by the same caressing route, as he thrilled to the touch of her smooth, undulating firmness in torso and limb. In the half light, he observed her watching him expectantly from the midst of her glistening semi-nudity. He swallowed hard against his hunger for her.
He went to his knees beside her and together they removed sweater and bra, his hands rasping warmly over her hardening nipples in the process. Now Annie lay in complete and shimmering nudity before him.
Devouring her consummate sexuality, he breathed, "Oh yes, Annie, you are a lot of woman"
She held out her arms to him and he went to her, enfolding her, tingling to the satin nakedness pressed against the length of his body. Their open mouths joined again as their bodies strained wantonly against each other, the writhing friction fanning the flames of desire to giddy heights.
Seeking hands eagerly found and clutched at each other's nudity with growing urgency. As his anointed fingers dexterously belabored her, Joe heard the breath catching raggedly in Annie's throat.
"Are you ready, Annie?", he muttered.
"Yes, I'm ready, Joe dariin' ... I'm ready", she strangled, her hips jerking violently in tune with his intimate finger exercises.
Pausing briefly and tantalizingly in the threshold of her open welcome, he met her in a roller coaster plunge of shocking delight that tore shuddering gasps from both of them. Then they were deeply together, sharing the joyous knowledge they had shared so many times before, but which never ceased to thrill anew.
Their rhythmic dance started at the slow tempo he knew she preferred at the outset. Slowly, teasingly, each fibre of their beings savored the wondrous closeness. Gradually, bit by bit, as he felt her arms tighten across his back and her heels dig more firmly into his calfs, he stepped up the cadence.
His own urgency mounted to the bursting point. The soft presence he contained in his arms and impaled on his now ferocious thrusts, became a writhing, moaning, scratching thing, clapped in the jaws of a need that he knew matched his own. At the instant his body ran from him and battered through the gates of fulfillment, Annie went taut, clamping him in a steel trap of creamy flesh, and screamed acknowledgement of her own agonizing completion.
For some time they remained entwined in the collapsed aftermath of their draining encounter, until panting breath and enfeebled, twitching limbs could again be controlled.
Joe made to pull away at last, but she held him ensnared.
"Oh, Joe, I'm afraid", she moaned.
He tried again to disentangle himself, about to frame some words of reassurance when a gale of weeping broke within her and came raining out of her shaking body. Annie clutched him tightly with legs and arms, and sobbed: "I'm losing you, darlin', I'm losing you. You're already gone."
Joe relaxed in the soft, shuddering cradle of her, listening wretchedly to her bitter weeping, hating himself. How fervently he wished he could dry her tears in the right way. By making her know there was nothing, no golden venus-vixen, standing between them, but his lips were sealed. He cared deeply for this Annie, for her goodness. Yes, he loved her, he believed, but he couldn't, in honesty, tell her what she so desperately wanted to hear. Carla was a fact. A crazy, disastrous, exciting, fatally fascinating fact of his life that had brought he and Annie to this.
Annie released him, her flood of tears ebbing, and he sat up.
"Joe", she sniffled, staring bleakly at the ceiling, "is it Carla Smith?"
"... Yes, Annie", he managed after a pause, his eyes dropping.
"Do you love her?"
"I don't know ... No, I don't think so. I don't think it could be called love ... I guess I've lost the right to say this but, crzay as it sounds, I still think I love you."
"She's a very beautiful woman", said Annie hopelessly.
"Yes," he quietly agreed.
Another spasm shook Annie's lovely body and she pressed her hands to her eyes. "Oh, Joe", she wailed. "What can I do? I'd like to scratch her eyes out, kill her, for taking you away from me ... but I can't fight her. She's so lovely and I'm such a mess."
Joe considered her, a sad smile coming despite himself at her miscalculation of her charms. "Annie, you're not a mess", he said gently, patting her lush thigh. "You're a beautiful girl, more beautiful than Carla."
"Oh, Joe, I am not", she fired back miserably. "I've got eyes. I can see! She's so pretty and poised and sophisticated, and wears such elegant clothes. I'm just a clumsy hick from the country. I don't blame you for wanting her instead of me"
"Hush now, Annie, you're talking silly", he tried to soothe her.
"No, I don't blame you at all, Joe" There was a trace of hysteria in her voice. "Look at her figure. So slender and graceful, and I'm so fat and sloppy."
He wondered how such an obviously beautiful girl could put herself down so, could so misjudge her physical charms. "Annie, what you're saying simply isn't so."
"And her flashy blonde hair", Annie went on between sobs. "Mine must look like steel wool next to hers. No, I don't blame you, Joe, I don't blame you...." She repeated the pathetic absolution over and over again until her voice trailed off at last.
Later, when they had dressed and Joe was preparing to leave, Annie, now dry-eyed and practical, said: "Well, Joe, I guess I'd best not come to the office any more."
He knew she was right. Her position would be intolerable if they tried to continue a working relationship, at least for now.
"What will you do?", he inquired wretchedly.
"Oh, I'll look around. There's always a place for a good secretary", she said without enthusiasm.
"Look, Annie, take your time. I mean, you won't need to worry about money. I'll keep sending your paychecks until you find something really suitable." That's the very least you can do, you bastard, he said to himself.
"And, Annie", he added, "don't underestimate yourself. That stuff you were saying, comparing yourself with Carla ... I'm the villain of this piece, nobody else, and I know it. I don't know what's got into me, but I just can't seem to help myself."
There was nothing more to say. They shook hands sensibly and civilly. As the door of Annie's duplex closed behind him, Joe's eyes swept the starlit horizon of the muggy July night. Strangely, a cold wind materialized out of the hot darkness and swept-chillingly through him.