Chapter 13
Then they were there. The impressive apartment building faced the water, and there was ample parking space for both cars.
The apartment was a vast expanse of carpeted areas and ultra-modern furniture. Small talk-a drink-music from hidden speakers, soft, throbbing. Gil and Una huddled at the bar, his head bent toward hers. Time seemed to stand still.
Susan tried to catch Gil's eye, to tell him, Goddammit! Let's get out of this guilded spider's den and go home.
He wouldn't look at her. He had eyes only for Una. She wore an extremely low cut gown, sparkling with rhinestones. The cut gave Gil a spectacular view of lush upper breast-curves and when Una laughed, as she did often, she would let her shoulders slump forward to reveal even more.
"What about that coffee?" Susan asked.
"Later," Gil said. "Right now I'm making a fool of myself with good scotch."
Later, she had a chance to speak with Gil.
"Aw, come on, honey!" he said. "We'll cut out before things happen. They haven't tried to rape us yet, have they?"
"Gil," Susan said desperately. "Don't do this! Don't do this to me!"
She felt desperately alone, frightened. Worse, she was beginning to be attracted to Paul Radford. His flattery, his looks, his virility were having their effect on her. Dammit, she was human. He was an attractive man. She felt an ominous air of evil hanging over her. Something was going to happen if they didn't get out of there.
"I'm not going to do anything to you," said Gil. "Una talked pretty freely on the way over. You're right in thinking that they'd like to play games. She admitted as much. But she also said that they didn't believe in pushing people into anything. She said that neither she nor Paul would make the first move. So, if we don't do it, this is just a get-acquainted night. Okay?"
Una Radford broke up the conversation by drawing Gil onto the large rug. She draped herself around him and left Susan alone with Paul while the soft music throbbed.
"They dance well together," Paul observed.
"Yes."
"Shall we see if we can do as well?"
There was nothing else to do. Her husband was dancing with the tall, beautiful Una. She let Paul take her into his arms. He was a good dancer. He didn't hold her tightly. There was no clutching, no pressing of his body against hers. Gradually, she let the tension drain out of her.
It was good music and Paul was a fine dancer and the drinks were buzzing around inside her head. Well, it was get-acquainted night. She wouldn't make the first move. She felt relatively safe. She decided to relax and enjoy it. After all, a very attractive man was being very attentive.
"You're a fine dancer," she said.
"It's only because of my partner," he said. He had a nice way of talking. Flattery which would have sounded corny from someone else sounded natural on Paul's lips.
It was, she discovered, after midnight. There had been several trips to the bar. They had stopped dancing and were sitting in the living area.
"See," Gil told her in a whisper, while Paul and Una were doing something somewhere else, "I told you it would be all right."
Paul came back and began talking about hobbies. It seemed that he was very hip on photography.
"Lately," he said, "I've been shooting color movies. I know it sounds immodest, but some of them are damned good."
"Well, they are, darling," Una said. "You don't have to be modest."
"Too bad we can't see some of them," said Gil.
Paul chuckled. "I just happen to have brought my projector and screen and a few choice samples." He turned to Susan. "I don't want to bore you. If you'd rather not...."
"Please show them." Susan was being polite. She expected typical home movies. "I'd like to see them."
"Remember," Paul laughed. "You insisted." Paul set up a large screen and the projector. He directed Susan to sit beside him on a couch behind the projector, which was set on a low table. Gil and Una were on a matching couch a few feet away and to one side.
"Lights out!" Radford said, throwing a switch to plunge the room into total darkness. As he made his way back to the couch, he put his hand on Susan's leg.
"Excuse me," he said. "Can't see a thing."
The projector lights came on, but the machine was well shielded. Only the beam of light to the screen was visible. The rest of the room was in darkness. An image jumped onto the screen. Susan recognized the expensive swimming pool in front of which Paul had been standing when the picture he had sent them was made. The color was beautiful. The camera panned the area, showing that the pool was enclosed completely. Una Radford walked into the scene, very much at ease.
Una said, "I didn't know Paul was within a hundred miles when this was taken. I thought he'd gone out."
"You're not going to be modest, are you?" Paul asked her.
"Nice picture," Gil said. His voice was muddy. Susan could tell that he was pretty well smashed.
"Very nice picture," she heard Gil say as Una Radford, in the movie, quickly stripped off her clothing. It was skillfully done. The full-color image was almost life-size. She dropped her neat skirt, unbuttoned and slipped out of her blouse. She stretched, clad in panties and bra.
She rubbed her breasts, as most women do when they first remove a bra, to ease the irritation of straps. She stepped out of her panties quickly and gracefully. She kicked them to one side and lay down on a lounge. She sat up after a moment, took sun lotion and, in a slow, sensuous caress, applied it to her breasts, her stomach, her thighs, her legs.
"All I was doing was taking a sun-bath," said Una, "and that sneak was hidden in the bushes with his little camera."
Una, the image, lay back. The camera zoomed in for a close-up of her breasts. The camera came slowly down past her indrawn stomach, paused for a moment, then went a bit lower. Una slowly raised one leg to cock her knee. The picture faded out at Una's ankle.
"Now isn't that pretty good for a beginner?" Paul asked. It was as if he were discussing a snapshot of the Grand Canyon or something.
"I'm impressed," said Gil from the darkness across the room. "The audience wants more."
"More of what, darling?" Una asked in a low voice.
"I'm afraid I didn't bring any more of my own pictures," Paul said. "However, I do have a reel or two of some very interesting stuff."
"Run it," said Gil.
"It's a bit-unusual," said Paul.
"Stop being shy, darling," Una said. "We're all adults."
"Everyone get decent," Paul said. "I'll have to have some light."
Una's lipstick was smeared, Susan saw. She also noted how close Gil was sitting to Una. Dammit, he'd said nothing was going to happen! Either he was making the moves, or he had been wrong about Una.
How had she ever allowed herself to be put in such a position? All Gil was thinking about was getting into Una Radford's well filled lingerie. He was forgetting that this was not like the time with Lucia. This time, things could be very different, because there was another man around.
Darkness-the hum of the projector-a woman, nude, attractive, not as pretty as Una Radford. She was well formed and lay on her back on a bed reading a book. For a few seconds, nothing happened.
The camera moved from the woman to a window to show the face of a man. He pushed open the french window and stepped into the room and grabbed the nude woman. There was a struggle, and the pair fell heavily across the bed.
Soon the struggle stopped. There was a kiss, closeup. A warm smile of pleasure was on the woman's face when the kiss broke, and the camera moved to show why.
Susan could hear her own breathing.
The man stripped quickly. Closeup camera work showed vivid details of what followed. There was silence in the living room of the luxurious apartment and she could sense Paul Radford's presence close to her although he was not touching her.
"WowI" Susan said when the film ended.
"Wild, isn't it?" Paul asked. "It's one of the better ones, I think. You'd almost believe they were enjoying it, not just acting."
"I've never seen anything like it," Susan said. She felt strangely excited. The film had aroused familiar stirrings within her that she recognized as danger signals. A little more of that kind of stimulation and-
"Would you like to see another?" Paul asked.
"I don't know," Susan said, torn between her curiosity to see what else Paul had in his photographic bag of tricks and the common-sense desire to get the hell out of there. "Gil, what about you. Want to see another?"
Silence.
"Now where the heck are they?" she asked. "My guess would be-in bed!" Paul's voice was quiet.
Susan's heart leaped. She rose from the couch hurriedly and bumped into the table.
"You'd better let me turn on a light," Paul said. He found the switch for a small table lamp. The couch was empty. There were only Susan and Paul in the room.
"Shall we do a little spying?" Radford asked with a laugh.
Susan, unable to find her voice, nodded. Radford led the way toward the bedrooms.
The door was open. Una Radford was perched astride Gil. They were both nude. As Susan watched just outside the door, in the light of a bed lamp she saw Una raise herself high, lower herself, heard her moan with pleasure. They were already hard at it!
She was frozen to the spot. It was so damned sudden, so unexpected. Gil had told her nothing would happen unless one of them made the first move. Well, Mr. Gil Emory must have done some serious moving while the movies were being shown.
She felt the touch of Paul's hand on her arm. His arm went around her waist. She couldn't move. She could only watch the slow movements of the two on the bed. Her husband! And a beautiful woman who was giving herself to him, giving herself with evident enthusiasm. She saw Una, impaled, lifting, lowering, Gil moving up, down.
Then suddenly, Una disengaged herself, went into a crouch to do something to Gil Susan had never done. She watched Gil's face and gasped as he put his hands behind Una's blonde head and locked his fingers in her tousled hair. His body arched, and he sighed.
Radford pulled her away. If he had tried to pull her into the bedroom, she might have screamed.
He drew her back into the living area.
"I didn't expect that," he said. "I wasn't sure we were ready for that."
Susan couldn't speak.
"Don't be upset," he pleaded.
Emotions battled within her. Repulsion-guilt-feeling of wrongness. Yet, riding over it all, there was lust, crying out with its inexorable voice. Una was having Gil. Gil was venting his passion in that soft, blonde body.
And here was her partner, standing beside her, a man, an attractive man who wanted her. It was wrong, but its very wrongness added zest to the singing passion that engulfed her in a flood.
Slowly, deliberately, she reached behind her. She found the zipper and undid it. She shrugged out of the dress and let it fall to the floor. She posed for a moment for Paul, because his eyes were admiring her, seemed to penetrate the flimsy covering of her white panties, her lacy bra.
"How very beautiful!" Paul breathed. He didn't touch her then. He waited as she dropped her bra, stepped out of her panties. Then he lifted her into his arms. She let her head rest against his shoulder, felt the strength of his body as he carried her.
The bed was huge and firm. She lay on her back and watched as Paul removed his clothes. He was a very big man, bigger than Gil.
He walked slowly to the bed and stood for a moment, looking down at her.
"Lovely Susan!" he murmured.