Chapter 8

The boy eased himself down on his teenage girlfriend. "Just relax."

"But...." Her face contorted, reflected the simmering of pain. She groaned.

There ... there it is." He was motionless, hovering over the girl, studying the tears that had crested in the corners of her eyes. "It's gonna be all right, now," he whispered. And then he began a slow back-and-forth motion that was tempered with gentleness and brimmed with promise.

Rita stole closer. The teenager's golden limbs yawned wider and wider apart. Her hands, clenched in pain just seconds before, now opened and clasped at her lover's broad tanned back.

Joel, cognizant of the thrills that he was now bringing to the girl's body, increased the tempo.

The girl was no longer impassive. Her firm young buttocks squirmed.

"Better?" the boy whispered.

"Ohhhhhh, y-yes! Yes, i-it's ... ohhhhhh, Joel! . . , Joel, i-it's WONDERFULLLLLLLL!"

The boy went faster. His hands sought the lushness of the teenager's pinkened breasts. Their bodies slapped together. Lee locked her tawny legs around his waist Her eyes rolled.

"Feel good?"

"Ohhhhhhhh!"

"Does it?"

"Y-yes ... YES!"

The boy was enthralled with her moans of delight. He thundered at her like a madman. But the teenager asked for no mercy. She accepted what there was of him and pleaded for more.

Rita couldn't stand to watch them any longer; the sigth of them was driving her insane with desire, and she moved off to the kitchen. Her nerves were a mess, she noticed: Her hands were trembling, saliva was locked in her throat.

She poured herself a drink to steady her hands. She didn't want to recall the mental images of what she had just witnessed, but the exciting visions were not to be easily banished from her mind. Shamelessly, she knew she yearned to be the subject of the boy's ardent thrusts. His endurance was maddening, she thought. Other youths, less experienced ones, would have exploded prematurely. But this youth in the bedroom and why did she have to keep remembering it? he knew the trick of lasting, of coming to a rest and then starting anew.

She washed her desires away with another drink. And then another. She blotted out the frenzied sounds of love that emanated from the bedroom, stood forlornly at the window and looked down upon the busy street below.

She bit her lips and chain-smoked her way through several cigarettes; and at last it was quiet in the bedroom. Sighs of happiness would now be escaping from their mouths, she thought, sighs of completion and love. And they would be locked in that final embrace: A shivering tender resolve of peace. Of peace and contentment. And as Rita thought of it, hungered for it, the loneliness and frustration drove her back to the bourbon.

Surprisingly, it was the girl who first emerged from the bedroom and when she discovered Rita sitting alone in the kitchen, she let out a small cry of fright.

"I-I didn't know you were here. I ... I mean we ... we thought you were still out."

Rita was amused by the teenager's embarrassment. And her hair was disheveled, her clothes wrinkled there could be little doubt of what had taken place even without Rita's eye-witness account. "So quit stammering and pour yourself a drink."

The girl did. Her hands were trembling. "Rita, you'll never guess what happened ... I mean...."

Rita couldn't control the mischievous smile that came to her face. "Tm not a dummy, Lee. I think I know what happened."

"Are you mad?"

Envious would have been a better word, Rita thought, and she said, "Why should I be mad?"

Suddenly, after sipping some of her vodka, the teenager leaned close and whispered into Rita's ear: "And you were right It does feel good!"

Rita was glad. She hadn't set out on a course to debauch the younger girl, but at least the teenager had been given an opportunity that Rita never had: that is, the freedom of choosing whether she wanted to be seduced. In Rita's case, her mother hadn't even allowed her to go out with a boy, much less go to bed with one, so it was good to see that other kids were not denied that right better yet to know that they had enjoyed themselves.

"Were there any phones calls while I was out?" Rita asked.

The teenager shook her head. "Not a one."

Rita frowned. It was strange that her advertisement hadn't brought more response.

"Sunday is probably the day that they'll all call," Lee offered.

Rita didn't answer her, but she hoped that Lee was right. She had to have models and good ones!

"When are we gonna start trying those clothes on?" Lee asked.

Rita told her next week. Monday she would air mail her orders. By the end of the week, the stock should begin filtering in.

"You can come over after school," Rita suggested, "and we'll start practicing."

"Sounds like fun," Lee ventured.

Rita shot a glimpse at the teenager's body, and at Joel, who had just entered the kitchen. "It will be fun," she said. "Lots of fun."

"Can Joel come?" Lee asked.

The double-entendre amused her. Remembering the vivid scene she had recently witnessed in her bedroom, she smiled and said: "Sure he can come! He can come whenever he wants."

The boy gave her a peculiar smile and Rita wasn't sure whether he had caught on, or not. He sat at the table and poured himself a drink; Rita could scarcely take her gaze from him and the memory of him and Lee filled her with renewed desire.

She was glad, therefore, when they announced they were leaving something about a swimming date with another couple and not because there was any lessening of desire on her part; but she knew that if they stayed another hour, she'd get the boy drunk, maybe Lee, too; and then there'd be a wild frolic in bed not that that was so terrible but she had things to do: the pressing details of her business, and she needed every hour she could command.

"You sure you don't wanna come along?" Lee said at the door.

"I'd love to," Rita answered, flicking her eyes at Joel, "but I just can't afford the time. I do hope you understand."

"Sure," they chorused. And then Joel added: "Maybe another time huh?"

"Sure, Joel. Another time."

I'll call you next week, then. Okay?" Lee said.

Rita told her that would be fine, then closing the door on them, she collapsed on the sofa. Her body was wretched with desire. She would have given anything in the world to have gone to bed with the teenage boy; that was one thrill she had never experienced. Maybe he was awfully young, but again remembering his stalwart attack, his staying power, and the zest of his youth, she reasoned him more than capable of satisfying her not simply satisfying her, but perhaps driving her out of her mind.

She finally blotted these erotic thoughts out of her head and made herself some lunch. The drinks had left her slightly numbed, but after she had consumed two sandwiches, drank a measure of hot tea, then washed up, she began to feel herself again, and by two o'clock she was busy at the phone.

The office of the building contractor was closed on Saturday afternoon; however, she was able to reach him at his home. She gave him an effervescent green light on the alterations for her fashion shop; he could bring the contracts to her apartment over the weekend; there was no reason for delay.

After she had hung up on him, it occurred to her that she was really jumping the gun she still didn't have Ridgewood's $10,000 in the bank but this was a small item, she told herself. And by Monday that was less than 48 hours, now she would have the money; and more than enough.

She spent the rest of the afternoon studying catalogues and making selections. She broke away from this on three occasions: young girls phoning about her ad in the paper. Appointments were scheduled for Monday afternoon; she had to explain that Sunday was impossible just too much work and then she returned to her catalogues.

Midnight arrived and she was bone-weary, racked with fatigue. She struggled to an all-night delicatessen, forced down a corned-beef sandwich, some coffee; exhaustion weighted her like a crippling disease.

Sunday was, in many respects, no different than Saturday: She poured over the catalogues and order blanks through much of the day, estimated stock requirements, ranges in size, selections; her discriminatory powers were taxed to the limit.

There was a break in the routine during the late afternoon. The building contractor arrived with his paperwork, and this having been dispensed with, she entertained more phone calls; teenage girls who had seen her ad and wanted a job. The additional response pleased her; obviously, there would be no shortage of teenage models.

Everything seemed to be in order, she decided at five o'clock. Her order blanks were filled, several appointments had been set up for Monday, the building contractor had the green light and then it hit her: Henry I The tapes! She hadn't copied the tapes.

Desperation best described her Sunday night. She had to feed through six hours of recording tape on one machine and pick up the playback on a second recorder. There were minor breakdowns in the taping mechanism, some alarm when she couldn't at first locate some mending tape; and during this madcap ordeal, she smoked nearly two packs of cigarettes.

His sexy conversation failed to excite at least, not in the manner that they had when she first heard them and if anything, they bored her. But Henry, she remembered, had captured a great deal of sexual excitement over talking this way on the phone. He would describe some former sex act they had performed, used graphic four-letter words, and it never occurred to him that she was recording his every word. And why had she done it? At the time, she couldn't have said, but it wasn't part of a plan to blackmail him. Of this, she was certain. But on the other hand, wasn't this exactly what it amounted to? And now Henry's words droned to her ears, his closing words on the last of the tapes:

"Rita, I wish you'd screw me...."

To which she now answered out loud: "I will, Henry. I will!" But not in the manner he so desperately wished it, she thought. And this was one screwing that Henry wouldn't be able to gloat about...