Chapter 10

"How come the bed is mussed?" she asked. "I had a headache and sacked out."

"What time did you get back."

"An hour ago."

"And Darla was here all that time."

"I told you I didn't feel well. That's why I had her stay. Do you mind?" he said irritably. "Just asking."

He lit a cigarette. Maybe he should ask her a few questions. For instance, where were the lamps she just had to buy? And why the imagine knit suit she was wearing?

Seemingly, she read his mind. "Those lamps they had on sale looked worse than ours." She removed her suit and slip, disappeared briefly, returned wearing shorts and a blue and white striped slipover. She sat beside him. "Miss me?"

"Uh, huh."

She smiled tenderly and sought his eyes. "Look at me." He did. "Love me."

"Uh, huh."

"Say it."

"I love you." And it was pathetically contrived. She knew it, too.

"What's wrong with us, Bill?" She rested her hand over his.

"Is something supposed to be wrong?" he said, avoiding her questioning gaze.

"You know it is. For the past few days, we've been like strangers to each other. Why?"

He was silent. His eyes were fixed on the floor.

"I can't be the way you want me right away, honey. It'll take time. I told you."

"What are you talking about?" he said coldly.

"You know ... like last night. I mean ... you'd like it if I let myself go more...."

"Edie...."

"No, let me do the talking."

"But...."

"The next party we have," she said, clasping his hand tightly, "I'll do anything you want. I promise."

. He started to tell her that that wasn't it, but the phone rang. It was Sinclair.

"Bill, I hate myself a million ways for having to call you again, but...."

"What's the problem?"

"Is the Missus there?"

"Yeah?" he said suspiciously. "Why?"

"Then we can't talk about this now," Sinclair said worriedly. He paused. "Look, could you go to some outside phone and call me?"

"I suppose. What's it all about?"

"Tell you when you call. Will it be long?"

"Five minutes."

"Good."

He hung up and went out to the bar. He dialed Sinclair's number, but the line was busy. He had two drinks, dialed again. This time the call went through.

"So what's the problem?"

Sinclair cleared his throat. "You," he said.

"Me?"

"Yes." He paused, then went on. "Bill, that Olson contract means quite a lot to our company. You know that. And tomorrow Harrigan is flying in and...."

"What are you worried about? You know I can handle Harrigan."

"Bill, there was a detective down at the office this afternoon. He was asking for you."

"A detective?"

"Are you in some kind of trouble, Bill?"

"Hell, no," he snapped. "Is this some kind of a joke or ... wait a minute. I know." His eyes lit up. "The other night...." He told Sinclair about coming home, being slugged, later phoning the police. "They're probably checking to see if we've had any more trouble."

Sinclair sighed heavily. "That's a big load off my mind, Bill. For a while there, I thought I was in danger of losing you and ... boy, I don't want anything to queer this deal with that Olsen firm. We need their work."

"So you can relax," Bill said, wiping his brow. "There's nothing to worry about. I'm not a fugitive. By this time tomorrow, Harrigan will be eating out of our hands."

He went back to the bar and had a few more drinks. Shouldn't be drinking this much, he told himself. Ought to be clear-headed for tomorrow Harrigan coming but hell, he knew how to draw the contracts out of the man. No sweat. Have another drink.

Reaching into his suit coat pocket for some bills, he felt something silky. He pulled the pocket wide. Panties! The babysitter's panties! How in the hell? ... There was a note.

"You want to pay for the drinks now, Mac?"

Absently, Bill reached for his wallet and flung down a five. He read the note. It read: "So you'll have something to remember me by...."

He grinned. The crazy kid. And when had she put the panties there? He'd only left her alone long enough to go to the bathroom and put on ... that was it. The monkey had slipped off the bed and...

Suddenly, Bill climbed off the stool and went to the john. Have to get rid of the damn things. Christ, if Edie discovered them...

He closed and latched the door. He held the panties close to his face. So lovely, so soft, so ... the feeling was coming back. The panties...

A strange compulsion swept over him. He acted without conscious thought, as though under hypnosis. He lowered his pants, his shorts. His trembling hands brought the silken panties to his flesh. His eyes rolled. Then, as though caught in the shame of what he was doing, he came abruptly to his senses. What was the matter with him? Acting like a nut, he was.

He fastened his clothes and flushed her underpants down the toilet bowl. Christ! His face was perspiring; he was acting like a damn kid. A drink, he thought. Calm himself down.

He hurried out to the bar and ordered another bourbon. What had possessed him to do such a thing? he wondered. Why in the hell did it excite him to such a pitch when he did something like that? And that night that he had dressed up like a woman the passion of the act was maddening; was he turning into a goddamn queer?

"Gimme another one, bartender."

The bartender shrugged. "You drink that like it was water."

"That's what it tastes like," he said sarcastically. "Plain old water." He drank it down in a single gulp and went to the phone booth. He called Edie. Why? He didn't even know.

"Where are you?" she asked.

"Getting drunk."

"Why don't you come home and do it."

"Why should I?" he said, feeling the need for belligerence.

She accepted it calmly. "Well, for one reason, I love you. For another, we're having company for supper."

"The Bradfords?" he said tiredly.

"Just one Bradford, thank you. Alice has to fly back to Boston. Her mother is sick, so...." She paused. "...honey, I felt sorry for Tom all alone there tonight, so I asked him to have dinner with us. You don't mind, do you?"

He saw himself stripping her down before Bradford's astonished eyes, making her do things against her will, bringing her shame and degradation. Excitement grew in his loins. "Why should I mind?" he asked. "Maybe we'll have a sex party just the three of us."

She sensed his mood and tried to please him. "I'm all for it," she said gaily, "and if you don't get home here, we're gonna have a sex party without you."

Don't you always? he thought.

"Have you been drinking?" he asked her.

"A couple. And I feel real, real good."

"Is Bradford there now?"

"Naturally. How could we have a sex party if he wasn't here?"

He was silent for a minute, thinking how unnatural she sounded.

"Are you coming home?" she asked again.

"I'll be there."

"You'll hurry?"

He said he would.

" 'Cause I don't know if I can hold off on Tom, or not." She giggled. "I mean if he puts his hand under my dress just one more time ... please hurry."

He hung up. She was playing a game with him, of course. Bradford wasn't there, but she knew it excited him to hear such talk; she desperately wanted to please him. She did this quite frequently in bed at night, teasing him about her high school dates with other boys, supplying him with the kind of answers he most wanted to hear:

"Show me where he touched you."

"Down here."

"I'll betcha you got hot, didn't you."

"Sure I did."

"Where else did he touch you."

"Here."

"Say it."

"My breasts."

"The other word, damn it! Titties. He touched my titties."

"And then you started playing with him, didn't you?"

"I had to."

"Sure you did. And you liked it, didn't you."

"Uh, huh."

"And you wanted to do it with him."

"Uh, huh."

"Say it."

"I wanted him to do it to me."

"Again!"

"Oh, honey. Lets do it. I don't wanna talk about it anymore. I just wanna do it ... with you."

And then he would take her, and remembering those scenes so vividly now, he quickened his steps in the long trek toward their apartment.

She was setting the table when he arrived. She explained that she was only joking about Bradford he had guessed as much but Tom was dining with them, Alice had flown back to Boston, and dinner would be served in approximately 30 minutes.

"I suppose I shouldn't work you up that way," she said, closing the cupboard doors, "but it was the only way I could think of to get you home." She kissed him lightly.

He smelled the gin she had been sipping on. "So now we have two drunks in the family."

She lifted her gin highball off the counter-top and held it to her lips. She flipped the steaks over that were in the broiler. "If you can have fun," she said gaily, "so can I." She drank some of the highball. "Besides, if we're going to have a sex party, I might as well get prepared."

He snickered, and once again he felt the need to say something sharp; however, the drinks had numbed his speech and he ambled wordlessly to the bathroom and closed the door.

He remained there for quite a while. A cold shower put him back on solid ground, but it did not rid him of his miserable headache. Dressing was an effort, his lethargy was unshaken by her announcement that Tom Bradford was here, and the thought of food distressed him even more. He shouted up the hallway that he would be along in a few minutes, that they could go on ahead with the dinner, but Edie argued that they would wait.

He finally did emerge from the bathroom, and upon entering the kitchen he was greeted with a unison of applause. He played the clown, performed a crude bow for them, followed this with the rudiments of a smile. Bradford waved a hearty 'hello', and Bill drew out a chair and sat down.

The dinner was outstanding; the choice steaks had been expertly broiled to his liking, and halfway through the dinner, he began to feel better.

Edie was all smiles, more captivatingly lovely than he had dreamed possible. Her hair was swept up on top chic was the word and she wore the red velvet dress he'd bought her two birthdays ago. It was the first time that she had ever worn it before anyone else too revealing she had declared yet tonight she wore it with supreme indifference. The back of the dress was cut away; the front was tailored with a laced bodice, dipping low to reveal the half-moon risings of her breasts. There was a long, beguiling slit in each side of the dress; something to reveal the creamy white of her thighs.

He told her how lovely she looked, called Bradford's attention to the peep show that was so accessible to the eye; thereby drawing an embarrassed smile from her and an "All right, you two," when they both looked under the table at her legs.

When the steaks had been put away, they sipped quietly on an imported after-dinner wine. Bill had grown increasingly playful and slipped his hand under the table and under Edie's velvet dress. Her thighs were warm, a look of happiness stole into her eyes, and for a dreamful lingering moment, he nearly forgot that her saccharine smile was manufactured for the sake of appeasing him.

Bradford caught the by-play between them, and he leaned back heavily in his chair and said, "If you two lovebirds want ol' Tom to take a walk...."

Bill withdrew his hand. "Just feeling her up," he said with a laugh.

Edie colored. "Anyone for coffee?"

Both men said yes. She climbed away from the table and Bill gave her a playful slap on her buttocks, noticing in the same instant that she wore no girdle.

At the sink, she unplugged the electric coffee maker an effort which caused the short velvet dress to go riding up the backs of her legs. She had on the spike-heeled shoes.

"What d'ya think of those shoes?" he asked Bradford.

Bradford whistled. "Real humdingers! Turn a minister into a sex fiend." His eyes swam up the smoothness of her legs.

Edie pretended not to hear their raucous comments; she concealed her embarrassment with the clatter of cups, bending over their guest to pour the coffee. The wide V of her cocktail dress revealed the bulging imprisonment of her superb breasts. Bill licked his lips; Tom remained red-facedly silent.

When she came to Bill's side of the table, he ran his hands up and down her bare legs and watched the expression on her face.

"Would you like this hot coffee right in your lap?" she said with a giggle.

He moved his hands all the way up to her silk panties. She dodged away. "Damn you!"

Both men laughed.

"Edie, you're uncooperative," Bradford said.

"Absolutely," he agreed. "A man wants to know if his wife is wearing underpants. It's his inalienable right."

She set the percolator down. "Did you find out?" she asked.

"As a matter-of-fact, I didn't." He started to press his hands under her dress again, but she stepped backwards and sat down.

"We could watch TV for a while," she suggested after they had finished their coffee. But neither man thought much of her idea.

"Do either of you know how to play pinochle?" Bradford asked.

"Strip poker sounds like more fun," Bill answered, then he paused to look at Edie, comfortably secure in the knowledge that she would now say: "It's too cold," or something like that.

She sat stiffly silent, returning his gaze with a studied intentness such as he had never known. Her eyes were dark, brooding; her mouth insensitive, still. Then abruptly the expression changed, she smiled. Her eyes were warm, lit with mischief, and she said, "You know, that's something I always wanted to do. Play strip poker."