Rendezvous With a Stranger (6 page)

      
“Is that all you are?” I ask.
 
“A lot of dangerous games?”

      
“If you didn’t want that, Ellen Laurey, I wouldn’t pay any attention to you.”

      
“And why do you call me Ellen Laurey?” I probe directly, adding vehemence to my inquiry.

      
“Because it is your name, is it not?”

      
He knows I lied about myself, but right now, I can’t tell the truth.

      
“So, what would shock me this instant?” I ask.
 
Like a coy flirt, the challenge shoots from my mouth without my taking time to think of its repercussions.

      
He maintains a confounding expression I cannot read.
 
“Go down on my cock—under the table,” he says.

      
I laugh.
 
“You can’t be serious.”

      
“Do it now, or you won’t see me again.”

      
“You are serious.”

      
He doesn’t reply. The lack of words seems all that’s necessary to communicate his message and I look about the restaurant actually considering his demand.
 

      
The time of day means the tavern’s almost vacant, and where we sit there’s no one nearby.
 
I recall when we entered, how he engineered this table, slipping the hostess a twenty to give us the privacy he wants.
 
All pre-planned, how can I fail him and not fail myself?
 

      
There’s just the minimum tablecloth to shield me from an outside view, but that’s hardly enough if someone catches the movement of my feet and legs underneath.
 

      
I go quickly to my knees and bring myself to his crotch.
 
One hand slips along his thigh, the other goes for his zipper.
 
Drawing it down slowly, I note he wears no underwear and the smell of him greets my nostrils with the sweet and pungent odor of sex.
 
His erection is half risen, bobbing at my lips.
 
Taking him in my mouth, I move as briskly as the small space will allow, letting my jaws tighten around the thickness.
 
I draw him deep into me.
 
If he were free to move I sense he’d jam it down my throat, but even he has to make accommodations to have his pleasure here.
 
The further I draw his erection inside my mouth, the more I sense the urgency building in his loins.
 
There’s just a tiny groan to accompany the blowjob and then his hand at my head pressing me with firmness.
 
I let my hand jack the organ while my tongue and mouth play with the foreskin and head.
 
He begins to cum fast.
 
Relief washing over me, I lap his thick juices relishing a taste I’ve had before, but one that grows more sweet the more I’m given the gift of him to suck.

      
I have nothing to wipe my face on, until I pop from underneath the table and the stranger hands me a handkerchief.
 
I smile sheepishly awed by what I’ve just done.

      
“You’re doing well, Ellen Laurey,” he says as he watches me look for signs of voyeurs in the room.

      
I wonder how to reply, but I can’t think of a thing to say.

      
The stranger pays the bill, reaches out to run his fingers through my hair in a minute of affection and then rises to leave.
 
“I won’t be so kind to you next time,” he says and he’s out the door.

      
I take off for the country Saturday morning having made reservations at a Bed and Breakfast Isaac once took me to.
 
There are fields of wine grapes ripening for harvest, and trees ladened with apples ready to press into cider. Autumn reaches its long hand into the midst of my life and shakes it like it shakes winter-bound trees.
 
I want no men in my life for one long day and one long night, no Robby, no stranger, no new pair of staunch legs and throbbing erection to confuse me further.
 
I bring a satchel of books, pieces of promised hours without the outside interference of my thoughts to cloud this vacation.
 
A bottle of brandy will help me sleep and I don’t plan to wake until noon when the hotel proprietor’s knocking on my door to remind that checkout time looms close.
 

      
It’s all a fanciful dream, this idea of forgetting about my lover and my husband, but at least for a few minutes I do find some solace in the pages of a twisted mystery story.
 
The afternoon and evening come and go uneventfully, and even the night poses little threat to my peace.
 
I don’t sleep until noon, but wake early, too refreshed to linger in bed.
 
With the trees looking like a painting of New England, I take a brisk walk in the chilling air, fighting a fierce north wind that stains my cheeks with red.
 

      
The B&B serves brunch at eleven.
 
I’m starved, the feast filling me full.
 
But when I catch myself flirting with a single man at the table next to me, I suddenly decide it’s time to go.
 
My vacationing sex is becoming reawakened.
 
And rather than thinking of this delightful specimen of manhood that chuckles and flirts back with alarming ease, I’m thinking of the stranger.
 
His perverted sense of sexual theatre has my body clawing, my mind just moments away from frenzy.

      
When I leave the dining room to pack for home, my hostess stops me.

      
“There’s a message for you,” she says.

      
“At the front desk?”

      
She nods and I move in that direction.

      
The plain white envelope bears no name so I wonder how anyone knew this was for me.
 
Ripping it open, I stare dumbfounded at the slip of paper it contains inside.

      
“Ellen Laurey, may your rest be peaceful.”

      
I grip my throat.
 
My heart pounds.
 
I hadn’t thought of him stalking me, but there’s little else to believe.
 
I shudder walking toward my room, but then stop and turn to the girl at the desk.

      
“Who brought this here?” I ask.

      
She looks at me blankly.
 
“I’m not sure, Mrs. Cauthen, the night clerk must have taken it because it was here this morning.”

      
“But there’s no name on the envelope, how would they know it was for me?”

      
She shook her head baffled.
 
“That is peculiar, but it was in your box.
 
Isn’t it yours?”

      
“Oh, yes, it is,” my words drift.
 
No one knew of my trip.
 
Not my friends in the city, not my colleagues at work, not Robby and certainly not the ponytail man.
 
And yet, he’s found me here.
 
I gaze around as if I think he’ll step from the shadows and present himself, but there’s nothing but sunshine streaming in windows and all the shadows have disappeared.
 
“Thank-you,” my comment is smothered by fear and I return to my room.

      
It doesn’t take me long to pack, especially since I’m throwing clothes into my suitcase with little thought about how they’ll look when I get home.

      
How can I submit to him in a cheap bar, let him order me naked in an alley and not tremble with fear… but I’m too afraid to answer my own question.
 
If I stopped to listen to myself I’m sure I’d hear that I’ve gone crazy, one step shy of deranged. I drive home, my home in Isaac’s apartment, with my heart furious for having danced this tango with an unknown man who won’t even share his name with me.
 
Heart still thumping with an anxious dirge, when the apartment door finally closes behind me, I try one sigh of relief.
 
I try to laugh as well.
 
Perhaps this fear is as much madness as anything real, though it seems to have taken any peace of mind I might have found on my night away.
 

      
Trying for some sanity, I flip on the TV, and then fix a plate of nachos in the kitchen.
 
Thumbing through the channels for something to take my mind off my madness, I find the panic ebbing like the tide.
 
It returns in small surges, but then seems to fall away as long as I keep the stranger’s face from my mind.

      
Oddly, it’s ten o’clock before I go the bedroom.
 
I haven’t even unpacked my clothes.
 
Maybe they remind of the panic when I left the B&B, or maybe it’s the note inside my suitcase crumpled with my crumpled clothes.
 

      
Finally having the peace of mind to tackle the task, I make my way to the guest room at the back of Isaac’s apartment.
 
He’d told me to use his king-size bed, but there were those memories of him that I didn’t need.
 
I’ve been happy to sleep in the daybed down the hall where the morning light hits the windows, and it’s shady in the afternoon. There’s a balcony just outside French doors that leads to the rooftop patio and what makes this apartment so especially appealing.

      
Turning on the light, I’m about to throw my satchel on the bed when I spot something unfamiliar lying there.
 
I cringe. Fear returns like an old lover and grabs me with unwanted hands.
 
I can’t begin to move or fathom what’s happened.
 
A hundred scenarios pass through my mind.
 
Is Isaac home?
 
Has he planned this silly stunt to scare me?
 
Has one of his old girlfriends with a key decided to lodge with me and perform kinky rites in my bedroom?
 
Or is there something more sinister going on—a stranger lurking in the shadows?

      
I can’t take my eyes off the object on the bed. A sleek black leather riding crop lies where I lie at night, where I’d nap in the afternoon, or masturbate in the morning.
 
Looking like a wily snake I think it’s going to slither on its own, but it’s as immobile as I am.
 
Backing away, as though I see a ghost hovering over the implement, I sniff the room for his aroma, swearing now that I’ve sensed his presence since I returned.
 
He’s been in the apartment, inside my room, leaving traces of himself, telling me he owns more of me than I’ve ever consented to give him.
 
Will he come in the night?
 
Rape me without warning?
 
Will I wake to find myself tied to this bed, strung up for a battle with this riding crop?

      
Finally taking a bold stride across the room, I test the outside door and find it locked just as it had been before I left.
 
There are no marks of forced entry.
 
How could he have gotten past the dead bolts?
 
Does he have a key?
 
My fear increases with each dire thought that pours into my head.
 
And still, how that sleek leather taunts me—as if it’s reaching out for my hand.
 
Inching closer, I’m finally standing right over the menacing implement,
 
so near, all I have to do is reach out and pick it up.
 

      
This belongs to the stranger, I conclude.
 
Not new, but used.
 
I can that see by the wear on the woven handle and how it’s been molded by the warmth of his fingers, conforming to the palm of his large hand.
 
I can’t stop what’s happening in my body, the way sensations of desire are bursting loose, the way our conversation in the restaurant comes back to me—about his binding me.
 
I imagine him using this leather nightmare against my back, or perhaps it is my pussy that he wants to flail with the cut ends of this piece.
 

      
I pick it up and it feels hot to touch.
 
My pussy’s frantic, hoping I’ll use my hand to get off, or even the butt end of this inside my cunt.
 
I can’t.
 
I can’t let it lure me into that kind of world.
 
I won’t.
 
I won’t relent to him.
 
I won’t let him have me again.
 
I won’t let him bind me, abuse me or bend me to his will.
 
I think that with my whole being, sure that I’ll throw off his next overture.
 
He’s making me immune to him with these dangerous intrusions, and I believe that I’m free of him—all except the part that’s wedded to the power of his voice and anxiously awaits his next words.

      
Afraid of what the riding crop is doing to me, I let it fall from my fingers and watch it bounce lightly on the bed and finally settle.
 
I’ll sleep in Isaac’s room tonight, there’s sure to be less of the stranger inside those walls.

g

      
I fall asleep quickly in Isaac’s bed, and am too exhausted to let my fears into my dreams.
 
In the morning, I decide it was foolish to fear of the riding crop, or even be unnerved by the stranger’s access to my life.
 
I’ll simply take control and kick him out.
 
I’ll let the bastard have a piece of mind for having presumed so much about me.
 
I have the power to choose and I’ll decide if I’ll submit.
 
With that kind of resolve, I toss the riding crop into the back of my closet and take up residence in my room where I belong.
 
When I sleep easily another night, I figure I’ve won a great battle.
 

      
After three days with my resolve firm I think I’ve cast the man out of my life for good.
 
I’m so busy at the university with classes and conferences that I have many hours when I’m not directly thinking of his next appearance in my life.
 
I know he’ll surface again, he wouldn’t have left these signs of himself otherwise.
 
But I’ll have a different answer for him the next time he finds me.
 
Woe to him who stalks me, or even thinks of shattering my peace with intimate invasions. He can have me on the street, but not where I live.
 
This place will be safe, I vow.
 
And to implement my determination, I change the locks on the apartment doors.

      
It’s dark when I move through the village outside the campus, but there are, as always, dozens of students milling about, going from coffee house, to tavern, to hole-in-the-wall theatre.
 
I stop and talk to two students I recognize from my classes and their cheerful tone infects me, so I’m smiling happily.

      
Thinking I’ll go home and answer e-mail, even call Robby at ten as I promised, I’m looking forward to the evening with little to do.
 
By nine o’clock when the phone rings, I’m at the computer expounding to a friend through my keyboard.
 

      
“Hello,” I answer.
 
Holding the receiver between my cheek and my shoulders, my fingers continue to fly across the keys with my last thought.

      
“You have my crop?” I hear his voice, the low timbre of its earthy quality vibrates through me.
 
For an instant my body reacts to the sound, then I stop the feelings cold.

      
“Yes, and you should take it back,” I tell him forthrightly.
 
“You won’t be using it, at least not on me.” I don’t know how many times my inner voice practiced this line and it still comes out stilted.

      
“Are you wearing clothes?” he asks.

      
“I’m wearing my robe … but that’s not important,” I shoot back.

      
“Then put on your coat without your robe, your black heels will do, and I’ll meet you on the street.
 
Bring the crop.”

      
“I will not!” I say, about to slam the phone in his ear.

      
“Be sure to bring the crop,” he replies calmly.

      
“You’re not hearing me,” I’m sounding shrill.

      
“But you’re listening to me,” he replies as if nothing I’ve said, not one determined feeling makes any difference to him.