The Reckoning (5 page)

“It’s your two a.m. wake up call, old buddy. Drop your cock and grab your socks!”

Royce blinked from the blast of light in the hotel room. He blinked again. Two armored creatures were standing vigil at the foot of the bed—pouts on their painted lips—and staring coquettishly at him with their clownishly mascaraed eyes.

“Royce, meet the twins,” Cliff boomed.

“I’m Tawny,” announced one, hands on hips.

“I’m Plenty,” chortled the other, “but we’re not really twins.”

“Ladies,” Royce said huskily.

Cliff wedged between them, circled his arms around their cleavage-packed, metal bodices. “You could have fooled me, girls.”

The two giggled, purposefully whipping their blonde, dark-rooted manes for Royce’s benefit. He knew it was all a show, yet it was an act he relished. Yes, sometimes Cliff was invaluable. By now Royce was sitting up in bed, knees tucked to his chin with the sheet tight to his body. He wasn’t wearing anything underneath, which Tawny (or was it Plenty?) quickly ascertained by lifting the sheet and taking a peek. Royce laughed. “Oh, my,” she simpered. He touched his knees together and felt his thighs squeeze a growing woody.

Cliff explained he was lucky to run into the girls at Caesar’s, where they were employed in a public relations capacity.

“We carry spears and greet people,” Tawny squeaked.

“We make guests feel welcome,” Plenty said.

Royce beamed. “I’m sure you do.” His erection throbbed.

“Ta-da!” the girls announced in unison.

Hands behind them, the Amazons worked a miracle. With a sweeping flourish, their breastplates dropped and thudded heavily on the carpet.

Royce gasped. Two pair of obscenely large breasts levitated at the foot of the bed, attached to two whores of Rubensesque stature.

“Yow!” Cliff barked.

Royce licked the spittle off his lips. His bloated glans were hurting.

In turn, each girl hefted her mammary glands in her palms and proclaimed their dimensions. Plenty was 60 HH. Tawny a mind-boggling 70 FF. Royce had seen breasts of such immensity only in some of the girlie magazines—never “in the flesh.”

They advanced on Royce. And suddenly he was surrounded by them, smothered in the immense cleavage. Hungrily, he nursed on a ripe nipple, ingested the bag until he choked. The cloying jugs were at his face, ballooning against his stomach and chest.

And they were real, too. He could tell by their shape and touch and lack of telltale flesh rivulets that were a dead giveaway for implants.

Tawny spit on his dick and trapped the organ between her cleavage—stroked his throbbing shaft with her tits. Pleasure electrified Royce’s body. It was the best “Russian” he’d had to date.

“Did I do good or what?” Cliff said.

Royce moaned an affirmative, his mouth full of tit. He glared over the crest of a creamy hillock and spied Cliff (now stripped out of his clothes and wearing only the dark glasses) stretched out on the other double king and following the action. Cliffie jammed a coke-powdered pinkie in his right nostril and snorted. The quick burn made him grimace and cough. Teary, he said, “You owe me one.”

Teeth clamped on Royce’s root and he winced from the thrilling sharpness. This scene was nasty, just plain nasty. The best ever.

Cliff scratched his slack, hairless belly, lazily yanked on his dink like it were a rubber band.

While Tawny gave Royce head, Plenty’s tits whipped his face with their silver-dollar-sized brown nipples.

Royce’s member flopped out of Tawny’s mouth. She glowered at Cliff and said, “Hey, you promised treats.”

“And so I did,” he responded magnanimously.

“Me first!” Plenty said, dismounting from Royce. An intermission was taken so Tawny and Plenty could each do a line before getting back to the business at hand. Royce awaited their return with urgent anticipation.

Refreshed and invigorated, the two bounced back on the bed and went after Royce with hyper enthusiasm.

At one instant, Plenty ran a firm nipple along his erection. Royce shuddered, his toes curled. He fought the urge to ejaculate as long as he could.

On the other bed, Cliff continued stroking his soft member. “Yeah,” he whispered. “You’re gonna owe me.”

Plenty giggled and said, “You can fuck me. But Tawny can only give you head. She’s havin’ her period, okay?”

It dawned on Royce that these girls had pussies as well as tits. His eyes went to Tawny’s pubes, shaved in the stripper’s V he was so familiar with. There, dangling out from the girl’s fat labia, was a telltale Tampon string.

“Cool,” Cliff said, leaping off the bed to get a closer look at Tawny’s genitalia.

Later, while Plenty rode Royce cowgirl style and Tawny licked Royce’s swollen balls, Cliff snuck up between Tawny’s voluptuous thighs and buried his nose between her ample buttocks. Looking like a bear snaring a salmon, he pulled the bloody Tampon from her vagina with his teeth and briefly displayed it like a prize before spitting it out on the bed. Tawny screamed as Cliff clamped his lips to her vulva—and sucked away.

The little stunt cost Cliff two more lines of coke.

Sunday evening about six their plane landed at LAX.

In the jet way Royce again pressed Cliff on the matter of the twins.

“Listen, we agreed to go fifty-fifty. What did they cost us?”

“My treat.”

“But—” Royce was about to say, but didn’t, that Cliff hadn’t even touched them. Wasn’t
able
to touch them.

“Listen, Royce. You can do something nice for me sometime. Okay?”

“Okay,” he replied uneasily. “Okay.”

In the terminal Royce checked in with his answering service and bought a blown-glass dolphin in the gift shop. After cutting Cliff loose with a non-negotiable “Later,” he caught a cab (leaving Darth in the airport lot would have been a sin) and rode out to Carly’s apartment in Redondo Beach. Her old gray Pacer was parked in her space.

When she greeted him, he presented her the dolphin (garnering himself a sweet peck on the cheek) and assured her San Francisco had been “Booooring.” He went further and made a big to-do about the elaborately wrapped gift on her dinette.

“Susan will be thrilled.”

She beamed proudly. “It’s a trifle bowl.”

“Neat,” he said, not knowing what the hell a trifle bowl was. He followed her into the tiny kitchen, where she was preparing a dinner of cottage cheese folded into warm noodles.

“Would you like some, Royce?”

“Love some,” he enthused, glad for the airline meal he’d had earlier.

“And we have Rice Krispie bars for dessert.”

“Your faves,” he chortled.

Carly removed the saucepan of noodles from the stovetop and poured the steamy pasta through a strainer over the sink. Royce eased up behind her, kissed her left ear as his hands fiddled at the waistband of her Guess jeans.

She set the cookware in the sink and tenderly squeezed his left wrist.

“Should we?” she asked softly.

“Yes.”

Royce’s fingers yanked the tail of her blouse up and stroked the smooth skin of her bony back.

“Oh, Royce.”

His groin pressed into her tush. Royce’s fingertips were now sneaking beneath the tea bag-sized cups of her bra.

“Royce…”

He squeezed the bumps, made them bigger—and fevered his mind with pornographic images of Plenty and Tawny.

“Ouch, you’re hurting me.”

4

Business Development

Fevered, sticky dreaming…

Day of the Long Knives.

With lead feet, in an abattoir of marble, crystal, brass and executive toys. Fear gnawing belly out.

Stench most foul today. Those beady, spider eyes. Killing floor is slick with wet.

This is my bid.

This is my offer.

Nothing else matters. Do you feel lucky?

Show some respect.

Down I go. Ho ho ho!

Royce was having a nightmare about performing fellatio on Michael Milken when Leslie shook him awake. Luckily, a carpet roll had broken his fall when the gas from the furnace exploded.

“Royce, you’re burned.”

“Les,” he said urgently. “Thank you for the watch.”

“I should get you to the hospital.”

“The furnace.”

“It looks okay now. The pilot light is lit, and I’ve opened a window to ventilate. You need a doctor.”

His right thumb and forefinger were blistered. He touched his face, grimacing. Sunburn city.

“No, I’m okay.”

His wife helped him to his feet and up the steep cellar stairs. Leslie had him sit on the edge of their bed while she rummaged through the medicine cabinet.

“Does it hurt much?”

“Only when my heart beats.”

He looked at the nightstand digital clock: one-twenty-three a.m. Christ. When would this dreadful night end?

She returned with a jar of Vaseline, popped the lid.

“I wouldn’t be looking at any mirrors for awhile,” she advised.

That did it. He waved away her ministering hands and went to the mirror. His face was pink, and flecks of singed hair littered his scalp and eyebrows like dandruff.

She giggled. He glowered back.

“Well, Royce, you do look a little funny. Like a snake shedding its skin.”

Yeah, a snake. He went back to the edge of the bed, and she tenderly applied petroleum jelly to his face.

“You’ve just been working too hard, Mr. R.”

Royce flexed his blistered hand through the shaft of morning sunlight streaming in through his office window.

“I just want to put last night behind me,” he told Tony over the phone.

“I understand. I’ll call the DA’s office. It shouldn’t be a big deal.”

“I just…well. Just want it over. I guess I have been working too hard.”

“Maybe you and Les should get away for awhile.”

“Bad time. The holidays. Home and hearth and all that.”

“Well, if you decide to, Craig can stay with us for a few days.”

“We talking about the same Craig?”

“Cut him some slack, Royce. His only crime is being eight years old.”

“And coming from a broken home.”

“I wouldn’t exactly call your situation a broken home.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence—and the offer. I mean it.”

“Sure.”

“And one more thing, Tony.”

“What’s that?”

“You got to keep me out of trouble.”

Tony chuckled. “I’ll do my best, bud.”

When Royce put down the phone he saw Brenda come into his office and close the door behind her.

“Whew,” she said, waving her hand like a fan.

“Problem?”

“Some women don’t understand the subtleties of wearing perfume.”

Royce nervously eyeballed his desk calendar. It would be like him, in his present mood, to forget an appointment. But the calendar was blank this morning.

Brenda arched a judgmental eyebrow.

“A Ms. Monica Pleshette to see you. Said she had a ten o’clock.”

Royce scowled. “I don’t know any Monica Pleshette. At least I don’t think I do.” Suddenly he felt exhausted.

“Apparently a referral from Gary Ames at Carrollton Banks. Shall I see if I can get him for you? Find what this is about?”

He rubbed his eyes. “I guess you better.” Then it struck him.

Her!

“No, show her in.”

Royce smelled the woman’s presence a good thirty seconds before her arrival in his office. Standing, he summoned all his psychological strength to present an image of crisp charm and professional competence.

“Monica Pleshette,” she said, sweeping into the room and extending the slender fingers of her right hand. Her sharp, enameled nails poked his right palm.

“Royce McCulloch,” he said, shaking her hand. He gestured her to the chair across from his desk. “Please.”

She sat down, crossing shapely, black-stockinged legs with a
whoosh whoosh
sound of silk. The way her startlingly blue eyes now gazed at him made him tilt his chair back slightly. His chin dropped and he made brief eye contact with her rather ample bosom, where a cream-colored silk blouse, unbuttoned alluringly low, had parted to afford a tease of nude brassiere cups and fat curves of snowy white, freckled cleavage. His eyes recognized the female pulchritude as familiar territory.

“Yes,” he said lamely, clearing the frog from his throat. Smiling lamely, he made his eyes stay on her face. Already her perfume had quite overpowered his tiny office with its cloying heat.

She beamed. “Congratulations.”

“Congratulations?”

“Looks like you’ve managed to get some sun. I wish I could. I feel so cold lately. Brrrr.” She briskly rubbed her hands together.

He touched his face. “Oh, this? Just a run in with an old furnace, I’m afraid.”

She frowned. “Nothing serious, I hope.”

“No,” he assured her. He offered her coffee, which she declined.

Awkward silence followed. The woman’s presence was making him increasingly uneasy. Not only attractive, she exuded “class,” which showed in her grooming. Her auburn hair was stylishly coifed, lustrous, but with a hint of the untamed in the presence of an electrifying cockscomb that often fell into her eyes and needed whipping back with a casual swirl of her head. And whereas some women in business made the mistake of trying to dress just like their male competitors, Monica’s blue wool business suit (color matched to her eyes) was cut with a decidedly feminine flair. Also, she kept the jewelry to a tasteful minimum: no
nouveau riche
displays of diamond cocktail rings the size of glass doorknobs for this one. Instead, she wore just a simple gold bracelet and a gold Rolex.

The lady was beautiful. The lady was commanding. The lady was very, very formidable.

“Well,” she said, setting a leather portfolio case on his desk. “Down to business.”

“Certainly.”

“You come highly recommended, Royce. According to Gary Ames, you practically walk on water.”

He shrugged the compliment away. “Gary’s a good friend. How do you know him?”

“Socially. The symphony board. Some charity work. And I bank with him, or I should say my business does.”

“Which is?”

“Retail. Lady’s apparel. I have a boutique on Old South Gaylord Street.”

“Successful?”

Monica shone proudly. “Very.”

He grinned. “Then you certainly don’t need me.”

“But I do, because I want to expand now.”

The woman’s chest seemed to be advancing on his desktop.

“Expand?”

“Mail order, on a national basis, and the Net.”

Royce’s mental gears finally spun.

“An ambitious goal, Monica. Mail order’s start-up costs are high. The marketplace for catalogs is already overcrowded, and Internet marketing has not proven itself in the long run.”

Without a blink she said, “But my product has a strong appeal and is stand-apart enough to occupy a successful preemptive niche in the marketplace.”

Royce’s hormones seethed. This woman was sharp, maybe too sharp for her own good. Over-confidence, after all, had killed as many new business ventures as under-capitalization. He tilted his chair forward and rested his forearms on his desk, recapturing some of the space he had surrendered to her earlier.

“And just what is your product?” he asked incredulously.

She unclasped the portfolio and spread it before him. His reaction was visceral; his groin tightened, the temperature on his face rose to a broil.

It was a photo of a very well-endowed blonde woman, a haughty cast on her face, mouth pouting. The model was attired in diaphanous red fabric and straps that seemed to both display and enhance every erogenous zone she possessed. Lurid pink fingers silk-screened on the bra cups gave the illusion of uplifting the breasts and tweaking the half-exposed nipples.

Down below, fingers of a like nature appeared to spread the crotch of the panties, where there was a lewd little slit in the cloth.

Oh my. Oh dear
, he thought. The serpent Sex had reared its ugly head again in his daily affairs.

Monica giggled. “I suppose I should have given you a warning or something. Frankly, I can’t tell whether you’re blushing or not.”

He closed the portfolio, electing to ignore her inquiry. “Interesting,” is all he said.

She went on: “The name of my company is Naughty’s. I specialize in intimate lady’s apparel—fantasy lingerie, I call it. My market is the aware woman, married or single, who believes we should take sex off the billboards and movie screens and put it back where it belongs, in the bedroom, the boudoir. The Naughty’s woman is not an anorexic social x-ray but a lusty female not ashamed of her sexuality, her curves. My fashions are more erotic than Victoria’s Secret, more imaginative than Frederick’s of Hollywood, and more exclusive than Mello Mail. I design everything myself.”

She glared boldly at him and continued, “Tell me, does the nature of my business preclude a professional relationship with you, Royce? On moral grounds, I mean. If so, I need to know now.”

His mouth stumbled. “Ah, no, I don’t think so. Business is business, I guess. I mean, no, I don’t think it would be a problem.”

The woman crooked her right elbow on her knee and bestowed a bewitching smile on him. “And sex does sell. Of course, I realize I may have to expurgate my graphics somewhat to comply with postal regulations.”

“That is probably an understatement,” he quipped. He was beginning to enjoy this.

Her eyes widened. “Well?” she pressed.

“Yes, well, I do think you have a viable proposition here. But there are some questions I have all my clients ask themselves before they begin a new venture.”

She cut him off, saying: “Like am I a natural risk-taker? Yes. I wouldn’t have opened my shop in the first place if I weren’t. Do I have a strong ego? I think that is evident, Royce. Do I have superior conceptual ability? I think my products demonstrate that. Am I resourceful? Very. Once I make up my mind to do something, I can’t be stopped. I—”

He broke in: “So you’re imbued with the entrepreneurial spirit.”

“Yes!” she enthused.

He mounted a last-ditch effort to raise a roadblock.

“Capital?” he inquired.

“A silent partner has afforded me some deep pockets. I have enough operating capital to launch a high-profile, nationwide roll-out and sustain a strong maintenance campaign for five years, even with a very conservative one percent return on mailings.”

He told her again, “Then you don’t need me.”

“Oh, but I do. I need your expertise to develop the business plan, my road map to success, as it were. And, quite frankly, I can benefit from a man’s point of view—an experienced businessman with a firm hand who can tell me whether my feet are too far off the ground.”

She was doing it again, advancing across the desk at him. This time he resolutely stood his ground. But that perfume of hers was making him light-headed, reeling.

“Sure, I can help you.” He felt out of breath, like he’d been jogging. Spent, but well-exercised. He told her, “But I’ll need to know almost as much about your business as you do. Are you willing to allow me that?”

Monica smiled. “Certainly. That will be the fun part.”

They were ironing out the details of an hourly retainer (Monica waxing on about what a “bargain” Royce was) when Brenda popped her head in and announced Royce’s noon lunch appointment had called to confirm.

“Oh, I really shouldn’t keep you any longer,” Monica said, rising and gathering her things. She handed him her business card.

“That’s my shop’s address. Do drop by soon. I’m most anxious to get started. And should you need to contact me after hours, my home phone is written on the back.”

He bowed as an unaccustomed paroxysm of chivalry coursed up his spine, then escorted her out into the reception area. There he helped her on with her brown leather trench coat. She spun on him, whipping her shining hair from her collar, and tightly cinched the belt of her coat. Her chest heaved up at him. Such large breasts on a slender frame made her appear brazenly top heavy.

Boob job?

“Royce, it’s been a pleasure,” she said, extending her right hand.

Another bow from him, this time with a flourish of his heels just short of a click. He tenderly squeezed her frigid hand, almost kissed it.

“My,” he said, “you
are
cold. I wasn’t aware I needed to turn the heat up.”

His new client simpered, “Well, you do know what they say, Royce. Cold hands, warm heart.”

“Of course, Monica,” he practically chortled. “I do look forward to working with you.”

“Super.”

Brenda, watching all this from her desk, rolled her eyes, looked like she was going to be sick. After the woman had finally left, she said, “I better call the fumigator. That perfume. Phew.”

Royce was still glowing. He asked, “And my luncheon?”

“You don’t have a lunch appointment.”

“But you said…”

“I might have been out of line, Royce. But I felt you needed some cavalry to come to your rescue in there. There’s something not quite right about that woman. If this were old Salem, she’d be the working end of a wienie roast.”