Chapter Twenty-Eight
Peter was torturing Jane. Nicely.
Right after he’d slid the full length of his cock into her and made his joke about Father Brian he pulled it out again, saying, “There—I believe that was under ten seconds...was that all you wanted?”
Jane could no longer see his face but had known he was grinning at her.
Well, two can play this game, she thought. “ I’m not sure,” she replied, her voice seemingly casual. “There might have been something else...”
“Well, you’d better think of it soon, it’s getting late,” he replied.
Then he took his cock in his hand and used the tip to gently separate the lips of her vagina, but instead of entering her again, he’d simply begun to tease her there, slowly raising and lowering his cock so that the tip barely brushed against the inside of her lips in a way that made her want to sit up and pull him down on top of her.
After a minute or two, he pulled away again for a moment. And now he was doing the same thing as before, only with the length of his cock, pressing tightly against her there and sliding up and down between her lips with maddening slowness. With each upward stroke, the head seemed to touch a particular spot that was making fireworks go off in Jane’s head.
She’d once seen a game at the state fair where men would hit something with a big hammer and a weight would rise up and strike a bell. She knew how that bell felt now.
Her breath was shuddering in and out of her as if she were freezing, although the opposite was more the case. She desperately wanted him back inside her, to bring her to the climax that seemed so close and yet not...quite… Oh god, it was driving her crazy! But she was resolved not to beg, not to say anything. It was a contest of wills and she was going to wait until Peter was too excited to resist entering her again.
Well, she was going to try...
A moment later, Peter pulled away from her again and Jane thought, at last—assuming that he was repositioning himself to enter her.
Instead, she heard him say, in a teasing voice, “Well, I guess you can’t remember. It’s time to go home anyway.”
And with that, he reached down and pulled her panties back into place, then grabbed her wrists and slid her forward so that she found herself standing in front of him.
Oh, no you don’t, thought Jane.
She threw one arm around his neck and pulled him down to her while curling the fingers of her free hand around the shaft of his cock, which was still slick with her juices. She kissed and fondled him for a long moment, then whispered into his ear, “I think I remember now...”
“Is that so?” he replied, gently disengaging himself from her. “Well, you can tell me all about it on the way home. And if I’m still in the mood, maybe we can do something about it then.” And he turned and started walking towards the car door, holding his pants up but not fastening them.
Jane heard the challenge and hurried around to her side and got in.
Oh god, she thought, he’s going to make me ride through town in my undies.
Not only through town, as it turned out, but right past Suzy’s house, where the party was still in full roar. Peter even slowed down and leaned across Jane to call out a greeting to someone on the sidewalk he knew, and for a moment, Jane thought he was going to stop and talk to him.
She pictured Peter’s friend coming over to lean in the window and seeing her wearing only her sexy underwear, with Peter’s still-erect cock tapping against the steering wheel. She knew Peter was just teasing her with that very possibility, but she was relieved (and maybe just a little disappointed) when he continued on without stopping.
She noticed Chrissy’s car as they drove by, and though Jane wasn’t sure, she thought she saw Chrissy sitting in it and figured she was getting ready to leave as well.
Then they were past the corner, and the lights and sounds of the party faded into the darkness behind them. Peter said, with comic casualness, “Now, what was it you were trying to remember?”
Jane immediately slid over next to him. She wanted to keep him aroused, but she also didn’t want him to get so excited that he drove into a ditch.
She leaned over and whispered in his ear, “I’ve been kidnapped by a bad man. He made me take off my dress and get into his car. Poor me, I don’t have anything on but my bra and panties. And he’s making me put my hand on his cock while he drives.”
She reached over and began to delicately stroke his shaft with her fingers—checking out of the corner of her eye to see if it affected his driving. He seemed to be doing all right, aside from the fact that he was breathing through his mouth and staring ahead a little fixedly. And seemed to be driving a little faster. She decided to keep going.
“Oooo, he’s such a bad man,” she cooed in his ear, “making me touch his cock like this,”—giving it a little squeeze and smiling as she heard him take a sudden breath. Then she continued, “I sure hope he’s not taking me somewhere where nobody can see us. Because then he could do anything he wanted to me.”
She fell silent then and let him think about that while she devoted herself to seeing how many ways she could think of to stroke and tease his cock. One fingertip. The back of her fingernails. A little four-finger tap-dance…
When they pulled into the darkness of the driveway leading to Jane’s house, she cried out in mock distress, “Oh no! A dark deserted road! Oh please, Mr. Bad Man, don’t stop here!”
This, of course, was Peter’s cue and he took it.
He stopped the car and turned off the engine. But he left the headlights on. Then he opened his door and stepped out, grabbing Jane by the wrist and dragging her across the seat toward him as he held up his pants with his other hand. “C’mon, you!” he growled menacingly, falling into his role as Mr. Bad Man.
Jane scrambled out of the car and onto her feet, protesting, “Oh, please don’t, Mr. Bad Man! Don’t, please!” only to be pulled roughly around to the front of the car and made to stand between the headlights with her behind against the car.
Then Peter stepped back from her, his face a convincingly lustful sneer made scarier by the headlights, his pants sagging around his thighs, and his cock showing in high relief against the shadow it cast on his stomach.
“Turn around and put your head down!” His voice was nasty, guttural, and Jane shivered with delight as she turned and rested her head on her arms on the hood of the car, pretending to whimper with fear while she imagined him staring at her behind, now pressed tightly against the red lace of her panties.
“Spread your legs.”
She did so, as slowly as she could, turning her face to him and pleading, “Oh, Mr. Bad Man, please don’t...”
“Shut up.”
She did, and put her head down again, knowing what was coming next.
“Pull down your panties.”
Jane was, of course, dying to do just that, but she wanted to savor the anticipation just a little more, so she stood up and turned around.
“Oh, please Mr. Bad Man, please don’t make me pull down my panties,” she pleaded, knowing full well the effect this would have on Peter. And sure enough, he grabbed her roughly by the shoulders, spun her around, and forced her to bend over again while he used his foot to knock her feet apart.
Jane was delirious. “Oh no! Please don’t!” she cried. “Please don’t pull down my panties!” She whimpered again as she felt them being yanked down. “Stop! Oh please don’t...”
There was a pause. Jane became aware of the night sounds again, the cool breeze moving over her skin, the heat rising from the hood of the car.
Then the nasty, leering voice behind her: “Anything else you don’t want me to do?” Mocking her.
Then his tongue, licking her from the base of her spine to halfway up her back before withdrawing, leaving her shaking with desire for him.
“Please....don’t...” She raised her head to be sure he heard. “...Fuck me!”
Jane had no idea why she loved being taken and used like this—bent over a car hood, panties down around her thighs, while Peter/Mr. Bad Man ravaged her from behind—but she did. Loved the whole dirty fantasy of it.
Loved it when he pulled out of her, turned her around, and made her sit on the bumper, cold against her naked behind, and take his cock into her mouth.
Loved the way he held her head with both hands as he pretended to force his way in then reached down and scooped her breasts out of their brassiere and fondled them roughly while sliding in and out of her mouth.
Loved it when he lifted her back onto the car hood, tore off her panties, and finished her there, both of them crying out as they climaxed.
Afterward Peter raised his head from her chest and said, “Hmm...kidnapping. We’ve got to remember this one.
And Jane had whispered, “Oh, yes.” Then added, “You bad man.”
Peter had stood then and reached down for his pants, which had long since fallen around his ankles. Then, after fastening them, he’d gone around to the driver’s side of the car, and Jane, still lying on the hood, saw the light from the headlights disappear. Then in the resulting darkness, she heard the jingle of his keys and his footsteps again, seeming to recede. Heard the trunk open then close again, followed by the sound of his footsteps approaching.
“Sit up for a second.”
She did so while Peter unfolded a cotton blanket behind her, then she lay back again and lifted her hips so he could spread it beneath her behind as well. She untangled herself from her bra and handed it to him. She heard him toss it in the car window, then bend down and fumble around on the ground—to retrieve her panties, she assumed. She heard something else being tossed into the car and guessed she’d been right.
Then he was wrapping the blanket around her and climbing up to lie beside her on the hood of the car. He put an arm around her and pulled her close so she could rest her head on his shoulder. The night was clear and moonless and a long swath of the Milky Way was visible overhead between the tops of the trees. They lay in silence for a long time, looking up.
Then Jane heard him say, almost to himself, “...the odds...”
“Hmm?”
Peter seemed to realize then that he’d spoken out loud, because he laughed a little, then said, “Oh, I was just thinking that most people on this planet are never going to be as happy as I am right now...”
Jane snuggled closer and said, “As we are...”
Peter tightened his arm around her, leaned over to kiss her on the forehead, and continued, “Right. As we are. And then I was trying to figure out how it happened. You know, if I hadn’t seen you going through pockets in the coat room at the dance that night...”
Jane jumped in. “If you hadn’t chased me into the bathroom and made me do all those nasty things...”
“If you hadn’t agreed to do them,” Peter topped her—adding, with a smile in his voice, “...you little slut.”
“Hey!” Jane sat up and said fiercely, “I am not a little slut!”
Peter, surprised by her vehemence, began to stutter, “I...I know that, I was only...”
Jane threw off her blanket and, naked except for her sandals, rolled over on top of him.
She put her face close to his and whispered. “I’m your little slut!” Then she put her tongue in his mouth.
It wasn’t all that late when Jane, fully dressed—if a little sloppily, a result of putting her clothes back on in the dark—trudged up the steps to her house. Still, she was surprised to see so many lights still on; her parents were usually quite regular about their bedtime.
She was wonderfully tired—and a little sore, though she didn’t mind.
Their last lovemaking had been slow and sweet, with her kneeling above him, straddling his hips. It had also been a little noisy near the end, as their passionate motion had caused the hood of the car to buckle and rebound with loud boinging sounds.
Peter had helped her to dress afterward, then driven her the rest of the way home. They were both going to sleep in on Sunday, but planned to get together in the afternoon. They’d murmured sleepy endearments to each other as they parted for the night.
Jane entered the house quietly, and the first thing she noticed was an odd clicking sound coming from down the hall. She followed it to the closed door of the little room she and her parents called the office. It was used as a sewing room more than anything else because that’s where the sewing machine was kept, but there was a desk and chair in there which Jane’s mother used for correspondence and paying bills.
Jane stood outside the door and listened. Typing, that’s what it was. But at this hour? Who...
And then she remembered. Opening the door silently, she peeked in. And sure enough, there was her mother, seated at the desk, her back to Jane. As Jane watched, her mother continued to type for a while, then stopped, and Jane heard her muttering to herself as she reviewed what she’d written before beginning to type again.
Jane was smiling as she softly closed the door again and headed upstairs.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“Well, Miss Herlihy! And what brings you here of a Sunday?”
Chrissy smiled at the sergeant at the front desk. “Hi, Uncle Finn. I just remembered I didn’t put some files away, and you know how Dad is about leaving things around.”
“Too right you are.”
Finn wasn’t really her uncle but had been a friend of the family for longer than she could remember—and an army buddy of her father’s before that—and thus had always been ‘Uncle Finn’ to her. She patted his shoulder as she hurried past him and down the stairs that led to the File Room, where she worked.
It felt strange to be here in her Sunday clothes, strange to have the basement all to herself. But a thought had been nagging at her all morning; she had woken up with it and had been distracted by it all morning, through both church services, and had finally decided that she couldn’t wait until Monday to follow it up.
She used her key to unlock the door and enter, then switched on the lights.
She hated this room; it was overheated in the winter and clammy and smelled of mildew in the summer. And even though it was a large room it had no windows and she always felt as if she were suffocating. Plus the fluorescent lights were old and made a ghastly yellowish light and flickered at irregular intervals, which gave her headaches. But the two other women with whom she worked never complained, and they had been there for over twenty years so Chrissy didn’t dare to do so. She knew from past experience what her father thought of ‘whiners’, as he called them.
So she had no desire to stay there one second longer than necessary. She hurried down the rows of alphabetically arranged filing cabinets that filled most of the room until she reached the ‘M’ section. There she quickly narrowed her search to a particular drawer, pulled it out and flipped through the files.
There. Yes. She’d been right. She had no idea why the name had stuck in her head, but there it was. She pulled out the manila folder and took it back to her desk. It was the right name, but was it the same family? She had to be sure.
Whenever Chrissy felt overwhelmed by boredom or needed to distract herself from her own thoughts while working, which was often, she would open whatever folder she was supposed to be filing and read it. Or sometimes when she recognized a name she would do the same thing. It gave her a sense of power to know things about people in her town that she wasn’t supposed to know. She knew, for example, about Jane’s father’s arrest for drunken driving many years ago.
And now, here was the name she knew she had seen before:
McIlvray.
She opened it and began to read.
Chapter Thirty
For a change, Jane woke up well before her parents. She climbed out of bed and yawned and stretched. It felt a little painful to do so; she was stiff from her lower back to her thighs and, remembering why, she smiled. But aside from the stiffness, she felt wonderful; she loved someone and was loved in return. She had slept well and she was...famished.
She took a quick shower and hurried down to the kitchen. She looked in the fridge, saw a container of fresh blueberries and decided to make pancakes. As she was assembling the ingredients for the batter she realized she wanted more: she wanted a huge breakfast. So while she was flipping pancakes she also scrambled some eggs and fried some bacon and put some coffee on to perk.
Her father was the first one to follow his nose downstairs. Anticipating this very possibility, Jane had made a large amount of batter, and gave him the first batch of cakes to start on while she put on some more eggs and bacon. She had just sat down to join him when her mother shuffled in, looking half-asleep, and was given coffee immediately to go with her breakfast.
Finally, they were all seated at the table. Jane’s father said to her mother, “I heard Jane come in last night but I must have been asleep when you came to bed. What were you watching that kept you up so late?’
Jane’s mother stifled a yawn before replying. “I was writing,” she said with a smiling sideways glance at Jane. “There was a big discussion about Vietnam at the Democrats meeting the other night. Nobody actually came to blows but it got pretty hot for a while. The party seems really divided about it—nationally, I mean, not just here—and I thought it would be interesting to write up the main points on both sides. You know, flex my writing muscles a little before we tackle the book. It was fun—made me feel like I was back at college.” Jane smiled at this and her mother, seeing it, gave her a wink.
“Good idea,” Jane’s father replied. “Speaking of which, maybe you and I can start making notes and sketching some kind of an outline today.”
Jane’s mother nodded. “Just let me wake all the way up and have a shower.” She turned to Jane. “And how are you doing, honey? Did you have a good time last night?”
Jane nodded and said, “Yes. But I think the party was bigger than Suzy’s mom and dad had planned. They were a little overwhelmed.” She described the scene of wall-to-wall noisy teenagers eating everything in sight in a way that made her parents laugh out loud.
Jane’s mother asked, “What are you going to do with your last day of freedom?” and Jane’s father chimed in, “Oh, that’s right—you start work tomorrow. Not much of a summer vacation.”
Jane replied, “Oh, that’s all right, I think it’ll be fun. And I’ll be fabulously wealthy by the end of the summer,” she added, smiling. She turned to answer her mother. “I don’t know what I’m going to do. It feels weird not to have any homework waiting for me.” She shrugged. “Peter will probably come over later. Maybe we’ll go for a walk or something.”
“He seems like a pretty bright lad,” her father offered. “What year is he in?”
“He just graduated—well, graduation’s this Friday but, you know, he’s done.”
“Oh. And what’s he planning to do next?”
And there it was: June, July, August...and gone. It was still a small cloud on the horizon but a cloud nonetheless.
Jane tried to smile as she answered, “He’s going on to a regular college. His father went to Kenton College in Ohio and got him a scholarship to go there too.”
Her father said, “Well, that’s a pretty good school, from what I’ve heard,” but it was obvious from the glance he shared with her mother and the sympathetic look he gave Jane that he’d heard what she hadn’t said.
After the dishes had been done Jane’s father read the paper while her mother showered and then the two of them withdrew to the office to begin on their book.
Jane, feeling pleasantly aimless, puttered around all morning: reading, doing some laundry and–a particularly enjoyable task–putting away all her school materials for the next three months and throwing away what she no longer needed.
After such a big breakfast no one was particularly hungry at lunchtime, but Jane made a salad and some sandwiches and after setting some aside for herself brought the rest into the office for her parents to snack on later. Peter called shortly thereafter and arrived on foot a little while later.
They went for a walk in the surrounding woods. Jane took him to her favorite place, a tiny sunlit meadow with a stream running through it. She had brought along a blanket and—as she was still scratching at a few mosquito bites she’d gotten last night—some insect repellent. Intuitively they each knew the other was sated with sex from the night before, but it was still a pleasure to undress each other and apply the insect repellent to each other’s skin.
They lazed in the sun, listening to the stream, talking quietly, and exchanging occasional kisses. Jane told him about her trip to Boston and her appointment with Doctor Weissman.
Later, still naked but for their footwear, they walked in the woods some more, holding hands and joking about Adam and Eve. Jane thought that in some ways this was more intimate than anything else they’d done together. To just be naked together because they wanted to be and walking around as if it were the most natural thing in the world, the sunlight dappling their skins in ever-changing patterns as they walked...it suddenly seemed so beautiful that Jane felt tears spring to her eyes.
“Peter...”
“I know.” He stopped and embraced her. Then they simply stood there, looking into each other’s eyes, swaying slightly back and forth, listening to the forest sounds, and loving each other with all their hearts.
Chapter Thirty-One
The sodden bottom of the cardboard box fell out the moment Jane lifted it and ‘12 Dozen Duncan Yo-Yos’ fell clattering to the cement floor. Jane blew the air out of her mouth in a sigh of exasperation. This was not how she’d imagined her new job. She’d pictured herself holding up pretty dresses in front of adorable little girls while their mothers oohed and aahed, not hauling damp cardboard boxes around in the basement.
There was already a streak of dirt on the sleeve of her white blouse and the pantyhose she had forced herself to put on that morning made her feel as though she were suffocating from the waist down. She resolved to buy a garter belt; it was bound to be cooler—and she had a feeling Peter would like it as well.
As she crouched to gather up the fallen toys she told herself that it wouldn’t always be like this.
She liked Suzy’s mother, Mrs. Jorgenson, who had a warm, outgoing manner similar to her daughter’s. She had apologized to Jane for not speaking more with her the night of the party and set about making her feel at home in the store. But then the shipment had arrived at the back door almost simultaneously with two sets of customers who required Mrs. Jorgensen and Suzy’s attention so Jane had been sent out back to receive it and bring it all downstairs. She’d had to move some things around to make room in the storage area, and that had led to the small mishap she was now attempting to straighten out.
The rest of the morning went better. Jane learned the layout of the store and how to use the cash register. She helped Suzy and Mrs. Jorgenson wait on customers and even sold a bathing suit by herself to the mother of a crying, squirming five-year-old without flinching once.
At noon, while Mrs. Jorgenson looked after the store Jane and Suzy took their bag lunches to the park nearby and chattered amiably while they ate. Jane found herself beginning to recover the sense she’d once had of really knowing her friend the way she had when they were younger, and it made her happy.
What didn’t make her happy was spotting Chrissy waiting outside the store when they returned. She had her back to them and was peering in the store window with her hand to the glass as they approached. When Jane greeted her she jumped as if frightened and whirled around.
“Oh, hi Jane, hi Suzy—you startled me,” she said with a nervous smile. “I was just passing by and...remembered you were working here and thought I’d say hello. But I really have to get back to work now. It was nice to see you, though.”
And she’d hurried off. Jane noticed that she was carrying a manila envelope under her arm.
She and Suzy turned to each other, shrugged, and went back inside.
At the end of the day, Mrs. Jorgenson let Jane out the back door into the alley, where Jane had chained her bike, and bid her goodnight before closing up. It took a moment for Jane to get the ancient lock on her bike chain to work, but it finally let go, and after storing it she walked her bike between the buildings to reach the sidewalk.
Where she found Chrissy waiting for her.
She looked almost as nervous and ill at ease as she had that Sunday morning in Jane’s basement, and she had trouble meeting Jane’s eyes.
She said, “Let’s go to the park,” and Jane sensed that this was not a request, despite Chrissy’s timid demeanor. Something had changed and Jane thought she’d better find out what it was. So she walked her bike next to Chrissy as they made their way to the park. Neither of them spoke but their glances sometimes met, and Jane noticed that Chrissy was carrying the same manila envelope as before.
The sky was overcast, and the wind smelled of approaching rain. Jane hoped that this wasn’t going to take too long.
As they entered the nearly deserted park Jane headed for the closest bench, then put her bike on its kickstand and sat down. She looked with frank curiosity at Chrissy, who sat down next to her but looked straight ahead, holding the envelope in her lap.
“I want to see Father Brian,” Chrissy said, still seeming to look at something directly before her.
So what else is new, thought Jane. She said, “I know, Chrissy, but I told you, I don’t know where...”
“You’re lying.” Chrissy’s voice was matter-of-fact, emotionless.
Jane stopped short, and Chrissy went on, without turning her head or changing the colorless quality of her voice. “I know what you did, you and your friend.”
Oh no, thought Jane.
She began to stammer, “Chrissy, I-I’m sorry...”
Then she stopped as a thought struck her: If she knows what really happened, why is she still asking to see Father Brian?
Chrissy continued as if Jane hadn’t spoken. “Tell your friend that I want to see Father Brian. Soon.”
Jane found this last remark eerie; why was Chrissy referring to your friend and Father Brian as two different people? It frightened her a little. Still, even though she was sorry she had gotten into this situation, and she knew it was her fault, Jane was going to put a stop to it right now.
“Look,” she began, “I’m sorry about what happened. I know I...”
“Does your friend know about this?” Chrissy lifted the envelope and without looking over placed it on Jane’s lap.
The wind gusted just at that moment and almost tore it away before Jane could grab it. Inside were what appeared to be official forms of some kind. They looked old. Clipped to the front of them was a set of pictures of a woman, one of her facing the camera and one in profile. There was a disembodied arm at the bottom of each shot holding a card with numbers on it.
Mug shots, Jane realized with a start.
In the first picture, the woman seemed distraught; her hair disarrayed, her eyes glassy and unfocussed, seeming to look at something above the camera. Jane was sure she’d never seen her before. What does this poor woman have to do with...
Then she looked more closely as she noticed something familiar about the woman’s features. No—it couldn’t be. She flipped up the pictures and sought out the name on the forms.
McIlvray.
Jane quickly read through the form, trying to decipher the blurry copy and the official euphemisms of the report.
Subject taken into custody in Piggly-Wiggly grocery store, 307 West Main Street...
She read on in dismay. According to witnesses, Peter’s mother had been wandering around in the store, muttering to herself and glaring at the customers for nearly half an hour. And when the store manager had finally approached her and asked if she needed help, she had turned away from him, taken a steak knife from her purse, and stabbed him with it, screaming that he was the anti-Christ. He had later died from his wound.
Jane let the papers fall to her lap. She was horrified. She was sure Peter had never been told the true story; that he believed, as he had told her, that his mother had had some kind of mental collapse and was in a sanitarium only because she couldn’t take care of herself.
And he’s already so ashamed, Jane thought. If he were to find out the truth...
The papers and the envelope were lifted from her lap. Jane turned and saw Chrissy stuffing all the forms back into the envelope.
Chrissy then stood up and, still not looking at her, said again, “Tell your friend that I want to see Father Brian.”
She started to walk away, then turned back and for the first time looked Jane in the face, speaking loudly to be heard above the rising wind, “And don’t tell him anything else,” gesturing with the envelope for emphasis.
The implied threat was clear: Peter was not to be told that Chrissy knew. Jane looked into Chrissy’s eyes and saw for a moment the same dislocated look she had seen in the picture of Peter’s mother.
Then Chrissy turned and was gone.
Jane continued to sit on the bench, stunned, until the first drops of rain caused her to jump up, get on her bike, and hurry home.
She was distracted all through dinner. Her parents asked her a few questions about her job, but fortunately were soon deeply involved in discussing the outline for their book.
They made no comment when Jane excused herself early, saying she was tired from the first day of work—which was true—and headed up to her room.
She needed to think.
Peter needed to be protected, that was the most important thing. And Jane couldn’t see any way to do that without letting Chrissy have what she wanted. But that meant lying to Peter, or at least misleading him—letting him continue to think that Chrissy didn’t know who ‘Father Brian’ really was—because telling him the truth would lead to other questions, such as why Jane was asking him to see Chrissy again.