Ann and Trudy, now safely back in California, sat cross-legged on the Persian carpet of the Barot's living room, alternately sipping hot mulled wine and passing a joint back and forth, while Dante's uplifted head and flaring nostrils sniffed at the trail of marijuana smoke that circled about his head with aromatic sweetness.
"You have to admit, Ann, Mike does have a sense of humor in his own twisted way."
Ann took a long thoughtful drag off the joint before passing it to Trudy's anxious fingers. "I feel embarrassed somehow, Trudy. I… I mean it's the first time I've ever…"
"Hey! Don't worry about it," Trudy said, laying her hand on her friend's arm. "You know, like it's no big deal. I felt pretty strange after my first time, too." Trudy blushed, realizing her admission. "It's like a drug, you know. Each time I say never again, but I'm beginning to realize that it's part of my nature, my very human nature. I'm just…"
"Just what?" Ann felt nervous now that the subject was out in the open. This was a girl she had lived with, shared a home with for over a year and it was not something to easily come to grips with… making love to another woman for the first time.
"I'm just sorry that it had to happen under such, such strained circumstances, that's all." Trudy's slender finger traced the pattern of the paisley design of the carpet, ponderously.
"I know." Ann studied the profile of her stewardess friend, her brown curly hair hugging her head in ringlets of golden highlights that shimmered in the rich tones of the setting sun.
"It's just such a common thing among the people I hang out with, you know what I mean?" Trudy lifted her head to see the visible impact of her statement. Ann pulled her loosely hanging hair back with her free hand.
"I can understand that. You have to do something with those feelings. Mike has always been a master at that game. If it hadn't been for him I never would have made love to another woman."
"How come you got mixed up with him again, Ann? I thought you split from him?"
"I did!" Ann said loudly. "I was in the library one day and he found me – out of nowhere." And Ann went on to explain the strained circumstances under which Mike had ordered her to his house and then turned his men loose on her, how she had actually enjoyed that debasement and how vile and disgusting it made her feel with herself. "After all, Trudy, I love John!" Ann shook her head at her perilous predicament. "Explain that one to me, please!"
"Oh, my God!" Ann's hands raised to her head, cupping her lovely face with the palms of her hands. "I've been so preoccupied with all this traveling around and with this weird situation between us, that I completely forgot: Mike Boston is still in control of me!" Ann groaned in mental anguish. "Trudy, what am I going to tell John? He's going to be back tomorrow and I know he still won't agree to Mike's plan." She shook her head in dismay. "What am I going to do?" she wailed.
"Maybe if we offer to turn some tricks for him, hell leave you alone."
"No, way. I'd only end up in more trouble," moaned Ann.
"I know. He's a sly one. Did I tell you he paid me three thousand dollars to go out and have coffee with him just so he could grill me on where you were?" Trudy poured herself another glass of wine from the quickly disappearing half-gallon of red table wine.
"He what?" Ann couldn't help but laugh.
Dante who had been lying before the fireplace was now nervously and ominously circling his mistress, his eyes leaving her slender form while he whimpered and whined his needs.
"Think he's trying to tell me something?" Ann rose to her feet to let him outside.
"You know what strikes me as really strange about Mike Boston?" said Trudy thoughtfully.
"Yeah? What's that?" Ann called from the kitchen where the back door was allowing a chill draft to waft through the room, the fire suddenly blazing from the input of oxygen.
Trudy stared into the fire. "Have you ever seen him make love, I mean naked?" She put her finger to her lips in a thoughtful pose. "I wonder if he's ever really made love to anyone-I mean other than making them give him head. A good friend of his… you remember him, the guy I was in bed with that night of the cruise in San Francisco when Mike found you in his bedroom and hauled you off… well, he was a good friend of Mike's and he said something about him being impotent. Kind of makes me feel sad for him. Must be an awfully lonely way to struggle through life."
"Come to think of it, you're right," said Ann sitting back down and lighting another joint. Then she burst out in gales of laughter. "Don't you realize what he's done? He's making us feel sorry for him!"
Ann sighed deeply then, the reality of the situation hitting her in the face like a cruel blow.
"Look, Ann. I've got to hurry if I'm going to make the night flight. Got to get back to Boston. I'm still living in.that same apartment, would you believe?"
Ann extended her arm and touched Trudy's hand. "Listen." She looked directly into Trudy's deep blue eyes. "If ever you need me for anything, don't hesitate to call. Please? And give no further thought to what happened last night. I enjoyed it."
It was the first time that Ann had actually said she had enjoyed it. Before it was a lustful experience-a predisposition born of drugs and alcohol. But now it was a reality and she felt the burden of guilt lift from her chest and clear her fogged mind.
The two friends hugged tightly. There was a new sensation now, between them. It was not one of lust or physical need, but a close bond of friendship and respect that even Mike Boston could not sour and destroy as he had done to countless others.
"Bye, pal." Trudy pecked Ann on the cheek. "Give me a call and let me know what happens with this quandary of yours. I don't envy you any." And with tears flooding her ocean blue eyes, Trudy walked toward the door and disappeared.
Ann heard the engine of Trudy's rented car rev up and roar away down the mountain road and out of her life. Not forever, she thought hopefully, not forever.
Every bone and muscle in Ann's body ached, screamed for relief. Her vagina and anus were sore and ravished. "And it's not over yet," she sighed and laid prostrate on the Persian carpet before the fireplace, her legs spread-eagled and her arms straight out from her sides. The position was a familiar one, and Ann mused on days of her childhood in Illinois when, after a new snow fall, the children would gather in her yard and lying like this they would wave their arms and legs in wide semi-circles. It was a game they called `angel', and they'd get up and see who had made the biggest impression on the snow. She recalled with nostalgia how cool yet warm the snow felt and how the powdery substance wormed its way up her jacket sleeves, up her snow panted legs, even into her mittens. How wonderful it would be, she thought, if life could be that simple. To make angels and watch the snow fall.
Her reverie was broken by Dante scratching at the back door. "I'm coming, I'm coming," sighed Ann, rising to her feet. That dog needs more attention than my husband!" she cogitated as she opened the back door. "Okay, you mutt," she teased as Dante came bursting through the door, a stick in his tightly clenched teeth. "Get that out of here!" Ann snapped angrily. I wish John showed as much interest, she thought angrily as she plopped down in the swivel rocker.
Laxly she picked up a magazine, the same magazine that she'd been reading when Mike's letter arrived two days ago. She reread her horoscope for Libras. "Some good news, huh?" she laughed at the meaningless words. "I could use a little good news."
She yawned wearily and was considering a good hot bath and shampoo when she realized how late it was. She had four hours of sleep last night and it wasn't nearly enough to satisfy her exhausted body, but feeling the need to remove the stain of last night's ravishment, she ran a steaming bath in their sunken tub and filled it with bubble bath. As was her habit, she locked all the doors – including the bathroom – and turned on the Jacuzzi. Its whirling action stimulated her aching body and she lay there for countless minutes, aware of nothing.
Her body and soul now greeted each other for the first time since Mike Boston had entered her life. She slipped on her blue plaid housecoat, not bothering to slip on her nightgown and threw a towel over her dripping wet hair.
From the dressing room she grabbed a hairbrush and headed for the living room.
She was greeted by a room full of sweet smelling flowers! Bouquets of red roses, of yellow roses and white roses. Arrangements of daisies, daffodils – her favorite – and iris. Peonies and violets. And in the center of them all stood John, cutting a handsome figure as he stood there erectly, his feet spread wide, glancing straight ahead with his pilot's hat in his dangling hands that crossed in the front. He looked like an Air Force photograph – a conquering hero from a 1946 war movie. Ann ran to her husband and threw her arms around his neck, her wet hair dripping on his shirt.
"Oh, baby! What a surprise!" Mike Boston was now light years away.
"And I have a surprise for you, my dear." He unclasped her arms from around his neck and carried her to the bedroom where he set her down on the brass bed. "How would you like to move to Hawaii?"
"What?"
"Just got an offer. I've been thinking about what you said about spending so much time, alone and paying for this house and somehow it just didn't make any sense."
"Tell met Tell me more!" Ann jumped up and down on the bed girlishly.
"A friend of mine – another pilot – who owns land in Hawaii-beach front property incidentally, has been after me to go into business with him since he already has a plane. We're going to set up our own charter business and fly tourists from island to island."
Ann was beside herself.- "Oh, baby! I'm so happy."
"We can still rent out this house and keep it if you'd like. Anything you want! The world is at your feet, my lovely lady."
They made love passionately, sweetly, tenderly, and lovingly. And not until Ann Barot woke up the next day did she realize that Mike Boston no longer had a hold on her life. She and John would be flying to Hawaii the next day – the last day of Mike's threatening power – early in the morning. Mike Boston would be calling on an empty house. Once more the world was rich and full of promise. Her promise.