Guilty Pleasures

by Stella Cameron

  He started to brake again.

  “Get your foot off it,” she told him calmly. “And quit panicking. We’re going to pull this off. By the time we’ve finished we’ll have everything we want.”

  The corner of his eye twitched. “I think we should get back to Kirkland. The shit’s going to hit the fan over this. We need to be there to protect our interests.”

  “My interests are just fine,” she told him, wishing she could believe it. “And if you stick with me, yours will be fine, too.”

  “Spit it out, Mary. I’m not a game player. You know that.” She pulled her blouse free of her skirt and opened one side. Concentrating on what she did she tucked the soft fabric back, Art looked at her, then back at the road. His throat jerked. “Cover that up,” he said but his voice broke. “Any ruddy trucker’d get an eyeful.”

  She stroked her naked breast. “Those poor men must get so bored. I’m just doing a little charity work.”

  Art’s hands tightened on the wheel until his knuckles turned white. “What do you want?”

  “I want you to do exactly what I tell you. Whatever I tell you.”

  He glanced at her breast again and shifted in his seat. He checked the rearview mirror. “Button up, Mary. For God’s sake.”

  Her response was to push the other side of her blouse away. She tilted her head back again and rested her right arm along the window rim.

  “This guy’s going to overtake us.”

  “Not if you speed up, lover.”

  Promptly, Art swerved into the fast lane. “Damn it, you’re giving me a hard-on that won’t quit.”

  “I’ve already done that.” She grinned, and cupped him. “Ooh, maybe we won’t make it to that place I told you about.”

  “Do up your blouse.”

  “Make me.”

  “I’m driving the damn car.”

  “The fuckmobile,” Mary said, and laughed aloud. She sobered just as quickly. Business first, then on with the good times. “Jack and I have done it plenty in this car, I’ll show you how in a minute.”

  On a downhill grade, the truck drew level, and Mary looked up at the driver. He stared straight ahead.

  “You are sick,” Art said with feeling. “You can’t stop yourself can you?”

  “And you’re a little choirboy,” she said sweetly. “A choirboy who enjoys target practice, among other things.”

  The trucker glanced down. Mary smiled and waved. As if it were on tracks, his head moved back and forth between his view of the road and her breasts. He held his tongue between his teeth.

  “Christ!” Art said. “He’s going to wrap that ruddy great thing around a pole. Is that what you want? Will that satisfy your ego?”

  She sniggered. “Right now he’s got a pole of his own to deal with.” Deftly, she slipped a hand under Art’s arm and unzipped his pants. Her hand was inside before he could try to stop her. “Drive, baby, and be glad you’re the one in this car, not him.”

  “Stop it. I can’t drive like this.”

  “Remember what we talked about the last time we were together—other than targets?”

  He groaned and his hips came off the seat.

  The trucker kept dead level and Mary didn’t need to see in the cab to know what he was doing with the hand that wasn’t on the wheel. Sexual power thrilled her. She relished the way she’d learned to use it, and how immortal it made her feel.

  She slowed down on Art. No point ending a perfect early-morning drive in a ditch. “I asked you a question,” she reminded him.

  His hips moved again.

  “Patience,” she told him. “I’m going to make you very happy, but we’ve got to clear a few things up first. I told you something had to be done.”

  “Yeah.” He actually leered at the trucker, who showed no sign of missing any chance to eat Mary’s breasts with his eyes. His tongue made repeated trips around his lips. “Look at that sucker. He’d climb right in here with us if we invited him.”

  Mary leaned out of the window and shouted “Hi! Hey, you!”

  “Knock it off.” There was a threat in Art’s voice this time, and she remembered how mean he could be.

  The truck window rolled down, and the man inside shifted his baseball cap to the back of his head.

  “Want to join us?” Mary yelled.

  He laughed.

  She abandoned Art’s crotch in favor of lifting her breasts for the neighbor’s greater benefit.

  “You’re going too far,” Art told her. “You’ve gone too far. If we get a cop on our tail, he’ll throw us away.”

  “Not if I get him to join our little party, too.”

  “This is all part of it for you, isn’t it? This exhibitionism?”

  “What was your first clue?” She jiggled her flesh and watched the trucker turn pale. She could almost see him sweat. “That’s what made it so easy for us to work as a team. Art. We’re both into alternative sex.”

  “I haven’t forgotten what you want me to do,” he said making a grab for her blouse and missing. Instead his fingers closed on a breast. He let go immediately. “I haven’t forgotten one detail. And you’ve succeeded in turning me so far on, I hurt. That means you’ll get everything you want before I drive us back. Everything, and more. Can we stop this madness now?”

  “Soon. I just want to make sure you don’t back out, though.” And she closed her fingers on his pulsing penis.

  “Mary! We’re going to have an accident, I tell you.”

  “I want you to forget what I said about Jennifer. It’s not a problem. I talked to Jack about it, and he says she’s so ugly, he has to screw her in the dark.”

  “The guy in the truck’s beating off.”

  “Really?”

  “How can he do that and drive that thing?”

  “Talented, I guess. Or desperate. Don’t think about what I’m doing. I’m only making sure we don’t have to waste any time when we get where we’re going.”

  “You don’t have any proof Jack’s sleeping with Jen.”

  “I have proof. I told you I did weeks ago. It mattered then, it doesn’t now.”

  “I thought you were afraid it could get in the way of the show.”

  “No way. I was wrong about that. I wasn’t wrong to worry about his infatuation with Polly. She’s the real threat. He’s trying to squeeze me out because of her. He’s sleeping with her, too, but he’s not admitting it. You should have seen him after that call. He was a madman.”

  “You’ve finished the trucker. He’s pulling off.”

  Mary waved to the man again and blew him a kiss. “My good deed for the day. You should have seen the way Jack performed after that call this morning. Like a rabbit. I don’t want any of that wasted on that colorless little nothing. And I don’t want her working on him to get me off the show.”

  “Why would she do that?”

  “Because she wants him all to herself. And he’s told her he doesn’t need me, that he’s the brain and the talent—as well as the money—behind the whole production.”

  “This show means everything to me, too,” Art said. He covered her hand and squeezed it, and shuddered. “Jen and me need Polly’s Place. We never had it so good before.”

  “You mean you never had it so good before you had me,” she told him, doing her own squeezing. “When I told you to send Jennifer away, you said you would.”

  The Mercedes slowed gradually. Art let the vehicle float into the slow lane. The truck was way back now, on the wide shoulder. “I agreed because you threatened to tell Jack about us if I didn’t.”

  “How did you think you’d do your act without your ugly twin?”

  “I didn’t.” He locked his elbows. “I intended to tell Jen to stay away from Jack. Then I was going to convince you that I could make sure she stayed away. I can do that, Mary. Jen wouldn’t do anything to get in the way of this opportunity.”

  She pumped him ferociously. “You bloody little liar! I can’t trust you.”

  He all bu
t ripped her hand away. He twisted her fingers backward until she screamed. “You don’t learn, do you? I’ve told you it’ll be me who makes the final calls. And I’ve already shown you how much I can hurt you—anytime I want to. Jen’s no bother, I tell you. Didn’t you ever think I might have something on my sister? That I can control her? Didn’t it cross your mind to leave things to me?”

  Tears of pain squeezed from the corners of her eyes. “I don’t leave anything to anyone. It’s a mistake to leave the important stuff to other people. I learned that lesson the hard way. By losing.”

  He released her fingers and turned the Mercedes from the freeway onto a road through flat farmland. “This is going to be a new experience then, isn’t it. Forget Jen. She won’t be a problem from here on. If you had any sense, you’d shut up and let Jack have her. All the more of you for me.”

  Pleasure licked through Mary. He’d never said a word about really wanting her before. “Okay. Whatever you say. About her. But the other has to be done my way.”

  “Off with the old obsession, on with the new? Now it’s Polly you’re worrying about.”

  “I’m not worried about her.”

  Art nosed the car between tall bushes bracketing a dirt road. He drove even more slowly.

  “Where are we going?” Mary asked.

  “Never mind that. Finish telling me what to do.”

  “We don’t have to have Polly. People come and go on top shows. Happens all the time.”

  “Not when a show is tailored around one person.”

  “She’s no good in the part.”

  He snorted. “Every kid in the country thinks she’s great.”

  “Polly’s going to have to leave the show. We’ll all be very sad. But it’ll be another learning experience. How to deal with saying good-bye.”

  “Haven’t we done that?”

  “Not this way.” She looked around. “We’ve run out of road.” Scrubby trees made a tunnel over the car and the track ahead dwindled to a narrow path.

  “Great, isn’t it. I’ve always loved places like this. Like you’re cut off from the world.” He stopped the car and turned off the ignition. “Sexy as hell.”

  She wriggled and undid her seat belt. “Promise me, Art,” she wheedled, getting to her knees on the seat and slipping off the blouse.

  He closed his teeth on a nipple, and she shrieked with pure sexual ecstasy. “You’re violent,” she told him.

  “Yeah. I’m violent. Violence turns me on. That’s why we make a great pair—we like the same things. What am I supposed to promise you?” He hauled her scrap of a skirt up around her waist and slapped her bottom till it stung.

  Mary made ineffectual grabs at his hand, thrusting her breasts in his face while she did so. “You’ve got to promise to help me get what I want. I’ll look after you, Artie. I’ll always look after you. Take off your pants.”

  He paused long enough to undo his belt and push his jeans down past his knees.

  “Lovely,” Mary said. He was huge. Another thing that kept her coming back for more. Huge, and broad at the tip. She swung a leg over his hips and let him flirt against her while she grew even wetter. “Once Polly goes bye-bye and we all get over being so sad Auntie Mary’s going to write herself into the story. To help the kiddies understand how the world works.”

  Art laughed through gritted teeth. “Don’t you think the sponsors might have something to say about exposing the little dears to this sort of thing?”

  “Now!” She positioned herself and drove down, took him inside until their sex hair mingled. Art gave a keening cry, and she rose and fell on him again and again. “I’m going to take care of us. And I’m going to have Jack, too. And Jack can play around with your sister in the dark if he wants to. It’ll give me something else to hold over him. He can’t risk me leaking that to the papers. Jack who has twisted sex with a woman he won’t look at with the light on. That might not play too well with parents in some parts of this country. Not wholesome.”

  “Shut—up,” Art muttered holding her breasts while he used his strong legs to do what needed to be done.

  “Just give me your word and I will shut up,” she said grimacing with satisfaction. “You’re going to find out where Polly’s gone and make sure she doesn’t come back.”

  His eyes opened. “What the… What does that mean?”

  She smiled at him. “We’re going to teach the children of America about death. You’re going to make sure Polly has a fatal accident.”

  “Mad,” Art said and yelled as he climaxed. “You’re ruddy mad. Who are you going to want me to kill next week? My mother?”

  Mary spread her arms in glorious abandon and shimmied bouncing her breasts before his eyes. “Don’t be an ass, lover,” she said, as she howled with her release. “Polly’s the only one in my way. And you know you never had a mother.”

  Twenty

  Nasty kept the Porsche’s speed down and drove behind Dusty and Bobby in Dusty’s sleek silver camper. All the way to the tiny town of Past Peak in the foothills of the Cascade Mountains, Polly had spared only brief glances for the beautiful scenery. The rest of the time she kept her eyes on the vehicle ahead. For Nasty to make such a point of wanting it where he could see it, there had to be the threat of danger every mile of the way.

  “This place doesn’t change,” Nasty said when they drove through the center of the town. An abandoned railroad station stood to their left, and a row of single-story shops and businesses to their right. “Nice town. Nice people. The best. You and Bobby will have to come back when you can be free to wander around.”

  Polly’s heart made yet another flip. Her life was becoming a series of fleeting, happy moments in one long, hellish episode.

  “Phoenix used to work there.” Nasty pointed toward the shop fronts. “Round the Bend. Trendiest little bar and diner in the west.”

  As they drove by, she located the sign. “Roman’s wife, Phoenix? I thought she was a lawyer.”

  “She is. Doesn’t practice. She had to live, and there isn’t much call for lawyers around here.”

  “Why would she settle in a place where it was so hard to find work?”

  Nasty checked his rearview mirror—as he’d done about a thousand times since leaving Kirkland. “That’s another story. She needed a break. The camper Dusty’s driving was outside the Bend when it caught fire.” He chuckled. “Fortunately I got the fire out before the whole thing went up.”

  “How—”

  “Another story,” he told her. “I’ll tell you another time. Belle Rose—Rose Smothers’s place—is about three miles on the other side of town.”

  “Roman and Phoenix are sort of larger than life to Dusty, aren’t they?” Polly said. “Kind of a legend in their own time.”

  He chuckled again. “Dusty puts up a good front. Dusty the crusty ogre. But he’s crazy about kids. Roman and Phoenix have two girls. Junior and Marta. Dusty’s their surrogate grandpa, and that makes Roman and Phoenix okay, too.”

  “Bobby thinks Dusty’s great.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I think you scare him a bit.”

  “I won’t when he finds out what a marshmallow I am.”

  The laughter came before she could stop it. “Marshmallow?” Laughing felt good.

  “Ask anyone I’ve known for a long time.” He sounded aggrieved. “They’ll tell you. That Nasty’s got a loud bark. Doesn’t mean a thing. He’s a marshmallow. Ask Dusty.”

  “Maybe I should ask someone you’ve known for a long time who isn’t your partner.”

  “Maybe.” The silver camper made a right turn up a narrow road. Nasty followed. “I’m going to have that talk with Bobby. Things kind of got away from me last night.”

  Polly yawned. “Marshmallow and king of understatement. I think Bobby’s the only one among us who slept at all. I’m still feeling sick about Belinda and Festus. Poor Belinda. She’s really suffered.”

  Nasty pushed against the steering wheel, straightened his arm
s. He hadn’t said much about what had happened at Another Reality. At his insistence, Polly had filed a complaint with the police. They’d told her she’d have to come back into the station to identify any seized materials. She’d agreed. But there had been no discussion between her and Nasty over leaving town as soon as Bobby woke up. They’d headed out of Kirkland by seven.

  “It could have been Festus who knocked me into the lake,” she said without deciding to say anything at all. “And he could have attacked me. He doesn’t look it, but he could be one of those tall, wiry people who are very strong.”

  “Yeah.”

  The camper passed through an open white gate leading to a wide driveway. When the Porsche drew into the same opening, Polly read Belle Rose in wrought iron on the gate. “Sounds like the name of a Southern mansion,” she commented.

  “Or a description of the owner,” Nasty said. He turned up the corners of his mouth at her. “Rose is from the South. She was her father’s—her daddy, as she calls him—she was his only child, and he gave her everything. Except self-confidence. Rose is a very lovely, very reclusive woman. She loves people. She’s going to want to keep you. Don’t think I’m kidding—she will.”

  Polly wasn’t sure she was keen on someone wanting to keep her, no matter how lovely and generous she was. “It could be that we’re overreacting. If Festus is responsible for everything, the police are going to track him down, and it’ll be over.”

  “Sweetheart, if I could have one wish, I’d wish to find out that I’m overreacting. Until I know I am, I’d like you to let me play this my way. Okay?”

  Argument wouldn’t make a dent in his resolve. “Okay,” Polly said. “But I can’t be away very long. And I do have to at least call Jack and warn him. And my mother, and Fab.”

  “I called Jack early this morning—when we got back from the police station.”

  She turned abruptly toward him. “You called him?”

  “Told him you and I were going away together for a few days.”

  “Xavier!”

  His gum snapped, and she heard the force of his teeth coming together. “We’ve arrived.”

  She glanced at a fabulous, two-story white house—Southern mansion-style from its columns to its extravagant veranda— and returned her full, furious attention to Nasty. “You told Jack Spinnel that you and I were going away together. As in going away together?”