CHAPTER 9
Wendy had been drinking. Tina had been managing her. She’d come home too buzzed to sleep, worked on cleaning her Bonneville’s wheels and hubs. Then, covered with grease too stubborn for Ajax to get off, she wrapped herself in a shower towel and passed out on top of her bed, too gross for the sheets.
The purple bunnies were just about to swarm when the world abruptly had a ringtone. Wendy opened her eyes and saw something far scarier: she’d left her phone on the other side of the nightstand and to get it, she’d have to leave her bed, which was suddenly the most comfortable place in the world.
She was this close to letting it ring—it couldn’t be that long until it went to voice-mail—but then she remembered that she was in a relationship now and really couldn’t tell her phone to fuck off just because someone wasn’t courteous enough to text.
Besides, someone could’ve died or something. And now she was worried someone had died. How could she enjoy her bed when someone might be dying?
Cracking inactivity out of her bones and groaning, Wendy shuffled herself out of her bed and picked up the phone. She sagged back down on the bed as she answered. “Yeah?”
“Ms. Cedar, good, you’re up.” Janet’s voice was a strong jolt of espresso, even if Wendy could only manage a weak smile. Four hours later, this call would’ve made her day. But it wasn’t four hours later. It was four in the goddamn morning.
“We have very different definitions of ‘up’. You know, if you feel the need to wake me up, you could at least do it by crawling into bed with me, wearing mink…”
“This isn’t a social call—”
“And it’s Saturday, right? Because I don’t know who told you I spend my Saturdays masturbating, but they’re sorely half-mistaken.”
“Yes, I’m afraid there’s no time for pleasantries.” Janet kept the faux-professionalism in her voice, to the point where it didn’t sound so faux. “Our current marketing director was diagnosed with leukemia yesterday. He’s starting treatment immediately, so I’ve been chosen to go to the conference in his stead. Very last minute, they just settled on me being the one to make the trip. I’ll need someone to assist me, so since you already worked on the pamphlets, I take it you’re familiar enough to be of assistance?”
“Yeah. Go to Arizona, I’m cool with that. Do we get hazard pay?”
“If you could pack a bag and come down here, I’ll drive us to the airport. It’ll just be for the weekend, and I’d really appreciate it. I’m afraid we would have to share a hotel suite, but I trust that won’t be a problem?”
Wendy rubbed some errant sleep from her eyes. “Okay then, we spend three hours doing a sales pitch, the rest of the weekend finger-banging and watching cable porn. I like it, I like it. Should I bother packing underwear?”
Janet faked a laugh. “I’d love to hammer out those details, but I’m with the board of directors finalizing the arrangement, so use your own best judgment and we’ll attend to the little concerns later on. Please come right away, you don’t have time to shower.”
“Yeah, no doubt, no doubt. What’s your favorite color? Because whatever it is, I can probably bring a dildo that color. There was a sale and I thought, ‘Wendy, why not treat yourself?’”
“All right, glad to hear I have my best man on the job,” Janet said with false cheer. “Please get in touch with my secretary if you have any further inquiries, she probably knows more than I do at this point.”
“Are we taking a plane? Because, Mile High Club? Very easy with two women. Unless you’re really into scissoring, and I’ve always found that pretty overrated.”
“Thank you again and I will see you here.” Janet hung up.
Wendy cracked some more stiffness out of her joints, going around her apartment and unplugging her appliances. While she tried to remember every gizmo that needed to stop leeching electricity, she rang Regan. She got her answering machine. “Hey, sis, can’t babysit this weekend. Work thing. Janet needs me to go with her to Yuma.”
The phone abruptly picked up. “‘Janet’? You’re going to Yuma with a ‘Janet’ now?”
“Yeah, she’s my boss.”
“I bet she is.”
Wendy held the phone away from her ear while she worked on a straight face. Regan could detect a snicker at five hundred yards. “I need to go. And we’re not having sex.” Technically true.
“I’m looking her up on Facebook.”
“Do not send her a friend request!” Wendy hung up. She didn’t have any clean clothes. She’d have to take her laundry and do it at the hotel.
It was true what they said. Nothing good happened after 2 a.m.
“Need any help with your bags?”
Still stretching after the long car ride, Wendy jerked in surprise. That didn’t sound like her Uber driver, and she should know after listening to him talk about dolphins for thirty minutes, like geez, dude, host a nature documentary already. Although it was kind of cool that killer whales were just really big dolphins.
She looked over to the speaker, un-spacing out. It was a small woman, thin and seemingly frail except for a steely, spindly aura of strength she possessed. Her hair was dryly styled, her face neatly made up to hide the fine bones of her features in suggestions of volume. Wendy couldn’t place her exact age, but had the idea that calling her an old soul would be taken as an insult. Still, she was beaming a pleasant smile and Wendy returned it.
“Sure. Hate to make two trips.”
Wendy wished the driver a good day and agreed to give him five stars, or whatever system Uber had nowadays. Then she handed the woman her carry-on bag while she lugged the suitcase, acutely aware of her arm muscles against her shirt sleeves. She thought that perhaps her commitment to bohemianism should stop at using secondhand luggage, and include buying something with rollers.
She’d packed only the essentials. She really thought they’d be lighter than this. “Wendy Cedar,” she greeted, nodding thankfully.
“Mary Borchardt,” the steely-eyed woman returned. Her gaze was disconcertingly intent, like it had weathered at twice the rate of her body. “I know who you are. You’re going with Janet to make the sales presentation.”
“You know Janet?”
“We collaborated on the Hawkowl. She’s a firecracker, isn’t she?”
“That’s one word for it.” A word like hootenanny or skedaddle.
They’d made it to the lobby, and the place was like Count Dracula’s office space with almost, but not quite, everything closed for the night. The few hints of movement she could see on higher floors and infrequently lit offices seemed vaguely frenetic. Maybe it was just her imagination; the excitement at the prospect of barely having to share Janet with any of her responsibilities. Wendy just had to kick the presentation’s ass and cue one grateful Janet Lace…
She had to remind herself not to think about that one in public. She was liable to start shooting gay out of her eyes like laser beams, mooning over Janet.
“Could you tell Janet Lace that Wendy Cedar is here?” she asked the receptionist, dropping her suitcase by the front desk. The receptionist obligingly relayed it up the first of however many rungs were below Elizabeth Smile. If Elizabeth was even still at work. Wendy yawned.
“Crazy, isn’t it?” Mary asked, all rhetorical as she set the carry-on down by Wendy’s suitcase. “All this hard work and aggravation, and it all comes down to getting people to want to buy the damn things.”
“Yeah,” Wendy agreed. “Funny.”
“Would you mind giving me a little sneak peek of the pitch? It’s hard for me not to worry.”
“No time,” Wendy said, seeing that the elevator was on the way down. “This is kind of last minute, have to make my flight.”
“Yes, of course, of course. Just tell me if you’ll be mentioning the RadarVoid system?”
“RadarVoid?” It sounded familiar, but woken up from a deep sleep and then tranquilized again by the car ride over, Wendy felt too frazzled to fully place it.
“One of the new features of the Hawkowl. My team implemented it and we’re all very concerned it won’t get its due. We’re mostly women, you see, sort of the girls’ dormitory you might say, and, well, you know how it is.” Mary reached into her jacket pocket and brought out a file folder. “Here. Take it. The project overview. I’d hate to see it buried just because someone up there doesn’t see it as important.”
The elevator emerged into view, Janet visible through the glass wall, arms crossed in consternation, gloved fingers rattling against her biceps.
Wendy fought against a smile, remembering that she was supposed to be helping a fellow employee out. She took the folder. “I’ll see to it that Janet gets it.”
Mary grinned and seized Wendy’s hand in a firm shake. “Thank you! Thank you very much. It’s so wonderful to be appreciated for, well, not for once, but sometimes it does feel like it!”
“Think nothing of it. Us girls have to stick together.”
“Exactly.” Mary nodded. “Exactly, exactly, exactly! Well, have a nice flight and, yes, try not to work too hard? It may be business, but it’s still a trip!”
Wendy laughed. “You too!” she said, as if Mary were going on a business trip, stupid, stupid. She shook it out of her head and picked up her suitcase and carry-on just in time for a beefy intern to take them from her. Another one was pushing Janet’s rolling suitcase ahead of him—it looked so easy—leaving Janet only grasping her usual briefcase.
Wendy held still as a statue as Janet passed by her.
“Come,” Janet said, giving her a raised eyebrow.
Wendy followed her back to the curb, where a limousine had pulled up.
Honestly, who knew Janet Lace could be so fucking extra?
The limo ride was long and smooth. Wendy had done it before, of course, and even if she did want to shove her head out the sunroof, she would hate to embarrass herself that way in front of Janet. Her boss, meanwhile, sat dead center in back of the bench seating, casually checking off engagements she was deferring on her phone—sending texts to all the poor bastards who wouldn’t get to see her because she was in Yuma. And not seeming to notice at all how the limo was flying from the hundred bucks she’d slipped the driver to get them to the airport ‘toot sweet’.
Funny as hell—all that just so they would be there two hours before their flight took off. Not that Wendy cared. She was just looking at Janet. All the way in the back of the stretch, lioness in a rolling den, going over her phone like it was the bone of a picked-clean carcass. The Yuma trip was a big opportunity for her, and her smile was smeared with red. A fresh kill. A delicious kill.
And every so often, her eyes flicked up from white-painted glasses to take in Wendy. And each time, Wendy felt, in a very real way, honored to be noticed by her. To get her attention when there were so many other things it could be on.
The ride settled: they got on the highway, and the stop-and-go traffic just went. With balance restored and the speed smooth, Janet finished with her phone.
“You’re aware, I trust, that you’re accompanying me because of your diligent work ethic and excellent performance, not because of any…superfluous factors?” Janet asked, a near-match for the Voice of God.
“Yeah, I know, I’m awesome,” Wendy replied. She got up. She sat down beside Janet. Beside those long legs, skirt leaving them bare, crossed thighs leaving them hoisted up close enough to touch…“What are you thinking?” Wendy asked, to avoid thinking what she was thinking. The partition may have been rolled up, but it wasn’t soundproof. And Wendy may not have been a screamer, but she also wasn’t sure if that’d be the case with Janet.
Janet looked her over, with a smirk that showed she knew exactly how much Wendy liked being looked over. “I’m wondering what you’ll let me get away with.”
“I’m pretty flexible,” Wendy replied. “Both in terms of my body and with gay stuff.”
“Not in bed, I know you’ll let me do anything I want to do to you there. I’m referring to intensity. I’m referring to something for you to endure.”
Wendy gulped. She’d never actually gulped just because someone implied she was about to get a break-off-a-switch whooping. Then again, no one had ever implied she’d get a break-off-a-switch whooping. And it wasn’t like anyone fantasized about being sent to time-out.
“Have I been a bad girl?” Wendy asked, trying to sound sultry and fearing she mostly sounded like she needed a cough drop.
Janet nodded slowly. “The phone call. You’re a smart girl, Ms. Cedar. You clearly realized that was a work call, to be taken seriously, and not an appropriate venue for your antics.” She leaned toward Wendy. “Do you enjoy the thought of me trying to attend to important business, with respected colleagues, while imagining you? What I’m going to do to you? How I’m going to do it?”
Wendy bit her lip. “I do like that thought,” she said. “I like knowing that you think of doing things to me as much as I think about it.”
Janet shook her head. “Naughty. So naughty. And willfully disobedient.”
“I need to be taught a lesson,” Wendy agreed. “Tamed with a firm hand…”
She could almost see Janet shiver. “Pull up your skirt.”
Wendy did. But slowly. Not to be dramatic, but so that her hands didn’t shake. “I liked how it felt, that day in the elevator. I couldn’t stop thinking of how it would feel if you did it. I still can’t.”
“Do you think I’m going to reward you or punish you?” Janet asked. Her eyes burned into Wendy, nearly making her whimper before they dropped down to bare thighs. “Pink panties, Ms. Cedar. That’s very cute. Did you used to wear cute panties like that for your college girlfriend?”
“No. Just for you.”
“I like them,” Janet said. “But your behavior has to come first. I’m taking away the privilege of wearing panties. From now on, whenever you’re at work, you’ll have to put up with knowing that you’re exposed. That anyone can see you, or feel you, at any time, and there’s nothing to protect you from it. That I’m the only person who will know. And I will check to make sure you’re being obedient, Ms. Cedar. If you’re not…” She trailed off.
Wendy shuddered. It wasn’t in fear.
“Well? Take them off. You’re not allowed to be covered.”
Wendy couldn’t stop herself from shaking as she planted her shoulders against her seat, arched her hips, worked her panties down. She felt Janet’s eyes on her sex, saw the look in Janet’s eyes as the woman saw her exposed, and she was suddenly aware of just how much need there was in her body. If Janet had asked, she would’ve done anything for her.
She set herself back down in her seat, and her skirt hadn’t fallen back down. Her bare ass touched the cool leather of the seat cushion and she remembered the glove and she remembered how good it had been just for Janet to hear her and she clenched and tightened until it was almost painful, until she wanted to beg Janet to finger her just so she wouldn’t implode. But she had to be good. She’d disobeyed enough for one day.
She bent over—Christ, everything was such a fucking porno with Janet watching her—and scanted the panties down her legs. Over either one of her feet. As she lifted them, one by one, the pressure on her womanhood crested. She thought she could get off just by squeezing her thighs together. Instead, she picked her panties up off the floor and held them out to Janet.
Janet took them and put them in her pocket. “I hope you brought a pink dildo,” she said. “It’s my favorite color.”
When they arrived at the departure gate, Wendy patted her skirt down about half a billion times in ten seconds before the chauffeur got the door and she got out, following a Janet who appeared cool as a cucumber. As if she didn’t have another woman’s panties in her fucking breast pocket.
Janet stood beside the door as Wendy got out, being more careful of her skirt than she’d ever been. “Remember, Ms. Cedar,” Janet said, continuing their conversation as if it had been about the market value of legumes.
“Next time I expect you to follow my instructions implicitly.”
“Yes, Ms. Lace,” Wendy replied. She meant every word.
Wendy would’ve expected nothing less: Janet had airports gamed down to a science. Before they were even out of the limousine, she had given Wendy slip-on shoes and clear toiletry bags for her personal items. She double-checked Wendy’s documents for her, then fitted them to her own, and put them in her jacket pocket. Not the same one she had Wendy’s panties in.
Wendy couldn’t stop thinking about how bare she was. If she bent over too far, took a long stride, walked down a flight of stairs, anyone could see her. It was probably one of her better reasons for not taking the stairs, all told.
She handed over her laptop case at security, took off her shoes, and could feel the inside of her skirt on her thighs, her hips. Of course, she could always feel it there, but it felt so much more intimate with nothing to stop it from going through her. If Janet touched her, right through her skirt, it’d be like she was wearing nothing at all.
She looked over at Janet. Janet was watching her. Smirking. She put her shoes back on. Very carefully. She imagined Janet declaring her panties at the customs desk. Wait, they didn’t go through customs to go to Arizona, it was part of the US, technically.
Janet did it again with the flight. The plane was medium-sized, cramped but not claustrophobic, with a wide aisle and two gangly seats on either side. There were few passengers on the red-eye, and they were able to space themselves out into bubbles of privacy: a skeleton crew occupying a vast, insurgent territory.
Janet and Wendy sat in the middle, by the wing. From the aisle seat, Janet gave the wing a quick check and an approving nod through the window, as if it were a horse she were about to take for a ride.
Wendy stowed her carry-on—Janet hadn’t even taken that much, just her purse—and sat by the window. She wondered just how comfortable she should get; it was a long flight. “So, when do you want to…go to the bathroom?” she asked, glancing about at the other passengers. None of them were within earshot and she hoped it stayed that way as more boarded.
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