Ruined

by Jw Grodt

  “Brad, that’s the deal, the only deal, take it or leave it. I would rather stick to our previous agreement.”

  There was a long silence. Brad knew he was had. He wanted the deal much more than Gerald did.

  “Okay, Gerald. You win. Have your attorney draw up the necessary papers.”

  * * *

  By the end of August Jared was about ninety percent back to normal. If he heard her name, it would upset him but Brad concluded his son was in the early stages of moving on. Because of his situation, the company had sent their number two man for the first couple of monthly trips in June and July and there wasn’t a trip in August.

  During that time, Brad flew down only once to see Nicole. In late July, David Shope asked if he would be willing to deliver a plane to a man in Hilton Head. Their regular delivery pilot was on vacation. When David said he would put him up for a few days at a swank hotel, all expenses paid, Brad could hardly refuse. Brad took a detour and landed at the small airport on Duck Island and picked up Nicole. They flew on together and delivered the plane, then relaxed at the hotel, enjoying going back and forth between the beach and the hotel suite. Brad took her and released all the weeks of tension dealing with Jared. He wrote his name in the oily sheen of her flat, tanned stomach. She was his forever.

  They were enjoying a drink one evening at a bar in a local club when a man about Jared’s age approached them.

  “Miss, would you like to dance? That is, if it’s alright with your father?”

  There was no hint of sarcasm, which made it worse in Brad’s mind. He lost control and hit the guy, causing him to stumble backwards. A bystander caught him around the waist and the guy lunged at Brad, landing a punch to his left eye. The bouncer was there in an instant and, having only seen the second punch, ushered the young man to the door. He came back to see if Brad was okay and he and Nicole assured him all was well. Brad felt a shiner coming on. He had to be more careful. He didn’t need to wind up in jail and risk blowing his cover.

  Later, back at the hotel suite, Nicole held an ice pack to his eye.

  “Why did you hit that guy? All he did was ask me to dance! Why cause such a scene?”

  Brad mumbled something about “too much to drink.” It was all he wanted to say at that moment. When Nicole turned away to go get more ice, he looked in her direction just to get a look at her ass, but his eyes diverted to the mirrored wall opposite: Nicole’s face was contorted as if she were fighting off laughter.

  * * *

  “How’d ya get the shiner, Dad?” Jared asked him when he came over for breakfast a couple of days later.

  “Hit my face on the wing of the plane. Stupid, huh?” Brad lied. More lies. Would there ever come a day when he could just tell the truth about it all? He just wanted to be with Nicole and live honestly about everything. His thoughts flashed back to that nighttime walk from Kelsey’s…well, almost everything.

  “Looks like it hurts. Listen, Dad, I have to fly to San Diego the first week of September. How about you and I go together? We can do some house-hunting?”

  “That’s thoughtful, Jared, but I really can’t get away right now. Still a busy season for me.”

  “Well, think it over and if you change your mind….” Jared looked at his watch. “Gotta run. See you later.” He grabbed his car keys from the hall table and no sooner had he shut the door than Brad was on the phone to Nicole. He would reserve a plane and be there with her for an entire week.

  September began clear and cloudless, the air temperature hinting at the coming change. Crickets sounded from the tall, dry grasses along the roadways, harbingers of shorter and cooler days. After Brad dropped Jared at Reagan National he sped off to the small airstrip to board his own plane. At the proper altitude, he switched to autopilot and began to dream of sweaty lovemaking sessions with his young mistress. The yoke became her hips as he needlessly gripped it; the plane pushed through the atmosphere, piercing billowy pockets of cloud as Brad pushed into her moist, pink mound.

  He drove his rental car to the condo and saw that her SUV was parked outside.

  “Nicole, I’m here,” he called as he let himself in. The radio was blaring hip-hop. He hated that music. He called out again but no answer. Directing his gaze toward the balcony, he saw the back of her head. She was lounging in a vinyl chair, looking out toward the breakers, taking in the sun. When he slid back the glass door, he saw that she was completely nude: wearing only sunglasses and ear-buds. Her entire body was pulsing to the beat of whatever she was listening to. He reached out and lightly touched her arm. She shrieked and jumped out of her chair, knocking over a small table along with a full glass of iced tea. She pulled off her sunglasses and punched him in the chest, telling him he could go to hell for scaring her. Moments later they were on the bed.

  “Did you bring your swimming trunks, by chance?” Nicole asked him in the kitchen some time later. They wolfed down sandwiches and beers. Brad was feeling especially light-headed. He reminded himself to get a physical.

  “Actually I did, by chance.”

  “Good! The water is still enjoyable, let’s go swimming.” She wiped her mouth on a napkin and ran off to the bedroom to change. She was ready before he could open his suitcase.

  “Aren’t you ready yet?” she asked, standing in the doorway of the bathroom in her crocheted bikini, her full pink lips pouting under her over-sized, Jackie-O sunglasses.

  Brad synchronized the thwap-thwap sound of his own flip-flops to hers as they padded to the elevator and then as they walked out through the main foyer to the beach. By the time they hit the sand he was winded.

  She spread a blanket on the sand and tossed her beach bag aside. “Race you to the water,” she said, with three steps head start.

  Nicole wrapped her legs around his waist as they bobbed about in the waves. He tasted the salt-water splash on her lips, and then thrust his hips toward her, letting her know he was ready when she was. He wondered what it would feel like to do it in the ocean, but then got concerned that some little sea creature might take a nip. He decided to wait for a better moment. Nicole rubbed him until he was hard and then giggled and headed for the beach.

  They lay together on the blanket and he watched beads of water trickle down the sides of her breasts. She was wearing her sunglasses again, looking out toward the water. He hated when he couldn’t see her eyes; he needed to know what she was thinking.

  Three young guys in their mid-to late twenties were high-stepping up the beach, laughing and punching each other as they walked. One of them pointed at Nicole. They cocked their heads in acknowledgment and she smiled primly and offered a subtle wave. As soon as her fingers wiggled, Brad’s blood boiled.

  “I’d like to kick those little fuckers’ asses,” he said.

  “Oh, Bradley! You’re more of a man than those three punks combined. Forget about it.” She turned over on her stomach and stroked his leg. For the moment he was placated. He drifted off into a heat-soaked nap. A short time later, his eyes opened when he heard the low murmur of voices, muffled by the steady salt breeze. Nicole was standing a few feet away, talking to a tallish, tan guy with thick dark curls. Muscular hairy calves shot from his aqua-striped board shorts.

  “Hit the road, buddy!” Brad called out before he was even awake.

  “Brad, be nice. We’re just talking.”

  “Is your dad always this protective?” The guy laughed and smirked as he reached out and touched Nicole’s bare ribcage. She slapped his hand away. “He’s not my father, he’s my husband, asshole!” she shot back.

  The young man looked over at Brad and then stared at Nicole for a second, to make sure she was serious. He muttered apologies and walked off.

  Nicole grabbed her things and made a beeline for the condo. Brad couldn’t tell if she were angry or embarrassed. He tried to keep up with her. When they were standing in the living room of the condo, she
through her sunglasses on the wet bar, spun around to him and said “Don’t let other men looking at me get to you, ok? It’s no big deal!” She strutted off to the bathroom.

  After Brad heard the water running, he slowly opened the door and went inside. He stared at the wavy outline of her naked body through the glass block shower. A moment later he stepped inside. She let him fuck her from behind as foamy serpentine strips of shampoo cascaded down her back.

  “I’m all yours, baby,” she moaned.

  With one final thrust he let go of his anger. Damn right. Bought and paid for.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Near the end of October Brad called Nicole. “Darling, it’s time to move to our home in Mesa. The lease on the condo is up next month. I have made arrangements to have all your things picked up the third week of November. I will fly with Jared on the twentieth to San Diego and show him my new place. He’ll stay a couple of days then fly back to DC. The next day, ‘Robert Phillips’ will fly to Raleigh and you will pick me up at the airport with your bags loaded. We’ll take the southern route to Mesa. We’re finally going to start our new lives, Nicole.”

  “Oh Brad it sounds so wonderful. I can’t wait.”

  * * *

  Jared talked incessantly over the roar of the engines of the 727. He was talking about the future, or what he thought was going to be the future. Brad couldn’t stand it. He ordered two rounds of drinks and, finally, Jared fell asleep. Brad leaned back in his seat. He himself was jetting toward a bright future, but for some reason an inexplicable dark cloud on the horizon kept blocking his view. How could he feel so hopeful and yet so hopeless at the same time? For a while he reconsidered faking his death. But how could he make it all work? He must be having some sort of mid-life crisis and that was complicating his thinking processes. Jared was a grown man now. He would do fine on his own. He didn’t need a daddy, especially one like him.

  Jared stayed his two days at Brad’s new home: a quaint, forties stucco bungalow on a cul de sac. When Brad saw him off at the airport, his son’s parting words were like a machete ripping through his sternum. “I’ll see you at Christmas, Dad. Thanks for all you help this year with the Nikki thing. I love you.”

  Brad drove from the airport crying like he had just lost Julie all over again.

  The next day, Robert Phillips boarded Flight 618 to Raleigh. When he deplaned, she was there, in all her freshly-showered, vanilla-scented glory. It was like putting his face in ice cream when he embraced her and pressed his face in the curve of her slender neck. Her body was a supple oasis in his dry, desolate desert of remorse.

  “Let’s grab dinner before we hit the road,” she said when they finally peeled their bodies apart.

  They stopped at Marcelo’s, a quiet, low-lit Italian place with dark paneling and leather-upholstered booths. Nicole batted her eyes over her wine glass. He kept his gaze on the diamond solitaire against her shimmering breastbone. He doubted they would get very far that night. He had several drinks to celebrate his new feeling of freedom as well as to numb the guilt.

  They had agreed not to drive more than six hours a day, promising each other they would savor the road and all the adventure it brought them. They arrived in Nashville and took in a performance at the Grand Ole Opry. Nicole didn’t seem to be much into it, but back at the five-star hotel later that evening, Brad was sure he had made the time up to her. Her moans of pleasure made his chest swell with youthful confidence. Later, in the semi-darkness of the television’s glow, the sound turned down, Brad looked at his Sleeping Beauty. Maybe this is my penance. I am meant to take care of her. Perhaps it is God’s will that I have to give up my own child and care for her. As he admired the large, pink areola of her perfectly rounded breast peeking above the seven hundred thread count sheet, it occurred to him that God had been merciful.

  Early the next morning they headed south. Nicole was breathtakingly beautiful even in her no-make-up look. Her long, tangerine-colored nails draped over the steering wheel.

  “Darling,” she said, “I have planned a little surprise stop just for you. I promise you’re going to love it.”

  Brad laughed. “You’ve got the wheel. I’m totally in your hands and at your mercy. Mind telling me where you’re taking me?”

  She grinned, pumped her eyebrows and curled an invisible mustache. Then she popped a CD into the player in the dash. Elvis, singing “Don’t Be Cruel,” filled the car.

  “Just shut up and ride,” she said as she set the cruise control.

  He tilted the seat back and sang along with The King. For once she was playing his kind of music. A few hours later they were getting off the interstate at Tupelo, Mississippi. She took him to Elvis’s birthplace, a white frame shotgun house built by his father. The tour was fast, of course, but Brad was both elated and charmed that she had thought to do this for him. Afterward they grabbed some food and headed south on the Natchez Trace Parkway. Brad looked out the window at the kudzu-festooned vegetation. Just after they passed a sign for Kosciusko, Nicole turned off the parkway. She headed down a two-lane, narrow paved road. Swampland bordered on both sides.

  “Are you taking a shortcut?”

  She glanced at him with her ornery grin.

  “Oh, is this another one of your surprises?”

  “You betcha.”

  They traveled on for about ten miles. Brad kept asking her where they were going but all he got were giggles and “You’ll see.” She made a hard left onto what looked like a goat path.

  “Christ, you’re going to bounce my guts out,” he complained and braced himself between the console and the car door. They pulled up in front of an old clapboard, two-story cabin. It wasn’t much bigger than Elvis’ place. The white paint was puckered and chipping away. An old, broken down sofa sat on the front porch. The occasional calls of marshland birds and hawks broke the deathly silence.

  “Is this your surprise? I don’t get it.” Brad wondered how she had found this place and what on earth she was up to.

  “Come on, dear. You will soon.”

  She stepped out of the SUV and walked toward the house, calling out over her shoulder. “Can you bring in our bags, dear?”

  Bags? We’re staying here? Brad got out of the car and looked around in all directions. He shrugged. Maybe this is her romantic idea of complete and total privacy. He just hoped the place had indoor plumbing. He grabbed the bags and by the time he hit the porch the humidity had already gotten to him. Please God, let there be AC!

  Brad’s prayer went unanswered. There was only a slight temperature change when he entered the structure. It was still hot and sticky. The rug-strewn floors were hardwood, oak maybe, with wide planks pegged to the underlayment. It had a fairly updated kitchen with propane gas for cooking and heating. In a surprise of architectural charm, there was a balcony that created the hallway to the two bedrooms and a full bath upstairs. The front of the balcony overlooked the living room, dining room and kitchen. There was another small bedroom off the living room. All in all, Brad felt they could make it work.

  “How long did you rent this place?” he asked her.

  “Just a week. We can relax and make love indoors and out. No one will hear us. You can have your way with me, darling. You approve?” She put her arms around his neck and he dropped the bags.

  “Best thing I’ve heard all day.” He kissed her hard and reached slowly for her crotch.

  “Not now. Let’s get things put away first!”

  Brad sighed but mentally made notes of what he would do to her later.

  The place was a fully furnished unit. She had a local handyman, recommended by the owner, stock the refrigerator and cabinets. The nearest grocery store was fifty miles away, she told him. They were all to themselves.

  After they had unpacked, Brad lounged on the worn, black leather sofa in the living area. He sucked on the lip of beer bottle, taking in the cold,
dry brew and thinking it was going to take more than one to beat this heat. He looked up to see Nicole coming down the steps, wrapped in a white bath towel. She tiptoed, lingering a moment on each step, posing for him. He set the beer bottle on the low coffee table in front of him and sat up. She tossed the towel over the banister and ran down the last few steps, headed for the back door. He followed, peeling off his clothes in clumsy movements.

  She paused under a tree, the Spanish moss overhead forming a private canopy. He approached her, suddenly realizing he was walking through a small bog. He slipped and stumbled until he reached her. He pressed her body up against the tree and she reached up and grabbed onto a branch with both hands. She straddled his waist and he penetrated her. Before long they were down in the mud, the loam-scented, gritty wetness covering them. Brad’s fingers dug into the soggy clay. It was primordial: her moist, sucking mound and the sucking sounds of the ground beneath them were all one. Time was measured in sensations until the next day.

  He rolled over and looked up at the ceiling fan. The smell of bacon wafted up from the kitchen. When he came downstairs, she called out to him.

  “’bout time you got up, sleepy-head. Let’s take a walk after breakfast, ok?”

  A series of trails led from the house. It appeared that more than a few people had decided to take romantic strolls after hours of rutting in the mud. They took in the flora and fauna as Nicole talked of her plans once they got to Mesa. When they arrived back at the house, Nicole stopped short of the front porch. Her mouth opened and her eyes were wide.

  “What’s wrong, dear? See a ghost?”

  She pointed to muddy footprints leading across the porch toward the entrance. The front door was cracked open.

  “Wait here,” Brad said.

  He crept up on the porch and slowly pushed open the door. There was no sound or movement. He took two quick, soft steps and grabbed the poker from the stand near the fireplace. After searching the entire structure, he went back outside. As he emerged under the transom, he looked at Nicole, who was still standing where he had left her. Her arms were folded and she was looking off to his left.