Attending Physician

  Her scold brought tears to my eyes—in a good way.

  Lucy spoke in my defense. “Nana, Lady very brave. She made a bed mountain so the bad man couldn’t hurt us! Very brave. Big kiss for Lady, not scolding!”

  Everyone laughed.

  Gretchen leaned over and hugged me, which was surprising. Lucy hugged Gretchen, and insisted on pouring her tea, which was an ordeal with my antique hazel Chintz teapot.

  Raven stood in the doorway with her arms crossed, her eyes never moving from my face, which caused said face to blush, as she listened attentively to Terry’s softly spoken accounting. She was like a general whose lieutenant reported in. It dawned on me much later that that was exactly what was happening.

  In the midst of this, my phone rang. I excused myself, and slipped down the hall.

  Counselor Jamie on the line.

  Chapter 56

  “All done, Raven’s Beauty,” she spoke soothingly. “If they violate the restraining orders, they’ll go to jail. Ellie’s already in jail at least overnight, maybe two, if I can get it to stick, for same.”

  “Jamie,” I said, “thank you so much.”

  “Raven there yet?”

  Arms snaked around my waist. “Yes, do you need her?”

  “Yeah, for a sec, if you don’t mind.”

  “No, of course not, Jamie. Thanks again, my friend.”

  “You’re welcome, Raven’s Beauty.”

  I raised the phone in my hand to Raven without turning around. The support I’d received from these wonderful butches was outstanding, amazing, legendary, and it heartened me more deeply than I could say.

  Raven kept one arm tightly curled around my waist whilst she talked to another of her lieutenants.

  “Jamie, man, thanks,” is when I tuned in to the present.

  “Baby,” Raven put the phone on my desk. The tears threatened to fall over the edges of my lower lids. “You were letter perfect, according to my guys.” She bent to brush her lips against mine. “Thank you, milady.”

  “You’re welcome, darling,” I said. “Lucy gave me a focus that I might not otherwise have had.”

  “I’ll bet,” Raven commented. “After we hung up, my brain echoed: my daughter and my femme are under threat. I am not there.”

  “Oh, Raven!” I reached for her waist. “No, you can’t think that or else you’ll never go anywhere. You needed to be with Gretchen, sweetheart. Don’t second-guess that. Please.”

  “Papa?” Lucy’s voice came from the doorway behind us. “Did you give Lady a kiss?”

  “No, Lucy, I didn’t.” Raven did not turn around. “I’ve been a bad Papa, huh?”

  “Yes, a very bad Papa,” said Lucy sternly. “Now Lady needs two!”

  “Okay, Lucy, Papa will take her punishment,” said Raven solemnly and she bent to take my lips with hers, kissing me appreciatively (which was the assignment) and thoroughly (which I think she thought up on her own).

  “One,” came from our little punishment accountant.

  Raven cupped my face with her hand and lifted it. Her eyes danced with humor. Lucy was a card, to be sure. “So brave, so beautiful. I am so grateful for you.” She kissed me again. I thought my knees would give out.

  “Two,” pronounced Lucy in the way of, good, at least that’s done.

  “Hilarious,” I whispered. “I’m going to make you do it again, milord.”

  “Promise?” said Raven.

  “Cross my heart.”

  I pulled away from Raven and said, “Papa, did you see how pretty Lucy looks?”

  Raven gave Lucy the serious once-over. “She does,” she said. “Twirl, Luce.” She twinkle toed a circle. “Lucy’s hair is done just like Lady’s.”

  She passed the test, I thought.

  “Yes!” yelled Lucy. “Come on, Papa, more tea.”

  Raven hadn’t had any tea. Lucy grabbed Raven’s hand and began to drag her down the hall. Raven pulled me with them.

  Gretchen presided over the teapot in my absence, which pleased me no end. She offered to pour for Raven. Lucy climbed into my lap as I sat perched on a big bronze chenille ottoman. Terry and Mickey chatted softball. Geoff and Sara discussed healing from violence. Gretchen inspected the room happy to be done with the doctor for the time being. Despite the biopsy, she appeared a whole lot better than she had last night.

  Other than the jimmied front door lock, we’d sustained no real damage, and though that wasn’t damaged, it definitely needed better security. An old-fashioned hairpin standing between me, the rest of the tenants, and biker drug dealers wasn’t a good idea.

  I calmed down feeling Raven present with me in the same space. My safety really was no longer my job. I was at ease with her there regardless of some intense emotions from this afternoon that I had yet to process. My adrenaline had dropped but I still needed to release the fear echoing in my limbs. I needed to do a hundred jumping jacks or have five orgasms. I was picking the second option given the choice—just sayin’.

  Things began to wind down. Mickey escorted Sara home. Terry and her crew went back to work. Lucy and Gretchen went home.

  Delightfully, at a rather early hour, Raven and I were alone with no plans and no calls on our time. An unexpected gift.

  Mickey and Sara had put away the tea things so I sat in the L on the pink sofa, my legs extended on the chaise, when Raven came upstairs and carefully closed and locked the strong, old door that had kept her girls safe. She stood in the doorway of the living room.

  I didn’t say anything but the exhaustion on her face said it all. I patted my lap. Raven brightened and made two long strides, then collapsed onto the sofa like she’d deflated, ending with her long, long legs over the end and her black curls in my lap. Her eyes closed.

  A million and two words winged around us, but they’d wait. We needed some restoration, renewal, recharging. I began to run the soft pads of my fingers over the tension etched into Raven’s handsome, angular face, and watched it ease a bit before my very eyes. In a few minutes, her breathing evened out, and she’d fallen asleep. I sat still, breathing in her cologne, easing my tension as I let her sleep.

  I closed my eyes and went into a meditation space. I’d been meditating for more than twenty years but lately with this new `development,’ shall we say, namely, one Dr. L. Ravenal Lange, I hadn’t been as attentive to it as I ought to be. No wonder I felt strung out. It made sense even without the insanity of the sting operation.

  New relationship—bringing up the stuff from the last one—argh! Plus adorable angel/Yoda daughter—bringing up the longing for children. Plus a sort of co-parent/mother who wasn’t sure she liked me—bringing up others who hadn’t liked me either—and who might have breast cancer—bringing up natural human fears of illness. Plus Ellie—and her betrayal of our connection—and her biker dealers who wanted to hurt me. Oh yes, I was loooooong overdue to meditate.

  I sat for twenty minutes in the fading sunlight, mightily aware of the burgeoning love for the woman whose head lay heavy in my lap, communing in the lap of the Mother. Not asking Her anything or thinking any thought in particular but aware that things and ideas were rearranging themselves in my brain so I’d come out of my quiet time with a new understanding. I wasn’t one of those who got guidance during meditation. Instead, it came afterward, as I needed it, when I needed it.

  When I opened my eyes, Raven looked up at me.

  “Verity, I want you to be my wife.”

  Her sentence shimmered in the air in front of me.

  “I will, Raven.”

  “I’m not asking yet,” she added.

  “I know.”

  “It’s just ... today when I was ....” She ran her hands over her face and through her hair.

  “Raven, I know.”

  She connected with me again. “You do.”

  I did.

  “It’ll be a while but it had to be said.”

  “Yes, it did,” I agreed.

  I had my own version of her opening statement.
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  Chapter 57

  “Raven, you’re the boss, aren’t you?”

  “The boss of ...?”

  “The boss, the capo, the leader of your band of merry men.”

  “Oh, that. Yeah, I guess.”

  I laughed. “You guess. You are the capo, unless you’re in need, and then Cord is, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “So I’m the femme of a capo in the butch mafia.”

  She laughed. “I suppose.”

  “You suppose.” I bumped her jaw with my fist gently. “I am!”

  “Okay, okay, I give, you are.”

  “Are there other femmes in the ... um, auxiliary?”

  Raven laughed some more, a lot more. In fact, a whole lot more. “Like the church ladies’ auxiliary?” she choked out.

  “Is there a better metaphor?” I was more than slightly sarcastic.

  “Butch Mafia wives?” Now she howled.

  “Well, are there?”

  She tried to sober up. Really, she did, but something kept tickling her. “Um, let me see. The femme side of the equation is less ... um, stable than the butch side.”

  “And what does that mean, o capo mio?” I sang at her.

  “It means that the butch brigade has kind of stayed the same crew of us, where the femme side is more ... uh, fluid.”

  “Your boys go through femmes like they go through boxers?”

  “Well, not that bad, milady ....”

  “Oh?”

  “But ... well, yeah, we haven’t taken the settling down thing too seriously ... yet.”

  “Yet,” I repeated.

  “You heard me earlier, baby.”

  “Oh, I did. Believe me.”

  “So things might be changing a bit.”

  “Are there any other `permanent’ femmes, darling?” I asked dangerously.

  She heard it, too, because here came the prevarications.

  “Why, milady?”

  “Because, my beloved, if there’s going to continue to be a Butch Brigade, and we have to assume there is, and you are the capo, then I, as el capo’s femme, will be the natural leader of the Femme Force.” I made it up as I went along, delighted at my own instantaneous ingenuity.

  Raven’s eyes blinked. “Femme Force?” she repeated—and gulped. She sat up. No way she could continue this convo with her head in my lap. She had to be on her toes. Who knew where this femme would take her?

  “You think you’re the only one who knows how to organize the troops, sir?”

  “Uh, no, ma’am, but I don’t know about the girls organizing.”

  “Oh, don’t you, darling?”

  I made her squirm, and had some serious fun.

  “Let me think, Verity. Cord’s not seeing anyone, at least not seriously. Well, she’s dating a couple girls, but ... none of them are sticking, you know?”

  “Counselor Jenkins?” I asked, keeping to my agenda.

  “Jamie’s got his eye on Jane. I know that.”

  “His admin?”

  “Yeah.” She felt worse for not tracking her name.

  “That’s kind of not done though, darling.”

  “I know, but it wouldn’t be the first time Jamie gave a femme a job and then ....”

  “Then ...,” I prompted sweetly.

  “Then ...,” Raven stuttered. She was entering telling-tales-out-of-school territory and that wasn’t going to be kosher with her brothers and their butch code of honor.

  “What is this? The take-the-glasses-off-the-paralegal-and-discover-a-sex-queen fantasy?”

  “You know it?” asked Raven delighted.

  “Darling, I know most of the standard sexual fantasies. I’m a therapist.”

  “Oh, right.”

  “So, Terry?”

  “Single since Angie but gettin’ itchy.”

  “For love or to get laid?”

  “Milady!”

  “Darling, I’ve known men my whole life. You guys are no different!”

  “Fair point,” she conceded. “Not sure about Terry. I can ask. Mel needs some help in this department. He’s so shy.”

  “Got that.”

  “Sam has a femme.” Raven brightened. “She’s, I guess, the most permanent. They’ve been together since third grade.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Julia,” recited Raven, “and she’s as sweet as can be with Sam. He adores her.”

  “Dex?”

  “He dates geek femmes.”

  “What is a geek femme, darling?”

  “One who’s into computers.” I got it. “He gets rid of them—calls it deleting—if they don’t know more than he does.”

  “That’s a constant competition, isn’t it?”

  “You could see it that way.”

  “And Ollie?” I asked.

  “Ollie’s femme is a little on the rough and tumble side.”

  “Ollie? Our Ollie? He’s so gentle,” I said.

  “Yeah, she’s ... uh, a Rizzo type. Name’s Leah.”

  “Ohhh,” I said, cottoning on, “Ollie’s into bad girls.”

  Raven grinned at me. “You got it in one, Verity.”

  “Of course I did, darling,” I said absently. “So two permanent femmes, plus me, the new kid in town, and it appears that the butch brigade might shift slightly as well.”

  “It does?”

  “Yes,” I said, “Terry invited Mickey to the barbeque Sunday, and Mickey invited Sara.”

  “As a date?”

  “Yep.”

  “I thought Sara was a straight girl,” said Raven.

  “So did I, but she’s going to the barbeque with Mickey.”

  Then I thought of something I hadn’t factored in to our plans. “Darling, what do we have to do to get this shindig organized?”

  “Nothing.” Full stop.

  “Nothing. How does that work? Do you have house elves? Where does the food come from? The silverware? Flowers for the centerpiece?”

  “Centerpiece?”

  I waved at her. “You know what I mean. The things that make the party.”

  “A centerpiece makes a party?”

  “Raven ...,” I warned.

  “Gretchen will do it.”

  “All of it?” I asked.

  “All,” she assured me. “Our job is show early prepared to help with the set-up.”

  “Are you for real?” I said.

  “Baby,” Raven pulled me off the sofa and into her arms, “she loves it, and it’ll be good for her. She needs something to keep her mind off the biopsy. What better way than preparing a party for people she loves?”

  “That’s as may be,” I said, “but I’m still offering to help.”

  “You’ll make her day if you do,” answered Raven.

  Then she changed the subject.

  Chapter 58

  Raven pulled me close into her chest, her mouth near my ear, “Milady,” she rasped, “I want you.”

  Her blue eyes were suddenly dark as I pulled away to focus on her, dark as the ocean on the night of the new moon, filled with heat and longing. She harbored a need to make me hers.

  “Milord,” I said hotly, “please,” letting the longing into my voice, “take me.”

  Her mouth swooped down to mine and kissed me long, hot, deep, wet, and sweet. Every time I thought she would move away, she’d pull me closer and deepen the kiss. Her hunger for me only grew instead of easing. Or maybe that was mine for her. Hard to tell at that point.

  Finally in the interest of oxygen she released my mouth, and began to kiss my jaw and cheek till she smoothed my hair away from my ear.

  Then Raven began to talk in a low, sexy voice, “Baby, I want you to sit on my cock. I want to see you ride me from above and watch your beautiful face as you come again and again and again. Do you think you can do that for me, milady?”

  “Yes, sir,” I whispered aware that my panties were sopping wet, worse (or better) since she’d begun to speak. “Here on the living room floor, or ...?”
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  I felt her smile against my ear rather than saw it.

  “Here’s good.”

  I began to unbutton her white shirt, feeling along her breastbone and collarbones with deft fingers. I skimmed it down her shoulders revealing her undershirt and slipped my hands under the straps over her shoulders. It felt naughtier that way. Running my hands down her chest, I took a risk and searched out her nipples treating them as I would those of any man. Flicking, twisting, tugging. She worked hard for breath.

  My hands reached for her belt and I let them slide down the front of her trousers and grasp her cock.

  “Mmm,” I said softly, “all that ... just for me.”

  Then I began to unbutton, unzip, and slide her trousers over her narrow hips. I made her sit in the bronze chair and served her, removing boots, socks and trousers.

  “Sit still please, sir,” I instructed, and reached for the buttons on my own blouse. She started to reach to help me but I eluded her grasp. “No,” I said, “watch.” I let the silk slide off my arms to show her a rose pink demi bra; my breasts were barely contained in it. With every deep breath, they threatened to spill out of the lace. She watched me and it made my breath catch.

  I slithered out of shoes and skirt, standing before her in a pink garter belt, black stockings, and scant lace panties that matched the brassiere. She breathed out slow and hard.

  “Baby,” she said.

  “Sir. Come lie on the floor please.” I had a soft wool cashmere black and bronze Art Deco carpet. Neither one of us should get carpet burns.

  I stood above her in my lingerie and let my eyes roam her body boldly.

  “I am so wet,” I said, running my fingers between my legs as she settled on the floor. “So wet. For you.” I let her see my fingers stroking my own sweet spot, and how that made my hips twitch. Then I lowered myself into a squat above her hips.

  “Pull my panties aside, milord. Do not touch me otherwise.” I was crisp in my directions.

  “Baby.” She hitched her long fingers into the elastic at the edge of the patch of wet silk and shifted it to one side. “Now,” I said letting the urgency show in my voice. “I need your cock inside me, sweetheart. Now.”