After Midnight

last night, so…”

“I suppose you’d need to bang me up, just to make it look good.”

“Some. Yeah. Good idea.”

“You’re very big on tricky stuff,” he said.

“It seems like a great solution to me. I mean…I’m willing to go through with it if you are. What about you?”

“I’ve got a suggestion.”

“Yeah?”

“Why don’t we hold off on the so-called ‘rape’ till after I get back from the bank? You’ll already have your money, then. There won’t be anything hanging over our heads, so we’ll be able to relax and take our time and…”

“And I won’t have anything to hang over your head when you go into the bank.”

“You’ve gotta have that leverage, huh?”

“Yep.”

“But if we wait till afterwards…”

“I’m starting to think maybe you don’t want to do it at all.”

When I said that, he smirked and set down his beer mug and moved the bag of pretzels out of the way. I put down my mug, too.

He reached over and clutched the front of my blouse with both hands.

“Do you want me to rip it off you?” he asked.

“Gotta make it look good.”

“What’ll you wear later?”

“We’ll think of something.”

“Do you want me to do it right here?”

“We were sitting here having a couple of beers. You invited me in after we came back from Tony’s apartment.”

“And what were we doing there?” Murphy asked, still clutching my blouse.

“He’d stood me up for breakfast.”

“You’re going to stick with that story?”

“Sure. After we’d looked for Tony, I wanted to wait for him in his apartment. But you wouldn’t let me.”

“But you’d killed him.”

“Who, me? For all you know, he isn’t even dead. Anyway, you wouldn’t let me stay in Tony’s place, but you said I could come over here to wait for him. You said we could have a couple of beers and wait for him together.”

“Very good. Maybe you should be the writer.”

“Maybe so,” I said. “Anyway, so I just innocently sat here and had a couple of beers with you while I was waiting for my boyfriend to get home, and all of a sudden you grabbed the front of my blouse and ripped it open.”

As I said, “ripped,” he did it.

33

GETTING DOWN TO BUSINESS

Tore my blouse wide open.

My buttons went pup-pup-pup. The tail came jerking up out of my skirt’s waistband.

Murphy shoved the blouse off my shoulders, then stopped and held it there. “How’s that so far?” he asked. His voice sounded pretty shaky.

“Not bad at all,” I said.

“Thanks.”

“Now, hit me in the face.”

“I can’t hit you.”

“Go ahead.”

“No way.”

So I slapped him, knocking his head sideways and putting a handprint on his face. He looked startled. “Like that,” I told him.

“Maybe this isn’t such a good idea,” he said.

“You don’t think so?”

“Why don’t I just go to the bank and…”

Hooking a finger under the right cup of my bra, I stretched aside the flimsy red fabric, freeing my breast.

Murphy stared at my naked breast and moaned.

“Go ahead and feel,” I said.

“I don’t think…”

“Don’t think, just do,” I said. With that, I took hold of his wrist, pulled his hand away from my blouse and pressed it against my breast.

His hand felt smooth and cool.

He had a look on his face like a teenage kid who’d never done anything like this before. Embarrassed, confused, astonished, thrilled, grateful.

I was giving the guy a real treat.

Maybe giving myself a treat, too.

“Now what’re you gonna do?” I asked. I had a little tremble in my voice that wasn’t supposed to be there.

Staring into my eyes, he squeezed my breast gently and then let go and put his arms around me. He pulled me toward him and touched his lips softly against mine. With one hand, he took off his glasses. He set them on the back of the couch, then kissed me again, this time pushing firmly against my open lips, his mouth open slightly, his breath going into me.

I started feeling soft and lazy inside. As if the kiss was sapping my strength away. And my worries. And my plans. I felt all vague and peaceful. I almost could’ve drifted down into sleep, but I felt a curious eagerness about what Murphy was doing to me and what he might do next.

His phone rang.

We both flinched.

It rang again.

He took his mouth away from me and whispered, “I’d better get it.”

I nodded.

Murphy grabbed his glasses, then got up from the couch.

I untwisted myself and leaned back against the cushion. I felt as if I’d been dragged roughly from a wonderful place and abandoned.

I felt a little better, though, when he sidestepped past my knees and I saw the front of his shorts.

Arriving at the lamp table, he picked up his phone just after the fourth ring.

“Hello?…Oh, hi, Harold…No, it’s fine. What’s up?”

He turned toward me, made a face that made me smile, and ogled my exposed breast. Then his eyes lowered to my belly as if drawn by my injury down there. I knew how awful it looked, but I didn’t try to cover it. He frowned at the bruised and gouged skin, then met my eyes with a look of concern.

I wiggled my eyebrows at him.

Brightening up slightly, he said into the phone, “Yeah. Sure I’ve heard of him…Yeah, I saw those movies…He does?…” Looking me in the eyes, he suddenly grinned. “The most exciting book he’s read all year? Cool…Uhhuh…