The Lawyer and the Iller

Irene Donovan was just one of a dozen or so CID agents directly answerable to Warrant Officer Sam Houston. She knew Sam, or thought she did. When he told an agent to do one thing he was often expecting something else. That was Sam; always cagey, always coy, never clear. He'd told her to keep an eye on Susan Slattery, and that's what she'd been doing.

Sam had given her the low down on Shawn, a man she knew and liked; that's when she figured it out, she wasn't to just keep an eye on the girl; she was to play mother hen. So when Shawn rented a room at the Galleria she got in and wired the place.

She had no idea Shawn had a love life. He was OK looking; for the most part she thought he was fairly personable in an awkward sort of way, but he was no hottie. Shawn being with the Slattery woman made no sense; she as the genuine article, beautiful, graceful, poised, and elegant; Shawn was a clumsy dunder-headed fumbler.

Listening to the woman and Shawn upstairs gave her an entirely different perspective on the kind of man he was. With women he was still a bumbling oaf, for sure, but he was so sincere, he stopped being some two dimensional nondescript CID robot, and emerged as a real person with warmth and feeling, even tenderness. She was glad she wasn't recording anything. If she had, the two people upstairs could have been arrested on a dozen different morals charges. After all, this was Maryland; a southern state.

The more she listened the more she felt like she wanted to go and get a room someplace just to relieve her own tension. She didn't; she just continued to listen.

To Irene it sounded like they were on a bed or perhaps a sofa. He kept whispering warm remarks while probably undressing her. She imagined what the two of them were doing as they cuddled and cooed. She could only imagine, pretend, what the woman must have been saying to him. Irene surreptitiously touched herself under her mini-skirt as she listened and fantasized.

Shawn and Susan lay down on top of the coverlets that protected the king sized bed; "I suppose we should pull down the spread and get under the covers." Shawn said that out of concern for the possibility of picking something up.

Susan, busy kissing him replied, "Sure."

"I mean I've been told, even at the nicest places these cover spreads aren't cleaned all that often and we could end up laying on something that has some other person's germs."

Susan kept kissing his face and his neck, "Yeah OK."

"Well let's get up then," He pulled back and away to get up.

She followed him across the bedspread and stood beside him, still leaning up kissing and fondling while he pulled the bed spread down, "Mm. What's that you use, Old Spice?"

He kept pulling the coverlet, "Most of the time, but there are some other after shaves that I like too."

"Write them down so I can buy them for you at Christmas," She gulped at the thought of Christmas. She hoped there would be a Christmas for the three, hopefully four, or almost four of them. She thought four because she wanted to make a baby before they left the hotel; considering it took only one time, 'one shot', she mentally giggled; to make Shawna, making another little boy or girl in one day wasn't out of the realm of possibility.

"Susan? What perfume do you use?"

Susan asked, "Does it bother you?"

He looked at her incredulously, "I can't get it off my mind. I recognize it whenever I'm near you, but I don't know if it's a fragrance or just the way you smell."

She giggled, "Oh now I smell."

"No. I mean yes. I mean you smell really good." Shawn was feeling high schoolish and getting tongued tied.

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Irene listening in, laughed, "This is Shawn McClellan?"

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Susan leaned around and got the large purse she was using. She pulled out a plastic packet, "Here's what I wear. I don't know if it makes any sense. When I was a teenager I fiercely resented anything my mother did, and that went all the way to the kind of perfume she wore, but now I wear what she wears. Go figure."

Shawn looked at the brand name. He'd seen it before with one or another of the foster parents he'd stayed with, but never remembered smelling it, at least the way it smelled on Susan, "I'll remember the name."

He pulled her over closer, wrapped his arms around her, and kissed her. He stroked the back of her head down to her neck and back, "I love you so much." He kept kissing her moist lips.

Susan leaned up and returned his kisses with more of her own. She held her hands lightly on the nape of his neck. She felt his hackles rise as she touched him, "I'm no wanton, but you know I've been with other men."

Shawn kept kissing her, "Neither of us was a virgin the night I knocked you up."

"Don't interrupt. I wanted to say; while I've been with other men, I've never been with anyone like you. I mean you're no wimp, but you've never been this aggressive macho tough guy."

"In other words I am a wimp."

"No, not at all, it's just, like you know you're strong and you don't try top prove it when you kiss or when we're in bed," Susan was trying to be sensitive.

"I know; wimp. That's OK," Shawn was smiling.

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Irene was listening like it was the first time she'd ever really known McClellan. She had her hand under her panties and was using her fingernails, rubbing up and down her own private place. She was getting moist.

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Susan and Shawn lay back down on the bed. He pulled the covers up slightly, but she kicked them back down.

Shawn undid the clasp on her bra, and it slipped away. He could tell her breasts were larger, and figured it had to do with her pregnancy and the breast feeding. 'Wasn't it wonderful,' he thought, 'the idea of breast feeding; giving one's own life's fluids to one's own child.' He guessed the closest a man could ever come to that was when he gave his sperm to a woman; then it was his life's fluid going to the creation of another.

He wanted to do Susan right away, but he had a couple questions, "Darling; what's it like to breast feed."

She'd been kissing his neck. She looked up, "What?"

"I was just wondering, well about when you and Shawna?"

Susan gave him a special kiss on the end of his nose "It's kind of hard to explain, but it's easy to explain too."

"Does it hurt?" he asked.

She kissed him again, "When I haven't done any feeding, and my breasts are engorged, they get hard, and that can sort of hurt, but," peering over at their sleeping baby, "she doesn't hurt me."

He posed, "I mean all that sucking."

"That's a misnomer sugar bun. Babies don't actually suck. She sort of like latches on, and not just my nipple, she gets my whole aureole, and tugs. Once she does that the milk just flows out, no pain at all." Susan had been asked a question she hadn't expected, and she liked the idea of telling him about it.

He asked, "Do you like it? I mean, how does it make you feel emotionally?"

"What is there some kind of big emotional rush, like all this love and affection, not really." She wanted to tell the truth without a lot of romantic nonsense, "Let me see Shawn", kissing him again, "how do I get through all that testosterone?" She poked his chest with her hand when she said testosterone.

She went on, "Does it feel good having your baby snuggled against you, yes, but I wouldn't have to breast feed to get that. It is nice though, especially at 3:00 a.m. when she wakes up. I don't have to get out of bed and warm a bottle. All I do is reach over, get her, and press my breast in her mouth. I can almost go back to sleep."

"Nothing special then," Shawn said a little disappointed.

"No it's special, but it's not like I hear the 'Hallelujah Chorus'. You know, the 'Battle Hymn of the Republic' doesn't start rumbling through my head." She wanted to be forthright but not syrupy, it was special, but not in the way some novelist might say in a pulpy paperback, "Look, the other evening she was feeding, and she started to hum. She does that frequently; it's almost always the same three little notes. It's very cute, sweet. Well she was humming and then stopped. I looked down and hummed the same three bars. I could see her eyes. I could tell she was thinking. Then she hummed the three bars back at me. I really enjoyed that. It was a gleeful little interlude."

Shawn looked at Susan. He felt a little better, "So there's no great epiphany."

"No," Susan said, "just an easy peaceful kind of feeling."

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Downstairs Irene was still listening. She'd stopped doing what she'd been doing, and just listened, thinking, 'It was a kind of emotional high wasn't it.'

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Susan looked up dreamily at Shawn and considered, 'any other man would only be interested in one thing right now,' "You wanted to know something else?"

Shawn kept her in the corner of his eye, but still tried to make an attempt at being forthright, "I know you're not a virgin."

She interrupted, pointing at Shawna, "No kidding."

He blustered, "I mean when we did it the first time."

She responded, "No, you weren't my first."

"That's OK," He made no attempt to look at her.

She interrupted him so it didn't matter, "Well thanks a lot."

He bumbled around some more, "No I didn't mean that. What I wanted to say was..."

She interrupted him again, "Don't worry; no matter what, you'll be my last."

Shawn kissed her and tried to start over again, still stammering, "I, well," He got it out, "How did I do? I mean. I was just wondering."

Susan tried to get a peak at his face, but he was doing a good job of hiding it, "What do you mean, 'how did I do'"?

"You know."

"No I don't know."

Shawn wished he hadn't gone in this direction, but he was in now, that was for sure, "How do I stack up?"

Susan got it. She knew she couldn't laugh or even smile about this one. It was a stupid thing he was asking, but it made her feel good. He wouldn't have asked if he wasn't in it with her all the way. He was really opening up. She knew he was asking something men never talked about, at least not seriously. This was something that had to be handled delicately, "Shawn, sweetheart;" She pulled herself over a little closer, "I haven't been with all that many men, and in spite of the television ads, you're asking about something that doesn't matter to most women, not to me anyway."

He wanted to get out of the jam he'd put himself in, "I was just wondering."

"See here," she started. "You drive ten different cars, each one a week at a time. Then a week after you've been in all ten someone asks you which car had the most comfortable seat. Can you really answer that?"

He looked surprised, "You've been with ten different men?"

Susan stopped him, grabbed his chin and shook it back and forth, "No, not half that many. I was just making a point." Then she remembered something her father once said when he was arguing with her mother; a common occurrence when she was young, "My father once said something about women, 'stand them on their heads and their all sisters.' I think it's about the same for men."

That last comment got his attention; it made sense. He supposed it could go both ways. He didn't say anything though; he just lay there feeling and acting stupid.

Susan wanted to bring this discussion to an end, "Shawn, all men are dicks. It's not about size or shape of the tool; it's about the asshole connected to it." She laughed, wrapped her arms around his neck, pulled him in close, and kissed him fulsomely on the lips, "And you're the asshole for me Shawn McClellan! You're my perfect asshole."

He fell back on the bed with her in his arms. He slid his hand down her side, found her panties and pulled them down around her knees. Taking his fingers he started to massage her abdomen down to the fatty tissue just above her cleft. He cupped it in his fingers. Nearly hairless owing to Susan's decision to keep it neatly trimmed it felt warm and soft.

He thought about O.J. Simpson, a repugnant man if there ever was one, a man who'd murdered a beautiful woman, his own wife. But even Simpson, in one his stupider moments was alleged to have said and done something he could relate to. He'd once grabbed his wife's crotch while at a restaurant and proclaimed, 'this is mine.'

Shawn would never have done anything as stupid or blatantly degrading, but he had the thought. He kissed Susan fervently; while continuing to grip her womb; he thought; this is mine, she's mine, all mine!'

Susan sensed his mind was wandering, "Penny for your thoughts?"

He answered, "I was thinking about how much I loved you, and how much you've become a part of me."

"Like terra and cotta?"

"Like pop and tart."

"Like bacon and eggs?"

He squeezed her down low with one hand and held the back of her head with the other, "like forever and ever."

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Irene was still downstairs. What she heard had long since stopped being sexual. It was embarrassing; she felt like a peeping Tom. She kept listening though.

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Susan reached down and touched Hermie, his thing. It was large and hard. She used her fingers to lightly touch and fondle the tip. She felt it get even bigger.

Shawn couldn't wait, He slowly slid inside her. She felt as warm, moist, and tight as he'd remembered.

Susan pressed upward against him. She wanted him inside her, as deep as possible. She wanted lots of children, as many as possible, but only with Shawn. If things went south, and he was killed, she might never get another chance. Sure she loved the feeling, the sense of fullness, the incomparable heat and throbbing, the pulsating power, but she wanted his seed most of all.

Together they kissed, re-explored, whispered, and undulated. She loved him. He loved her. There was this feeling of completeness; a totality, a unity to these moments that could never be expressed. The English language, any language, lacked the power to relate what two people in love, really, totally completely, in love felt in moments like this.

Two hot dry bodies, four searching hands, two sets of moist lips, and the ever present surge and resurgent force of one man and one woman. His time came, and so did hers. He expressed himself with one more last powerful thrust that sent his manhood deep within her womb. She received him; she welcomed him, fully and completely.

They lay together, side by side, in harmony, in the comforting confidence of what they had together. His manly force slowly receded, but not his passion for her presence.

Her woman's body told the same story; a time of fulfillment but not completion. They were destined to share moments like this twice more before the afternoon ebbed into evening, and then yet again late that night they'd cherish that same joy of unity a fourth time.

Shawn lay with his arms around the woman he loved; the woman whose heart, body and soul were his 'raison detre'. Tomorrow they'd board a plane and travel to New York; he and she and little Shawna.

Susan's afternoon and evening had been a time of blissful rest coupled with the full exercise of passions energy, interrupted occasionally by the timely need to feed their mutual claim to life's immortality. The other thing; the time to make the break, albeit only a temporary interlude in what she knew would their great love song, could wait till the morning.

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Downstairs Irene felt more than a little guilty. That was when she understood the problem Sam had seen she could solve. The baby was going to need reliable care while Susan did what she had to do.

She knew Sam wouldn't officially approve, but she decided later tomorrow, after Shawn went north, she'd reveal herself to Susan. She'd set Susan at ease about day care. Irene knew what Susan was expected to do. She knew who Camulos was, and she knew the best way to help Susan, other than keeping as good a watch as she could, was to guarantee day care came from a secure source.

In the Big Apple:

Kia was getting ready for her second presentation. She and Shai had been forewarned about being too condemning of the Sudan. Keep that country's perfidy off the page. Her job was to get more aid for Darfur.

She was horribly deeply depressed. Early in the week her father, who was also in New York, had spoken to her about Kim. Kia was pleased, her mother and father had agreed to accept Kim into the family, but it was very much a conditional acceptance. If they married they had to live in Nepal and Kim, a follower of the teachings of Lao Tze, might have to adopt some faith closer to her own Hindu beliefs.

Her parents doubted, considering his foreign birth, if he'd be acceptable in Nepal as a Hindu. He'd be at the bottom of the cultural hierarchy, and that would undermine the whole family; maybe as a Buddhist, or if he remained a Taoist, at worst a Christian, absolutely never a Muslim, he'd be tolerated.

Kia's mind wandered in a different direction. She reflected on the two other men, beside her father, who'd figured so large in her life the last several years; there was Shawn, and, of course, there was Kim. Shawn and Kim were so different.

Shawn was everything his name inferred; a wild, erratic Celtic type. Shawn was quick to anger, but just as quick to forget. She'd watched him in action; diving into crocodile infested waters, chasing after kidnapped young women in Nepal, and buying the life of a woman based almost exclusively on an emotional attachment.

He was high strung, wild, free thinking, and in some ways totally unreliable. The French were like that too; flamboyant and too casual when it came to caution. In history they called it the French style. She remembered it had been Kim, though Shawn would have certainly denied it later, who'd dissuaded him from charging headlong into the trap they'd set for him the second time Susan had been abducted.

Then there was Kim; the South Korean. He was the thinker, the planner, the man who saw danger, and always found a safer, saner, alternative. Kim was a classic stoical Taoist. For him there was order in everything, even when a reason couldn't be discerned; for every Yin there was a Yang. He was reliable, stable, dependable, and above all loyal. She knew he loved her; he'd be devoted all his life, they'd have good children, and she'd go to her grave knowing he'd been pure in his heart and pure in deed.

Yes, Shawn and Kim were two fascinating men.; One, Shawn, the eternal Hot Spur, ready to dash into danger, the classic French Medieval Roland; willing to fight no matter the danger, no matter the cost.

Kim was very much the opposite; the mature Harry. Ha, she thought; a little Harry in the night! Stand and fight, but choose your ground to best advantage! Kim was Caesar to Shawn's Vercingetorix; one the meticulous planner, the other brave but foolhardy. She prayed that Kim was still alive.

Separation:

Not having worked in a while Susan hadn't worried about getting Shawna on a schedule so she was up twice during the night. Each time she looked over at Shawn; he was snoozing, completely unaware of the crisis ahead.

When Shawn awakened he saw Susan was already up. She had finished Shawna's morning feeding. He stretched, "Good morning sweetheart. What's up for today?" He'd decided to ignore Sam's instructions, and take Susan north with him to New York.

"Not a lot right now love muffin."

"Love muffin! Hey, I don't have any love handles yet. Let's give it a few years."

Susan chirped out a gleeful chortle, "OK, my big wonderful man, my heroic manly man; do you want to order up some breakfast, my big powerful masculine man?"

Shawn laughed, "That's more like it; breakfast, sure, how about some bacon and eggs?"

She asked, "Why bacon and eggs?"

He countered, "Didn't you say bacon and eggs last night?"

"All right; bacon and eggs it is." She picked up the house phone and called down to room service.