. 06

I entered the apartment carefully, fully expecting a handful of kitchen knives to fly across the room towards me. Susan ran towards me and kissed me strongly. So far so good. She seemed in a surprisingly good mood.

'Well,' she said, 'Did you fuck her up the arse as I told you to?'

I managed a rueful laugh and said 'No.' That the conversation and the rejoinders had rather put me off the idea of any sort of sex. I had been so worried about coming home today that I had not even had a cursory look at the VSX site and had a wank.

Susan said, 'So you didn't see me entertaining Gordon again?'

'No,' I shook my head. 'And I can't really blame you. Barbara was well over the top with that comment and she knew it. It came out because she was with me when we watched Gordon and you in the flat together. I got it all on catch-up and boy, did it turn me on.'

'Turned you both on, I hear.'

I looked strangely at her. 'Yes how...'

'She rang me last night. About half an hour after I slammed the Skype down. Her timing was perfect. I was just beginning to blame myself for even letting you go to Manchester, knowing that you would not be able to keep your cock in your trousers, especially after seeing me with Gordon. She apologised, showed me that she was in her room on her own. Walked me through all of it to show me that you weren't there. We talked for nearly an hour. She actually is all right, although I wish you had made her bleed at least once.'

'I am so please you are not too mad with me. Yes, she is okay. More than okay actually. She was shocked to be caught out trying to seduce your husband and reacted badly. Did she tell you that I upset her later?'

'Uhuh. And that you made up, without even kissing on it. I had better own up now that I didn't see Gordon, although it was on my mind for a few minutes after I slammed the Skype down.'

'Really, you really thought about it. I hadn't realised quite how turned on you must have been that night. You wait until I get hold of Elise. Still, we are okay are we?'

'Yes we are, be honest with me, how many times did the two of you make love over the last three weeks?'

'Not even once,' I was quick to tell her.

She started to tear up, her face wrinkling as the tears began to flow.

'We fucked twice but we never made love.'

She smiled through the tears and said 'That's what Barbara said.'

We cuddled silently for what seemed like an hour. Sorted.

I eventually said, 'She has a business proposition for us. Sorry for VSX that is. She owns half a dozen flats and wants to put them into VSX. We are meeting with Darren and Art tomorrow morning to tell them. What are our plans this weekend, this last one before my last week at school.'

'It is the first of the parties I have been organising for the King's Arms. We brought the first one forward by a couple of weeks because everyone we spoke to was raving about what a great idea it was and someone else came in who wanted to organise a one-off 'open mike' night on the date we had chosen. I have told all our tenants and think a lot of them will be going. I have warned them that it will not be an orgy like our Friday night parties usually end up. However, I am sure Eddie won't mind if it does. And Les perspires at the thought of one. I have already agreed with Ed that I will compere the first two or three and then let him take over for a few. We don't really have to be there every time, and Ed is happy if they are going well. I will still get paid for at least a year.'

We spent a quiet evening in front of the TV cuddling and holding hands. I really had not been expecting to be even talking, let alone cuddling.

The next morning at eleven we met up with Art and Darren. I first gave them a run-down on the Course and how professional I had found it. The first three weeks had gone well and I knew a lot more about Estate Agency, Finance and the Law and was looking forward to the last week where we would get an overall view on the Human Resources angle. I gave them a thumbnail sketch of the other attendees, saving Barbara until last. I could see that they were wondering when I would get to the meat.

When I did they were as shocked as I had been.

'Look, it came as a surprise to me too. I only heard about her plans last night but have had a while to think about it. It strikes me that there are two ways around it, if we do want to expand. The first is to license her to use the software and charge her a percentage of her earnings to cover the use of our name and billing department. The danger there is that she puts in sub-standard hardware into the flats, or somehow upsets her clientele. That her operation would not match the quality of ours and ours would suffer by its connections.

The alternative, is that we all dilute our shareholdings and make her a full partner. We sorted the calculations of the value of the flats to the company with the ones that you two both owned in the first place. We could take the lease value of the flats away as a deduction from the monthly income of them in VSX.'

We talked over the ramifications of dilution and agreed that the second plan was the better and could show considerable benefits with the right deal. Not surprisingly Art and Darren wanted to meet Barbara, and a phone call later it was agreed that they would structure a deal by Wednesday subject to coming up to Manchester to meet on Friday evening, after the course finished. I would book another couple of rooms for the night and extend my own by a day. Susan would travel up with Darren, and Art would drive up separately. We would meet in the hotel bar at six. I had my reservations about introducing Susan and Barbara, but it had to be done.

Walking back to the flat I asked Susan if there was anything I needed to be doing for the party tonight, only to be told that she was all organised. She had everything planned including her speech and a few short 'Games'. The entrance price included 2 free drinks and there would be a special deal on Prosecco by the bottle. The evening started at eight, the disco started at nine and throwing out time was eleven-thirty, to get cleared up by midnight. Susan planned to give her little talk about eight-thirty and would introduce Ed. She was understandably a little nervous. I persuaded her not to get there at six as she wanted. 'That's way too early,' I said. 'You will only fret while you are there. Seven will be easily early enough. After all you want Ed to do the lumping around of the disco. Just get there in time to have a couple of drinks.'

We arrived just after seven and sure enough Ed had done everything necessary to get the evening going. His Dad sat outside the door checking tickets. He had been told not to enter the room on pain of death. He was probably thirty years older than the guests and Ed didn't want him 'perving the tarts' as he put it. I did worry about Ed as well at that stage.

By ten past eight just about all the tickets had been accounted for, and the bar was in free flow, even I was helping out temporarily. Ed would remember to get another server next time even if just for the first hour. The drinks were free of course, which was one reason for the bar rush. Bar queues at ten-thirty would be more of a yardstick as to how the evening was going.

At exactly eight-thirty Susan and Ed took the stage next to the disco. The DJ, ready to start early, gave them a drum roll and a couple of long guitar riffs to quieten the room. It worked fine until Susan stood forward and all the boys started whistling. True to her promise to Les she had worn her new gold satin dress, with a huge scooped back and a large scooped front. Her tits were almost on display and any sign of her bending put her knickerless cheeks on display as well.

I had warned her that might happen and told her just to wait out the noise and let Ed try to quieten them. When she spoke, she should speak quietly so they would all want to hear her. That way she would command maximum respect.

She stood quietly, while Ed tinkled a couple of wine glasses together.

Eventually, 'Ladies, Gentlemen, boys, girls, whatever. Welcome to the first of our Saturday night parties at the Kings Arms. My name is Susan, and I am your hostess for the evening. This amazing hunk of flesh beside me is Ed. He is the Landlord's son and heir, and mine for the evening, so keep your hands off him ladies. Anything you want to know ask one of us. The plan is that the disco will start up as soon as you manage to get me off the stage here.'

The DJ gave himself a drum roll and stood and waved.

'Get off.'

'Get on with the music.'

'Stay there and flash your tits.'

She waited again for quiet.

'But before that happens, I want to tell you the rules.'

'Boo.' A loud booing noise broke out.

This time she shouted over the noise, 'There are no rules,' to loud cheers, and then waited for it to go quiet again. 'That's not quite true,' she said, 'but let me explain the only exception to no rules. We did think about theming these parties, but when we considered it, we realised that there were only two things that you ever thought about and we couldn't theme it around money.'

They quickly picked up on the joke, 'Yes, Get 'em off.'

She beamed, delighted that she didn't have to explain the joke. 'So, the only thing we all hate here is PC, Political Correctness. Anyone who has a problem with other people being non-pc can leave now, after your free drinks, and get your money back. I do not want to hear complaints of 'he touched my bum,' or 'he put his tongue out when he kissed me,' or 'she fondled my nuts.'

Loud laughter followed this statement. 'In fact,' she said, 'I am quite fond of fondling a few nuts myself so if you don't want them fondled steer clear of me.'

More cheers and laughter. 'Now, the serious exception to the no rules. No means No. I am planning a few really short, fun, maybe smutty, suggestive, dirty, embarrassing, sexy little games. If you want to take part just stay on the dance floor. If you don't want to take part, move to one side. Anybody, and I mean ANYBODY, even my Fiancee and Ed here, if you cannot respect no, if you try to coerce anyone into doing something they do not want to do, you will be thrown out. I cannot repeat enough, NO means NO. My little games will probably involve two people, so let us try one. Look all around you and choose a partner. I suspect that most of you will choose a member of the opposite sex, but believe me, I don't care if you choose any gender available. So, having chosen your partner, put both hands around their waist. That should show that the two of you have agreed on your choice. Now kiss. Ten seconds with tongues.'

They did. All around the room all you could hear was the slurping of tongues.

'Ohhh lovely. You all went quiet.'

'Now, break up with your partner. I suspect most of you chose people you came with, probably a partner or at least a good friend. Now turn around and put your backs together. Okay so far. Good. Choose a new partner, one you are looking at. Put your hands on their waist. Okay introduce yourselves, shake hands. Now kiss for ten seconds, tongues. There that's more fun isn't it. Now say goodbye and have a dance or a drink. The disco is going to start and every so often I will stop the music for a game. And remember No means NO. I'll see you later.'

I watched her coming back towards me, slowly talking to people who were buttonholing her en route. I noticed her grab a couple of guys by the balls. They just laughed and the girls they were with cried out in mock anguish, before doing it themselves.

'How did I do?'

'Perfect,' I said. 'Give me ten seconds of that tongue. I was in the wrong place and didn't find anyone.'

'Too slow,' she said. 'You snooze, you lose. I missed my chance as well. I realise now I should have grabbed Ed and showed everyone what to do. Mind you they seemed to have cottoned on quite quickly.'

We eased our way to a quiet corner where Ed joined us.

'Dad's over the moon,' he said. 'We were about twenty short of capacity on the tickets we sold but then a queue formed at the door. There still is one. The word had spread somehow even before you had finished speaking. It won't be a problem if we go overcapacity a bit will it? It's my Dad's problem with his licence if there is a police check. There seems to be a lot of room still.'

'Don't you dare sell any more,' Susan stormed. 'I don't even like you selling the shortfall on the door. I want these parties to be exclusive. No ticket no entrance. People will sign up early and then maybe we can put the price up. If we can possibly pick and choose and weed out stag nights and a lot of single men then it will be even better. It might even be possible to have Blue tickets and Pink tickets to even the numbers out. A partner for everyone. No stag nights unless there is a matching hen party. Now that is a good idea. Spread the word around. Special deal's for hen parties who register in advance. No stag nights unless we approve it in advance when we have hens organised. Within a few months we will get the numbers properly balanced. Next time, instead of your dad, we will get a 'DoorBitch' to check the tickets with a little leeway perhaps to let in say up to a dozen good-looking girls and boys. Even better, no tickets. Just names on the board, sooner or later the DoorBitch will recognise the regulars and the ones with money.'

Ed rushed off to stop his Dad selling any more tickets. He could see Susan's point. Exclusivity was good.

We stood and chatted with some of our tenants for a while, there were about eleven of them, Sam, Bryony, Melissa, and Tracy were there, as usual without any partners. Cindy was also on her own technically as Luther was away, visiting family. They were almost matched off by Tim, Roger Chris and Jon. Cindy was obviously close to both Jon and Chris Joanne and Pete made the numbers up.

Susan indicated that she was going to do another little game in a few minutes and strolled off to talk to the DJ. I asked Cindy to dance. I guess about half the room were dancing, the others drinking and talking. Most of our crowd followed us onto the dance floor.

Five minutes later the music stopped,

'Right,' said Susan standing up there on the stage with Ed, find yourself a partner. Remember how? Two arms right, two arms on their waist.'

Cindy and I naturally moved together holding each other around the waist.

'Right first thing, Kiss, ten seconds, tongues... Now introduce yourselves if you don't know the person. ... Right now whoever is holding a boy, grope his meat, see if you can make him hard if he isn't already. ... and finally, all the girls, show your partner your knickers, if you are wearing any. And if not prove it to them... Thank you and back to the dancing please.'

I had enjoyed my kiss and grope with Cindy and she had showed me that yes, she was wearing panties. White broderie anglaise. Beautiful. We danced another song and made our way back to the table where our drinks stood. We were joined by Susan and Ed. It was proving to be a good evening. Susan was everywhere, laughing with the customers one minute, helping bar staff another, pointing Ed in the direction of things needing watching and occasionally popping downstairs to reassure Les that things were going well. She spoke to the dozen or so people who, while they were no longer queueing to get in, were either hoping to slide in unnoticed or hoping that people would leave so that they could replace them. She assured them that no-one would be leaving before the end but that she would take their names now against the next months party. They would have to come in and pay a couple of weeks beforehand to make sure of the tickets on the night.

The evening was a success.

About ten o'clock she stopped the music again.

'So how's your evening so far?'

Cheers and more cries of 'Get them off,' echoed around the room.

'I have a couple of bottles of bubbly here for the first two thongs given to me by guys with the thong in one hand, and the girl in a fireman's lift over his shoulder.

She didn't have to wait long. There were screams, apparently from every corner of the room, and, after a few seconds you could see girls being hoisted into the air and moving forward.

She nominated the first two guys who came to the front and indicated that they should do slow spins, thus proving that, yes, it was the girl over the shoulders who owned the panties. The crowd cheered as the guys turned and walked back with the bottles clasped in their hands.

'Slowly back to your places guys,' Susan called as she saw the girls being smacked and groped as they were carried through the crowds.

She nodded to the DJ and the music started again.

There was about an hour and a half left, Susan asked me if I had any ideas left for one more game. I gave her a suggestion. The bar was in danger of selling out of the special offer prosecco. Ed and I were dispatched to the cellar for another four cases and a couple of sacks of ice to chill them. I gave Ed another idea for an alternative game and told him when to suggest it.

Just before eleven Susan again stopped the music. It was funny watching the crowd. A lot of the girls were ready to hoist their skirts and I could see a few guys loosening their belts.

'Girls, form a circle in the middle of the floor looking outwards, boys a bigger circle outside of them looking inwards.'

I pulled Cindy by the hand and joined the throngs. I was expecting Ed to interrupt Susan's announcement but he was too late to stop her asking both circles to turn to their left and walk five places.

'There,' she said, 'that should ensure you are at least ten paces away from anyone you brought with you tonight. You know what to do, put two hands on the person in the ring opposite you. You have a new partner for the game. Now kiss, you know how, ten seconds, tongues. Now I have a bottle of champagne here... '

'Hold on a moment,' interrupted Ed. 'I have a better prize. Two tickets to next month's party for the first couple to get out here wearing one item of their new partners clothing. Let me show you how.'

He ripped off his shirt, which he had already quietly unbuttoned, 'Quick Susan, give me your dress.'

He grabbed the hem and started lifting it over her naked body. The crowd was divided between those who were trying to remove their own clothes and those nearby who were watching a stunned Susan being quickly stripped naked. He gave her his shirt and in a stunned silence she watched him pull her dress over his head. 'Quick put the shirt on,' he said. She did it in a daze.

A dozen couples appeared to be running to the stage wearing various switched clothes. He handed the first couple a card with a printed IOU for tickets. He nodded to the DJ to start playing and escorted Susan back to the corner of the bar where we were standing. He and I grinned at each other in acknowledgement of a deed done well. He started to remove her dress.

'Woah, bastard,' she grinned coming back to life again. 'Leave that dress on for the rest of the evening and get those fucking jeans and boxers off as well. If I have to wear your shirt, that is the least you can do.'

'Okay,' he countered, lowering his jeans and boxers to the floor. 'Agreed. But you have to leave the buttons undone as they are now.'

I liked him. The boy I had first seen a few short weeks ago had just grown up.

I pushed them both towards the packed dance floor. 'Go on you two. Circulate. You are the image of this party. See if you can get some more clothes from the punters. Take the jeans and boxers Ed. Start to make a big pile in the middle of the floor. Start with the couples that have changed clothes and take their changed clothes. Start small and see what you can get. I will tell the DJ to announce that they can get their clothes back at eleven thirty. Come on Cindy, we will help them start the pile.'