I.
Rod Cochran, slumped in his car seat with eyes peering over the dashboard, watched a dark-haired
woman come through the tall bronze and silver doors of the Essential Insurance Building.
"Here comes your competition, Mrs. Sutton," he said to himself.
Rod appraised the woman as she crossed the parking lot. She was a couple of inches taller than Mrs. Sutton even without the three inch heels. She was leggier than Mrs. Sutton, but her stride had more bounce than sex in it.
"She doesn't move like you do, Mrs. Sutton," he said aloud
The woman was dressed in a black suit and white blouse which she wore as if it were a uniform. Power suit, Rod thought. Her rich chestnut hair flounced on her padded shoulders, softening her otherwise haughty, no-nonsense appearance.
"You look like you mean business, sweetheart. And I know what business you mean. "
She was The Woman, the woman Charlie Sutton, the top mover and shaker at Essential, was fucking. Foolishly fucking, Rod thought, for Charlie had the beautiful and insatiable Toni Sutton at home. Rod knew just how beautiful and insatiable because he had recently arranged several encounters with the gorgeous mature blond, one of which he shared with his nerdy college classmate, Tim Griffin. Those encounters had been helped along by three photos Rod had taken while watching Mrs. Sutton and Tim fuck each other crazy one afternoon in the bath house by the Sutton's pool. The pictures had initiated Rod's brief career as a blackmailer, a role he now wanted to shed And he hoped the woman now walking to her car was going to unwittingly help him accomplish that very thing.
Rod had a few contacts inside the corridors of Essential thanks to the fact that Rod's father, Stacey
Cochran, was a partner in the law firm that represented the insurance company. He had found out that the woman's name was Margo Mulhauser, twenty-six, previously married with no children, with an undergraduate degree in accounting and now studying for her CPA. Rod learned from a jealous secretary that Margo had her eye on a top position with Essential, and what better way to reach her goal than fucking Charlie Sutton.
Fucking your way to the top, eh, sweetheart? But not for long, not with Charlie Sutton anyway, Rod thought hopefully.
On the heels of that thought Sutton emerged from the building. Rod had heard plenty of stories from his parents about Charlie's years as a football star at Clearmont College. Rod smiled as he watched the older man aggressively move through the parking lot as if heading for the goal post with a football tucked under his arm. He was still in pretty good shape, Rod observed, with broad, heavy shoulders and only a hint of a stomach.
Just as Sutton reached his Jaguar, Margo pulled out of the lot in her little red convertible, heading north on LeBlond Avenue. Rod came up in his seat and watched Charlie follow in Margo's wake.
He started his car, sat there a moment and took a deep breath. He didn't need to be in a hurry. He knew
where they were going and he would soon be there himself. He reached for his phone.
"Dink? It's Rod. It's all systems go, man. "
A voice on the other end wailed," Cochran, I can't believe we're doing this. You gotta be out of your fuckin' mind, man."
"I am. I've been outta my fuckin' mind for weeks. But I'm about to get it back. See you in a couple minutes."
"Well, here goes nothin', man, " Dink said.
Rod thought, you could be right about that, Dink.
By the time Rod reached the Melish Hotel in the older part of Ravensfield, the convertible and the
Jaguar were parked side by side. They' re certainly not concerned about being caught together, Rod thought as he pulled into a spot behind one wing of the hotel. Dink had unlocked the back security door for Rod and he raced up the steps to room 369 where he used the key card Dink had given him. Inside, in the middle of the room, Dink Melish sat before several decks of knobs and switches, watching a monitor, head-phones around his neck. Rod eased the door shut.
"Anything interesting happening yet? " he whispered.
Dink made an impatient gesture toward the screen. " See for yourself, man. They still got their clothes on. "
Rod glanced at the grainy, indistinct images on the screen and listened to the hollow sounding
voices of Sutton and Margo.
"Is this the best you can do? "
"Listen, man. I had to steal this stuff from security. It ain't exactly state of the fuckin' art, you know. And by the way, where's my three hundred bucks? "
Rod reached into a pocket and handed Dink a small wad of fifties. The tall blond-headed young man shoved the money into his jeans saying, " This ain't enough. I should've held you up for three thousand. If my old man ever gets wind of what I'm doing, it's goodbye to my beautiful fuckin' career."
Dink was a former classmate of both Rod and Tim at Clearmont College, but dropped out after a semester to go into the family businesses, one of which was the hotel.
"You have any idea of how many laws we're breaking by doing this shit? " Dink complained.
"No. "
"Well I don't either, but there's probably a bunch, all federal. And three hundred bucks ain't
gonna begin to pay for a fuckin' lawyer. "
"You sound just like Tim. Always complaining. "
"Yeah? Timmy Griffin might be nerdy and all that, but betcha' he's too fuckin' smart to get involved
in something like this. "
Rod had to smile. He wanted to tell Dink just how much Tim was already involved, but the less
Dink knew about the background to Rod's scheme the better at this point. Rod took a seat on the edge
of the bed and turned his attention to the monitor.
"Can't you make the picture any better, man? "
Dink fiddled with a couple of switches and made the picture marginally clearer. A shadowy Sutton was unbuttoning Margo's blouse, then bringing his lips to her cleavage. She held his head between her breasts for some time, running her fingers through his graying, but still thick hair.
"Who are they anyway? The broad is a babe. I don't recognize the old guy."
"You should. He's had a lease on that room for about a month. "
"I could look it up. Probably paid cash and didn't use his real name. "
"It's better you don't know, Dink. "
Dink nodded and said, " Right. When it comes to the shit you get into, Cochran, ignorance is fuckin' bliss."
"Say, they can't hear us, can they? "
"Not unless you want to start screamin' your head off."
"Turn it up a little, will you?"
"Here. Use these. " Dink handed the head-phones to Rod and he clapped them on.
The droning voice of Margo Muhlhauser was saying, " You know, Mr. Sutton, I've been thinking about the Endicott casualty, and how Essential could limit its loss. "
Sutton brought his face up from her breasts and pulled her closer. " I'm about to fuck you during lunch and all you can think about is business. You're something alright, baby."
"Any time's a good time to discuss business, Mr. Sutton. "
"Not while I'm fucking you, baby. And I told you, cut out the 'Mr. Sutton'. "
Sutton turned Margo around and pulled the jacket from her shoulders, then pulled her blouse off and tossed it on a chair.
"I just had that dry-cleaned. Let me hang it up. "
Sutton was impatient. He whipped her bra off, pulled Margo to himself, playing with her tits. She wasn't as well endowed as Mrs. Sutton, and Margo's tits disappeared into Sutton's large hands. Margo remained impassive during Sutton's fondling. She's just going through the motions, Rod thought, and Charlie doesn't seem to know -- or care.
