When I first saw the house in Kansas City I knew it was going to be my forever home. I'd been born and raised in the Carolinas but after a few business trips to KC I decided to relocate.
The place in Wilmington sold in just a few days and I found myself with far more money than I'd expected thanks to a bank executive who just had to have a place with room for horses. That made it possible for me to find a great old home in KC and have money left over for renovations.
I landed on a big 1915 Craftsman house along one of the city's many parkways. The home had a storied history but it had fallen into neglect courtesy of the last owner.
Due to a few water pipes breaking the foundation had crumbled and needed to be replaced. It was no small matter to pick up the whole house and move it to the back of the property while the foundation was replaced. The old foundation was quickly removed and then the real problems came along. The soil engineer said that there were too many organic materials in the ground and that the new foundation would end up failing because of these problems.
The solution ended up requiring a full basement to be installed and the footings for the walls would be supported by steel piers rammed into the earth. Quite pricey but still not a financial challenge for me.
The engineering issues required a consult with an architect and she recommended that since the house would now have a full basement and not just a crawlspace that we make it into additional living space. One of the things I opted to do was to install a windowless guest suite that would double as a storm shelter. To add a little mystery to the place the architect hid the door behind a well crafted wall panel.
You'd never know the guest suite was there unless you already knew it was there.
After nine months of work the house had been restored to her original glory but with some modern improvements that had been tastefully incorporated into the original design. The kitchen looked all original because the refrigerator and dish washer were hidden behind period cabinet doors, the central heat and air were carefully masked by period wall registers, and the big screen television would hide behind a perfect wainscoting when not in use.
Years of paint had been removed to reveal the original woodwork that had been designed by the home's architect, Francis Barry Byrne. You could see the Prairie School influence on Byrne's interpretation of the Craftsman movement and the result was simply amazing. That anyone had ever laid paint over such work was a crime.
The following few months had me busy working on the landscape and then bothering to find some actual work. My job search was brief and my new posting at a local railroad was a great fit for my resume.
That led to my next step and that was dating.
For a number of reasons none of my dates ever seemed to work out very well. None of the women I met did it for me. They were usually too concerned with other things in life to seem like they'd want to be the traditional wife and mother-of-my-children that I wanted from them.
It was nineteen months after the house was completed when one spring day we had a tornado warning and I retreated to my storm shelter to wait it out. As soon as I closed the heavy steel door the sounds of the outside world were gone. The sirens and the wind were not to be heard. I also imagined that I could not be heard outside.
That started me to thinking about maybe having a guest in my guest suite.
Having access to the railroad's machine shop it was an easy matter to convert the storm door to being opened only from the outside except by a little trick I could easily keep secret. Then I removed the phone line from the suite by pulling the wires up through the conduit. With the steel reinforced walls forming an effective Faraday cage there was not only no cell phone reception inside the room there was also no Wi-Fi signal even from my router just one floor above.
Anyone in this room would be totally isolated from the world.
With all of the meticulous planning and work I'd put into the house and the guest suite I had actually given very little thought to who would be the new occupant.
Over the coming weeks and months I found myself ruling out the women my own age simply because no matter how much I'd try they'd never be what I wanted. I needed someone younger. Not ridiculously young, of course, but college age would be perfect. Old enough to understand the world but not so old that she'd be set in her ways.
That had me looking at the girls at the local coffee shop. Then it was the young women at the hair place I frequented. Then it was the young women I'd run into going to and from work.
This one time I was at a coffee place and contemplating the little blonde barista getting forced into my car I stirred from my daydream and realized that I just didn't have it in me to kidnap anyone. And if I did kidnap someone I even vaguely knew then the odds were that the police would eventually find me.
It was with almost a sense of loss that I gave up on my idea. The fantasy of having someone all to myself simply did not comport with my abhorrence of what it would take to make such a thing a reality. It's just not me.
The leaves started to turn color and the air took on a crispness to announce the coming of fall. My lovely home was most comfortable in this time and it was not uncommon for me to fall asleep in my Gustav Stickley original chair.
Thus it occurred one Friday night in late October that I was awakened to someone pounding on my very solid front door.
I opened the door to see who it was and in stumbled a very rude and very obviously drunk person dressed up as Harley Quinn.
"About time you opened the door! Hey..." she looked around and then looked at me, "You're not Brian! Where the hell is Brian?"
That was the last coherent thing she said before she puked on the hardwood floor and then passed out.
I sighed at the intrusion and then set about making sure she didn't choke to death on her vomit. After that I cleaned up the floor to prevent her sick from ruining the new varnish.
As she lay on the floor I contemplated calling the police to have her hauled off to sober up.
That was when I started to give her a better look.
I noticed that she had a wig on and when I pulled it off of her head a luxurious tangle of natural red hair cascaded forth. And then I noticed that her skin wasn't pale from makeup but that it was her natural shading as a true ginger. She was maybe all of one hundred and fifteen pounds, I'd say she was about five foot and two inches tall, and the "EZE" wrist band she wore clearly made her a college girl.
"EZE" stood for Epsilon Zeta Epsilon which was one of the sororities at Rockhurst University. The local joke was that the members were all 'easy' girls because of the acronym of EZE.
I wondered how she'd ended up in my home. Opening the front door I looked around and found no trace of a strange car, her possible friends, or anyone else.
Closing the door I locked it. Then I took a deep breath and turned around to see her still passed out on my floor. A quick check verified she was still breathing.
I also checked for a purse and finding none I quickly searched for a wallet, keys, or phone. Again, I found nothing.
That meant that nothing of hers was telling anyone else where she was at the moment. No phone, no cell-enabled keys, nothing.
I pondered my next move for all of thirty seconds.
Maybe less.
I gathered her up and carried her down the stairs. She mumbled a little as I fumbled with the panel that hid the door to the guest suite.
Then she was safely inside my...what to call it? It was too nice to call it a cell so I just decided to call it her new home.
I sat her up on the bed and then caught the scent of vomit and cheap vodka. My decision to undress her was then somewhat defensible. After all, who would want to sleep in shorts and a t-shirt covered with puke? Right?
So off came the "Daddy's Girl" t-shirt and I gasped at the view of her flawless alabaster skin. The top part of her modest breasts could be seen and I estimated that they were 34B and after I took off her bra I checked and congratulated myself for getting that right.
The shoes, socks, and shorts came off next and I decided to leave her with the panties. At least for now.
I guess I should mention that I was rock hard by this point.
While I elected to leave her alone to sleep off her drunk I will plead guilty to allowing myself to stroke her perfect breasts with their perfect little gumdrop nipples. A little attention and her nipples responded to me quite pleasantly!
I eased her back into the bed and lay her on her side just in case she had any more to puke up. I didn't want to go through all of this and then have her choke to death.
With that I closed and locked the door to her room and then made my way upstairs. Her soiled clothes came with me and I thought about washing them but then decided to just toss them into the embers of the fireplace. It took a few moments but then the flames rose up and burnt off the remnants of her costume.
