Walking quickly to the ladies room, she swallowed the pills and pressed her hot, aching face against the cool, blue tiles. Without even realizing it, she burst into loud, wrenching sobs.
Just then the door opened and in walked a new young file clerk named Betty. She hadn't been there very long and Valerie doubted that the woman would have had any cause to want to harm her.
Betty looked in shocked surprise at the sobbing woman and instinctively put her arms around her. "Why, whatever is wrong, Valerie?" she asked in a voice filled with concern, out Valerie only cried harder. Betty made soothing noises and finally, Valerie was able to calm herself a little bit and mumble something about her mother being very, very sick.
Betty patted her in sympathy and helped her wash her face and reapply her streaked make-up. "Look what I have here, Valerie," she said, holding up a joint.
Without waiting for a reply, she took out a light and pushed Valerie into one of the stalls. Lighting the joint, she inhaled deeply and passed it on to the other woman. Valerie drew a deep breath and felt the stuff begin to relax her almost instantly.
Fifteen minutes later she emerged, serene and floating. She felt much, much better. She couldn't be upset about anything now. She moved through the office as if in a dream and even coming face to face with Burt couldn't shake her now. Instead of looking away as she usually did, she looked deep into his eyes and smiled an angelic, trusting smile. "Hello there, Burt. How are you today?"
Burt was rather stunned; he could only surmise that perhaps he had been wrong about her all along, perhaps she had only been playing hard to get, but she was ready to give that up now. He figured that she must have gotten the note by now, but she didn't seem to be in the least bit upset.
He looked at her now, regarding her sweet smile and soft eyes with surprise. "I'm fine," he answered her shyly.
"That's wonderful, wonderful wonderful!" she said with a tinkly little laugh and drifted down the hall, leaving him to stare in perplexed wonder after her.
CHAPTER THREE
Valerie received no more notes that day, nor the next, nor the day after that. She grew calmer, wanting to believe that whoever had done such a thing that amused him or herself all he needed and now, the whole sordid thing would be over.
She felt she could relax.
She did, however try to be a little bit more circumspect about Blair. She refused now, to fuck in the middle of the day and insisted that they both arrange to stay late, or that he sneak over to her place late at night and then steal away before dawn.
She was a little bit more reserved in her lovemaking these days too; she was very shocked to find out just how low she could sink and it scared her more than a little. When Burt called her a haughty bitch, he was not too far from wrong. Valerie had been poor, very poor and she was never able to forget that. As if to deny her squalid past, she cultivated the air of a cold, icy bitch. She knew that she was a real beauty and she wanted to use that beauty for some purpose, to some ends higher than simply pleasure for its own sake. She was used to men who could do things for her, buy her gifts, or find her jobs. Although she thought Blair was handsome, sexy and a great fuck, she never would have let him touch her if he hadn't been her boss.
She was a woman who wanted men to bow and cater to her, to put her on a pedestal and be prepared to worship. The afternoon at Bloomingdale's was the first time she had truly let anyone dominate her and she had made Blair pay for it in other ways.
He was as good as his word. He had managed to get her a raise and there was talk of a promotion. He had bought her, in addition to the lovely lingerie, two beautiful new dresses, an expensive bottle of perfume and an antique ivory bracelet that looked beautiful against her thin, tanned wrist.
She wouldn't let him control her sexually either. He noticed the change and it only made him hotter. He loved her for it, for making him sweat and suffer and beg, because he knew that one day he would dominate her totally and on that day, his revenge would be sweet indeed. So, for the meantime, he put up with with her bad temper and her haughty ways and he indulged her whims, letting her decide when and how they would have sex.
One sizzling July night, they both stayed late at the office and enjoyed a heated fuck in the icy cool of his air-conditioned office. Afterwards, he gave her money for the taxi back to her apartment, but for some odd reason, she decided to walk.
Once outside, she was glad of her decision. The night was smoldering with a strange burning sensuality that only New York on a summer night can have. The stars were out and Valerie walked unhurriedly along the deserted streets, listening to the click! click! of her high-heels on the empty pavement.
Traffic was light and she didn't see very many cars out that night, so when one stopped, she noticed it right away. There was a very tall, lean, blond man in the car, with wispy hair and steely eyes that glinted even in the distance.
He waited for her to reach the car and when she was parallel to it on the sidewalk, he stuck his head out. There was a cowboy hat on it. He said nothing, but she could feel that he was undressing her with his eyes. Oddly enough, she felt no fear, only curiosity.
She looked at him, too, her eyes as blank as water, but said nothing. Then she continued on her way. After she had walked for another three or four, blocks, the car started again, slowly driving past her by a few blocks and then waiting.
She thought him very arrogant, this cowboy, but sure enough, she found her body stopping again in front of the car, not saying anything, just looking.
They stared at one another like two cats across an open field, not saying anything, just watching and waiting. She drew a little closer this time, but at the last minute, she changed her mind and hurried along the dark street.
The little charade continued. He waited a few minutes, then drove on ahead slowly and parked a few blocks ahead of her, waiting for her to catch up to him. The ritual of courtship it seemed, was slow.
This time, interest and curiosity aroused, Valerie walked right up to the open window of the car. The man was leaning on one long, sinewy arm, gazing up at her beautiful face in the light from the street lamp.
"Get in," he said curtly. Valerie stood there dumbly, not saying anything. "Get in," he repeated and this time, she watched, as if outside of herself, how her arm reached over and pulled the handle. The door swung open and she climbed into the car.
He drove quietly and at an even, steady, pace, as if not wanting to disturb the peace of the streets around them. Valerie thought she must be mad, getting into a car with a total stranger in the middle of the night in New York City and yet she felt no terror, rib fear. She waited calm and docile, for this man, this beautiful stranger with the glinting cold eyes, to decide what he was going to do with her next.
As he drove along, one hand slid from the steering wheel and moved slowly, without urgency, towards her leg. She didn't move, not even when his hard, long fingers made contact with her thigh.
Pushing the fabric of the thin, polished cotton dress she wore away, his hand began to slowly and artfully caress the soft, buttery skin of her inner thigh.
A sudden intake of breath revealed her passion, but still, she said nothing. His hand had her hypnotized, tracing smaller and smaller circles around the surface of her leg, getting closer and closer to the spreading moisture that was emanating from her cunt.
She leaned her head back on the vinyl seat, feeling her neck stick to the hot surface. Closing her eyes, she surrendered herself to the feelings that, rose and broke, like shuddering waves on the shore of her body.