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That had been four hours ago, before he’d tied her to the bed.

The clock on the dresser now read ten o’clock.

He had insisted that they leave the shades on the windows up, even though she protested that people in the building across the way might see them. There were lights on in the building across the way. Above the building the night was black. She wondered if anyone across the way could see her tied to the bed with silk ribbons. She was oozing below again, dizzy with wanting him again. She visualized someone across the way looking at her. Somehow it made her even more excited.

She watched him as he went to the armchair, picked up the holster, and took the pistol from it. Broad, tanned shoulders, a narrow waist, her fingernail marks still on his ass from where she’d clawed at him.  She’d described herself to him, back there in the bar, as half-wildcat, but that was something she’d never believed of herself, even after she’d learned all about multiple orgasms. Tonight ... Jesus! Afloat on her own ocean. Still wet with his juices and her own, still wanting more.

He approached the bed with the gun in his hand.

‘Is there a burglar in the house?’ she asked, smiling.

He did not smile back.

‘A lesson,’ he said.

‘Is that loaded?’ she said. She was looking at his cock, not the gun, though in truth the gun did frighten her. She had never liked guns. But she was still smiling, seductively she thought. She writhed on the bed, twisting against the tight silken ribbons.

‘Empty,’ he said, and snapped open the cylinder to show her. ‘A Colt Detective Special,’ he said. ‘Snub-nosed.’

‘Like me,’ she said. ‘Do you like my nose?’

‘Are you ready for the lesson?’ he asked.

‘Oh my,’ she said, opening her eyes and her bound hands in mock fright. ‘Another lesson?’ The gun was empty, she wasn’t afraid of it now. And she was ready to play any game he invented.

‘If you’re ready for one,’ he said.

‘I’m ready for anything you’ve got,’ she said.

‘A lesson in combinations and permutations,’ he said, and suddenly opened his left hand. A bullet was in it. ‘Voila,’ he said. ‘Six empty chambers in the...’

‘There’s an empty chamber right here,’ she said.

‘... cylinder of the pistol.’

‘Come fill it,’ she said.

‘And one bullet in my left hand.’

He showed her the bullet.

‘I insert, this into the cylinder...’

Insert something in me, will you, please?’

“... and we now have one full chamber and five empty ones. Question: what are the odds against the shell being in firing position when I stop twirling the cylinder?’ He started twirling the cylinder, slowly, idly. ‘Any idea?’ he said.

‘Five to one,’ she said. ‘Come fuck me.’

‘Five to one, correct,’ he said, and sat on the edge of the bed, resting the barrel of the gun against the inside of her thigh.

‘Careful with that,’ she said.

He smiled. His finger was inside the trigger guard.

‘Really,’ she said. ‘There’s a bullet in it now.’

‘Yes, I know.’

‘So ... you know ... move it away from there, okay?’ She twisted on the bed. The cold barrel of the gun touched her thigh again. ‘Come on, Steve.’

‘We’re going to play a little Russian roulette,’ he said, smiling.

‘Like hell we are,’ she said.

But she was tied to the bed.

He rose suddenly. Standing beside the bed, looking down at her, he began twirling the cylinder. He kept twirling it. Twirling it. Smiling.

‘Come on, Steve,’ she said, ‘you’re scaring me.’

‘Nothing to be scared of,’ he said. ‘The odds are five to one.’

He stopped twirling the cylinder.

He sat on the edge of the bed again.

He looked at her.

He looked at the gun.

And then, gently, he placed the barrel of the gun into the hollow of her throat.

She recoiled, terrified, twisting her head. The metal was cold against her flesh.

‘Hey, listen,’ she said, and he pulled the trigger.

The silence was deafening.

She lay there sweating, breathing harshly, certain he would pull the trigger yet another time. The odds were five to one. How many times could he...?

‘It’s made of wood,’ he said. ‘The bullet in the gun. You weren’t in any danger.’

He moved the barrel of the gun away from her throat.

She heaved a sigh of relief.

And realized how wet she was.

And looked at him.

His erection was enormous.

‘You ... shouldn’t have scared me that way,’ she said.

She was throbbing everywhere.

‘I can do whatever I want with you,’ he said.

‘No, you can’t.’

‘I own you,’ he said.

‘No, you don’t,’ she whispered.

But she struggled against the restraining ribbons to open wider for him as he mounted her again.

They did not budge from that apartment all weekend.

She did not know what was happening to her; nothing like this had ever happened to her in her life.

He left early Monday morning, promising to call her soon.

As soon as he was gone, she dressed as he had ordered her to.

Sitting behind the reception desk at CBS later that morning, she wore no panties under her skirt and no bra under her blouse.

‘CBS, good morning,’ she said into the phone.

And ached for him.

* * * *

CHAPTER FOUR

If a person is an armed robber and he moves to another state, chances are he’ll continue the pursuit of his chosen career. He will not, for example, suddenly become a used-car salesman or a television producer, however similar to felony violators those two professionals might be. He will, instead, buy himself a gun that isn’t hot—which is easy to come by in any city in the United States—find himself a mom-and-pop grocery store, and stick it up one fine night. If Mom and Pop are smart and cooperative, they will empty the contents of the cash register into his waiting hands and pray that he departs at once. If Mom and Pop feel that an armed intruder in their store is a personal as well as a criminal violation, they might foolishly resist this invasion of their turf, in which case they might lose more than the cash in the register. An armed robber isn’t armed because he belongs to the National Rifle Association. He is armed because he knows he is looking at twenty years down the pike if he’s caught doing his job, and he is quite ready—and often eager—to use the pistol in his fist. In America the most recent annual figure for deaths caused by handguns was thirty-four thousand nationwide, second only to deaths caused in automobile accidents. That is a whole lot of dead people. Carella sometimes wondered if the members of the NRA, while happily shooting deer in the forest, ever said a silent prayer for all those victims.