Henry seemed confused, which was fine, especially since the waitress had warned her that he wasn’t particularly bright, which would serve her purpose so well. He took a swallow from his beer glass and said, ‘But there’s one other thing I don’t understand.’
‘Yes?’
‘Karen, the waitress… she said that the girl sitting here wanted to meet a Gulf veteran, but that he had to be single and kinda good-looking. What’s that about?’
Adrianna picked up her beer bottle, gently suckled the top as she took a swallow, and then reached out for the last time and caressed the man’s wrist, making sure he got a good look at her tight slacks, in addition to the white tank top, her nips so hard now that they almost hurt.
She lowered her voice. ‘Maybe I want to say thank you in another way. Interested?’
Henry’s eyes lit up, like little horny diodes back there had just clicked on. ‘God, yes.’
She leaned forward, close enough so that her hair tickled his face. ‘Good. I have a room at a motel, a couple of miles away. Let’s get out of here.’
‘You got it, babe.’
The motel was called the Longstreet Arms, and Adrianna had earlier rented an end unit there. She was on Henry the moment the door closed. She dropped her coat on the floor and her purse as well, and the man grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her close. His beard scratched her face and she kissed him, kissed him hard, and his mouth was open and slobbering and she started bumping and grinding against a thigh, and that got him going, too. His hands grabbed her ass and she forced herself to giggle as she dropped to her knees, started unzipping his jeans.
‘Jesus,’ he said. ‘Jesus, you are one hot babe…God!’
Sure she was, Adrianna thought, deftly pulling his hardening member free from his soiled white underwear — ugh. She was hotter than any other small-town babe he had gotten in the past few years, she thought, he’d have been lucky to get some chain-smoking overweight hausfrau with bad teeth and tattoos from high school sloppily inked on her shoulder blades. Adrianna forced herself not to grimace, not to give in to the gag reflex as she took him into her mouth.
Henry shuddered and leaned back against the door, his hands now in her hair. She continued the repulsive act for a few moments before pulling away and looking up at him, smiling. ‘Time to get comfortable, don’t you think?’
He was grinning, breathing hard, eyes glassy. ‘Oh, shit, yes, babe. You got it.’
Adrianna stood up, took him by the hand, led him over to the bed. The room had light green wall-to-wall carpeting, a TV on a stand, and a bathroom that looked like it got cleaned regularly, every spring and fall. Henry worked fast to undress himself, and she helped him along. She didn’t protest when he pulled down her tight white slacks and pulled her tank top over her head. Now that her breasts were exposed, he growled and grabbed them. She couldn’t help herself when she winced as he worked on her nipples. She gently took a hold of his hands and said, ‘Don’t worry, hon, they’ll be there later. Lay back, now, why don’t you?’
He fell back on the bed and she straddled him, grinding her butt on his erection. His hands went back up to her breasts and then she leaned down to kiss him and whispered in his ear, ‘Want to try something kinky?’
‘Shit, yes,’ he said, grinning. ‘Would love to.’
‘Then close your eyes.’
Henry did as he was told, and Adrianna clambered off the bed, thinking joyfully, there he goes, just like the other ones, thinking with the wrong head. She went down to her purse, snapped it open, took out the two metal instruments, and within a very few seconds she had handcuffed his hands to the headboard of the bed.
‘Hey!’ he protested. ‘What the fuck do you think you’re doing?’
She was amused to see how small the other head was, now that it was shrinking away. She straddled him again, kissed him on the lips, and said, ‘Shhhh, dear one, everything will be explained shortly. Just keep quiet.’
‘The hell I will!’ he yelled, yanking at his cuffed wrists, the metal restraints rattling against the headboard. ‘You get me out of here, you crazy bitch, I’m not into this kind of kinky stuff, this goddamn bondage, not at all, and if you don’t let me out of here right now, I’ll—’
As he was raving, Adrianna went back to the floor, retrieved her purse, and came back up onto the bed to straddle him. She opened her purse and took out a Black Attack folding knife, which she snapped open. She poked the very point of the blade into his chin, right through his beard. A bead of blood suddenly appeared in the whiskers. Henry froze, his eyes wide with shock and fear, his arms now trembling.
‘Got your attention?’
No reply. She gently moved the point of the blade again, and Henry moaned.
‘Got your attention?’ She asked again.
‘Yes,’ Henry said, his voice thin. ‘Yes, you do.’
‘Good.’
Adrianna took a deep breath, felt the shuddering shame of thrill and excitement flow through her like a heavy slug of maple syrup, just sliding down one’s throat. She leaned over him and said, ‘I want to know more, Henry. Tell me more about your war in Iraq, back in ‘91. Do tell me more.’
‘Wh-why?’
‘Hmm, a good question,’ she said. ‘Hold on. Don’t move, and maybe I won’t hurt you.’
Back to the floor and to her purse, from which she took out a thin leather wallet. She returned to her handcuffed man on the bed — noticing right away the stench now rising up from him, wondering how automatic that was, the body reacting to being put in unavoidable danger — and straddled him again. She was conscious that she was naked, save for the pink-thong panties, but she didn’t really care.
Adrianna held up the leather wallet, flipped it open. ‘See the photo? Not a bad likeness, is it?’
‘Noo…nooo, it’s not.’
‘See what it says?’
‘It says… Adrianna Scott — and, Jesus Christ, you’re a fucking CIA agent! What the hell is this?’
The knife point went back to his chin. He winced and she said coldly, ‘For someone who can walk and breathe at the same time you’re pretty stupid, Henry. We’re not CIA agents. We’re CIA officers. Got it?’
He moaned again. ‘Please… what the fuck do you want? Huh? What the fuck do you want?’
Adrianna leaned into him again. ‘I want you to tell me a story. A story about killing Iraqis. Tell me a story. That’s all. Is that so hard?’
Henry closed his eyes. Another bead of blood appeared in the bristles of his beard. His chest moved rapidly, up and down, underneath her splayed legs. He said, ‘A story… that’s all? A story?’
‘Sure,’ she said. ‘And to be fair, I’ll tell you a story in return, all right?’
Eyes clenched shut, Henry said, ‘Our tank was called Killer Kobra. Part of K Company. All tanks had names beginning with the letter of their company. We… we… set off at 0300 hours, H-Day, the day we made our swing out east, heading up into Iraq. The classic left-hand hook. It was flat, rocky land. Great terrain for tanks. Lots of room to maneuver… we’ll probably never have an advantage like that, ever again. We were about twenty klicks north of the border, when we had our first contact… three Soviet-era BMPs, personnel carriers—’
Another jab of the knife. ‘I know what BMPs are, you fool. Go on.’
‘Then…then we saw a T-72, coming up over a sand dune. The poor son of a bitch probably didn’t even know we were there… Bruce, our tank commander, called for a Sabot round… I pulled it up, chambered it… boom!… goddamn thing, we could see the turret spin up… those T-72s were goddamned deathtraps, they were… we motored up and a few minutes later, we slowed down as we went past it… no reason ‘cept none of us had ever seen anything like that, in a real war…’