Chapter 22
I Start the Wheels to Cataclysm
The next morning, I was up at the crack of ten, or maybe elevenish, feeling renewed and full of purpose despite a serious hangover. Joy at the B.I.B.’s return had forced me into a night of celebrating including a brief stop at O’Malleys. I hit the computer with a steaming mocha latte in hand (minus the mocha and the milk), and checked out the Scranton news before logging onto the B.I.B. website. Other than the “buy one get one” sale on Miner’s beer, only one item caught my eye.
This was an article about the “City Hall Pipe Bomber.” Some stiff had confessed to intending to bomb the mayor’s office. (Sounded more like a civic service than a crime to me.) However, in the article, it mentioned that he was apprehended by a group of citizens after he had attacked a woman in an alleyway. There was an interview with each of the citizens, except the woman who had been attacked. Witnesses described her as having blond hair and being thirty or so, but then spoke of how she had left the scene with her face hard to describe because it was screwed up in what they could only describe as a “fish face.”
Thirty and blond reminded me of the B.I.B. and immediately made my morning glory remind me of its presence. But the fish face struck my memory. I hit the keyboard and found the picture files I had bought when I purchased the picture of the B.I.B. taken at Skelly’s. The guy had sent me pictures of the same woman doing a “fish face.” I pulled them up, and there she was, the B.I.B., doing a “fish face.”
There she was, blond, thirty, and fish faced. The B.I.B. had stopped the bomber, not the citizen group, and she had used the fish face to escape without being ID’d. Sometimes she seemed like such an sweet, ordinary chick and, at other times, so unapproachably powerful. I thought about the night with her at O’Malley’s, the flashing eyes, and tried to put that together with an ordinary woman. I tried to imagine what she would be like, what it would be like to stand beside her…and a few other things.
But I was the only one who knew she had stopped the bomber. That would be the subject of my blog on the website. I broke the story on the site and published the fish-face picture for the first time. Now that’s journalism…right?
I hurried through it because my real goal for the morning (after sobriety) was to research the only leads I had—Jennifer Lowe and the other Super Bowl women. There had to be a connection. I needed to find the other women and learn more about Lowe.
I did an Internet search for Jennifer Lowe and found some artists and dog trainers, but found nothing about “my” Jennifer Lowe other than her little florist shop. I researched her name for real estate holdings and found nothing, not even a little bungalow somewhere. I was thinking about my next clever move, or at least a clever move, when I saw Lowe LLC on the real estate tax listings.
The first listing matched the address of her florist shop. Hello, hello, I thought. But that was just the first of a dozen in the city. I crosschecked the listings to condos, office buildings, and restaurants. This chick had it going on. Then I checked other cities and found listings for Lowe LLC in New York City, Chicago, Orlando, Dallas, and on the island of Maui. If I had known how to do it, I’d have checked Europe and Asia and probably found more. Lowe was not a mere florist but a friggin’ conglomerate—who melts pens, by the way.
So there was at least one other superwoman, , and she wasn’t doing like “my” sweetie and fighting crime and injustice. Somehow Jennifer had found a way to turn her powers into millions. I didn’t remember seeing her in any of the latest porn or on a reality TV show like “Melting Pens with the Stars.” So for the moment her power remained a mystery.
Now the question was, should I close in on Lowe, or keep looking for the others? The memory of the pen clip melted into the tabletop made me think maybe the latter was a better idea.
Chapter 23
First Contact, Getting What You Want, and Getting Sick
When I saw my fish-faced picture on thebib.org home page, my hand flew up to cover my mouth, and my chair flew back a couple of inches, scratching across the tile floor. I moved in closer and covered the picture with my hand, as if that could block it from the world. I’m no IT wiz, but even I knew that wasn’t going to help. (I think you’d have to do that on every computer in the world to have any effect.) I looked around to see if Paige was near, nearing full-blown panic.
So far, I had gotten lucky, but that fish-face trick was well known to my friends and my family, anyone who really knew me. What would I tell Paige? What could I tell my family? All kinds of thoughts swirled in my head. Can I get the picture pulled from the site? Maybe I should admit it’s me, but say I’m not the B.I.B.? If I sue to get it off, I’ll draw all kinds of attention. What to do? Damn that guy from Texas, I thought. I put the cursor over the Add Your Comment button and clicked it. I sent this message to the site: “Hey asshole, that fish-face picture isn’t the B.I.B., it’s me. Some guy from Texas took it a few months ago. How’d you get it? I’m gonna sue your ass if you don’t take it down immediately. No one should believe this site. That picture is not the B.I.B., just a middle-aged mom from Scranton who just likes to goof around and blow off steam at a local bar sometimes. And guess what? She’s pissed!”
* * *
Don’t ask me how, ’cause I’ll deny it in court, but I knew it was her. Not only her, but the fearful, vulnerable side of her; the asshole comment notwithstanding. Something about that fish-face picture had made her scared; so scared that she was now risking being discovered to to get it removed. I stared at the picture and wondered, How could a fish face make me so horny?
Suddenly, a shiver came over me. Not an “I ate too many chili fries” shiver, either—it was like my whole body was empty and frozen in place. I was just a pair of eyes and a brain reelingwith a joyous, frightening, exhilarating, foreboding feeling that within my grasp was something that would change my life forever .
I stared at the page, reread her words, and thought until the pixels of the screen were burnt into my brain. Without direction or plan, as usual, my hands began to move the cursor. I logged in to the back end of the website, found the code for the picture, clicked on it, clicked “delete,” and then updated the site. In an instant there was a gigantic hole on the page, but I had something far more valuable. Through the hit history, I could now track back and find her computer address.
I fell back in my chair and felt the shivers come over me again in waves, like the surf on the north shore of Maui. (Hey, I was there…once…okay, I read about it.) I watched my hands shaking, even worse than on St. Paddy’s Day last year.
Little did I know that she was going through the same thing on her end, minus the shivers, joy, fear, exhilaration, or foreboding, and probably not the shakes or the profound sense of glory or connection. Let’s just say she was friggin’ surprised.
I felt close to her. I can’t explain the feeling any more than I can explain the way her eyes flashed at me that night in the bar, or the fact that no one else could see it. But I felt the exhilaration of a warm pulsation flowing between us. The thought literally stunned me.
* * *
I stared in shock at the empty space on the screen where my fish-face picture had been, my mind still racing in fear. I refreshed the page. I exited my browser and launched it again to be sure the picture was gone. I looked down at the hand that had covered the screen and laughed to myself, half-wondering if my powers could account for something like this. Good work! I thought, and then tried to make other parts of the site disappear with my hand, to no avail.
After a moment, I was confident that my words and not my powers were the cause, and I smiled. With the fear of being discovered gone, my heart rate must have dropped by twenty beats per minute. I breathed a sigh of relief and shook my head. But as the fear subsided, it was replaced by a sudden warmth, like the arm of a friend suddenly being draped around my shoulders. It was weird but it felt really good.
* * *
While I was feeling better, the north shore
of Maui was hitting me again. When the true impact of being this close to finding her hit me, it was a Maui wipeout. How would I talk with her, for starters? The last time I was near her I had babbled “SSSs,” and Dr. Jones had drooled. How would I keep from screwing up?
I had almost exposed her by posting her picture. That could have gotten her in trouble, or hurt. The mob surely would love to know who she was and where her family lived. The mayor had been nearly ruined by her. And Jennifer Lowe—what was she doing at the Searchlight Event? Did she have plans for the B.I.B. too?
The reality and the responsibility crashed over me. The room suddenly got hot. Perspiration beaded on my forehead. Either my thoughts were making me terribly ill, or I was in the middle of an alien movie with something about to burst from my chest. I ran to the bathroom, afraid I was about to get violently ill.
After I began to feel better, I stood up and put one hand on each side of the doorjamb. I reflected for a moment and sighed. Sometimes getting what you go after can be a bitch. “Damn chili fries,” I mumbled. Blaming innocent bar food made it easier to deal with the fact that getting what I wanted most in life had caused me to get sick.
When the warm pulsations came again, they mellowed me. The memory of the gray eyes of the woman I’d met at O’Malley’s reassured me like deep, comforting breaths
Chapter 24
Jennifer and Carmine Get Lucky
Being Jennifer Lowe, superwoman, was no guarantee of an easy life. A day of dealing with the small minds that helped run my financial empire had left me with tight muscles, short breath, and full of racing thoughts. The frustration of them being unable to keep up with me was like trying to herd kittens. Two hours of drinks and a half-hearted search for a man who could soothe my supersized libido at this upscale, mirror-filled lounge had brought me no more satisfaction than had waking up this morning.
I sat at the bar without company, as I was often forced to. The time it took to run my business didn’t leave a lot of time for friendships, and I was pretty much the only one in my league anyway. I finished my drink and stood up to leave, gathering my purse and coat, then realized that my cleavage had attracted attention from a nearby booth. A tall, muscularly built oilman here from out of the state, by the look of him, took my leaving as the cue to make his move. He stood and brushed back his dark hair, then stepped to my side. “You can’t leave just yet,” he started.
“Why the hell not?” I responded with disdain.
He brushed his drunken erection against my thigh and whispered in my ear, “Cause you are just about the finest thing I’ve ever seen, darlin’.”
“Oh, please. What kind of line is that?” I said. Great, another drunken Texan. Another fucker come to frack our oil and gas. Why couldn’t they leave my oil fields alone? I started to leave, but then a new thought made me turn back to him with a grin, much like a lioness might grin upon spotting an injured gazelle. There was no need to be coy or waste any time with a juvenile like this. I shocked him by taking a handful between his legs. “You know how to use this?” I asked, giving him a squeeze.
“Yes, sweetness, I believe I do.”
“Come with me,” I said, pulling him by his tie for a few feet before moving out in front of him. He followed me out, down the street, and into the lobby of the Maxim hotel. As I approached the front desk, the man behind it saw me, smiled, and straightened his coat. “Good evening, Ms. Gladstone.”
“Good evening, Anthony.” Anthony was used to my generous tips in exchange for his discretion. He knew me solely as Ms. Gladstone, and he knew which security cameras would suddenly not be working whenever I visited as well. I could depend on him when one of my midnight sessions with a man went badly.
“Will you want the same room this evening?”
“I believe I will, Anthony. Is 411 available?”
“Yes, it is,” he said. Anthony handed me a passkey whose origin had long been wiped from the computer.
I took the key, handed Anthony a folded stack of bills, and then turned to my victim/companion. “They keep 411 for me when I’m in town.”
“I’m impressed,” he said, staring down my dress.
We walked to the elevator, pushed our floor, and when another couple tried to sneak in the lift with us, I pushed the button to close the door, held out my hand to stop them, and said, “Sorry, we’re full.” After the car had started to move, I pulled the stop button and slowly dropped the straps of my dress. “Is this what you want?”
He was all over me with his hands and his mouth. When I heard him make a snarling moan, and saw his nostrils flair, I knew he was done for, and pushed him away, lifted the straps to my dress, and released the stop button. “Be a good boy, or you won’t get your dessert,” I teased.
He laughed and probably couldn’t believe his luck.
When the lift opened, I led him to an unmarked door just to the right of the elevator. “Here we are, 411,” I said, sliding in the key and pushing open the door.
It was an expensive but small room with a bath. I led him to the expensive, solidly built wood bed, then turned to face him.
“My turn,” I said, and had his suit coat and shirt off in a flash. He tried to reach for me, but I pushed his hands to his sides. “Let me do the work,” I said, unbuckling his pants and letting them fall to the floor before I began running my hands over his chest and down his shorts.
“Oh, baby,” he moaned. I knew my body temperature would feel like a furnace to him, and the warmth had its effect on him. He moaned again. They all did.
I knew I was completely in control, and this made me laugh a wicked little laugh, “You are a big boy,” I teased. “Take those shoes off, and make yourself comfortable.” He greedily complied and lay back on the bed. “The socks too,” I instructed. (Why did they always leave their socks on? What woman has ever said, “Oooh, baby, those socks turn me on?”)
I, dropped my dress and bra, and then returned to the bed. From the nightstand I pulled out a preplaced item and turned to sit on the bed beside him. When he reached for my breast, I gave him a long feel while I grabbed his wrist, wrapping it in a scarf and nimbly tied it to the bedpost.
The Texan chuckled. “You’re kinky, huh?”
“Oh, you have no idea.” Then I took his other wrist and likewise tied it to the bed.
“Man, oh man, you are one sexy bitch.”
I turned to look at him and smiled confidently. “I know.” I went to the foot of the bed and ran my fiery hands down his thighs to his ankles, making him moan again. I tied his ankles to the bed and laughed. That made him all the more excited.
I walked to the dresser and took out another pre-staged item, a bottle of scotch and a crystal tumbler. I poured a triple shot amount into the tumbler, turned to him, and took a long drink, giving him a good long show. The drink was mostly for me because I found his tiny brain and ease of conquest repulsive. Hopefully, he could provide me with at least a drop of pleasure, but even that had become less and less frequent from these men. He watched me greedily, the excitement of his anticipation clearly swirling his blood.
When I got back to the bed, he moaned loudly and began to shudder. I loved when they did that, like little boys at Christmas. The fact that I already knew the outcome and he did not was the only thing that made this little game fun anymore.. But I could see that he was a little too far gone already and needed to be calmed down if I were to get any further pleasure from him.
I climbed over him and put my finger over his mouth. “Not yet, big boy. I’ve got plans for you.” I took another sip of the scotch, put the tumbler to his mouth, and tipped it up. He drank from it and then tried to stop. My free hand moved between his legs and squeezed until he opened his mouth again and finished the glass. “Good boy,” I said. I got up and let my thong drop to the floor before turning off lights.
I loved hearing the aching moan he made from the darkness at his weak-minded premonition of the events to come. But it was only I who knew the future, and the
feeling was cold.
I felt the sensation begin in my toes and build until my eyes began to glow. But I couldn’t even bring myself to make them flash—I’d tried and failed too many times, with too many men. There was no connection between us, no warmth. I looked at him the way a wolf looks at a rabbit.
My body became engulfed in a dim moonlit glow caused by millions of tiny fingers of energy dancing from my skin in anticipation, eagerly searching for a connection that would allow the power to flow. “Whoaaa,” he said from the dark. Yeah, yeah, tell me something I haven’t heard before, I thought, trying to drown out the insignificant, irritating sound of his voice. When I got on the bed and straddled him, the moonlight glow instantly disappeared.
“Don’t worry Tex, this won’t hurt a bit.”.
Chapter 25
The Trail Leads to the Eastern European Jungle
My Pub Crawler avatar, a fellow built like Grecian god, was now staggering, then dropped to all fours, crawling toward Skelly’s. It was no use. I watched in horror as his blood alcohol level tripped the limit and he smiled and then rolled over into the gutter, with Skelly’s—and the B.I.B.—a mere two minutes’ stagger away.
I had been playing Pub Crawler for an hour now, in a concerted effort to keep from doing anything that might better my life. But now the frustration of being so close to finding the B.I.B. in the video game and failing had turned me back to real work.
It was time to recover my old notes on the other women born during the 1976 Super Bowl from my intricate filing system—I found them right where I had left them, beside a stack of unwashed jeans. () It was already getting late at night, but I convinced myself, with a little help from a bottle of Miner’s Lite, that I did my best work late, drunk, and without the slightest clue as to how to proceed.
I fumbled through the papers, trying to remember where I had left off before the website and celebrity status had caused me to drop them like a blind roofer. Jennifer Lowe’s name had an X beside it, which told me how perceptive I had been. Rebecca also had an X. Of the fourteen or so names, eight were either X’d or had moved away. So I began an Internet search, just as I had done on Jennifer Lowe, checking public records.
Super Born: Seduction of Being Page 20
