Chapter 5
“Big Sister! You’re back, look what I got!” Cassie screamed as she ran up to me holding the bunched up hem of her oversized sweatshirt out so I could see the college insignia on it. The little seven-year-old was practically swimming in the adult sized sweatshirt that came clear down to her knees. She was as adorable as ever, even when she twisted around and I could see the outline of a pistol at the small of her back. I knew her well enough to know that the gun wasn’t the only weapon she was carrying. As young as she was, she was a better killer than most anyone I’d ever met. She had been a gift from the Vampiric council; they gave her to me to protect both of us. I had never met her before then, and suddenly she was my little sister. Trained from birth to be the perfect assassin, now she was dancing with glee in my living room over a sweatshirt so big she could wear it as a dress. “They had this store that sold all kinds of neat college stuff!”
“We stopped at the bookstore after registration. Welcome home,” Mary greeted me crossing the room while drying her hands on a dishtowel.
She must have been cooking again.
“You got registered then?”
“Yes, classes start Monday. I managed to get all my classes during the day except my bio-lab. It’s from seven to ten on Wednesday nights. I didn’t declare a major yet. I want to get some basic classes out of the way before I decide what I want to do for the rest of my life.”
“That’s good. Cassie, what are you doing?” I asked pointing to the stack of books spread out around the living room in a form of organized chaos.
“Studying. I wanna be real smart for my test tomorrow.”
Suddenly I felt like somebody had slapped me and the memory fell into place. “Shit! I forgot all about her placement interview,” I cursed to myself under my breath, suddenly wishing someone had reminded me again, so that I didn’t have to remember all the little things that went along with being Cassie’s guardian. You know, things like making sure she eats right, washes behind her ears, goes to school, the little things parents always worry about.
“Don’t even bother trying to talk her out of it. Once she saw the college she decided she wanted to be a professional student, and she forced me to buy her some study books. Nothing fancy, just basic first and second grade level stuff. That’s probably where she should be because of her age anyway.” Mary shrugged.
“I see.”
“You look all worn out Big Sister. Did you go to work without me again?” Cassie asked with hurt in her voice and a pout on her face. She always gets upset when I don’t take her with me to work a case. At least this time I didn’t have to lie to her.
“No sweety. I’ve just had se–” I slammed my mouth shut so fast I accidently bit my tongue, literally. “I mean . . . a long day. That’s it, a long day. In fact I think I will take Charles advice and go soak for a while.” I turned and started for my room.
“Wait. Emmy and Vicki are in your room and Vicki doesn’t want to be disturbed until she can get Emmy asleep. We put her in your bed, well, because it is the most comfortable of all the ones we have.”
“I was just after a change of clothes.”
Without missing a beat, she spun on her heel and headed off towards the laundry room. “I have some of your clothes in the dryer. Go get in the tub, I’ll bring you something to wear.”
“Alright.”
* * *
The hot water soothed out the soreness in my aching body almost instantly. I soaked for a minute before Mary entered the spa room with a teacup in her hands, and clothes draped over her arm.
“I figured you could use this.” She had to speak up a little so I could hear her over the bubbling jets of the hot tub.
I took the tea and sipped the warm herbs. Mary neatly folded a pair of boxer shorts, and a camisole on the edge of the tub for me. That was all I wore at night anymore. The only reason I started wearing anything to bed at all was because of Cassie. She had this habit of sneaking into my room in the morning to wake me up. We had to create a house rule; if there was a hair elastic over the knob of the bedroom door, no one was allowed to enter without knocking and waiting for permission unless it was an emergency. That was the only way Vicki and I got to spend any private time together. It was also the only way we got to have sex, since we were always interrupted otherwise.
After placing my night attire by the tub, Mary gathered my clothes and guns from the floor where I had left them in an unruly pile. Twice she looked through the pile and then around the floor of the tub.
“Lose something?” I asked placing the tea on the side of the tub in the little dent that was just the perfect size to act like a cup holder for the teacup.
Mary blushed and stared at her feet. “Um, honestly I was looking for the panties you had on when you left this morning. I kinda wanted to borrow them on Saturday.”
“You wanted to borrow my underwear?”
Ok, should I be honored, creeped out, or excited that she wants to borrow my intimates?
“Yes. They are so comfortable, and I have just the perfect bra to go with them since I don’t fit in yours.” She glanced at my chest and smiled to herself looking down at her larger breasts. Since I’d first met her, her breasts had already grown a full cup size. She was maturing into a beautiful woman, which in a way was good since she was almost eighteen. But I had made it a personal rule not to even look if I could avoid it until her birthday. Jailbait was a term I had no intention of learning anything about.
“This wouldn’t have anything to do with that date with that boy from the video store you told me you have on Saturday, now does it?”
She never answered, instead just looked at her feet as she dug into the floor with the toe of her mule.
“I see. The only reason I know of that you would want a pair of little black seamless, satin-like, lacy, sexy panties, is that you plan to have sex with your date,” I growled in an un-approving tone.
“Yes, Old Mother Grey.”
“Don’t call me that! I wasn’t giving you a lecture, I was just making a statement.”
“It sounded like the start of a lecture to me.”
It was a fight I knew I couldn’t win. I cared about her just like everyone else in my life, and I’d become very overprotective of my friends. “Fine. You are welcome to borrow any of my clothes that fit except the armor, lord help us if you ever have a need to borrow that, just ask first. I’m sorry though. I sort of . . . left the panties . . . someplace . . . today.”
Mary pondered that a second, and it didn’t take long for her young educated mind to connect the dots. “Wait, you left the Archives with Tanaka, then he drops you off, and you’re walking around in a daze like your best friend just died, and then you don’t have your underwear anymore. . . . YOU SLEPT WITH HIM?!?!” Her voice was full of shock.
“Keep your voice down!” I growled through clenched teeth. “You don’t need to announce it to the world!”
“Sorry. So, what, didn’t you enjoy it?” The genuine interest in her tone made me suddenly aware that at times my life was too focused between my legs.
“No, well yes, I mean, I don’t know, it all happened, the vodka, then the video–”
“He videotaped the two of you together?”
“No, yes, I mean it was Vixen not me, it was her tape, of her and others. . . .” I trailed off lost in a menagerie of colliding thoughts.
“Um, Kieran . . . if Tanaka calls or stops by, would you like me to tell him you’re not available?” It was the first time she hadn’t called me Miss Kieran since we’d met. But the informality went with the honest concern in her voice.
“Huh?” I asked with the puzzled look on my face. At times I was too dense for my own good.
“Well, it seems to me that you don’t really want to talk to him right now.”
“Actually, you’re right, I don’t.”
“Alright. Will you want something to eat? I was going to start dinner.”
“Honestly I don’t think I could eat
right now.”
She nodded and started for the door stopping on her way. “Um, one more thing. I kinda borrowed your powder-blue butterfly panties today.”
“Powder-blue–what?”
“These,” she said reaching down with her free hand. She flipped up her dress to flash the underwear at me.
I threw up my hand to block the vision. She was still only seventeen for another month after all. “Mary! Put those away. Ever since you learned the truth about me at Christmas you’ve gone outta your way to tease me, why?”
“Because you look so cute when you blush, and I know no matter what, you will never do anything to hurt me. You are one of the nicest people I’ve ever met. And I trust you with my life. So, aren’t these yours? They were in your laundry.”
I looked at the scrap fabric that barely covered her front. Trying not to notice how lovely her legs were shaping up with the aerobics she’d started doing to get into shape a month ago. “No, I’ve never seen them before. They aren’t mine.”
“They’re mine,” Vicki announced stepping into the room without warning. “But they look good on you, really accents your ass. When I got home the other day you had some laundry washing, so I just tossed them in. I wondered where they went. Look, feel free to raid my closet anytime. But I get first dibs on all clubbing outfits, I don’t want to be going out and have to settle for second choice because you have it.”
“Deal. I’ll bring you some more tea.”
Mary left and Vicki started to disrobe.
“Mind if I join you?” she asked it in a way that let me know she had no intention of taking anything but an agreement from me. Which was fine. In a way I kinda wanted the company. And I couldn’t stop myself from drooling a little seeing her naked and glistening from the water.
“No. I think there’s room.” I gestured to the rest of the tub that would easily hold a dozen people.
She moaned a little as she settled into the warm churning water. “Emmy is finally asleep. When she wakes up we need to ask her where she’s been getting her painkillers. It sounds like they are making her sicker. Maybe she got a bad batch. So how was it?”
“It?” I asked without having any clue at all to which she was referring. But, I should have known no secret was safe.
“Sex with Tanaka.”
If I wasn’t red from embarrassment before, I was now. “Do I have a big neon sign above my head that says ‘just had sex with a guy the first time, please ask about it’?”
“No, I just pieced together the events that Emmy told me with what I overheard from Mary before I came in. So you did have sex with him?”
“YEEESSS!!!” I broke down sobbing. “I’m so sorry. It-just-he-and-then-shirt-water-rippling-and–”
“You’re babbling like a nervous schoolgirl. Start at the beginning, tell me what happened,” she giggled lightly and cradled me in her arms in the water smoothing my hair back from my face.
“We went for lunch. Just lunch. Only to talk. Then we went to his place, one thing and another, then-we-he-touch-then-did–”
She stopped me by ever so gently placing her finger on my lips.
“Babbling again sweetie.”
I took a few deep breaths to clear my mind, “He made these really good fruit smoothies with vodka.”
“You know better than to drink vodka. You know what happened at New Year’s.”
“Does everyone have to remind me? I know, it was a really bad idea to drink them. But, he looked so sexy before, and he made them.”
“You didn’t do your sneaky bend-over-and-have-a-rub trick did you?” she grunted the question at me.
“You know about that? I practiced in front of the mirror so no one would notice.”
“Yeah, you practiced, that’s the problem. It looks like a fake movement, it draws attention, not hides it. I’ll teach you how to pleasure yourself in public without being seen someday. So, anyway, you had a few drinks, then what?”
I told her everything. Every little detail up to being caught coming home without my underwear. Including the robot.
“So you had a three-way with Tanaka and his sex doll?!” she asked roaring with laughter that added to the waves in the tub.
“It’s not funny!” I screamed back at her defiantly. For what little good it did.
“Oh, but it is. Sorry, you’re being serious, but it is sooo funny!”
“Vicki, I am so sorry I cheated on you.” That was how I felt, and I was honest when I said it. But it surprised me how quickly it stopped her in mid-laugh, and brought her serious face back.
“Woa! It’s okay, you were honest about it. You know that I would rather share you then not have you at all. The fact is that you were honest about it, and I can tell that this has been tearing you up inside. Don’t worry about it. I am okay, and I’m still here for you. You’re like a sister to me, a sister with a few wonderful physical benefits. I’m not going to leave you just because you have a romp with Tanaka and his robot.”
“Alright, can we drop it then?”
“Sure, I never knew how Tanaka got his lube jobs. You suppose they use 40 weight oil or something lighter for lube?”
“Vicki, stop it. It’s not that funny.”
“Isn’t it? You suppose she comes with the standard fifty thousand orgasm warranty?”
That did it, now I was laughing with her.
* * *
“Wake up sleepyhead,” Emmy’s voice called me in the darkness.
I blinked myself awake to see her kneeling next to me.
“Sorry about stealing your bed. I didn’t mean to stick you on the couch. Why didn’t you bunk with Vicki?”
I sat up and blushed at the memory of my romp with Tanaka. It was like a paper cut that was always in the way, you got reminded it was there whenever you did anything.
“It just didn’t feel right,” I finally admitted to both of us.
“Things kinda weird after sex with Tanaka huh?”
So much for keeping a secret around here.
“Does everyone know about that?”
“I just pieced it together. You left with Tanaka, never came back to get your car, and I heard Mary mumble something about you coming home without the underwear you had on when you’d left. Natural deduction, you had sex with Tanaka.”
“Your infallible logic does not make me feel better.”
“Sorry. Don’t you have to drop Cassie off at Tarter Academy in an hour?”
“Shit is it that late already?” I bolted straight up on the couch and started searching for the outfit Mary would normally place next to the bed when she knew I was going to be running late that morning.
“Relax. It is only a ten-minute drive. Don’t tell me you were planning on giving her a bunch of advice before you dropped her off, were you Old Mother Grey?”
“Not you too. I hate it when Mary calls me that.”
“Yea, I know. But you have to admit; sometimes you act like the over-protective mother when it comes to Cassie. What are you planning to do while she is taking her tests? I hope you aren’t planning to hang out in the parking lot like some stalker until she gets done.”
“Actually, I was planning on going to the movies. I used to go all the time, and I haven’t been in months. Why not come with me? You could use the time off.”
“Any other time I would say yes, but not today. The police press conference is today. I have a lot of work to do. I’m in charge of distributing the shockgels to the police armory. Unfortunately I’ll be busy all day. But tell you what. Pick a day next week, any day, and we will go, just the two of us.”
“Cassie hasn’t ever been to the movies, we should take her too.”
“Sure, just say when.”
“Mary has an evening lab on Wednesday, and Vicki has the late shift too. We could go then.”
“Wednesday night it is.” She giggled with a widening smile on her face. No doubt in my mind that she was thinking it was going to be a girl’s night out to remember. I wouldn’t have put i
t past her to plan something girly to go along with the evening, like a late night shoe shopping spree or something.
“Tell me something, where have you been getting your painkillers from lately?”
“My office, why?”
“You mean Doc’s old office? Maybe you should stay away from anything he left in his office. Vicki thinks that maybe the painkillers were actually making you sick. It is only a thought, but he may have spiked the stuff in his office before leaving.”
“I hadn’t thought about it. Sounds plausible. I’ll dump his stores and only use stuff that I know is safe, just to be sure.”
“Good. Uh. . . . Emmy, have you ever heard of the Archives building sex robots? The one Tanaka had in his closet was so close to human I could barely tell the difference.”
“Sex robots? No. But I did see a lot of information in Doc’s office about the Brothel Bill. It may be connected.”
“Brothel Bill?”
“A proposal to create legalized prostitution in the state. The license requirements will keep most humans from being able to work there because of the possibilities of diseases. But if you had a robot that could be sanitized between each, er, . . . client. Well, that makes sense. I’ll look into it.”
“Tanaka said that he preferred the secretary models. There may be more than one type of robot being made.”
“I will check. By the way, did you . . . with the robot?”
“AAARRRGGGHHH!!!” I screamed falling back onto the couch and burying my head under the pillows.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” she giggled with delight at my embarrassment.
* * *
Tarter Academy looked like an Ivy League University. Except that the students were all a lot shorter, and there was an obvious lack of frat houses and sorority girls. I would bet good money the most hardcore beverage those students ever had was rootbeer. Of course being that the entire student body was eighteen and under explained a lot. Everyone on campus was dressed in the same olive-green and navy uniforms.
Eeew!
“Look at the uniforms, they’re so . . . uniform.”
Immortal Death (Kieran Grey Psionic Hunter Book 3) Page 5
