by Brad Latham
Lockwood considered a moment. So Stephanie had been lying. Or was it Muffy? “Her health….”
“What about her health? My God, if she’s given VD to the chauffeur, I’ll….”
“No. Epilepsy. Petit mal seizures. Did she ever have any while you employed her?”
“Epilepsy? Stephanie? Great glory, that woman’s a horse!”
“You’re sure?”
“Mr. Hook, I had her examined when she came to me. By a doctor. The best. And she worked for me for three years. Never a sick day. Not even a sick minute.”
Lockwood looked at her and took a last bite of the apple. “I seem to have run out of questions,” he said.
Muffy smiled and shifted her legs again, and this time a bit of satin slip showed as the skirt hiked a little. It shouldn’t make a difference, Lockwood told himself, but it does. He moved a little closer, as Muffy watched him, eyes agleam, amused, almost mocking.
“You’re a spoiled rich bitch,” he told her.
Muffy just laughed. “You call yourself a detective? Everyone knows that.”
“You’re missing out on a lot,” he said, his hand running lightly over her arm. “You lose a great deal when all you can think about is yourself.”
She stared back at him, still mocking, but a glimmer of uncertainty beginning to creep through.
He ran his hand up over her arm again. “A man caresses you like this, and all you feel is what it does to you, the sensations it produces in you.”
She said nothing, listening, watching, puzzled.
“You pay no attention to what the other person is like. What he feels like, how he responds, what his sensations may be. To you he’s just an object giving you pleasure.” He ran his hand up to her neck now, fingers caressing its nape. “You don’t really feel the fingers that are touching you, don’t respond to their individuality, their shape, their reaction to you.”
A vulnerability was beginning to show in her, and she seemed to tremble a bit, as his fingers moved along her face, tracing it lightly, lingering near the lips, then moving off. “There’s a whole other half of love-making that you miss because with you it’s all inward, all self-oriented. Look at your partner. Feel him. Be aware of the pleasure that’s coursing through him as he pleasures you.”
Muffy’s lips parted a little, and this time he ran his fingers over them. They were soft and smooth and full, and in a moment, they closed on his fingertips, briefly, then opened, then closed again.
“I don’t love you,” he told her. “I could never love you, but I’m drawn to you. Something about you—”
She moved her lips against his, cutting off the sentence. Her lips pressed his, gently, almost fearfully.
“Teach me,” she breathed. “Teach me whatever you like.”
His arms went around her back and pulled her to him. Her breath went deep, and her breasts felt warm against him.
He kissed her again, lightly, his lips leaving hers and slowly, caressingly, explored her face. Her body tightened against his, and his lips once more sought hers, a little more urgently.
Her body undulated against his for a moment, her lips matching its movement. A button had opened on her blouse, and her breasts rose and fell as he watched them, the skin firm and blond and almost glowing. His hand left her back and brushed down her breast, along her side and down her outer thighs. She tightened her grip on him.
“Not just yourself, Muffy,” he told her. “Think of me, too, share in who I am, what I’m feeling, be aware of every part of me as well as yourself.”
Both hands clutched at his back, searching, feeling, pulling. He opened another button on her blouse and bent down and kissed the tops of her breasts. Little sounds of pleasure began to escape her.
He drew back and held her at arms’ length, regarding her. She stared at him, a little bewildered, a little frightened, having already silently awarded him full control over her.
He unbuttoned the sleeves of her dress, then the front of it, and slowly helped it fall off her, till she half-sat, half-lay against against the side arm of the couch, clad only in her bra and skirt. “Do the same for me,” he told her.
Muffy was unused to being told to do anything, and for an instant she hung back. Then she surrendered, her graceful, whisper-light hands delicately undoing each button, eyes on his, lips full and yearning.
The shirt off, she pressed hard against his chest, her hands exploring his back, wonderingly tracing each muscle, exploring it for a while, leaving it and then returning, her lips flush against him, losing herself in the hairs of his chest.
He kissed her, running his hands over her back and finally, she drew away from him, her eyes unblinking, watching him as she undid her bra, and slipped it off. She came back to him, and he cupped one breast in his hand. It was small and beautifully shaped, and it felt right. Slowly he pressed it, and released it, pressed it and released it, and her breathing grew deeper.
There was a faint warm dew on her now, and her eyes swam as he tilted her head back and kissed her again. Her hand fell lightly on his groin, and moved away. His hand gripped her wrist and returned it. This time she caressed him, zephyr-like.
“I want you,” she whispered. He said nothing, but plunged his hand down along her spine and beneath her dress, laying claim to her smooth, firm buttocks, stroking them, kneading them.
She went limp in his arms for a moment, and he pulled off her skirt, enjoying her as she reclined against the couch, defenseless in her underpants, garter belt, and stockings, the panties moist between her glimmering thighs.
He pressed his body over hers, carefully, keeping most of the weight off, his hand behind her back pulling her up against him. She was feverishly tugging at his trousers, hands now awkward in their haste, then triumphant as they found the hitherto unseen flesh of him, darting over him like birds, feather-winged and ecstatic.
She kneaded his testicles for a moment, then stopped and leapt off the couch. Startled, he watched and saw her strip off the rest of her clothing, ripping the stockings in her haste, not caring, and then jumping onto him, her thighs around his waist, her lips full on his, pushing and pulling, tongue plunging into his mouth.
He rose up and lowered her onto the couch, his body following hers all the way, his penis momentarily brushing against her vagina, throbbing at the wetness it found there.
“Put it into me,” she begged, but he held off, caressing her again, running his lips and tongue and hands against her, all over her. She was like some delicate confection, delectable in her femininity and her lust. Her head was tossing from side to side, thrashing in passion, hungry with impatience, as she implored him to mount her.
His finger found her clitoris and stroked it lightly, and she pressed herself against him till they were almost a single mass of flesh. “Please,” she implored, her voice husky, perspiration moistening her upper lip and along the sides of her beautifully shaped nose.
“Feel me, be aware of me,” he told her again.
“I am! I am! Please! Please! Put it in me!” and this time she grabbed for him, and plunged herself over him, deep, deep, the scabbard of her taking him to the hilt.
He moved once, twice, then drew it out, and she gasped in surprise. Again he caressed her, kissed her, licked her, his head between her pulsating thighs, plunging his fingers . inside her as she strained against him, ecstatically.
He pulled away again, watching her. She was out of control now, panting, cloaked in moisture, eyes imploring, body arching toward him. He closed over her then, and slid back inside her, and they rocked together, liquid sounds moving up to them as they strained against each other, she wildly, urgent and grateful, with total abandon, he passionate yet contained, fully in control.
She began to shake, a little at first, then more, then subsided, then began again, this time more intensely. He picked up the tempo, and now her whole body began to vibrate and press against him, harder and harder, quivering like a piano string sounded by a master. Then came a giant catacl
ysm, and she seemed for a moment to melt into him, her flesh his flesh, his flesh hers. Then they parted, and her arms dropped to her sides, a deep sigh escaping her. He leaned back against the couch, and in a moment the two of them were asleep.
“I’ve got to see you again,” Muffy told him, as he dressed. She lay there casually, nude, every inch of her blond and inviting.
“I must see you again,” she said when he didn’t respond.
“You will, I’m sure,!’ he told her.
“I don’t mean professionally,” she pouted. She jumped up and placed her hands on his shoulders, all curves and firm, smooth flesh. “I have an idea!”
He was dressed now, and anxious to go.
“I’m having a party, two weeks from now,” she told him, almost breathless with excitement. “Everyone’s going to be there!”
She straightened his tie, and her eyes were mischievous again. “We’ll pretend I’ve hired you as a guard!”
He looked at her, eyes cool, but she didn’t seem to notice.
“And everyone there will think you’re just a hired hand, and then in the middle of the party, when things are really booming along, you and I will slip off—and—and do it!” she exclaimed, exultantly, eyes flashing.
“Good bye, Muffy,” he said.
“Well? Don’t you want to?” she asked, unbelievingly.
“Good bye,” he said again, and opened the door.
Her lips parted, and then closed. A brow lifted and her eyes went sharp. She was Muffy Dearborn again, and he was just a salaried detective, a faceless being from another, drearier, world. She had already turned away from him before he’d half-closed the door.
He walked over to 47th Street and wondered mildly at the two cop cars in front of the Summerfield Hotel. The lobby seemed quiet, however, and when he stepped into the elevator his thoughts went elsewhere.
He reached the twelfth floor, walked to his apartment, and stopped. The door was open. Chambermaid, probably, he thought, but his hand was on the butt of his revolver as he stepped toward the open portal.
Down the hall, in the living room, was a large man in a fedora and a business suit, his back to him. The Hook’s hand folded over the pistol grip for a moment, then relaxed. He caught a glimpse of blue. Cops, he realized. The man in the fedora now turned in his direction and faced him. It was Jimbo Brannigan. His heart sank a little, and then he pushed the thought away. It must be something else.
He walked down the hallway, nodding toward Brannigan. Brannigan nodded back, but the usual smile of greeting was absent.
“Where you been?” Brannigan asked him.
“Out.”
Brannigan’s eyes narrowed. “Out long?” he finally asked.
“Three—four hours. Four,” Lockwood answered. There seemed to be people in the bedroom. “What’s happened?”
“That’s what I’m asking you,” Brannigan replied.
“How the hell should I know, Jimbo?” Lockwood exploded, the fear returning. He wanted to ask about Stephanie, but couldn’t bring himself to. “I haven’t been here.”
“That so?” Brannigan jammed his hands into his pockets. He seemed to be angry with himself.
“Has—has Toomey been here again?” Lockwood asked, hoping that that’s what it was: that Toomey had come back and Brannigan had gunned him down and Stephanie was all right. Why the hell had he left her here alone?
“I don’t know anything about Toomey,” Jimbo responded, his cold blue eyes staring right through The Hook.
“It’s Stephanie,” Lockwood said at last, unable to put it off any longer.
“What about Stephanie?” Jimbo demanded, his tone brisk and professionally hopeful.
“Something’s happened to her.”
Jimbo considered him quietly. “Yes,” he said finally.
“Where is she?”
Jimbo’s eyes shot toward the bedroom. “In there.”
Lockwood moved numbly toward the room, not wanting to find out what it contained.
A cop stood in the doorway, but moved aside as Jimbo nodded at him. Lockwood walked into the room.
The coroner was there, occupied, not even glancing up as he entered. Stephanie was on the bed, face down, fully clothed, one shoe hanging at an angle from her foot.
“She’s dead?” Lockwood asked, knowing the answer.
The coroner, to whom he’d directed the question, looked up at him, then at Brannigan. Again Brannigan nodded, and the coroner turned back to Lockwood. “Yes. I figure for about two hours.”
It was then Lockwood noticed the woman in the corner, huddling fearfully. The little white cap on her head, the black satin dress would have told him who she was even if he hadn’t seen her before. The chambermaid. “You found her?” he asked her.
The woman couldn’t speak, just nodded at him. Finally, she turned toward Jimbo. “Please, sir, may I go now?”
“Just a minute or two more, Miss. This man here,” he indicated Lockwood, “you know him?”
The woman glanced at Lockwood fearfully, then answered Brannigan. “Yes,” she said, “he’s Mr. Lockwood. He lives here.”
“Was he here when you came in to clean up?”
“No. Oh no.” She began to tremble. “He’s a gentleman, sir. He couldn’t have done this!”
Brannigan pressed on. “Did you see him come out of this apartment any time before you entered it?”
“No.”
Brannigan pushed the fedora back on his head, a little out of patience. “Okay, you can go. But don’t leave the hotel without checking with us first.”
“Thank you, sir, thank you,” and the woman fled, relief flooding over her.
Lockwood looked again at Stephanie, so still and quiet, and then turned to Brannigan. “How?”
“Strangled.”
“Strangled,” Lockwood repeated, trying to give some reality to it. Just a few hours before she had been alive, young, beautiful. People like that didn’t die. Not in his personal life. In his profession, yes, but this was different —this was reality, this was his apartment, his sanctuary.
He searched for a cigarette, couldn’t find one, and Jimbo handed him a Lucky. He lighted it, and drew in gratefully. “You don’t know who did it,” he said finally.
“Nope. We were hoping you might be able to help us on that one,” Jimbo answered, and again the warmth that was usually there was missing. A troubled look crept over Jimbo’s face. “Christ, Hook, if you know anything, don’t stall me. You know sooner or later we’ll find out.”
“I didn’t do it, Jimbo.”
“Where were you, Hook?”
“With—a lady,” he answered.
“I’ll need more than that.”
“Not now,” Lockwood said. “She has her reputation—”
“It could be a question of her losing her reputation or you losing your life,” Brannigan informed him quietly.
“I didn’t do it, Jimbo. You know me better than that.”
“I’ve known lots of people who couldn’t have done the things they did. But they did them anyway.”
“Give me a little time, Jimbo. That’s all I’m asking for. A little time. This has to be connected with the Dearborn case, somehow. Either that—or Toomey,” he concluded.
“A little revenge, you think?” Jimbo asked, hopeful. It was obvious he’d give anything to keep the murderer from being Lockwood.
“Could be. Let me check it out. That, and a couple of other things.”
Brannigan sighed, a great, long, deep, Irish sigh. “All right. Stay in the city, of course.”
“Of course.”
He walked past Brannigan, and through the door, then through the living room, and down the hallway. He opened the door. “Hook,” it was Brannigan’s voice, and he turned. “Hook—Hook. I’m—sorry.” He turned again and left, quietly closing the door behind him.
He took a cab to Muffy’s. He had to see her first.
She opened the door partway when he rang and looked startled when sh
e saw him.
“I’ve got to speak to you,” he said, noticing her uncertainty.
“Not now.”
“Now.” His voice was firm, and she wavered and finally let him in.
She was dressed only in a wrapper, her hair askew. “I’m sorry if I’ve come at an inconvenient time,” he began.
“You have,” she answered sharply. “Please say what you have to say and get out of here. Mr. Hook.”
He sat down on the sofa, but this time she didn’t come near him, just stood there, impatient, maybe a little uneasy.
“Did Stephanie have any enemies?”
“What?”
“Did Stephanie have any enemies that you know of?”
“My God! You come here and annoy me about my maid?”
“Stephanie’s dead.”
She didn’t say anything, just looked at him, then sank slowly into the chair behind her, one hand absently smoothing back her hair. A questioning look formed on her face, but still she said nothing.
“Someone strangled her.”
There was fear now in Muffy’s face. “Does it—it have something to do with me?”
“I don’t know.”
“My God! First the jewels, then Jabber-Jabber, and now Stephanie. It—it could be me next!”
Lockwood regarded her coldly, and felt faintly sick with himself. How could this cold and totally selfish woman have ever attracted him? “Possibly, Muffy,” he said, enjoying her fear a little. “So it could pay you considerably to spill whatever you know.”
Muffy’s voice quivered with hysteria. “I don’t know anything, I tell you,” she cried, her voice going harsh. “Get out of here! No!” she implored, as he rose. “Don’t go away! I need you! I need someone to protect me!”
She fell into the chair again, sobbing, for once all her dollars not enough to protect her, not enough to keep this terror from overtaking her, sending its chill coursing through her veins.
For a moment she was silent. Her wrapper had fallen open, and her naked breast was exposed, but this time it held no attraction for Lockwood. He was about to leave when he heard a small sound. “What’s that?” he asked.
