"Pull over," she said. "I need to piss."
There was something so crass about the way she spoke but I liked it. It was direct, it was harsh and it was domineering.
"Sure," I said and slowly braked to a stop.
The sun was still high in the sky, baking everything it touched. The ground was solid and cracked and whatever little grass remained was scorched like brittle hair. I peeled off my t-shirt and dropped it to the floor. It was stinking and soaked through with sweat. Opening the door, I hoped some much needed ventilation would drift into the car but only warm air entered the vehicle so it felt as though I was being heated up even more by a giant hair dryer. It was fucking unbearable.
For a moment, I thought there was a chance I could die from the heat. She didn't seem to care though. Meandering her way out a few yards into the desert, I wondered where she was going to hide and do her business but then I saw that she wasn't planning on hiding at all. Yanking up her skirt, she squatted down and urinated in the dirt, her eyes boring into mine the entire time. Logic was telling me to feel uncomfortable but I couldn't look away.
It was arousing in a disgusting kinda way and I was so thirsty I imagined lying with my face beneath her, drinking up every last drop of her piss. Inside my pants, something was beginning to happen and I knew then that I was truly losing my mind.
"Berger you bastard. How can you get horny at a time like this? After fleeing so much death? With this woman who is grieving."
But my body didn't adhere to logic and the erection only grew harder.
When she came back to the car, she saw me shirtless and scanned my body with her eyes. She noticed the bulge in my pants and the shameful look on my face but said nothing.
"Drink," she said and held up the bottle of vodka.
It was the last thing I needed. My body was craving sleep and water and a patch of shade but I felt as though I had to do whatever she said. I found myself gulping down the vodka, feeling it burn a hole in my stomach. It hurt like hell and went straight to my head. My tongue felt dry and I had to hold down the urge to wretch.
Meanwhile, she drank it down like it was water. When the bottle was half empty, she set it down between her legs and lit a cigarette. I couldn't help but notice she didn’t' offer me one.
"There's a motel not that far from here," she said, breathing out smoke.
"There is?"
I was under the impression she hadn't ventured far from San Lucrezia but evidently I was wrong.
"About thirty miles that way," she pointed into the distance.
"You been before?" I asked.
"A long time ago when Lol was a baby," she said.
"Think it's still there?"
"Probably," she shrugged. "Nothing around here really changes."
There was the deep gnawing feeling inside me that I needed to be sick but I swallowed hard and tried my best to avoid the sun although it was turning my usually pale chest a worrying shade of pink.
"From the north?" she asked with a laugh. "You look like you don't see much sun."
"Yeah, from the north and no, there's not much sun up there."
She laughed again, releasing a ribbon of smoke from her chest.
"Wanna fuck?" she suddenly asked.
"Er?"
"Wanna fuck," she repeated as though she'd asked me a normal question. "You're hard, right? We're together. We're both crazy, alone with nothing but the sun. We’re..."
She trailed off as she flicked her cigarette butt out the window.
"We're suffering," she finally said. "I suppose that means something."
Before I could answer, she slapped her hand on my crotch. I responded to her instantly although I wished I didn't. I should have kept driving, found somewhere to get out of this fucking sun but I was powerless beneath her touch. Her eyes were penetrating mine, her grip getting tighter around my cock until I was throbbing against her.
"We're both suffering," she repeated. "There's no shame in finding a moment of pleasure when there's nothing but pain in your heart."
She reached up and kissed me, the smell of smoke strong on her breath. I kissed her back, pushing my tongue against hers. Moving onto my lap, she straddled me, pulling up her skirt around her waist. Taking my hand in hers, she guided it to her pussy which was wet already and rubbed furiously. She grew even wetter and rested her head against my chest as she groaned softly. She pressed my hand even harder into her until her nails were digging into my skin.
"Yeah, like that," she whispered as she bit gently into my chest.
When it felt as though she was on the brink of orgasm, she tossed my hand away and sat on my cock. Rocking back and forth, she rubbed herself against the bulge in my jeans. I could feel the heat of her pussy through my clothes, could smell just how aroused she was. She moaned louder, sank her teeth even deeper into me.
I could feel myself become overwhelmed with the urge to fuck her. I needed to be inside her, feel the tightness of her, feel the heat and wetness of her, but she was pushing me down into the seat, not letting me move an inch.
She rode me, grinding her pussy against my erection until she began to scream, then in a flash, she ripped open my jeans, pulled out my dick and drove it inside herself. She shook as it entered her and cried out as she came. I ejaculated in an instant, yelling as my body jerked forward.
For a long while after we both reached climax, she sat on top me, our sweat sticking together as she caressed the back of my neck.
"I always like to wait," she said. "Until I can't take it any longer."
My flaccid, exhausted penis remained inside her. She was still wet, still hot. I wanted to fuck her again but my body was spent.
"Jesus, fucking.... Christ," was all I could say in response. "You nearly killed me. I almost passed out."
She laughed and climbed off me.
"If only women could kill with their pussies," she said. "I think the world would be a different place."
Arranging her clothes back into place, she reached for another cigarette, this time offering me one. I took it gratefully although it only made my mouth and throat drier.
"What now?" I asked.
"We go to the motel," she said.
I nodded, knowing that from now on, I'd always do what she told me to.
"Then where?"
She licked her bottom lip and rested her head against the window.
"I don't know."
"Where do we go tomorrow?" I asked. "There's gotta be somewhere better than this hell, somewhere where the wildlife won't kill us."
She turned to me, the look of pain returning to her eyes. There was a hint of confusion on her face, or maybe it was anger.
"Who said there'll be a tomorrow?"
Chapter Two
Lincoln
"You want what?"
"You heard me?"
"Bosworth... You know I can't."
"I can pay you whatever you want."
Professor Schiele sighed. I imagined him in his office up in Chicago holding his head in his hands.
"You know it's not about the money," he said.
"So what is it about?"
Again, he sighed, this time louder.
"You know exactly why, Bosworth. I can't just give you Tricephthial. You're out of your fucking mind!"
I knew this was bad. In the fifteen years I'd known the old man I'd never heard him so much as raise his voice nevermind actually swear. I thought people like him didn't even know the word fuck existed. Now I was seeing him in a whole new light.
"I won't tell a soul, obviously," I said. "You know I'm private."
He took a deep breath and lowered his voice.
"I know a lot of things about you," he said. "Things more alarming than your privacy. Look, I can't talk to you anymore."
"I can call back later."
"I mean ever."
Silence fell between us. There was a faint crackle on the long distance line. This was bad. Really bad. But at the same time Tricephthial was the on
ly hope I had. It was the only hope Etta had.
"You don't mean that," I said. "You can't just... cut me off. The two of us have been in business together for years. We've-"
"I mean it," he interrupted. "It's hard enough having to justify to people that I have any association with you at all after all the trouble you've been through in Normont let alone this! What exactly do you need Tricephthial for? And why the fuck are you Mexico demanding I send you a private jet filled with a cloning agent."
"I need it," was all I said. "Because I just do and I can pay you anything. Anything!"
"No! For the last fucking time, Bosworth, this isn't about money. This is about ethics. This is about playing God!"
There was no better response than to burst out laughing. What the fuck did he know about God? There wasn't a God, not on this shitty Earth where there was nothing but pain.
"Look,"I said, trying to steady my voice so I didn't sound like the madman I was. "I'm sending a jet to Chicago. I don't care if you're on it or not, but the Tricephthial has to be. Got it?"
He hesitated but we both knew he had no choice because he knew just how persistent I could be.
"We can't let this get out," he said. "Your name in America is... how do I put it?"
"Shit," I said. "My name is shit right now but the people love a scandal and they love to hate the rich so that doesn't surprise me."
"What happened in Broadwood is more than a fucking scandal, Bosworth!"
Silence came between us once again. I sat on the stairs and felt the cold marble against my bare skin. It was then, as I looked down at my body that I realized I was naked. I didn't know how much time had passed since Berger left. It could have been hours, days, who the fuck knew? The minutes down here dragged by, weighed down by the heat and smell of death.
"I'm sending the jet."
"You can do that but it doesn't mean the Tricephthial will be on it. I can't give you it. It's... it's evil."
"Aw shut up. You're supposed to be an academic and you're gibbering about puerile polemic notions of good and evil. Get over yourself. Besides you patented it. Send the Tricephthial or I'll come get it from you myself."
I hung up before he could say another word. Despite his protests, I knew he'd send it. He was too scared of me not to. Everyone was.
Walking back down to the basement, I was aware of the smell. No matter how much ice I'd brought down here, it did nothing to cool the room down. It melted fast, creating puddles on the ground. I stepped into the water around Etta's coffin. It felt soothing on my feet.
"Sweety?" I said to the box of ice.
Water was cascading down the sides. I pushed my hand into the ice cubes and felt her hand fall into mine. It wasn't plump and soft like it used to be. There was a mushy quality to her body like a bag of bone filled soup.
"Sweety?"
For the most fleeting of seconds, I thought she answered me but then I realized it was just the whirring of the nearby machinery.
"Sweety, I think I'm losing my mind," I said to her, gripping her hand even tighter. "But we have hope. A professor I know is sending us something real special, something that will bring you back to me. It creates new life from old, it is, dare I say it? A cloning accelerant. Only Professor Schiele with the genetics of his Nazi ancestors running through his veins could patent something so wonderful yet spectacularly controversial. He's used it too. He's the only person who has ever used it. He cloned a rabbit of all things. Strangely cute and childish for someone like Schiele but there we are, universities often don't have anything more human-like on offer."
I paused, as though if I waited long enough, she would answer.
"You're over here,"I continued, walking to the petri dish that lay beneath the pool of neon blue light. "You're in here right now and soon you will be whole again, new again, a fully grown adult just like you again but without..."
I didn't want to think about it. She'd be without thoughts, feelings, memories. She'd look and feel just like the Etta but she wouldn't know who I was.
"You can hear me, can't you?" I said to Etta.
I knew she couldn't. People like me weren't allowed to believe in the afterlife that's why we toiled away down in hidden basements creating our own religion crafted from microchips and chemicals.
With the notion of knowing I could never truly hear her thoughts again, I began to weep. Soon I would have her to hold, a fresh body with her perfect face. It was the closest thing to her I could have but it wasn't... her. Her mind was elsewhere now. I didn't know where but it was far away from me. I could only hope that, although it went against my beliefs, her spirit was somewhere nearby. Maybe it was guiding me in my work, maybe it was watching me fall to pieces, maybe it was looking at me right now thinking I had gone insane. I was just a naked man, kneeling in melting ice talking to a corpse about things no one would believe.
"I have... to go now," I said to her. "Before my mind disappears completely."
Thrusting both my hands into the ice, I grappled with her slippery body and pulled her to the surface. Her face now lay in front of me, blue and putrid. The skin from her cheek was beginning to slip away.
"I love you, always," I said and kissed her forehead, my lips sinking into her flesh. "The next time I'll see you, I'll have the accelerant and then it won't be long. It won't be long at all."
~
I was dressed now and clean too although there was little use in showeringas the heat made me exist in a perpetual state of perspiration. In gray slacks and a blue shirt, I sat beside the pool. As I caught sight of my reflection in the patio doors, I saw that for the first time in a long while, I looked almost okay. Except my clothes were hanging off me and my cheeks were jutting out at sharp angles.
There was nothing else I could do though, so I took a deep breath, swallowed three caffeine pills with half a liter of water and made my way outside. I couldn't remember the last time I had left the house and it felt strange, like I was intruding on the area. A car came up behind me. Somehow it felt hostile as it slowed. Looking over my shoulder, I saw a young couple staring at me. What are they doing? I thought. Why are they just sat there, staring at me like they've seen a ghost?
The young man, handsome with a long beard, gave me a puzzled look then mumbled to his girlfriend. I thought I heard him say my name but I couldn't be sure. She bristled at whatever his request was but leaned out the window anyway.
"Her, mister. You're blocking the way," she said in perfect English.
It was then that I realized I was standing in the middle of the road like an idiot. I stepped to the side and they glided past slowly, their eyes on me the whole time.
"Sorry," I mumbled as the girl reached my side.
"De nada," she said but her eyes were wide and afraid.
Did I really look that bad? Was my appearance actually scaring people?
Fuck it I thought. What does it even matter? I watched the car disappear into the distance then I carried on.
~
The airstrip was deserted apart from me and a single air traffic controller who looked annoyed that he had to turn up to work. The strip was rarely used apart from by rich locals and by that I mean drug barons. A black blob in the distance lowered itself down below the clouds, its engine roaring as it descended. My beautiful Bombardier Challenger 3 was preparing to land, its wheels lowering itself out the bottom like a miniature set of testicles.
The Tricephthial had to be on it. It just had to be. The other option was to wait and I didn't know if my mind and body could cope much longer without being able to hold my girl. I thought about her back in the basement below the ice. There was going to come a time when I lay her back in the box and would never be able to pick her back up because she was going to be nothing but bones. The Tricephthial. It was my only hope.
The engine roared louder as the wheels hit the tarmac and a moment later, the jet was screeching to a halt with the smell of engine fuel and burning rubber stinging my eyes and throat. I coughed and found
that I couldn't stop. The air traffic controller looked over at me as though he thought I was about to drop dead but he walked away anyway. I wasn't his problem.
I was halfway up the stairs when the door opened. Stacey, my long serving hostess would be waiting for me with the case of Tricephthial and then I would be on my way but as I reached the top step and outstretched my arms for it, I saw that Stacey wasn't waiting for me, Professor Schiele was.
"Fuck, this place is like a furnace," he said as he mopped his brow with a handkerchief. "And Jesus Christ Bosworth what happened to you?"
I opened my mouth to speak but couldn't say a word because he carried on rambling.
"The journey down here was magnificent. Just wonderful. Real fairytale stuff as we went over the Gulf and good grief the rain at one point. Thought we were going to die. Well, why are you standing there like that, Bosworth? Are you frozen to the spot? Are you okay?"
He barged past me.
"Come on let's get a drink. Cynthia's been moaning for the last half hour that she's run out of gin. Drank the minibar dry she did."
"Your wife's here?" I gasped.
I fucking hated Cynthia. With her powdery face and frightening, pink, plumped up mouth she had a voice like a typewriter chewing tin foil and hair as false as her feelings.
"Aaaaaw Lincoln!" she whined as she saw me.
She had that quintessential Manhattan squeal, the one that sounds like her vocal chords are somewhere behind her nostrils.
"You look teeerrible," she said as she air kissed me. "Don't tell you've got the..." she dropped her voice. "Don't tell me you've got the... aids?"
Oh my God, I thought. Could this day get any worse?
I found myself walking behind the two of them like an obedient puppy, my eyes on the case in Schiele's hand the whole time.
"Where's the limo?" moaned Schiele.
"I... I didn't think you were coming," I said.
"What! You thought I was just going to send this beautiful thing I created all the way down here and not see what you were going to do with it? Are you out of your mind? Because you certainly look as though you're out of your mind."
Jewels And Panties: (Book 1-15) Billionaire Romance Series Page 66
