The Panic Room

"-dicknose, sleezebag, douche-drinking, ass-kissing, slut-banging-" she added.

I grinned, at her creativity. "-numbnut, no-ball, pigeon-toed-"

She was leaning into me, her voice growing softer, grinning. "-fruitcake, lardass-"

I pressed my forehead against hers, barely breathing. "-knob-gobbling-"

"-toe-sucking-"

"-wife-stealing-"

"You already said that one," she whispered.

"That one really pisses me..." I didn't get anymore out, before her lips were on mine, and she was pushing me backward, crawling on top of me. The woman damn near gave me a tonsillectomy, after counting all of my teeth, locating my three fillings, and learning what I'd had for lunch. I was gasping for air, as hard as a rock, when she yanked her head back with that malicious grin of hers.

"What are we going to do with them?" she asked. The crazy woman was stripping off her blouse, straddling me, grinding down on my traitorous stiffness. The one part of my body too stupid to be scared shitless.

"That's why I came to you. We're in this together."

Her bra was flying across the room, and I was staring at a pair of gorgeous tits. Her nipples screamed to be played with and gobbled up. She saw the direction of my gaze. "They're real too. You like?"

"Very nice. By the way, Denise's are real." I'll be fucked if I knew why I said that. Probably the terror looking for a way out. I was dealing with the devil.

"No shit?"

"100% God given, no artificial preservatives."

"Damn. I never would have guessed." She seemed to lose a little of her momentum, settling back down on me. "These ain't so special after all, are they? Not after what you've been sampling."

"Trust me, Marcie, those are pretty spectacular."

She was gazing down at me, and I saw a look on her face I hadn't seen yet, that evening. I wasn't sure what it was. Concern, confusion, doubt?

"She wouldn't, you know. I don't know how he talked her into it, but that silly woman loves you like crazy. There's no way she'd cheat on you. Especially now, it's impossible."

"That's exactly what I would have said, before today. You saw the video. You can see her face a few times. I recognized her watch and those heels. No, that was my Denise."

She laid down on me, her soft tits mashed against my chest, head on my shoulder. "It doesn't make sense. Dale, yeah, he's a-"

"We know what he is," I interrupted before she could get going. "I don't care how he convinced her. Maybe he convinced her I was cheating, maybe he blackmailed her, or maybe he just seduced her. I don't care. She cheated on me. She did."

She was quiet, playing with my hair. I don't know how, but my hands had found their way down to her butt, and they were having their own little party, without telling me. They seemed to be very happy. My trouser-buddy definitely approved of their action. I was a little disturbed by the idea that my appendages were betraying me. The woman scared me half to death.

"There's got to be more to it, Sean. Something stinks. Trust me when I say she wouldn't think of cheating on you, the way things are. I hate to say it, but we've got to find out the how and the why. Then we can kill the lily-livered, pompous, puss-sucking, queef-sniffing, ass-spelunking-"

I cut her off in the most convenient way possible. She mumbled something like 'turd-burgling' into my mouth before her tongue was too busy. Those sneaky, conniving hands of mine had figured out she was wearing a skirt, and it was up around her waist. I don't know how they did it. I'd never get away with something like that. Old sparky was cheering them on from behind my zipper, struggling to be noticed. I moaned when the digits slipped inside her panties, feeling the smooth skin of her butt-cheeks.

She pulled away slowly. "I want to talk to them."

"We can do that."

"If that bitch wife of yours doesn't have a damned good excuse, and I mean damned good, you know I'm going to fuck your brains out, don't you?"

She was serious. I suspected she was equipped to do just that. She'd probably leave me a hollow-skulled fuck zombie. "Leave me enough to remember it?" I pleaded. My hands loved the idea, and gave her butt a squeeze of encouragement.

"Oh, it won't happen all at once. I imagine it'll take me a month or more to get past this betrayal. I'll save most of your brains for the grand-finale." She gave me a quick peck, reached back and stopped the party in her panties that my hands were attending, and sat up.

"God, I hope she really is just a slut. But I doubt it," she pouted, before climbing off. Moments later those outrageous ta-tas of hers were hidden from view. I imagined it would be a while before the evidence of my excitement would retreat far enough to untent my pants.

We drove over, and as we were entering the house, she hit me with something so obvious, I don't know how I had missed it. I'm claiming temporary insanity.

"The cameras record everything, right? So we can see it from the start. From the moment they entered the building up until now."

The statement stopped me in my tracks. Son-of-a-bitch. How stupid could I be? "Yeah, all activity stays full resolution for 48 hours, before getting compressed and archived."

"Archived? So if they've done this before, at least here in your home, we can see that as well?"

"Yeah. It'll mean a lot of viewing."

"Let's start with today. I want to see all the evidence before confronting that-"

I stole her insults away with a quick kiss. "We don't have time. beautiful. It would be midnight before you finished telling me what you really think about them."

She sat on the couch, while I poured us each a drink.

"Snacks," she called out to me.

Great minds think alike. So do ours. I already had the crackers and cheese out, a nice smoked Gouda, a chipotle Wisconsin Sharp Cheddar, some Maytag Blue, and was heating the Brie. I found a tasty summer sausage, some pâté, home-made beef jerky, and pepperoncini. I added some almonds, macadamia nuts, grapes, cherries, and garnished it with dark chocolate shavings and a few sprigs of fresh rosemary for color. I figured we'd be at it a while, and I had skipped dinner. Unless you count those three and a half beers.

I juggled the huge platter with the drinks, and set them before her. "No olives?"

Damn. I forgot the olives, and no snack tray was complete with olives. I went back and put a half-dozen each, black and pimento stuffed green into a crystal bowl.

I was about to sit down, when she piped up again. "Napkins? And my drink could use freshening."

When I got back, she had the video cued to her husband at the front door. She was obviously no slouch when it came to learning strange software. I mentioned as much.

"We use EF Secure too."

Got it.

We snacked. We snacked and drank and watched. Huddled together, side by side, our heads hovering over the 10 inch screen, nearly touching.

"Mother-fucking, slimeball!" she gasped. "Did you see that?" Before I could answer she'd backed up the video 30 seconds. "Watch her glass."

We'd already observed him entering the house. She looked like she was expecting him, and welcomed him with a hug and a kiss. The lousy cheating, cock-sucking, faithless whore. They had chatted, and she'd poured them each some kind of drink. They sat on the couch, talking, close, knees touching. I watched her get up to go to the kitchen, and he put something in her drink, stirred it with his finger, gave the glass a couple of swirls, and put it back down.

"You think he drugged her?" I asked. I wondered why, from the way they were acting, it didn't look like he needed to.

"No fuck. I told you, there was no way she'd fuck around on you. It was all that piss-drinking, mule-loving, dog-fucking..."

I let her get it out of her system. I was feeling guilty as hell for the way I'd cut her off the last few times. Especially if my wife had been drugged.

We saw Denise finish her drink, and after 10 minutes or so, she was showing the effects. The slimy bastard stood, and pulled her to her feet. She went along willingly, until he tried to kiss her. She might have been half out of it, but she was still aware enough to pull away and slap his face.

"Way to go, babe," I mumbled.

"You know, I'm going to castrate that drug-dealing, wife-raping, father-sucking, bug-fucking, low-life miserable loser."

We watched as he pulled her hair back and kissed her again, while she struggled. I could feel my blood-pressure rising by the moment. She collapsed against him, and he put his arm around her waist, dragging her to the back of the house.

"How did he know about our panic room?" I said my thoughts aloud.

"Oh fuck." Marcie moaned. "I... I told him. I mentioned it was like ours, and how yours was better, and about that new panel you were putting in. How it was so well disguised in the pantry. Our is under the friggin' stairs, and you've got to go through the guest room to get to it. Denise was so proud of yours."

I felt a shiver run down my spine, and grabbed the tablet away from her. "Fuck! I'm such an ass! I locked her in that room with her rapist!" I hit the real-time button, and jabbed my finger at the green button in the corner, starting the 30 second timer to open the door. "Fuck! Fuck, fuck, FUCK!" I screamed.

The video went live, and I saw my Denise standing, fully dressed, hair disheveled. It looked like she was screaming. I turned on audio, and heard her sweet voice. "HELP!"

She turned and I saw Dale was huddled on the floor, curled up in a ball. She kicked him a few times, walked around him, and targeted between his legs. "You no-good, wife-raping, scum-licking, needle-dicked..."

"Call the police!" I yelled at Marcie, while I charged across the house, tablet in hand, as the green button turned to yellow.

I got to the vault door as it slowly started to open. I was going to have to talk to EF Secure about that 30 second delay. I needed faster retracting lock bars. That was for damn sure. Glaciers moved faster. When it was open wide enough to squeeze through, I leaped into the gap. "Denise!"

I almost bowled her over, as she was running toward the same opening. "Sean! I knew you'd come," she sobbed, throwing her arms around me, shaking.

Man, I felt like shit. I held her for dear life, kissing her hair. "I'm sorry, baby. I'm so sorry..."

Marcie squeezed past us, and I heard a grunt as her pointy toed shoes went to work. "Damn you, Dale! You're nothing but a..."

I carried my wife out of the room, to protect her innocent ears.

The community security guy was already at the door. By the time I could no longer hear Marcie's vituperative attack on her ne'er do well spouse, the sound of the approaching sirens was getting louder.

* * *

Marcie, Denise and I were sitting in the living room, finishing up the last of my appetizer plate.

"You're sure you don't want to go to the hospital?" I asked for the dozenth time.

"Enough, Sean. No need. Like I said, the bastard used a rubber, and he was so small, I can't even tell if he was ever in me." She turned to her friend. "Seriously, Marcie. What is that thing? It can't be four inches long, and not much bigger around than this," she said, holding up a pretzel stick.

"So when you said he was pencil-dicked..." I asked.

Marcie shrugged. "Alright, maybe one of those kindergarten pencils. More like a whiteboard marker."

It was the first time we'd been alone, between the police, the security guard, the EMTs, and nosy neighbors.

"How'd you get away from him? He drugged you, and he's a lot bigger," Marcie asked.

"I woke up on the floor with a headache, naked. The idiot, drink-drugging, spouse-raping, mouse-fucking, assnugget was sleeping on the bed. I mean, really? He couldn't even leave me the bed and use the other one? In my condition? So I beat the shit out of him."

I chuckled. "That you did. I don't think there was an inch of his body that wasn't bruised, his balls were swollen up the size of tennis balls-"

"Which is a big deal," Marcie interrupted, "when they start the size of marbles."

"He deserved it," Denise said angrily. "You don't think I'll get in trouble do you?"

"Of course not. He'd already raped you. We have the evidence, the glass, the bag of drugs, your blood test, and the video. You were in fear for your life, locked in with a rapist."

She pouted. "I don't know how he locked us in. I couldn't get out. I tried, baby, but nothing worked."

I pulled her into my lap, feeling lower than a snake's belly. Lower than Dale's morals, or his life expectancy if he ever got out of jail. "I know you did, Honey."

"What took you so long, Sean? I thought for sure you'd be home no later than seven. It was almost ten when you got here."

Fuck. What do I say? I looked over at Marcie, who conveniently turned away, avoiding my eyes. "I... I saw you on video, with him. I thought you were cheating on me."

"You thought I would cheat on you?"

Man, this wasn't good. "You were doing it with him. I couldn't face you then, so I locked the door-"

"You locked the door?"

I nodded sheepishly. "I'm so sorry, babe. I didn't know what to do. I was so upset seeing you having sex with that bastard, so I had a couple of beers-"

"YOU DRANK BEER WHILE I WAS BEING RAPED?"

Shit, this wasn't going well. "-and went over to get Marcie, since Dale was involved too."

She glared at me, and I watched her eyes open wide. She ran her finger over the corner of my lip, and pulled away red. She'd stopped yelling, and her new tone was much scarier. Her voice was low and harsh. "You kissed her. You two were making out while you left me in there with that animal. Did you fuck her too, Sean? I can smell her on you. Was that your revenge? You thought I screwed around so you fucked my best friend?"

Marci spoke up finally. "No! We didn't. It didn't get anywhere near that far. Neither of us got totally undressed."

Denise turned on her friend. "Not totally undressed? How undressed did you get?"

"Just my top. That's all, I swear. It wasn't his fault, Denise. I sort of jumped him. I was so pissed at Dale, I wasn't thinking straight."

My wife climbed off my lap, and stood glaring at the woman who had been her best friend. I'd never seen her so pissed. She looked scarier than Marcie at her worst. I wanted to run and hide.

"I want you out of here," she said slowly. "Out of my sight! Get OUT! YOU MAN-STEALING, BACK-STABBING, HUSBAND-FRENCHING, TIT-WAVING, SCRAWNY-ASSED..."

She marched her to the door, then stopped and grabbed Marcie's arm. My God, here it comes, she's gonna kill her.

"I'm sorry your man turned out to be scum. I know that's gotta hurt. Call me tomorrow, Ok? We'll do lunch."

Marcie nodded, then gave my wife a hug. "I'm sorry he did that to you. Thanks for beating the crap out of him, you saved me the trouble of having to do it myself."

They kissed each other on the cheek. My wife watched from the door until I heard the engine start. She waited a few more seconds, before screaming "AND STAY OUT!" Marcie turned off the outdoor lights, and turned toward me.

"How were her tits?"

"Nice, not half as good as yours," I answered carefully.

"No shit. And mine are real."

I nodded mutely. No way I was going to mention that Marcie's were too. Or how I knew that. Things were bad enough.

"You know you're in deep, deeeep, shit, don't you?" Denise said.

"I know. I'm sorry. You have no idea how bad I feel."

"You really thought I cheated on you?" she whispered, pouting.

"I couldn't believe it. It didn't make sense, but I saw it. You were having sex with him, in that room he wasn't even supposed to know about. You know I didn't like him, but you insisted on being friends. The way things had been lately. I... I lost it. I couldn't even watch. I wish I had, I would have noticed, you weren't moving. That's not like you."

"How could you think I'd ever cheat on you, Honey? You're my man." Her sad words were additional stakes in my wounded heart.

That's what had her most upset? Not that I locked her in with her rapist. Not that I left her there for hours. Not even that I'd reached second base with her best friend, her rapist's wife. She was upset that I hadn't trusted her.

"I was an idiot. I believed my lyin' eyes. I should have known better. I... I'll never forgive myself."

The pout. She hit me with that deadly pout, cranked up to a full 10. I felt the tears fill my eyes.

She stood and took me by the hand. "Let's go. I need a shower desperately. You can wash my back."

As we walked up the stairs, she gave my hand a squeeze. "You know this one's going to cost you."

"I know."

"You really fucked up, Sean."

"I know."

"I'm getting that Maserati I was looking at."

"I was just worried it wasn't safe," I tried to explain. The Granturismo convertible. They claimed it did 166 MPH. Never mind that it was $130K. She thought she looked good in it. The fact that she'd had three speeding tickets in two years had nothing to do with it.

"The Maserati!" she snapped.

"Yes, Dear."

"The Tiffany tennis bracelet."

Ouch. "Yes, dear. I'll get it afterward, it's hidden in the teal guest room. I bought it for your birthday. It'll just be a little early." Another $16K. This fiasco was going to break me.

"You remember that show I wanted to see? It's gone now. You made me miss it. We're seeing it. In Manhattan. With dinner at Le Bernardin. I get one of those Central Park carriage rides too."

Fuck. The trifecta. Whiny romantic play, French food that I hate, and an hour freezing my ass off behind some smelly horse with diarrhea.

"Of course, Dear. I should have canceled that board meeting when it was in town. I'm sure there'll be something on the menu I'll survive."

She turned on the shower and started undressing. I watched until she glared at me, looking me up and down. I understood. I couldn't wash her back fully clothed. I stripped.

"We're going to Mykonos, not Vail."

Shit. Not Greece again. I'm sure she saw the pain on my face after that demand.

She glared at me. "Or would you rather explain your behavior to your mother?"

"Fine," I pouted. "We'll go to Mykonos."

She stepped under the water, then moved to the side to make room for me. She passed me the soap and a wash cloth. Damn. When she said wash her back, she really meant wash her back.

"For three weeks," she said.

"Three weeks! Are you fucking kidding me? No way, Denise. I fucked up. Fucked up bad, but three whole weeks? In fucking Greece?"

She turned around and looked into my eyes. "You didn't trust me?"

I saw how hurt she looked. I pulled her close, clinging to her. "I'm sorry. I'll never doubt you again. We'll go for three weeks. For a whole month if you want. I love you, baby, and all I want is for you to be happy."

She let me suffer for a little while longer. "I'm thinking Hawaii, the big island. I didn't really like Mykonos that much. Or maybe we could go on a cruise."

"You don't want to go to Greece?"

"Not really. I just needed to see how bad you felt. How guilty you were feeling."

"I feel like dog shit, Ok? Right now, I pretty much hate myself. I can't believe I jumped to the wrong conclusion. It seemed so obvious at the time. I mean, I saw it happening..."

"And your first choice was to hook up with my best friend? That was mean."

"I didn't, baby, I swear. I just went to see her, since her husband was involved too. I had no intention of doing anything with her at all. She jumped on me, and I was too surprised and shocked by everything to think it through."

"Yeah, well at least I know you didn't fuck her. She really did try to jump you, didn't she?"

"She's really scary when she's mad. Terrifying. I had no idea."

My wife passed me the shampoo, and I lathered up her hair. "I'm still getting the Maserati and the tennis bracelet," she said, tilting her head back for me.