Endless Days & White Knights Ch. 03

Caroline could feel the wetness between her legs cool in the exposed air -- just as she ripped her hand free. She shoved the woman off of her.

The woman screamed as she crumpled to the floor. "She's free!" the woman shouted.

Caroline shot forward at the waist and the third person in the room released her panties. Caroline lunged for the finger that had been touching her -- but the man at her feet plowed his shoulder into her bare torso.

Caroline could feel two of her fingernails plunge into the third person's forearm. She scraped several inches of flesh from the person's arm. The man tackled Caroline back into the bed. The third person left the room before Caroline got a glimpse. The man grabbed the woman, who left her clothes behind as they raced out of the motel room. Caroline pulled the panties from her mouth and leapt from the bed -- only to be anchored back into it by the man's belt. By the time she worked herself free -- they were gone.

What felt like hours later, Caroline dragged herself to her apartment door. She noticed the stairwell and realized that they -- whoever "they" were -- knew where she lived. That thought sent a shiver through her. She quickly retreated into her apartment and pushed the door shut.

The rest of the day Caroline spent in the fetal position on her couch. What did the woman mean, she wondered, when she said to "stay out of this"? Was it a friendly warning passed between lovers? Was it a threat? How many more muscular men in suits were lurking in the dark out there?

She pulled her knees into her chest. She curled up tighter on the couch. She felt the day grow gray and then black. Night fell. Her eyes were open but all she could see was the woman grinding on top of her. She could smell the woman's hair as it drifted onto her face. She could feel her weight. Her ankles began to ache from the memory of the man's iron grip. She could feel the flesh and blood under the fingernails when she scratched the mysterious third person. Who had that been? Was it Carver? Why didn't he show himself?

Hours passed. She stayed curled on the couch. Waiting for -- what? The phone to ring? The door to get kicked in? She didn't know. What should she do? Quit her job at Azura? Did it really matter to her what millionaires and billionaires did with their money? Maybe she would just "stay out of this" ....

She drifted and, in the blackness before her, Carver's face appeared. And the woman's voice -- "Render unto Caeser..."

Caroline opened her eyes. She didn't know they had been closed. And for the first time in almost 24 hours, she sat up. "Render unto Caesar..." R. U. 2. C.

She found her laptop. And then Carver's email. His email address -- carve@ru2c.aw. RU2C dot a-w. RU2C -- Render Un 2 Caesar.

Caroline typed www.ru2c.aw into her Internet browser. It led her to a secure website. She needed a username and password to get into it.

She's not sure how long she tried to access the site, but it was light outside when she looked up again. Hours had passed. And then realized another day had, too. It was Sunday morning. A drizzling mid-morning gray hung over the day. She wondered if she could walk away from the events of the last few days. But there were too many questions that she couldn't answer. And she believed getting into that website would answer them. If she only knew someone who could hack into—

She didn't bothering showering. She threw an overcoat on top of her hoodie and skirt.

Caroline hadn't been to a college campus in almost ten years. But she remembered Jeremy -- the college intern who had vomited onto her new Ann Taylor sweater -- always talking about playing football on Sundays. She found a group of college men (boys, really) tackling and throwing and grunting in a football field. She was struck by how young and fit they all seemed and imagined how in ten years they would start to lose their muscle tone and hair and cockiness.

The finally game broke up and Jeremy noticed Caroline watching him. He was muddied and walked with the oblivious swagger of a college senior. He noticed the laptop tucked under her arm and asked, "You here for tech support?"

In his studio apartment, Caroline opened her overcoat and realized she was wearing the same clothes from Friday night. "You're good with computers, right?" she asked.

"Listen," he said, "I owe you an apology. I think the last time we saw each other..."

"Yeah, you kinda ruined my sweater," she said.

They both laughed an awkward laugh. "In the TGI Friday's parking lot, right? Sorry. You just looked so hot and we were drinking and..." he said, as he slipped into the bathroom. He left the door open and she watched his muddy shirt and sweatpants hit the floor. He called out, "So you're having computer problems?"

"Well, I just need help accessing a website," she said to the open bathroom door.

He poked his head out of the door -- his bare shoulders and chest just visible -- and said, "Usually when someone needs help getting into a website, it's because they're not supposed to get into it."

Caroline watched Jeremy strip off his boxers behind the door. She could see the boxers fall off his leg. But he closed the door as he said, "I charge for that kind of work -- so you know."

She heard the shower running, so she sat and powered up her laptop. And waited. And waited. Finally, she swung the bathroom door open. "I'm kinda in a hurry," she said and then gasped.

Jeremy stroked himself behind the glass shower door. His hand was covered in suds. He looked up and stopped stroking, but didn't let go of himself.

"Oh," said Caroline.

"If I'm going to work next to you being all sexy like that, I need to jerk off -- so I can focus on the computer," he explained.

"Okay," Caroline said and started to back out of the bathroom.

"No, stay," he objected. "It'll help this go faster. You don't have to like show me anything or do anything." He began stroking again. "Maybe just unzip your hoodie. A little. Not all the way."

Caroline watched him stroke himself behind the glass. His naked body drenched by the shower. He wiped the glass in front of his face. His eyes trained on her body. His eagerness was as much a turn on as what he was doing. She put two fingers on her hoodie zipper. And started to improvise. She wiggled her hips and with each hip thrust, his hand stroked harder.

"Oh, yeah," he encouraged her.

When she touched the inside of her thigh, she was doing it less for his enjoyment and more to appease the tingling she was starting to feel down below. As soon as she dragged her hand to the hem of her skirt, he shouted, "Oh God!"

She watched him convulse and stroke harder, then more slowly and then stop. He rinsed himself clean and she found herself staring at him. The tingling between her legs did not go away. In fact, it intensified.

Jeremy was surprised when he shut off the water that she was still in the bathroom. And even more surprised that her hoodie was completely unzipped and her skirt was on the floor.

"Oh man," he complained, "I just—" He pointed back to the shower.

"That was so hot," Caroline said. She pulled her hoodie off.

"Gimme five minutes," he said as he lunged for her. His mouth covered one of her breasts while his hands clumsily tugged at her panties. "This'll help me get it back up," he said as he slurped her.

She pressed his head into her and pulled her legs out of her panties. She climbed onto the bathroom counter and he licked his way down her belly. "Oh yeah," he said as his face disappeared between her legs.

He didn't seem to know what he was doing, but he made up for the lack of quality with quantity. He licked and kissed everything he could get his tongue and lips on. Every so often, he would do something just right and she would moan. This, of course, encouraged him to work faster and deeper.

She thought, "This is a B-minus..." but welcomed the distraction. For a few minutes (a very few minutes), she would not think about strange people in stairwells or dark motel rooms. Her foot dangled between his legs and she touched him with her toes. He was hard again. "Tell me what to do," he said.

She used both feet to feel him getting harder. "That's what I want," she said as she pulled him to his feet.

Jeremy opened the medicine cabinet behind her head. Before she knew it, he had a condom on and was inside her. She had never done it in a bathroom before. She had never had a nearly naked woman grind on her, either. And that memory was all she needed. A wave of ecstasy overcame her. She groaned and squeezed Jeremy's back. And that was enough to have him explode into her. He collapsed into her. And she felt the sink faucet jam into her back.

Less than fifteen minutes later, she was back in her Tercel driving to her apartment. Jeremy mumbled something about an asymmetrical algorithm when he hacked into the website for her. It took him less time to get into the site than it did for him to come the second time.

Back in her apartment, she showered and changed. She thought about taking a nap, but went back to her laptop instead. The RU2C site (the .aw meant that it was an Aruba domain, according to Jeremy) contained business plans and acquisition strategies. Caroline scrolled through page after page. She clicked and double-clicked on plan after plan.

"Oh my God," she muttered over and over again -- as she uncovered what Carver St. Pierre was planning to do. The sun had come up on Monday morning when it struck her that Carver had a mole planted with Azura. "Someone's in on this with him," she said aloud.

She knew she needed to get to work but was exhausted and laid her head down on her laptop...

A knock at her apartment door jarred her awake. When she opened the door, she found Zack. He was shirtless and in his bicycling shorts. The next thing she knew he was on top of her on her bed. Her legs were wrapped around him and his strong thighs drove him into deep into her -- deeper than any man had gone before. His body was hot, almost too hot to touch. And he looked into her with those wounded eyes and that heartfelt smile -- and she felt the orgasm welling between her legs and shooting into her feet and up to her throat. And just as she began moaning...

She jerked forward. Her eyes fluttered open. She was in the leather backseat of a Lincoln Town Car -- waking up from a dream. The driver stared at her in the rearview as the airbag from his steering wheel deflated. The heater made the inside of the car a sauna. Caroline was sweating and looked down to see her hands under her skirt. She unrolled the window and the fresh morning air helped bring the memories back...

...Early this morning, after she realized that there was a mole at Azura, she hurried out of her apartment. She carried a mug of coffee and a laptop to the parking garage. In her Tercel, she dialed her cell as she backed out. She heard a "Hey!" and saw that she had nearly run over Zack -- who was riding his mountain bike to work. He gave her a "my bad" smile and friendly wave as he hopped back onto his bike and rode away. The person she had dialed answered her call as she watched Zack ride out of the garage. His muscular thighs flexed, even through this jeans. His thighs had mesmerized her and they would later appear in her dream...

The person she had called was Dan from the San Francisco office. He was an Azura attorney and someone she felt she could trust. They had pretended to have an affair earlier in the year, so that he and his wife could divorce. As a closeted gay man, Dan liked the charade of marriage but preferred the freedom of being an ex. On the phone, Dan surprised Caroline by telling her that he was in town and they arranged a meeting later in the morning. "Now that you're a big shot," he said, "have your assistant arrange a car service to bring you to City Tower."

Caroline hadn't yet reached the office on her first day as a "big shot" and Dan already knew about the promotion. Good news travels fast, she thought.

As she walked toward her office, Vanessa -- her new assistant -- noticed her coming. Vanessa slid on a sweater as Caroline drew near. She wore a short-sleeve blouse under the sweater. Was she hiding something? Why did she suddenly cover her arms at Caroline's approach.

"Cold in here," Vanessa said to Caroline's unasked question. Caroline asked her to arrange for a car service.

As Caroline checked her emails and her calendar, Vanessa told her that the car was downstairs waiting for her. Caroline brought her laptop and found the Lincoln Town Car by the curb. As she slid into the leather backseat, the driver apologized that the heater was working overtime. The car was hot... The white noise of the traffic... She hadn't slept in days... and she was out. She slept hard and Zack came to her in the dream.

The driver had been watching her masturbate in her sleep instead of the road and rear-ended a minivan just as she began to moan.

"City Tower's just two blocks that way," he apologized and Caroline ignored his eyes as they traveled her body.

She spotted Dan waiting for her under the glass and steel of City Tower. "Where's your car, darling?" he asked as he pecked her on the cheek.

"Long story," she said as they stepped into the elevator. He used a key to press the top floor button.

"Now, what's all of this about?" he asked. His sport coat, pressed slacks and Windsor-knotted tie fit him perfectly. He looked like a 1950's movie star.

The elevator zoomed skyward. "I've uncovered some information that I'm not sure what to do with," she explained. "It has to do with one of Azura's biggest investors -- Carver—"

And then the elevator doors slid open. They were on the roof. The wind whipped into the elevator and nudged them outside. Dan gestured for Caroline to follow him to the glistening black helicopter waiting there. He ducked his head as he opened the passenger door. Sitting comfortably in the backseat, reading an iPad, was Carver St. Pierre.

Caroline climbed into in the plush seat next to him as Dan shut the door from the outside. Dan tapped on the pilot's door to signal that it was okay to take off.

Carver had barely looked up from his reading. The helicopter lifted off and Dan, City Tower and the city itself grew smaller by the second. Carver finally set his iPad down and produced a bottle of Veuve Clicquot champagne. He poured the bubbly into two crystal flutes as the helicopter sped toward a vast ocean on the horizon.

More coming...