The Promise Pt. 03

"Err, you will be—number one. But that isn't what I meant by the first one."

"Oh... you mean it really is the first time you've strayed? Well you've got excellent taste," she said in a charmless matter-of-fact tone. "I don't suppose it's ever occurred to you that someone like me could be useful to you in your academic career?"

"Emm... "

"That's a 'no' then is it? Look, I may not have read a lot of deep books, but I know people. I know friends, I know enemies, I know who can be useful to me who's not either. That's politics and as far as I know, it applies whether you're in the car wash or in Parliament. Don't knock it. I've got a nose for trouble. And speaking of that, there's something else."

"What?"

The phone rang again. This time she shut the door. He could hear her voice as a low murmur which ceased. Then she heard a bustling in the bedroom, of drawers and cupboards opening and closing and then being closed and the sound of her marching around the room.

**********

At length, she ripped the doors open and returned to the living room.

"So, what was this 'something else' you were going to tell me?" he said, then took a look at her.

She was wearing an off-white vintage overcoat—fifties or sixties he was unable to say which—with the voluminous but short sleeves made to show off long gloves and she was more or less enveloped in it down to her calves.

"I don't know—sorry, it looks like I am going to be going out," she said looking down at what she could see of the coat. We'd better get our talking out of the way."

What was the fucking point? He pictured some horrible man with a knuckle duster in one hand and her cunt in his other.

But she was speaking: "Oh I know what it was—you know Linda and Ellen and their little friend?"

"Yes. I'm—"

"They're unsuitable."

"What—what do you mean?"

"They're unsuitable. I don't like them."

"Look, I hate the way they talk about you."

"Drop them. They're no use to you and I don't like them."

"I'm not sure what you have in mind but they have their better natures, if you appeal to them."

"I don't care about their better natures, and what I have in mind is you leave now, and let me get on with my life," she said pulling on some long white gloves that complemented her coat.

"Are you going to see someone?" he shouted, before he could stop himself.

"That's my fucking business. This is my home, such as it is, and for the millionth time: you came to me, not the other way round. Now... Linda, Ell and Carol? You can not be my lover and hob nob with those slags. I forbid it."

He couldn't bear the thought of her with some bullying cockney bursting out of a cheap suit and sneering at every thing he stood for... but what did he stand for now?

"At least tell me what it is between you and them?"

"I don't see much point in this discussion, if you're not prepared to look at it from my point of view. I need to go."

"I do look at it from your point of view. Really. Give me a chance. But look, do you really have to go out?"

"What's your problem, Robert?"

"What's the problem? We're talking about starting a relationship here, and at the same time you're calmly telling me that you're going to go out with someone else, and maybe even bring them back here, instead of consummating that relationship that we're supposed to be starting..."

She yawned and started to fiddle with the buttons on her coat, buttons which were not far off the size of digestive biscuits. Maybe the gangster let her keep her clothes from her heyday, those mythical sixties or whenever it came from.

"Oh Robert, please, haven't we done enough consummating already?"

"You can't go and fuck someone else, Christine. You can't go and fuck someone else. You can't go and fuck two different men in the same day, like some whore stopping the next car round the back of King's Cross."

Her eyes flashed. "Try me. Just try me, Rob. It's my life and I can do what I like with it. I've had enough of being pushed around by men. That's over. But I'll tell you what. Let's hear whose side you're on. I'm going to give you a chance then," she said and started to take her gloves off. "What is it with me and them? It's pretty unfair is what it is. They wanted to get rid of me, because my face didn't fit. Their pal—Sandra, she got sacked because she was useless. Know that?"

"Well I heard there was a harassment issue, her and Roy? I believe it went to tribunal but..."

"I've never had any trouble with Roy. But they just think I'm an imposter who's taken her job. It's so unfair. How fucking dare they, those slags?"

"If I was staying, I'd sort it out."

"Listen. They don't want it sorted out. They want rid of me—wrong face, wrong place, wrong time. When I came, I was on three months contract, and I was assisting Sandra, remember? This job was the first chance I had to dig myself out of the hole I was in after my divorce. Roy set me to work putting together stuff to support the bid, because she couldn't handle it. Most people returned their stats in good time. You did. I was grateful.

"It wasn't difficult."

"I had to stand over those three squeezing it out of them, or fail like their pal. I could have been let go at any time. I didn't fail. I'm still here and they don't like it and—guess what—I don't like them. But I don't sit about crying, I just get on with things. Rob?"

"That wasn't very nice."

"They're not very nice, are they?" she said into his ear.

He paused for a moment like a removal man assessing a tricky load. At length he said, "They're not very nice. To tell the truth it'll be a relief to see the back of them."

"You'll drop them?"

"I'll drop them. They don't really mean anything to me; just a bunch of ex-colleagues who're too fond of cakes and ridiculous drinks like Sambuca and Malibu."

"What happens if you come back for the staff social?"

"The social?"

"You blank them, right. Understood?"

"Blank them? As in pretending I can't remember them? Are you sure?"

"Look, you come to me and say you can't live without me, but you won't protect the woman you love from her enemies. I'm afraid that's something I look for in a man. And if you can't do that, well there's plenty who can." She pulled her gloves out of her pocket. "I think you'd better go now."

Suddenly Rob caught an image of her giving herself to be violated by a man who looked like Reggie Kray, her eyes rolled up and closed with passion, panting and moaning, satisfied by his brutish attentions.

"Don't go. Give me a chance. Please."

"Alright. Surprise me."

She slapped her hand lightly with the gloves and then put them away. As she did so, her coat fell open. Between the flaps of the coat he could see flesh, and filmy fabric. Almost involuntarily, he snatched one side of it to open it further. She was wearing a scarlet slip, underneath with black stockings and probably nothing else beside a suspender belt.

His cock went up like a semaphore in a mixture of lust and despair. He grabbed her frantically. "You were going to go out, like that?" he said, his face blunt with despair.

"Why? Don't you like it?" she said in syrupy tones as her lips moved slowly towards his.

"You're taking the piss. You must be," he snapped bitterly, as he felt her move right up close to him.

"So will you blank them?"

He paused, deliberating.

"I-I'll blank them."

She started stroking his curls.

"Rob, you and I, we can't be together if they're in the picture. They'll try to stop us, split us up. So when you come back to the next staff party, you make it clear that you can only be bothered talking to Roy and I. And come to the office, not the staffroom, before we go to that god forsaken pizza palazzo. I want them to be humiliated, to know you're on my side, that we're laughing at them. I want them to feel ridiculous."

"They are ridiculous."

"So you're on my side? Against them?" She put the tip of the ruler under his chin like a swordsman toying with a defeated opponent and raised his chin so that their eyes met.

"I am now. From uh now on. I can't be on terms with them if they can't show you a bit of decency. If I see them at the staff do, I'll look through them as if they were made of glass." He paused for a moment. "I'm on your side. Your enemies... are my enemies."

"Oh Rob... I think I really am quite fond of you." She put the ruler aside and laid her hands on his shoulders. "But you're so tense. Let me give you a neck massage."

She got up and went behind the couch. Her hands descended softly and she started kneading his neck muscles. "Why are you so tense? You were totally hyper when you came in."

"Sorry. A lot's happened."

"Tell me about it. But I'm not lying, I wasn't expecting you—"

The telephone rang.

"Get that, Rob," she said detaching herself to stride out to the bedroom.

Answering the phone to a rival was absolutely the last thing in the world that Rob wanted to do, and clearly another test. Furthermore, although it shouldn't matter, he felt at quite a disadvantage dealing with it when he was practically in the nude. But he knew that to refuse would be an unqualified fail. Also, he found that he wanted a change of subject from that of Linda, Ell and Carol.

"Hello," he said nervously drawing the handset to him. He could hear the wardrobe door in the bedroom opening and shutting.

"Oh, hallo Mr Robert. I recognised ya, soon as you spoke. Keeping busy?"

"Is that... Sam?".

"Might be."

Christine marched into the hall to get something from the front room, or rather, having taken off her coat, to make sure he got a good look at her in her slip. It was a good fit and her figure looked sensational. She had high square shoulders like a model and and her long legs reminded him of smoothly turned and finished wood. With the coat off, she was travelling with some bravado, and the liquid flow of the garment emphasised the swing in her hips and her arse and the promise of its alchemic translation to his pleasure.

"If that's Sam, tell her I'm cooking tomorrow," she yelled.

"Oh yeah. Sam."

He had completely forgotten what he was doing, but a crackly voice from the telephone receiver brought him down to earth.

"Fancy you happening to be there like that, Mr Robert."

"Was that you ringing up?"

"Dunno what you're talking about. It's me ringing up now. Tell her I'll be round to dinner tomorrow."

Christine came up. Her lips pressed briefly on his, then she turned away, so that her back was facing him. She lifted her arms smoothly and crossed them in front of her face, as she grabbed the tapes of her slip and pulled it away over her head in a red flurry. The pallor of her flesh was emphasised by her black underwear: the thin straps of her brassiere crossing her back; the suspenders, suggestive of restraint, with the silvery mechanism of the clasps, hanging from the belt, which was decorated with scarlet embroidery, and rode on her hips like a gunslinger's holster set.

"You... you got her to make all those calls. Didn't you?"

"I'm very happy because you're on my side against those toerags," she said, ignoring him in a superior tone of voice. "Come with me."

She sashayed towards the door, walking a few paces in front so that he would see the smooth wobble in her arse as her hips turned, and the wrinkles which moved across the filmy stuff of the knickers that covered it, like wind blowing ripples across a pond. Swallowing the remnants of her gin, she led him to her bedroom and embraced him. As they held each other, she could not resist a joyful, triumphal smile. She had taken him from her enemies, and she was busy turning him against them with a programme of re-education that worked through his cock.

"Kiss me. I like it," he said. "You know something? You should smile more. Smiling suits you."

"Yeah? Well I don't always feel like it," she said and didn't kiss him.

"I know, but it really suits the shape of your face. Hey?"

"Hey what?"

"So you didn't have a bloke lined up?"

"I did," she breathed into his ear.

"You did?"

"You, you idiot. No, I'm not a whore, thank you."

She pushed him down to sit on her bed. She stood and worked on his neck. Her breasts jiggled in his face, the nipples peeping like rosy fruit from the floral pattern lace which decorated the dark mesh of her bra.

"Just relax."

As her hands moved on him, she had to remind herself that setting him right about Linda and Ellen was only a start. There was still plenty of work to be done...

Meanwhile, as he stared at her bosom Rob was beginning to think that maybe he had finally arrived where he wanted But then... then she said:

"Pop this on."

That scarf of hers now fluttered in her hand in front of his face. He seemed not to recognise it and made no move of any kind. As he sat there, paralysed with indecision, a filthy look came onto her face, her eyes went narrow, a purplish flush on her cheeks.

She slapped his face hard enough to surprise him, and circled his head with the scarf pulling it forward to tighten a knot at the back.

"You didn't think I'd let you keep your little sex game to yourself and that frigid bitch you live with?" she hissed into his ear.

His mouth fell open as he gasped at these words and froze in horror.

Christine immediately forced him backwards onto the bed, falling on top of him and pushing her lips onto his. She rammed the mass of her tongue through them, silencing him before he could assemble any words of rebuke. He raised his hands to resist and push her away, but her kiss filled his mouth, and the poisonous thrill of it passed like a bush fire though his whole body. She had him by the hair, holding him in position while she worked him with her lips and tongue bringing him more and more under her control.

The hands he had raised to reject her, slipped instead around her waist. Then they eased behind her, as his fingers flexed on her rump and the rest of him went limp underneath her and she made a sort of purring sound. He was no longer interested in anything apart from her body, and his mind went blank as her tongue pushed calmly over his. Whatever he'd been bothered about before, was forgotten in his concentration on the amazing touch of this woman who had made him her lover. Presently her kiss was passionately returned as if he had no control over it. He was totally engaged and gave way to a bout of prolonged snogging.

When she released him, the moment had passed—and they both knew it—that moment when he could credibly challenge Christine's spiteful provocation.

But rather than defending his girlfriend, he had been stroking her enemy's bottom. He was fucking her enemy, and this was an occupation he had no intention of abandoning. He found his betrayal liberating, and indescribably exciting. He was beginning, too, to see that she meant to use sex to turn him against Steph and to reward this disloyalty with her body.

And it's working, he thought, as he felt his heart pounding.

When she was seducing him the night before, she had treated him to an impromptu leg show. And now, just as then, he felt trapped in the role of voyeur, watching something that made him feel both sick and aroused at the same time. But this time it, seemed that what he was watching was himself falling under her tentacles all over again, like a Peeping Tom roused to onanistic frenzy by the spectacle of collapsing virtue. And what was being demolished was his regard for the relationship he'd been so heavily invested in for over five years, and the other one in it.

He asked himself for a moment whether he was a louse for his failure to defend Stephanie. But what he realised, once he'd given it some thought, was that the problem was down to the feeble nature of the feelings she inspired in him. In the end, when you looked at the matter objectively it was she who was to blame, really.

"I told you you'd come round," she said, in a gloating voice. "You didn't think I was going to let you keep this for that stupid bitch—what's her name again?"

"Steph."

"I suppose you mean 'Stephanie'?"

"Err, Yes."

"Call her that then," she commanded. "I don't like baby names. What is she called?"

"Stephanie. She's called Stephanie." He was amazed at how saying her name without abbreviation immediately distanced her from him and spread a chill.

"And again," she snapped.

"Stephanie. Her name is Stephanie." It felt as if they were talking about a stranger who meant nothing to him. He could almost feel Christine staring at him with a probing look as he said it, a probing look he was unable to see. And this reminded him of the surrender symbolised by his blindfolded state. She really was obnoxious, yet somehow every time she pulled something on him, he ended up giving in because he had to see what this awful woman was going to do next.

"What about Stephanie?" he asked.

It was only now, that he dared to think consciously of Steph as an impediment, but he was making up for lost time. Now, he started to see her as a malevolent obstacle, full of nothing but words and concepts, an obstacle which was going to have to be avoided, or even swept aside if Christine and he were to enjoy each other properly.

"Yes. What about her? You belong to me now and not to that stupid bitch. You don't respect her. You wouldn't have talked like that about your sex life if you respected her, would you? I said to myself, 'In half an hour he'll be standing up for my pleasure, not for her honour. And I'll say yes'."

"Say yes to what?"

"I'd say that asking a single lady—who's alone in a flat at one in the morning—if she does it doggy style, I'd call that a proposition, and not one that a gentleman would make—"

"I didn't—"

"If you don't like the outcome, you know where to go—oh and telling me you 'used to' play blindfold with your 'partner'—that's advertising a vacancy as far as I'm concerned. Were you afraid you might like it more with someone else?" she taunted him in a thin, high voice. "And then you'd have nothing left for her? Well you ought to be afraid. Whatever it is you 'used to do' with a blindfold, you know you're going to like it better with me, don't you?"

He said "Yes" without thinking and then, "But it was you that started that talk... it made me feel kind of sleazy."

"If you feel sleazy, it's because you are sleazy. You're the one who tried to take me at the front door, Genghis—lifted skirt, lowered drawers and all."

Rob sensed the change of tone.

"If I'm sleazy," he drawled, warming to the knockabout," it's because I've been worked on systematically by a 'vice girl' who plies her depraved trade in the guise of a Victorian secretary."