Traffic Girl - Katie Ch. 08

That was very sweet to hear.

"It's not their fault," I said. "They can't help what crazy people do."

"Still," Katie said. "It just tells you about who they are. They were so scared this would harm our relationship."

"Not at all," I said, waving a hand in the air to dismiss the notion. "I'll just be happy when the lunatic who did it gets her justice."

"And she will, daddy," Katie said.

The tenor of the celebration was pretty subdued, at least for us. I held court in my bed in the center of the room, although I made it a point to make it over to the dining room table for dinner. Sitting down was an intricate feat because I had to prop up my left leg on another chair, and it was pretty awkward. But for thirty minutes to eat and then move back to the living room was worth a little bit of pain. Besides, after we ate, I took my next dose of ketamine. The doctors had agreed that I responded to the drug very well. Given my concussion and the cardiac episode that had been caused by the accident, the fact that ketamine encouraged greater oxygen flow was very desirable for my recovery.

And I wasn't going to deny it. I really liked the high. A lot. The fact that they gave me both ketamine pills and a nasal spray? That was only better. After dinner, our group gathered around on the couches. I had no idea how good a simple night at home like this could be. Just seeing the smiling faces and hearing the laughter of our friends did more for me than almost anything else.

Then my mind wandered back to the developments Jason had filled me in on. We were on the cusp of becoming really rich. Like really rich. My net worth in liquid assets alone was pushing half-a-billion dollars now. With Juliet's next movie coming up, and the Stephen-Jeff Stone heist flick on the way? We stood a very real shot of touching that rarefied air. The "B club" as Petey called it.

I should just walk away from work completely when that happened, I thought to myself. Live off the residuals. I had come too close to losing everything to waste any more time on anything that I didn't want to do. I had too much to live for.

I realized that I was lost in my own thoughts and had completely spaced out. Crystal and Bianka sat on my bed and shook my shoulders. They both looked exquisite. Crystal was chewing gum at a rapid-fire pace, wearing an obscenely small white t-shirt that molded around her wickedly erect, pierced nipples. Bianka, always more casual, wore a tennis skirt and tube top. Her skin was so perfectly tanned, you couldn't believe it was natural -- but it was. The brunette looked at me with her doe-like eyes.

"When you get well again?" Bianka said. "Crystal and I want to give you the hardest time you've ever had."

"So hard," Crystal said, snapping the gum and smiling, making her face light up in a dimpled smile.

I could see in both their eyes that they were high. They must have been bumping up on their trips to the bathroom. It didn't seem right that they should feel compelled to conceal it. Not here.

"You know, I'm okay if you want to do some lines," I said loud enough for the rest of our guests to hear. "I'm flying on ketamine right now anyway."

Everyone laughed. Crystal put her hand on my uncovered thigh.

"Oh, god, did I leave some under my nose?" she asked, rubbing the edge of her nostril.

"No, not at all," I said. "You don't think I can tell?"

"You are getting back to normal," Rita said, sitting down at the foot of the bed. It was odd watching her run a hand over my cast and not being able to feel a single sensation because of the plaster. "We can't put anything past you."

"Have you been abstaining?" I asked her. "Why would you?"

"We've gotten stoned," Rita said. "But we've kept the coke to a minimum. A bump here and there when we were too sleep deprived. We wanted to wait until we had something to celebrate."

I found Juliet, who was sitting on the couch to my left. I made eye contact with her and the Oscar statue that sat next to her.

"If we don't have something to celebrate tonight, I don't know when we will," I said. "So, you heard me." I raised my voice to make the announcement. "Party your asses off."

"Wouldn't it make you too hard, daddy, to watch us do lines?" Kat said sweetly.

"Maybe just a couple lines each?" Jess offered, and I could sense the eagerness in her voice.

"I probably won't explode if you do that," I said with a laugh.

The ketamine felt amazing. In this environment, which was so familiar, the high was soothing. It was quasi-normal. Then I heard the tap-tap-tap of a carbon fiber card on a mirror, and the girls gave me a front-row seat as, one-by-one, they took their turns blowing two lines each.

They were right. It made things painful below my waist. Almost in a good way. But almost to the point of overload. I almost lost my mind when Katie sat down next to me, licked my ear, and whispered that she couldn't wait to feel my cum inside her again.

"Maybe you could get me an edible or a gummy?" I asked her.

"Are you sure, daddy?" she said, and she fixed her eyes on me.

The warmth that radiated from her was another sign of being home again. I couldn't believe how quickly just being here made me feel better. The weed hopefully would make me feel even more chill, evening out the psychedelic euphoria of the ketamine. But a fifty milligram gummy turned out to be a bit of overkill. My fuzzy brain still wasn't thinking quite sharply enough. I didn't take account of how much my tolerance had reduced.

So within about forty-five minutes? I was nodding off. Jason, Crystal, and Bianka slipped out first. Juliet and Melanie followed a few minutes later. I came to in time to realize the house was empty. I suggested the girls leave clean-up for the next day, and they laughed. Of course they would. And they had decided that, for sleeping arrangements, they would alternate sleeping with me, while the other three finally got to crash in our bedroom.

The rationale was sound. I would get to have some quiet time with each of them, on alternating nights, and they would get to sleep and, if they felt up to it, reconnect on their own level. It was clear that, after almost a month of my incapacity, my body wasn't the only thing that had fractured. As a family, we had been unable to keep up any kind of meaningful routine. We were in crisis management mode. We needed time to heal and all come back together as a cohesive unit.

I also realized that building up my stamina -- just for everyday life things -- was going to take some time. It was wonderful to be in a bed large enough to just cuddle with the girls one at a time again. It made clear to me how much I had missed something as simple as their touch. That first night, having Kat snuggled around me put in stark relief how important the physical was for us. That probably seemed obvious, but until I had been without it for so long? I didn't want to let go of the feeling again.

The next day, Petey and Alix came over for a visit. Petey filled me in on the details of the Juliet back catalog streaming deal, which Jason had outlined in broad brush strokes. It really was an incredible thing. And Petey summed it up nicely.

"This is the next step to make us rich-rich," he said. "The B club? It's so close you can taste it, my dude."

Over the ensuing week, the girls curated a steady but measured diet of visitors. Nicole and Bryce, as well as Kelly and Jamie, came in from Vegas. The guys' offseason routine was about to pick up, so it was nice to see them before it got too crazy. And their presence made me itch for a trip to Vegas again. I vowed to get there as soon as my body could handle it -- the partying and the walking. It hit me that I had no idea how long that would take.

For her part, Kelly announced that she would be spending significantly more time in LA when Jamie was tied up in football things. She had decided that the Vegas Hooker House ran just fine on its own. As she put it, "My work there is done." Kat, in particular, perked up at the news because it had been so long since she and one of her oldest friends had been able to spend tons of time together on a regular basis. The surprise, however, was that Nicole said she would be at Kelly's guest house during those times. She and Bryce, we knew, had been trying to have a baby during the offseason, but in those few months had no movement on fulfilling her dream of getting pregnant. Nicole wasn't sold on the Vegas fertility clinic options, and there was one in LA she had her eye on. That announcement led to the best laugh I had had since the accident.

"Just wait until John can fuck again," Kat had said. "Two months' worth of cum would knock you up for sure."

I laughed until my ribs hurt beyond what I could bear. That the joke had come from Kat only made it all the better. It underscored what a long way we had all come -- and that there were exciting things ahead. Realizations like that helped build on the optimism I had felt since coming home. Little by little, day by day, it built.

And my body started to rebuild itself. The cumbersome hip cast came off after two weeks, instead of three. The doctors were extremely happy with my progress. My heart showed no signs that anything had ever happened to it. My rib soreness receded to occasional and mostly faint -- except when Kat was telling wicked jokes. It was humbling to see how atrophied my left leg had become, but I got started on physical therapy five days a week. The doctors had suggested three and that I build from there. I demurred. I wanted to push myself. I needed something to throw myself into. I had become obsessed with the goal of returning to normal. Whatever "normal" might mean now.

After my third day of PT, I was resting on the couch. The adjustable bed was gone from the living room now. It was upstairs in our bedroom because I still got a lot of relief from being able to position my hip just right. Still, it made a huge difference sleeping in the same room as the girls. The doorbell rang, and I realized that I was alone on the first floor. I looked at the TV screen and got a shock. It was Old Katie. With London. Even on camera they looked like sisters. It was uncanny.

I got up and limped to the door, an ache running from my hip flexors down through my ankle. Still, I marveled at the simple action of walking.

"John!" London said when I opened the door, surprised it was me who greeted them.

She flung her arms around my neck. Her aunt stood two steps behind and smiled at me wryly.

"Wow, you really are on your feet," she finally said.

"Come on in!" I said.

I led them to the living room, and they sat on a couch across from me. There was no avoiding it. It was awkward at first. Old Katie and I had met just the once, apart from a brief visit in the hospital and some texting with me about the security enhancements. I hadn't seen London at all. She was focused on finishing up her last semester at UCLA and, without Rita to control her, had retreated into the college life shell.

"Londy, what do you have lined up for after graduation?" I asked and then cringed. It sounded like an old person's question. But I didn't know how else to kick off the conversation.

The cheerleader bit her lip and looked at the floor. I couldn't tell if I had hit a sore spot or that she wasn't ready to tell me.

"Oh, I'm looking at a couple things," she said vaguely.

"My offer still stands," Old Katie said. "You could work for me. In front of the camera or behind the scenes."

"Please, Katie," London said and rolled her eyes. "You know I've got to do my own thing."

It immediately established what their dynamic was like, and it was very strange for me to witness it. I had only seen London as a sexual animal -- one that reminded me so much of her aunt, my college girlfriend. And Old Katie's words were the first time I had felt like she was really my age and not still that bubbly UCLA cheerleader who loved to party and fuck.

The small talk didn't get any less awkward, but it didn't last very long, which came as a surprise.

"I'm going to go check in on Steph," London announced and stood up.

Stephanie, the other weather girl who had become the primary object of Rita's exploration with dominance, was still in the picture. But she had intentionally kept a low profile since my accident. She helped Rita behind the scenes and threw herself into work, still putting up with the scheduling abuse and chauvinism that seemed to run rampant at her station. Something big was in the works, however, and the girls had to do very little to convince me to go along. Stephanie had put in her notice at work. She was in her final week. In her spare time? She was moving into our guest house. She didn't have a plan, but when the girls had sold me on it, it didn't take any time. Rita was determined to make Stephanie her full-time pet. It was another instance when I felt like I was returning to my old self. Because I made the decision with the little head between my legs. Who wouldn't want Stephanie around, with her luscious natural tits and unbridled sense of wonder as she explored what an LA lifestyle could offer?

So London, her walk as perky as her ass, went to see Stephanie. And Old Katie sat across from me, her gray eyes boring into me.

"Thanks for coming to visit," I said. "I wanted to say thanks for all the help you were with the security setup. I never really dreamed how extensive it should be."

"You don't need to thank me, John," she said.

There were other words waiting to pour off her tongue, but she pressed it against the back of her lower teeth and stopped.

"We are definitely building a better cocoon, though, thanks to you," I pressed. "And, look, I've got to say. It's a total trip seeing you and London here together. Side by side? Christ, Kates, it's like looking into a time machine."

I stopped myself when I realized I had unconsciously slipped into the use of my pet name for her from college. She noticed.

"Kates?" she said.

"Sorry," I replied.

"Don't be," she said. "I just thought you said I looked like I hadn't aged a day."

She flashed a warm smile, which I was pretty sure intended to convey that she was teasing.

"How's the pain?" she asked.

"A lot better," I said. "A different kind now. I'm into physical therapy. Day three. So it's more of a soreness. Maybe a little pain."

"I'm sure they have given you the good stuff to combat that," she said, and I sensed an eagerness and intrigue in her voice.

"Depends on what you think the 'good stuff' is," I said.

"I've always been partial to oxy myself, but I bet you might have even gotten a morphine drip in the hospital," she said. When she said it, she shuddered just slightly. In excitement.

"Ketamine," I said. "Much more my speed, as it turns out."

"Special K?" she said.

"The same," I confirmed.

"Interesting," she said.

"I've been able to cut my daily dose down to about a third of what it was," I said. "But, I'm not going to lie, it's kind of nice to build a stockpile. It's not a bad high."

I laughed, and Old Katie joined me.

"You look good, John," she said. "I bet you're back on your feet in no time."

"Thanks," I said.

There was another awkward silence, and Rita bounded down the stairs. She had showered and changed. I realized that had taken her almost an hour, and by the radiant grin on her face, I had a sneaking suspicion that Kat or Jess or both had joined her in the shower. Katie was in New York, kicking off the final six shows of the Stages Tour later that night. It ached to think of her being gone for a full week, but since I was doing well, I insisted that she not fly home every night. It took too much of a toll on her physically.

"Katie!" Rita exclaimed. "Good to see you! What a surprise!"

Old Katie got up, and they hugged. Rita planted herself on the couch next to me.

"London wanted to come say hi, too, and visit Steph," Old Katie said.

"Oh, did Steph make another run of her stuff over here?" Rita inquired, glancing at me.

"I guess so," I said and shrugged.

"Do you want a glass or something, some water, sparkling water?" Rita offered.

"No, no," Old Katie said, waving her hand. "Just a quick check in."

"We're happy to see you," Rita said. "You shouldn't be a stranger for so long."

"I'm sure you've all had your hands full," she said. "And the new security? It seems legit."

"You should know," Rita said sweetly. "We can't thank you enough for that."

Again, it seemed like Old Katie wanted to say something, but she just pressed her tongue against the back of her teeth and smiled.

"You must be tired from the physical therapy, John," Old Katie said and stood up. "I can get London and get moving. We really did just want to pop in and say hi."

"Well, don't wait so long next time," I said.

"I'll go check on what those girls are doing," Rita said and stood up, too.

Old Katie and Rita walked out the door together and headed for the guest house. I sat up on the couch and instinctively rubbed a hand against my hip. It was sore, but it wasn't hurt. The PT was already making a difference, I could tell. My goal was to be off of pain meds entirely within a week. I stood up and stretched, and I found myself thinking about Rita in the shower, playing with Kat and Jess. My cock got hard. I smiled. I decided it was time to start another part of my physical therapy.

But something tickled the back of my mind, the primitive, instinctive part of it. I felt some warning flags about Old Katie. She had definitely been a help with the security issues. But our interaction today was odd. I couldn't quite place a finger on it -- sure, there was her obvious infatuation with pain killers, but given her industry, that wasn't a huge surprise. It was more of a vibe. My mind ran with the thoughts for a moment or two. Was it too much of a coincidence that London, my college girlfriend's niece, had shown up as my bachelor party fuck? Then Old Katie had just come back into my life after so many years? I shook my head to clear the cobwebs. That all seemed too fanciful. But something still nagged at me, back in those deep recesses.

* * *

Two more days of PT, coupled with two days off, and I enjoyed periods now where I actually felt physically pretty damn good. I couldn't have been happier with my progress now or how my body seemed to be bouncing back. That physical improvement put another part of my recovery front and center, to the point where my thoughts almost never deviated from it. I wanted to have sex again. No. I needed it. I became obsessed with it. I was horny as fuck, more full of desire than I had ever been in my whole life.

There was a problem with that, though. Katie wasn't at home. She was in New York. Tomorrow was the final U.S. show of the Stages Tour. The five of us had made an inviolable agreement that, when I felt up to having a sex life, we were all going to be together.

"Let's fucking fly to New York," I told Kat, Jess, and Rita the morning of that final concert.

"Daddy, are you sure that's a good idea?" Kat said. "You've been doing really well, but is that too much, too soon?"

"Yes," Rita chimed in. "What's the difference between today and tomorrow? Katie will be back. We don't want you to push too hard too fast."

"Twenty-four hours," I said, pointing out the literal difference. Rita rolled her eyes.

"And you'd get a full day of rest to ... have even more stamina," Jess suggested.

"Don't you want to see the look on Katie's face when we show up?" I said. "Can you imagine that perfect surprise? We won't even tell her!"

"Are you really that horny?" Kat asked.

"Yes," I said. "You bet your fucking ass I am."

* * *

Our decision to join Katie in New York for the Stages Tour finale came at 9 a.m. LA time. That was noon in the City. With luck, we'd get to the stadium by eight o'clock, about an hour before Riley would go on-stage with Katie backing her up. We rushed to Van Nuys, where our usual Gulfstream waited. We had barely taken time to pack.