Bart heard a soft voice whispering in a long tunnel followed be sweet laughter. He slept on, loving the dream.
“C’mon. Wake up.” A hand touched his shoulder, gently shaking him. Through sleepy slits he got a hazy vision of Sally Ramsay leaning over him. She wore a short colorful silk robe that hung wide open in front and her perfect breasts were perfectly visible. Must be a dream.
“What was Jack right about?” What the hell? If this is a dream why not participate?
“Us, Bart. He said we should ‘get a room’. I’m glad we did. What about you, baby?” She slid into bed beside him and he felt her body press against him through the soft slick fabric of her robe. Sweet.
“Yeah. Right. Get a room.” Bart mumbled before coming wide awake to find himself staring directly into the big blue eyes of Sally herself. Her warm breath came closer and before he could say anything she took his face in her hands and kissed him aggressively.
Surfacing for air she said, “You'll find mouthwash and toothpaste and everything else you need in the bathroom. Why don’t you check that out while I get us some orange juice?” Ever the polite hostess.
She gave him a kiss on the cheek, popped out of bed, and danced from the room with each step revealing one or the other of her fabulous buns. Bart never felt the need to pinch himself before, but this time he did, just to be certain.
Still a little groggy he rolled out of bed, embarrassed to find he was naked. Dream or not I guess we’re well beyond worrying about that. Imagine?
The feminine master bath, clad in pink and crème colored marble smelled of Sally’s favorite perfume and sported a big walk-in shower. She'd laid out a complete set of ‘man appropriate’ toiletries beside one of the two sinks. Bart wondered if she had a lot of male guests and whether debutantes routinely showed their lovers this kind of hospitality. Whatever! He turned the big chrome handle marked “shower” and was treated to a symphony of no less than six spray heads spewing hot water in every direction. He stepped in and luxuriated in the relaxing surge. By comparison, his own shower would never look the same. Twenty minutes later he dropped a single use toothbrush in the trash and emerged from the bathroom showered, freshly shaved and wrapped in a towel wondering where he left his clothes.
Sally called out, “Bart, I’m in the kitchen.”
Her voice had a new musical tone and he couldn't wait to hear it again. He found his hostess seated at the black granite-topped bar sipping a tall coffee. A place had been set next to hers with an elegant linen placemat. A square white plate rested on it. A glass of orange juice waited next to an octagonal white cup ready to be filled with coffee. She’d also laid out biscuits, assorted fruit, and a selection of preserves. A guy could get used to this.
Bart stopped behind Sally’s stool and without thought or reservation put his hands gently on her shoulders then leaned over and kissed Sarah Brooke Ramsay lightly on the neck. In response she did not speak; she purred. A guy could get used to that, too, he thought sliding onto the stool next to hers.
“We missed dinner last night, didn’t we?”
“Yes, Bart, we did,” she said feigning a demure smile.
“We pretty much did it everywhere in the house, didn’t we?”
“Yes, Bart, we did. Four times if memory serves me.” Sally sipped her coffee without looking at him, but he knew she was smiling her little smile.
“Imagine.” Zeigler took a fig from the plate and began to cut it.
“Yes, just imagine. You invite me to have a drink after work and wind up taking advantage of me again and again and in my own home no less.” She tried but couldn't deliver the line with a straight face.
“Holy shit! Work! What time is it?”
“Bart, calm down. I already sent Jerry emails. We’re not going to work today.”
“What?”
“You heard me. You’re ‘incapacitated’ and I had a ‘family emergency’.”
“What’s your family emergency?”
“I’m taking you to Sausalito for lunch. Ever been there on a sailboat?”
“No. Sounds like fun.” Said the man who had worked nearly every day of the past four years.
“It will be, but first, you need to try the preserves.”
“What?”
Without breaking eye contact Sally let the top of her robe fall as she seductively rubbed strawberry preserves on her nipples. The dominatrix tone seeped back into her voice.
“I made them myself, Bart. Try my preserves.”
What was a polite man to do but comply with his hostess’s request? After all, both she and her preserves looked delicious and he was beyond resisting anyway.
Hours later, as they set out across the bay on a forty foot sloop Bart discovered Sally to be an expert sailor. The smile on her face and the sparkle in her eyes as she made the elegant boat dance over the choppy water of San Francisco Bay etched a picture in his mind. This brilliant, complex, sexy woman promised to take him on the ride of his life and any recollections of the videos from Ilya’s computer erased themselves from his memory.
Sally wrestled with a stream of conflicted feelings about Bart as she tacked away from the wake of an outbound supertanker. God, this is really going to get complicated! A tiny tear trickled down her cheek. She blamed the wind.