Chapter 8

"You... you what?"

Christina was standing in the living room, one hand to her stomach while the other was clasped over her mouth. There was a startled, almost horrified look on her face as she stared open- mouthed at her confessing cousin.

"I... I had to tell you, Christina. I just couldn't let this sort of thing go on without you knowing.

Barbara felt the blood rushing to her face as she sat there on the sofa, her fingers pulling at the loose-fitting coverlet material.

She had done it! She had actually done it! All during the day Barbara had thought about Brad, about what they had done, about the way she had felt. And then there was Pardner. All day long he had been nosing her legs, sniffing up her skirt, even pawing her right there in front of Christina in the kitchen. She had had to slap him hard on the snout, kicking him to get him away from her. No, there could be no other route. Christina had to know about her depravity. She couldn't hide it any more.

"But... but why?"

Barbara lowered her eyes for the moment, pulling at the sofa material, wondering why herself. She didn't know. Forces beyond her control seemed to have taken her over, making her do things she never would have thought of doing before. Maybe it was something to do with this ranch, something to do with all the animals here, with the freedom. Barbara didn't know. All she knew was that she had to leave, get away from this place or it would ruin her. But before she left she had to make a clean breast of everything.

"I don't know," she said dully, shaking her head from side to side. "It just sort of... happened."

There was a moment's pause.

"Then, you liked it. I mean," Christina said almost breathlessly, "Pardner didn't attack you... at least, not in the regular sense. You let things happen once they got started."

Barbara nodded her head up and down, feeling herself whirling around in a pool of shame and embarrassment. God, how she wished this interview were over!

"I couldn't help it, Christina. I just couldn't help it. Now all I want to do is go home and try to put my life back together, " she said softly, tilting her head back and inhaling sharply. "It's funny. I came here to escape, and found more trouble. Life just doesn't work out the way you want it to sometimes."

"Barbara, you don't have to go," Christina said, her voice deepening a little.

Barbara noticed the change and flicked up her eyes, turning her head and staring at her cousin. There was a different look on her face. She had expected shouts, cries of anger, looks of horror. But instead she saw something, something she couldn't quite understand.

"What's wrong?"

"I said, you don't have to go."

"But I thought... once you heard about what's been happening around her, what I've been doing, you couldn't wait to throw me out."

Christina smiled, rubbing her fingertips over her forehead. Her cheeks were flushed while her breathing seemed irregular.

"I've... I've been wanting to do things like you... things you've done," Christina confessed, her lips curling into a weak smile.

"What?"

The confession was unexpected, nearly overwhelming. Barbara's eyes widened, one hand to her throat as she gaped at her cousin.

"I mean... not only with Brad, but with Pardner," Christina said haltingly, lowering her eyes only for the moment. She rubbed her damp palms on her red cotton dress, apparently searching for the right words. "It gets lonely out here. Maybe lots of women do it, I don't know. But Pardner's been sniffing up my leg a lot lately. And... well, there've been times when I thought I was going out of my mind when I thought about him and me and... well, going to bed. How was it?"

Again Barbara reddened, finding herself clawing at the armrest. "Christina, you don't know what you're saying," she whispered, standing up.

"Yes I do! Oh yes, I do! I've been tied down here buying horses, trying to manage the farm and the ranch and it's driving me crazy," the woman blurted out, shaking the long brown hair from her eyes. "I need something, something that'll make me feel better. Oh Barbara, you've found it--with the dog, with Brad."

"Then you're not... not ashamed of me?"

Christina shook her head back and forth quickly, swallowing hard.

"Maybe a few years ago you would have shocked me," she confessed, smiling more broadly. Christina walked up to her, laying one hand gently on her cousin's shoulder. "But now, I know what you were going through."

The two women stood there in the living room for a moment, staring at one another. Barbara felt her cousin's fingers working on her shoulder, felt the hand caressing her neck. Feelings, feelings she had never experienced before in her life were making themselves present now. She wrinkled up her forehead, looking curiously at Christina.

"Come on upstairs," the brunette whispered, her smile fading a little. There was a look of excitement, of expectancy in her face.

"Come upstairs. Maybe Pardner will follow. I have to have some relief, Barbara. I have to..."

Her voice, her command made the blonde tremble. Again those dark forces were at work, those forces making her nipples hard, making them rub teasingly, deliciously against the light cotton of her white clinging blouse. Every square inch of her body seemed alive with sensation all over again, itching and glowing while her cuntlips again swelled with blood. Now Christina? Was she capable of going to bed with her cousin? Was her life going mad? Was she going into some never-never land of sexuality?

"Please, come with me, Barbara. It's unfair if you don't, " Christina said, giving her a rueful, pleading look.

It was impossible not to follow. Barbara moved as if in a dream, following her cousin up the creaking stairs, one hand trailing carelessly along the handrail. This was madness, sheer insanity! She had begun this conversation only to confess, not to explore yet another frontier of sexual perversion. And yet look how things were turning out!

Glancing back down over one shoulder, she saw Pardner standing at the foot of the stairs, his bushy tail wagging slowly from side to side while his head was cocked to one side. He looked at the ascending women curiously, wondering if he should follow. She was about to call out to him then checked herself. No, he would come up when he was ready. He would come up and then what would happen with two women and a dog? As she shuffled down the darkened hall toward Christina's room, Barbara wondered about that. And as she entered the large bedroom with yellow. Walls she found herself smiling at the possibilities.

"Should we close the door?" Christina wondered aloud, stopping by the bed and turning to her cousin.

"No," Barbara whispered softly, thinking once more about the German shepherd downstairs.

Barbara inhaled sharply, then began undressing. It seemed so weird, almost child-like to be taking off her clothes in front of her best friend and cousin. Time and time again they had done this before, dressing together in the same room, giggling while they talked about boys and all other things that made up a teenager's life. But never, never at that time had either woman thought about making sexual demands upon the other. Life had wrought curious changes in them both.

"This seems so... so awkward," Christina confessed, slipping off her skirt after having shrugged off her bra.

"I know. I don't know what to do," Barbara said, finding herself laughing nervously.

They stayed there for a moment. Then:

Barbara let out a hissing breath, hooking her fingers around the elastic waistband of her panties and pushing them down. Christina blushed, doing the same, raising one foot, then the other, stepping from her briefs.

"Come here, Barbara. Come here and touch me... touch me with your tongue," Christina said, backing down until she sat at the edge of the king-sized bed.

She was spreading her knees, leaning back a little with her hands behind her. It was so strange for Barbara, standing there in front of her cousin, looking at the dark patch of cunt-hairs appearing like a thicket of black metallic wires. Barbara stared at it, mesmerized by what was happening to them both.