Written in collaboration with Kellis

"I can't believe I'm lost already!"

Jack Langston shook his head. The green golf course extended to the left of his car. He searched for its entrance, proceeding slowly in the left lane of the busy street. An irate driver behind him honked persistently at his dawdling pace. He had been here once before, though not as the driver. On that occasion his new golfing acquaintance, Vito, who was also the boyfriend of his wife's sister, had driven him along a circuitous route of back streets.

Jack saw commercial buildings just ahead, so he made a reckless left turn into a cul de sac at the edge of the golf course. A typical apartment building of pastel stucco extended to his right.

He stopped the car to ponder his situation, consciously enjoying the air conditioning that kept the moist heat of south Florida outside the car. The palm trees and the warmth in February were a bit exotic, he thought. He felt uncomfortably out of place and looked forward to returning to icy Ohio in a few days, after his wife had visited sufficiently with her sister who lived in a trailer. Not a trailer, he reminded himself, having been vigorously upbraided for his use of that term; it was a "double wide" mobile home.

He was about to turn his car around and continue searching when a tapping at the passenger window distracted him. A woman stood just beyond the glass. Her lips moved, but he did not hear a word because of the hum of the air conditioning and the strains of Vivaldi on the CD player. Pressing harder on the brake pedal, he lowered the window to a blast of heat.

"Hi, mister," she said in a little girl voice, although she was obviously in her mid twenties. "Here I am."

Jack felt a pulse of excitement. He did not pick up strangers as a rule, but this was a girl, non-threatening, slender and almost pretty. "Here I am," she had said clearly. What could she be but a whore? — a young one whom he could not resist, a small one whom he could not deny. He yearned for youthful flesh, to be young once again, especially since his wife had given up on sex five years previously.

The car was well out in the street. No assailant could be hiding close by. His native caution was overmatched by anticipation. Would she get in? He motioned inward with his right hand while his left released the door locks.

"Gee, thanks, mister!" She climbed in and shut the door. "It's just on the other side of the golf course." She held a large purse tightly against herself and explained, "You have to look out for the cops, if you walk across it." She stared straight ahead.

Jack thought that a greater danger would be getting hit by a golf ball, but he replied, "I haven't seen a cop since I arrived here."

"Oh, they're all over," the young woman said nervously. "Are you playing tourist?" she added without pausing, staring out the window. She had not looked him in the face since entering the car.

"I'm here for a few days," Jack responded, feeling suddenly younger. He wanted to look at her, to study her young body, but he dared not. She was clad in jeans that clung to her slender legs, and his brief glimpse of her upper body had suggested small breasts. She was darkly blonde.

"I'm Sheila," she said, finally turning to him but not smiling. "Let's go."

Jack eased the car into the stream of traffic on the crowded street. The girl seemed to relax as the vehicle gathered speed. "What's your name?" she asked.

"Jack," he replied tersely, surreptitiously studying her from the corner of his eye.

Here he was for the first time in countless years alone in a car with a strange female. But elation see-sawed with apprehension. Suddenly he was very conscious of being a stranger in town, of the wife waiting for him back at the "double wide." He was no longer young and free to explore a girl's intentions. This one seemed to be somewhat sweaty, in need of a bath, although her odor, a faint spiciness, was anything but disagreeable.

"I thought you'd be younger," she purred, "but I find older men to be so interesting." She leaned slightly toward him, staring into his face.

"What do you mean?" Jack asked in a panic. "You could not have been expecting me."

She frowned as if surprised but asserted hastily, "Yes, I could! Just not you specifically."

A glance at her face revealed renewed nervousness. "Wh-what —" he began, meaning to ask for an explanation, but she looked away as her eyes widened.

"Oops, turn here, Jack!" Her nervousness vanished in a giggle and her hand fell upon his thigh. His need for an explanation subsided.

"Park here, Jack, right in front," she directed, and he promptly pulled his car to the curb behind a green convertible with the top down.

She opened the door and climbed out but turned back to say loudly, "Come on, Jack. I'm what you've been looking for."

"No, no," he stammered, flinching from the sudden blast of heat but wanting desperately to go with the girl. "I have to get back."

Her face contorted, this time unquestionably in shocked surprise. "What?" she demanded.

"I, uh, have an appointment," he explained diffidently.

She looked furtively up and down the street, leaned back into the car and whispered fiercely, "Goddammit, who changed the plan?"

He matched her whisper. "The ... the plan?"

She gestured impatiently with her head. "Come on, you fool. If we don't go through with this they'll fry us both."

"F-Fry?"

"And the feds are listening. Do you want to ruin everything? Damned if you will!" She leaned across the seat and snatched his hand off the gear shift, drawing it powerfully toward her. "Come on, damn you!" she cried, still in a harsh whisper.

After thirty years of marriage Jack had learned the futility of resistance to that decisive feminine tone. He slid obediently across the seat, allowing her to tug him out of the car and slam the door behind him.

He found himself marching up a front walk toward a small recessed residence, nearly concealed from the street by clusters of flowering vines thickly entwined on trellises. The sweet odor of flowers filled the air. The girl walked briskly, retaining his hand, her purse swinging from the opposite shoulder.

She glared up at him, speaking softly, "Where did Mario find you? I can't believe he didn't brief you better than that!"

"Brief me?" Jack asked in confusion. "About what?"

"You really don't know, do you?" She sighed audibly. "All right. You're supposed to make love to me — at least sound like it." Her eyes flashed up at him. "Think you can do it?"

"I ... I what?" His chin sagged as he stared at her.

"Fuck me, Jack! Be an old man with a young girl. Is that so hard to imagine? Here we are. Now for god's sake, don't let us down!"

She opened the front door and pulled him into a cool, dim living room, small and cluttered with newspapers, cast-off clothing and empty glasses. Sheila held a finger to her lips and nodded suggestively at various parts of the room.

"Well, mister, it'll cost you two hundred," she said loudly in her little girl manner. Suddenly he realized that he had misjudged her. What he had taken as immaturity was in fact the stilted, stagy manner of an amateur actress, last heard in a high-school play.

She added, "Would you like to undress me, to open your special package?"

She scowled at the man and made pulling motions with her hands. Apparently she was urging him to play a part, too, but he didn't have a clue. He wanted to leave, but he also desired to fuck this lovely girl, now that she had made her expectation clear.

"I don't have a condom," he finally said in a flat, dumb voice.

"That's no problem, Jack, sweetie. I'm clean. You can fuck me wet, if you want, and that would be really nice, don't you think?"

When he only ogled her, she demanded, "Well, wouldn't it?"

"Y-yeah," he admitted, reaching for her blouse.

She shrugged him off, declaring, "First give me your credit card."

His credit card? But his wife paid his accounts! How could he possibly explain an extra $200? This was too much. He took a deep breath, preparing to whirl out of the room.

But the girl removed a credit card register from her purse, saying, "It's already filled out. Only take a moment. There!" She slammed the slide loudly back and forth — flick-flack! — and added, "Sign right here, Jack."

He knew that his chin was sagging again, but she ignored his failure to comply.

"Jack Balenti?" she cried as if impressed. "You're really Jack Balenti?"

"I'm Jack —" Langston, he wanted to say, but she interrupted him in syrupy tones. "Nothing's too good for Jack Balenti!"

The register returned to her purse and the purse sank to the floor. She simpered, "Now you can open your package!"

He began to fumble at the buttons on her blouse, nervous, excited and totally confused.

"Keep talking, damn it," she whispered to him as she shrugged off her garment.

"You have such slender shoulders," he remarked, not only in response to her command, as he fondled them. He undid her brassiere without difficulty and let it drop to the floor. She had perky breasts, like those of a young teenager.

"Oh, my!" he gasped. He fell to his knees and pressed his mouth to a small nipple.

"You'll like my legs too, Jack. They're very girlish."

With trembling hands the man undid her jeans and pulled them down to her ankles.

"Oh, yes, oh, yes," he murmured and rubbed his cheeks against the girl's soft thighs, sniffing the pungent odor in her thin white panties.

He untangled the girl's jeans from her socks and shoes and then pulled off the remaining garment to reveal a lush pubic bush. He pressed his face against it, taking in a mouthful of brittle hair.

"Oh, Jack, I like that," Sheila exclaimed, perhaps sincerely. "But let's see what you have to offer."

She tugged on him, bringing him to his feet, then sank to her knees, undoing his trousers and pulling them down along with his shorts.

"Jack, baby! This is a nice one! But it's too fat for my mouth. Come, darling. Lie down here on the day bed and do me properly."

He sagged atop the girl, now on her back with knees raised high and legs spread wide in invitation. In delirious excitement he positioned his organ for the ecstatic plunge.

"Don't you dare put it in!" she whispered fiercely into his ear. "Just make the proper noises."

He raised his head, staring at her at a loss. She began to moan as if in sexual bliss. He knelt above her and watched her play the part of a whore being fucked. The sounds were not convincing to him, but he understood that he was not the one who needed convincing. He began to masturbate, staring at the naked girl beneath him, at her pert breasts, at her slender shoulders. "Make some noise!" she hissed.

Jack complied with a groan, again not only in response to her command, but in genuine excitement as he brought himself off, squirting on her small breasts, her neck and her face.

"Oh, goddamn!" she cried with real emotion when a stream of semen passed coincidentally between her lips. She gritted her teeth and glowered at the man kneeling above her, his erection quickly fading into something insubstantial.

"That was just fine, Jackie boy," she said a bit too loudly in a false voice. "We'll do this again anytime you're ready."

Quietly she spat curdled fluid onto the floor. "Give me a kiss, sweetheart," she added gaily with a deep frown on her face.

When Jack leaned down, hesitating, not wanting to taste his own stuff, she whispered to him very softly, "Okay, you son of a bitch! Pull your pants up and get back to Mario, if you dare!"

"But what —"

"No!" she cried, still in a quiet but fierce whisper. "If you get out of here right now without saying another word, we might still pull this off."

Jack rose to his feet. A feeling of elation swelled in him. He could hardly remember the last time his seminal fluid had passed a woman's lips. Even if he didn't understand how it had been made to happen, even if the girl now hated him for it, the fact of it was undeniable. Standing up, buckling his belt, he grinned at her in delight.

She took a set of keys from an end table and put them into his hand. "It's the green convertible with the top down," she whispered.

"What is it? You want me to put the top up?" he asked, forgetting to whisper.

"Shut up!" she hissed. "God, you're a dumb ass!" Her lips clenched in a snarl and she raised her fist toward him, the middle finger thrusting upward.

He laughed aloud at her expression. "Thank you, honey. I love you, too."

She made shooing motions, her eyes glaring.

He turned away, exhilarated by his first sexual experience in a very long time. He didn't get to fuck the girl, but it had still been marvelous fun.

He saw no vehicle nearby on the street except his rented Taurus and the green convertible with the top down. The sky was clear, hardly a cloud in sight. He shrugged and threw Sheila's keys onto the convertible's front seat.

Looking around while returning to his car, he realized that now he was just across from the entrance to the golf course where he had been scheduled to meet Vito a half-hour earlier. He started the car and drove it onto the grounds.

As he pulled into the parking lot, he spied Vito, swarthy face easily recognized under his typical white-pomponed tam, standing next to his Cadillac. Jack parked his Taurus beside the other car and met the man on the hot sidewalk. Jack grinned sheepishly. "Sorry I'm late, pal. You wouldn't believe what happened to me."

"Just got here myself," Vito admitted. "I had a business meeting and lost track of the clock. Now we've missed our tee time. I'm afraid we can't get on this afternoon."

"It's too hot for golf anyway," Jack responded in a good humor, the memory of squirting on Sheila still fresh in his mind.

"Well, then, let's have some cool drinks up in the club house," Vito suggested.

The two of them walked slowly toward the main building. Vito was obviously relaxing the pace for his older friend.

The chilled atmosphere inside was a palpable relief. They sat at the bar and ordered drinks, their attention drawn to the television set which displayed Tiger Woods sinking an impossibly long shot from a sand trap.

"God!" exclaimed Vito with feeling. "Why do the pros have all the luck, too?"

"You think it's only luck? He made one just like it the other day."

"I don't care. Nobody can do that without a generous helping of luck."

Jack, feeling good, chuckled. "Almost nobody. Reminds me of the time God and Saint Peter teed off on a Sunday afternoon."

"Reminds you —" Vito choked off with a grin. "Sounds like a good story."

"Almost as good as what happened to me on the way over here. I'll concede that was pure luck. I managed to get laid without —"

"Huh! We're talking about golf, Jack."

Jack took a drink and began an apocryphal tale of divine power converting a bad slice into a hole-in-one. But as he neared the punch-line, Vito held up a hand.

"Excuse me a moment, Jack." Looking over Jack's shoulder, Vito raised his voice. "What're you doing here?"

A third man drew close to them, stocky, wearing Bermuda shorts and a bright shirt. Only his face was gray. Even Jack could see the fear in his eyes.

The man gulped audibly. "Mario, I had an accident."

"You what?"

"Had a wreck." The man took a nervous breath. "On the way to get the girl, some drunk ran a stop sign and creamed Balenti's car. The cops were there before I got away. When I could finally grab a taxi, I went by the rec house. That federal van, or one like it, was just pulling in up the street. What the hell we gonna do?"

"You mean you didn't play your part?"

The man drew back, face even grayer. "I didn't get the chance, Mario!"

"Jesus Christ!" exclaimed Vito. His eyes narrowed. "Hang on a sec."

He turned to Jack. "I've got to handle this myself, Jack, and it might take a while. Wait here in the club, will you? I'll send Mitzy around."

"That's okay," Jack responded amiably, though the mention of Balenti's car had set off alarm bells. "I'll just mosey on —"

"No, no, the girls are planning some kind of surprise for us. Don't be in a rush."

Vito stood up and beckoned urgently to someone across the horseshoe-shaped bar. A young woman promenaded around the stools towards them. She was wearing a black "bar dress" spangled with glittering sequins, cut low and short above sheer black stockings. The creamy skin of the deep cleavage was displayed almost to her navel. Jack finally raised his eyes to an oval face with large brown eyes and pouting red lips, surrounded by thickly curled black hair. A crescent of diamonds dangled from each ear. She was beautiful, an example of South Florida perfection — including the pinpricks on her inner arms.

"Jack, this is Mitzy," Vito intoned. "Mitzy, Jack. He's a good friend of mine from out of town. Think you can entertain him for an hour or so?"

She purred in a low, throaty voice, "I'd love to try."

"Great! Well, Jack, you're in good hands — and other things! Now, if you'll excuse me..."