Chapter 12

I woke with heads on my shoulders, but no one holding me. They were both still tired. I looked at the clock to find it right at six thirty, so I slipped from bed and went to the bathroom. With shorts and a T-shirt on, I made up the inside coffeepot and went out onto the patio to find the big pot perking. Either Glenda was up early, or it was automatic.

I went to the front of the house to find the paper, came back to the patio, and poured myself a fresh cup of coffee. No sooner had I opened the paper, than Mercy came out in a cute little baby doll set and curled up on my lap.

As I held her and scanned the newspaper, Glenda came in with Martin, both with cups in hand. A few minutes later Hank and Debbie, in her T-shirt with holes, came over, next were Jim and Hanna with her oversized T-shirt, followed by Charlie and Shawna, wearing a really ragged T-shirt. Sandy and Mandy came in the back door, wearing short T-shirts displaying T-backs, then Phil and Judy drove up with boxes of breakfast sandwiches and pastries.

Judy was saying as soon as she came in, "We have to get a place out here so we don't have to drive so far. We're out here all the time anymore; we might as well live here."

Phil said, "Abe says he wishes he hadn't moved, but would have just bought a bigger place. He misses being out here every day."

Betty and Joan came around the side of the house with some very sexy gowns on. Don't you just love Saturday breakfast? Mercy got up and went inside to reappear with Sue, in one of her sexy gowns as well. Mercy said, "With all you girls coming over in the morning getting the guys excited, I needed to get Sue involved in this."

Samantha drove up in her little car and walked over in a long T-shirt and sat at the table with one leg on the chair. The question was answered immediately, she was totally commando.

Phil wanted to know what I had planned. He was talking about what I had said last night.

"I don't know yet, Phil, I'll find it soon. I need to figure out how much more we can stretch our space, then go from there. I don't think we need more locations. We can cover the whole US from where we are. I'm looking for different avenues of revenue and different areas of manufacture. I'll find it; I just haven't seen it yet."

He answered, "I guess I'm greedy. We've grown and expanded so fast, I know we can become more efficient soon and do a lot more business. I just love the constant expansion and new ventures."

About that time the guy down the street, a trucker, started his big tractor. He let it set on idle for a few minutes, warming up while he did some paperwork.

I got up and walked over to his truck. It was a big Peterbilt. He rolled down the window and thanked me for a great party the night before. I asked him what kind of mileage he got. He said generally around five to six unless the wind was against him then his mileage could drop to three or four. Sometimes out on flat country he said he would get up to seven or eight especially with the wind at his back. I had an idea.

I told Sue that I wanted to go out to the big equipment auction out on 301 for a little while. She nodded and asked if I needed her to come along. I said I'd be fine. When she asked what I wanted to buy, I told her I didn't know yet, but if there were any used power equipment, I would get it.

I showered and put on a pair of jeans and boots to go with my T-shirt. Mercy had changed too and wanted to come with me. On the way out she said, "You have an idea about something. I can feel it. I want to watch you do something with it."

We got to the auction early enough to register, and quickly look over the equipment available. There were a half dozen big generators, some forklifts, but there were several of what I wanted. I wanted a beat up old tractor. I found one, a Peterbilt with the insides almost totally trashed. The sleeper looked like dogs had lived in it. The keys were in it so I cranked it. It started fine. I tried the gears and they seemed okay along with the clutch. This thing was so smelly and trashy looking that if the bidding got to more than five hundred, then whoever bought it could keep it.

The auction started at ten at the front where all the fancy cars and pickups were. The practice was to slip in a junker while they sold the nice stuff, so people would overbid on it. They did exactly that. They fired the junker tractor up and brought it to the auctioneer. Just as the driver was revving the motor the blower belt broke making black smoke pour out of the stacks while the guy was trying to shut it down. The auctioneer had already asked for five grand and I had yelled twenty-five bucks. He ignored me and kept trying for five then four then three, two and was begging for a grand, I hollered twenty-five dollars again. The auctioneer looked at me, over the top of his glasses and said, "Make a reasonable offer, sonny, and I'll consider it." I hollered back, "Have you looked inside that thing? And look at the four inside drive tires, they're all flat. I'll give you thirty-five, that's a legal bid."

The crowd was laughing at the guy while he looked inside the tractor and got out, barely able to keep from puking. He turned back and asked for another bid then said "Sold to the long-haired guy with the pretty girl."

Mercy said to me, "You really want to do something with that thing?"

"I want to make a demo out of it. I have an idea. Let's go bid on the old power equipment and forklifts." Everything there was junk today, so all of it went for scrap metal prices. I bought it all, and looked around for the guy with the flatbed to get it out of here. He was sitting on his truck bed waiting. I got his attention and showed him the equipment I bought, and also the nasty tractor. He said he knew the guy that used to own the tractor, and that he had recently drunk himself to death.

He said he would haul it all to the business and prepared to load it. Thank goodness one of the forklifts worked, because we used it to put the generators and one compressor on the flatbed and used it to load the other forklifts.

While he was doing that, I opened the Peterbilt and opened the shroud for the old style blower belt. I dug through the toolbox and the parts hollow in the side of the cab and found an old belt. I slipped it on and buttoned the truck up. I drove the tractor to the loading dock and eased it up and onto the flat bed. While the driver was chaining everything down, I went to pay and get receipts and titles.

The auctioneer said, "I'll remember you, you're slick. You did right and I was wrong. That tractor was a turkey and you knew it. But it was still worth a grand, even just as spare parts. He paused and asked, "What are you going to do with it." All I said was, "Parts." He nodded as I left.

We drove back to the shop and opened the front gate so the tractor-trailer could back up to the big dock. I backed the tractor off and parked it out of the way near the fiberglass shop.

We were able to use the forklift to put the forklifts and generators in a line near the big storage building. I paid the trucker and he left to try to pick up another load. I began explaining my idea to Mercy. Fuel for truckers was expensive and it was going up all the time. I pointed to all of the square lines on the truck and explained, "I think I can build a tractor cab to go on a standard chassis that would be more aerodynamic. If we were to build a nice cab with an efficient sleeper, truckers with older equipment would upgrade with us. Then if we were to overhaul their trucks at the same time, they would have a new truck for a third of the price. That is, if I'm thinking right."

"If this works, we would have a truck/tractor overhaul shop, and a body shop. We would exchange the body and junk the metal. I think the idea has merit," I said.

"If you did this, how many people would you hire?" Mercy asked.

"There would be six to eight in the rebuild area, and probably six to ten building the body. Of course, if the idea is a good one, you could times all that by four, plus we would have to have salesmen and office staff. It could be between sixty and seventy-five if it works."

"Where would you do this?" Mercy asked again.

"I'd probably do it right here in the beginning. If the idea takes off and I run out of room, I'll buy or build something to hold the production facility."

Mercy was smiling at me, "I like it. You came up with the idea, bought something cheap to experiment with, and could possibly begin an entire new industry with over a hundred employees. I love the way your mind is so open. Ideas just come floating in."

We walked back to the pickup and drove home after locking up the yard.

Betty, Joan, Sue, and Hanna were all laughing and joking about their sexy stuff and how men were going to love to take it off. Every piece of intimate clothing they talked about, they described as having hooks and hidden buttons and multiple tiny bows. I listened for a while and finally had to open my mouth.

"You know what, girls? You want us guys to take those sexy things off of you? Men enjoy unwrapping presents, untying big easy-to-pull bows or sashes, pulling something loose over your head, whisking it off. We don't like buttons, unless they are great big buttons with even bigger button holes so we can tease ourselves by easily and slowly unbuttoning one big button at a time, revealing the goodies we want to get at so bad. If we have to fight to undo a bunch of tiny little buttons that our big fingers can't handle, a guy could lose interest, give up, or if he were crude enough, he might rip the darn thing off. Make the buttons large for a guy to work with, but small enough that they are still comfortable to sleep on.

The ladies had been listening intently as I gave them some clues. They each had a dawning. The four of them rose as a unit and vanished inside the house.

"You did it again," Mercy grinned. "You got an idea that floated in and gave it away in the blink of an eye. I'll bet they're in there making something sexy with big buttons."

"How about a beer, and maybe a ride out to the airport. Let's see where they put the 172 in the event we want to take a ride."

I pulled the shovel out of the storage area and pushed it up to the walk. Inside, I could hear Mercy telling Sue where we were going. When Mercy saw the bike, she asked if she could sit on it a while and asked me to let her to sit on it alone for a bit. It was only a minute before she was waving at me saying, "This is a good machine. It has a lot of character and wants to go. I'm safe on it with you, it told me so."

I had her put on the helmet- she gave the bike a hard look first- then I put mine on and fired up the bike. After warming it up, we idled out of the park, hitting the hard road and speeding up to go across to Lutz. We rode to the Aero Park and parked at the operations building. I checked in with the desk person and showed my ID, saying I wanted to go out to the plane. As we walked out, an attendant came with us saying it was too nice a day to not go up. He convinced us. We pushed the plane out and did a pre-flight inspection. Once we were ready, I started the engine and let it warm, and called operations to tell them I was filing a local VFR for one hour. The guy in ops keyed the mike a couple of times as I began a slow taxi to the runway. As I got near the runway, I called for permission to access the active runway and take off. The ops guy repeated my call sign and granted permission, along with a wish for happy flying.

We gained speed and took off just like the book said and turned out toward the coast. I wanted to go out toward New Port Richey and the towns up and down in that area. If we went too far south, I could get into the pattern for Clearwater-St. Petersburg airport. I didn't need a bad mark from the FAA. We stayed around four thousand feet and checked out the sailboats and big fishing boats. None were as big as Dewey's. Since Lutz is near the twenty mile final approach for the Tampa airport we remained low and flew over toward Plant city looking for the Zephyr Hills airport where they do a lot of skydiving. We saw the airport, looked up the radio numbers, dialed them in on the radio and requested a touch and go. We did a smooth touch down, one of my best, and took off noticing a plane dumping people out above us at about ten thousand feet. It was getting near our hour so I headed back requesting permission to land as I approached. I did a nice landing and taxied back up to the hangar and shut down. I turned off everything and made sure that the plane was secure.

Mercy and I pushed the plane back into the hangar, swinging the tail around to set it heading out in front of the 208. We slid the big door closed and went back up to operations. Just as we reached the operations building I stopped and said, "Duh." I waved at Mercy and said, "I have to do something." I went back to the hangar, took the logbook out of the 172 and entered the time out and in. I rechecked the meter in the cockpit and wrote down the ending number. Then I went over to the 208 and got my log book and entered the time flown in the 172. I told Mercy she needed to remind me to do paperwork, as I was forgetful.

We donned the helmets and rode the short distance back home. We had been gone for only and hour and forty-five minutes, but it had been a fun time.

Charlie and Shawna were on the patio, watching the Busch races and enjoying a glass of beer and some of the sandwich makings from last night on the table. Mercy and I were both hungry and joined those two with a frosty beer, and I made up some sandwiches.

I saw Hanna peek around the corner before she came out and asked Shawna to come with her. In a couple of minutes Sue, Betty, Joan, and Hanna came out, leading diminutive Shawna in a pale yellow, satiny, pair of loose legged shorts and a sleeveless blouse top that was short, just a little below her breasts, leaving her stomach exposed.

They had Shawna stand in front of Charlie and Betty said, "Pretend it's bed time or that it's playtime, and Shawna is teasing you, wearing this to entice you to have fun. We're curious how you would enjoy her, how you would remove the clothes before you ravished her."

Charlie looked a little confused and said, "We ah, Shawna ah, doesn't wear anything to bed. When she's horny she just strips and starts climbing all over me."

"Okay, pretend that she wants to tease you a little. To have you do the romantic thing, have you play with her, and take the clothes off her. Do that so we can see if this is a good item."

Shawna came closer to Charlie and bent down and gave him a gentle steamy kiss and stood back up. Charlie reached out and picked Shawna up and put her on his lap where he let her lean back on one arm that held her and began to run his hand across the front of the satiny piece of cloth that was the top.

He seemed to be getting into the scene, as he softly ran his hand all over the top then down across her exposed stomach and over the satiny shorts. As he reversed his direction, his hand caressed over Shawna's stomach but disappeared under the top to caress and cup her tiny breast.

Joan commented, "See, that's what I was thinking of when I suggested the short top."

Charlie's hand came back out from under the top and again caressed Shawna over the top and back down across her stomach then over the shorts down to her knees. You could see Shawna shiver from Charlie's touch.

As Charlie's hand came up from her knees, it slid easily under the loose leg of the shorts, where he spent a few seconds touching the secret places there.

It was Sue who said, "The loose shorts are definitely good."

Charlie touched Shawna some more, and with the roaming hand, his fingers went to the large top button and the top seemed to just fall apart. He did the next as easily as well as the final third button, completely opening the top. Charlie's hand immediately cupped the now exposed breast. Shawna was lying back in Charlie's arm with half closed eyes, panting.

Betty said, "We better get them in the bedroom or we're going to have a show right here."

Charlie looked up as if he had been caught doing something naughty, "Can we use a bedroom for a minute?"

Shawna grinned and said, "I'd continue in the middle of Main Street. You're being so romantic."

Sue pointed and they both got up, with Charlie grabbing his crutches and following Shawna."

Hanna said, "Let's make one Ruth's size and have her try it out on Tiny. She wears stuff like this all the time to tease him, we'll ask her how he liked it."

Sue came over to me and said, "Good idea you had. Those buttons came off easy. You were right about Charlie liking to unwrap a present." The girls went back into the house.

I looked at Mercy and said, "I should have had them make one for you and we could go practice."

"We don't need anything right now. I'm so hot from watching those two, I could take you on the table in front of everyone."

I got up heading toward the house offering Mercy my hand, "Let's go see how ready we are."

We went into the bedroom and because it seemed we were sneaking something, we were undressed and onto the bed in a heartbeat. Twenty minutes later we were back out on the patio with a fresh beer, having another sandwich, with Cheshire cat grins. Mercy and I both had put on shorts; our T-shirts had never made it off.

Charlie and Shawna came out with the same type of grins. Shawna was now back in her shorts. She said the girls were making several of the sets to have different couples test them. Shawna was sniffing the air and said with a leer, "There is more than just Charlie and me that smell good out here." Mercy just smiled and nodded.

We finished watching the race. Gene's Busch car came in third, with one of our newer customers winning. Pretty soon we hoped all the winners would be using our motors.

Shawna and Mercy were talking together and I heard Mercy say that she really liked her first motorcycle ride. She said it had been very neat to feel the air flow by while she hugged my back. Shawna said long rides made her horny. Mercy looked intently at Shawna then commented, "I think a lot of things make you horny."

There had been a pause on the TV and Charlie and I heard the comment and broke up laughing. Charlie said, "So true, so true."

Sue came out and said she would be right back as she was going to go get dinner. The other girls came out of the house and we began cleaning up so we wiped down the tablecloths and began setting the table.

People began showing up. Tom and Al came into the patio and got a kiss from their wives. Ruth and Tiny came, with Tiny getting a beer while Ruth made herself a drink. They were groggy looking as if they had just woken from a nap. Martin and Glenda came, walking over to pour a beer and settle into the nearest glider. Glenda mentioned that Abe and Alice were not going to be there: they were at one of their kid's houses.

Charlie and Matty, Tiny's mom and dad came strolling up with a big bag that was making noise that sounded like a bottle inside. Charlie put two big gallon jugs of a red table wine in the refrigerator. Shawna had seen the bottles and went inside to get glasses.

As Debbie and Hank walked over, Sandy, Drew, Mandy, and Bob came from the back, just as Sue drove up with Samantha in the car.

Mercy was watching this gathering of people with intense interest. Sue had brought several boxes of barbecued ribs, plus some pulled pork. She had big tubs of slaw and tubs of baked beans, along with a big box of individual foil wrapped buttered pieces of corn on the cob.

It was interesting to note that many couples ended up sitting together to eat. The conversations before supper continued at the table with those involved grouped together. Mercy ended up between Sue and Samantha, who was next to me. Samantha and Mercy got to know each other, with Mercy being fascinated with Samantha's photography.

Neither Sue nor I had told anyone of Mercy's ability or what she used to do. They just accepted her because she was with us. We let Mercy use her intuitive ability to learn about all our friends.

After supper and the clean up, the girls who had been making the cute little intimate wear brought out little bags for the ladies. Sue told all the ladies not to look at the clothes yet, but to surprise their mates with them later. The purpose of the experiment was to see how their mate removed the garment, and what their actions were leading up to the removal. She wanted them to use the opportunity for a little teasing. She also wanted to hear in detail how their husbands removed the garment, and would then find out from the guys what they thought.

You could tell that they were all very curious. Charlie said, "I don't know about you guys, but I'm up for a ride tonight. Who's coming along?" Hank and Debbie said they were, and Jim and Hanna said they were ready. Drew and Bob didn't want to ride on the back of the girls' bikes but told the girls they could go. The "Andys" decided to stay home and test the new garments.

Sue looked at me and said, "How are we all going to go? What about Samantha?" I nodded and said, "I didn't plan on Sam, but I had Mercy covered." About that time, Sandy came back over and said that Bob had to go see his Dad, who was in the hospital for a while, so she wanted to ride.

"How about taking Samantha with you?" I asked.

Sandy instantly said, "Come on, honey, I'll be gentle, lets get some jeans on you and something better on those feet."

Samantha went with Sandy to borrow some clothes while Mercy, Sue, and I went in to dress in riding clothes. While we changed, Mercy filled Sue in on our ride earlier and going for a short ride in the 172. Sue said she couldn't believe she had been so consumed in the new idea that she had forgotten all about us. She asked how Mercy liked riding and Mercy said it was great and was looking forward to this evening.

I finished dressing quickly and maneuvered bikes around pulling the FLH with the sidecar out of the shed, or as it was now, my personal shop. I started the bike to let it warm up. When Sue and Mercy came out they were surprised at the new addition. They both wanted to ride in it. If Mercy had been a little smaller, like Shawna or Debbie's size, they could have. As it was, Mercy said she would ride behind me.

When everyone gathered in the yard, I told the others that I needed them to keep it a little slow as I had to learn how to handle a sidecar. They all agreed and we were off. Sue observed that we were the only ones with helmets. I told her about the helmet law that had just passed. She immediately had her shorty helmet off and tossed it toward the patio. So much for safety. Mercy said these little things wouldn't do much to help if we were in an accident, so her helmet followed Sue's. Mercy used her hands around me to unbuckle my helmet and it flew toward the patio too as we started off.

We rode down to the clubhouse as I had expected. The gate guy had to swing the gate wide to let me in with the sidecar. We were a fairly big arrival considering five bikes and all the women we had with us. Several of the club members came over to check out my sidecar and the new girls that came. They were used to Sandy, but the addition of Mercy and Samantha had their antennae up.

As we were getting off the bikes, I noticed something that I had not seen before. All our girls had on the same T-shirt. Sue wore a T-shirt over a sexy top because she didn't want a club guy or prospect to get in trouble with Hap. But the other girls usually just wore some sort of T-shirt or tank top. They all had different color T-shirts that said, "Property of" on the top, then in the center there was a big S&S logo. Sue's, Mercy's, Samantha's and Sandy's all had an addition under the logo. They all read "& Steve."

I groaned hoping no one would notice. I led the girls into the socializing area to be greeted by Hap and Bear. They both hugged Sue, Mercy, and me. Bear looked at Samantha, then back over at Sandy, Sue, and Mercy, and said, "Hap, this guy's starting his own club. He's already got his bitches wearing his property patches."

Hap looked at the T-shirts and over at me. I was really blushing. "Shit, Bear, that ain't a club, that's a fucking harem." The two of them began laughing loudly.

Bear said, "I've seen this little girl with the newspaper people before. Who are you, darlin'?"

Sue, being the mother of all, said, "This is one of our special friends, Samantha. She's a student and part-time newspaper photographer."

The party was in full swing, with many of the club members setting off fire crackers around the area in celebration of July fourth.

Bear was obviously curious about the two new girls, but kept his silence for the time being. He and Hap had been drinking all day and were a little loose. Hap introduced me to the president of the visiting club. As he did, and the guy nodded to me, I felt Mercy crowd up to me, a little behind me. Hap noticed and had a little puzzled look on his face. Hap's lady came to take the girls to the ladies gathering but Mercy insisted that she stay with me. Sue became concerned and stayed as well. Sue pulled Mercy to the side and had a conversation with her while I talked with Bear. Bear was asking me about Samantha, whether she was another of my toys, and I had to tell him that Sue was the one always picking up stray babes, not me. He laughed with me.

Sue said that she didn't feel good and maybe we should leave. She said to Hap that she was sorry, but being pregnant that she didn't know when something would come over her. I gathered everyone, telling them Sue wasn't feeling good and we needed to go. Charlie looked at me funny, and I said, "Let's go, talk later."

We rode out of the gate slowly and I looked around real close. There was the usual detective car setting down the block watching the clubhouse but there were three cars sitting on the street with the windows down. I could see men in each of them. The cars were full. I told Charlie to begin going out toward the big street. I rode down the block to the detective car and rode up so I was next to his window. When he rolled the window down I recognized him as one of the detectives that had been at Ben's office that night that seemed so long ago.

"Why don't you call for a bunch of back up and have them wait somewhere real close. There might be trouble, I'm not sure, but something looks funny."

The detective said, "I wondered about those cars, I can't tell but it looks like there are several people in each."

"They're all full. That's what funny."

Mercy spoke up from behind me. "I felt that guy that was with your friends, Hap and Bear. He is a bad person. His mind said he's planning something. He was waiting for something, some signal."

I took my cell phone out and called Hap's. When he answered I told him to walk toward the house while I was talking to him. "Don't ask me how I know, but something's going down. That visiting president is not your friend. He's going to do something. Get your men to quietly get prepared and to be watchful. Don't shoot anyone as there is going to be a bunch of cops around here in a minute. Just be careful and get Bear somewhere safe. Watch that guy, don't let him out of your sight. Call me." I hung up on him knowing he was at least warned. While I had been on the phone, the detective had been calling in to his supervisor. I told him to be careful and turned to follow my people who were at the end of the block by now.

When I got down to the end of the block, we pulled around the corner where I told everyone what had happened and what Mercy had felt. They looked puzzled but asked me what they should do. I said that I thought we should just go on to where ever we were going, because we would be in the way, and we couldn't endanger the women.

Sandy said, "We can't leave them when they need help."

"Look, Sandy, none of us are carrying, because you can't legally carry inside a bar, and we're going to several. Those guys back in those three cars are probably all armed. The cops are sending people."

I had another thought so I asked, "Charlie, let me use your bike a second."

Shawna and Charlie got off and I rapidly rode down the street to the detective's car and as he rolled down the window I said, "Fuck it, just have some squads roll up and block those cars real quick. Do you have some close?"

"Real close, let me get six of them real fast."

I said, "Listen, when they get in position tell them to turn on their lights. That will screw up anything inside the fence. I'm not going to be popular for this but it might keep the violence down."

"Good idea, the lieutenant will be happier about taking action. I'm bringing the swat team with the squads."

Pleading, I asked, "Keep them out of the yard, there's no reason to go in. Treat those guys with respect and you'll get it back."

"Yeah, I know. I'm not seeing anything bad going on lately. They're policing themselves pretty good. They do have a bad way to remove problem people though."

I told the officer, "Live with it, they take care of their own."