Chapter 1

"Thanks, Marc. I had a good time."

Marc could hear the equivocation in Barbara's voice, but went in for a kiss anyway. Still, he wasn't surprised when she turned her head so that his lips found only a cheek. He'd been hoping for more. The date had gone badly at the start, when he'd mentioned that he was responsible for all of the building being done a mile up County Road 49 from her house. He'd thought she would be impressed. Instead, he got another lecture on the trees he was cutting down and the animals she imagined he'd be killing. To hear her talk, it sounded like she thought he was going to be out in the woods wringing Bambi's neck with his bare hands by morning.

Maybe she did. Either way, Marc got more than enough of that shit every time he went in front of the planning board. People were never so ungrateful as when you were building them houses and creating jobs.

As he kissed her cheek, Barbara gripped Marc's hand and shook it. Then, she turned and went up the walk to her front door.

Marc stood and watched her go, professional smile plastered on his face until she closed the door. Then, he groaned, "God help me. Three hundred dollars on dinner and I get a handshake ... from a waitress."

Since there was nothing else for it, he got back in his car, punched one of the presets on his radio, then fiddled with the MP3 player until Mozart's Die Zauberflote poured out of the speakers. He stroked the leather dashboard and whispered, "Sorry, Sweetie."

The car started up smoothly, purring like a cat, but Marc thought there might be a hint of resentment. Two thousand dollars worth of high-end sound system had been pressed into service to transmit the reedy warble of some pop queen probably chosen more for how she looked in a sweater than any actual musical talent.

This date was an all-time low. Marc had asked Barbara out because she was pretty and seemed like she would say yes. She was a waitress in the diner he ate in whenever he had to go talk to one of his foremen. A string of fruitless dates had made him desperate.

Even after the initial faux pas, Marc had thought he might have a chance. Barbara hadn't left. She'd agreed to stay and have dinner. A couple of glasses of wine had gotten the conversation going again. She'd even laughed at his jokes a couple of times. He'd hoped the crappy music might seal the deal. Instead, he'd wound up with a handshake and an ache in his balls that felt like it might be fatal.

The absurdity of his predicament didn't escape him. Thirty-four years old with a case of blue balls like he was sixteen again. He considered driving to the construction office. He would have an Internet connection and the place to himself. On the other hand, once he got home, he would have to deal with the babysitter and his son, Adam.

Thinking of the babysitter made his balls ache harder. The rational part of his mind recoiled at the reaction, but Marc gave it about as much attention as he had the hippie who'd called him a "wilderness raping monster" because his development was going to kill off the pink-assed tree frog or some other made up sounding "endangered species." Thinking about the hippie made his balls ache, too. She probably had hairy armpits and reeked of patchouli up close, but right now, Marc would happily bend her over a tree stump and fuck her until she screamed Kumbaya.

Clearly, Marc's frustration was making him unfit for human company. He couldn't face the babysitter like this. At the best of times, Tamara inspired impure thoughts. Girls her age had no business looking like little strippers. They certainly hadn't when he'd been fifteen. Supposedly, it was something they put in milk these days.

As he saw the turn-off to the construction office coming up, Marc made a snap decision and turned off onto the dirt road. He wouldn't be long and, if anyone saw him, he could claim he was looking up something about one of the interminable stream of permits he was applying for.

There was nobody in the parking lot he pulled into. The trailer that acted as the project's office was dark. Deactivating all the alarms took a few minutes, but did nothing to quell the urgency.

Marc didn't bother to turn on any lights, finding his way through the outer office by feel. He locked the inner office door behind him and threw himself down in the chair behind his desk. He cursed quietly, wondering why he hadn't bought a faster computer. Cost cutting had a way of biting you in the ass at the damnedest of times.

Marc's e-mail client popped up. He was about to close it when he saw a message marked, "IMPORTANT. E-mail subpoena." It was from his brother Todd, who was also his lawyer. He clicked it open, already thinking about which web site would get him off fastest so he could get home and get some sleep.

As he read the contents of the message, Marc groaned out loud. Todd was outlining a request by one of the protest groups to have his company's e-mail accounts reviewed by the court for ... He skimmed over what it was exactly. He wasn't stupid enough to do anything incriminating in his official e-mail account. But, a request for e-mail could easily turn into a request for web caches. He couldn't surf porn from here without risking it having come out in court later.

His mind raced as he tried to come up with an innocuous site that would provide some good wank material. He closed his eyes and unbuckled his pants.

When the idea hit him, Marc's eyes flew open. His heart pounded in his chest. Getting caught would be ... well, pretty much the end of his life. But, he wasn't going to get caught. He was behind two locked doors, a burglar alarm, and a padlocked fence. He'd be more likely to get caught in his own house. And, even if anybody figured out from a log what the site was, he had a perfectly legitimate reason to be checking it at this hour.

Extracting a card from his wallet, he typed in the web address he'd written down and the credentials that went with it. After the longest ten seconds he could ever remember, the feed from his nanny cam came up on the screen.

The image was grainy, but Tamara was sitting directly in front of the camera, on his living room couch. Marc squinted and leaned in, trying to see the image more clearly. When he did, he leapt to his feet and started buckling his pants, all thoughts of masturbation gone.

Marc slid his shoes off as he eased the back door of his house closed. He'd parked Sweetie around the corner, unsure of how he would explain having done so if it came up. He decided it was a necessary risk.

It probably wasn't that necessary. In the living room, the TV was on and loud enough to mask his approach. If he'd been an actual intruder, he could have had his hands around Tamara's throat before she even knew he was there.

Instead, he got right up behind the couch, looking down at the babysitter and said loudly, "Tamara, what the hell are you doing?"

The girl jumped and gave a little shriek. Marc gasped as he realized she could have easily dropped the baby. But, she cradled Adam's head so well that his little mouth stayed on her breast and he didn't even open his eyes.

Tamara panted and looked up at Marc, "Mr. Heywood. I didn't hear you come in."

"What are you doing?" Marc demanded again.

Tamara didn't glance down or cover up. One side of her pink tank top was down, exposing a firm, ripe breast. Adam's tiny hands gripped it, his mouth attached like a lamprey to the nipple. The babysitter covered his ear with the hand that cradled his head. She made a shusshing noise and said in a stage whisper, "Don't shout. I finally got him to sleep."

"I..." Marc's consternation wasn't feigned, "He can't be getting anything from that. You're not lactating. Are you?"

"I..." Tamara frowned and seemed to take a second to process the word, "No. But, he was crying and wouldn't take his bottle. This was the only thing that quieted him down."

"You..." Marc came around the couch and sat down next to the girl. Some inane talk show was on TV. He took the remote and clicked it off. "Tamara, you can't do that. Give him to me."

Tamara looked like she wanted to argue. But, she pulled the infant away and handed him to his father. Marc's eyes stayed on the exposed, saliva-covered aureole. When she pulled the top up, a small, wet mark appeared, framing the erect nipple that poked through the thin cloth.