Chapter 19

Libby and I were soon back into slow and tender action, with plenty of pauses as I kissed the back of her neck, or her shoulders, or reached around and gently stroked her clit or tits.

Quite the contrast to the total frenzy of our previous coupling.

This wasn’t all about lust and passion.

It was tender and loving and joyful.

I was making love to my friend, and from the way she was behaving, she was just lapping it up.

Not that it wasn’t totally amazing for me also.

Our eyes were fixed on each other as I took long slooooow strokes to our mutual finish, the expression in her lovely eyes reflecting her pleasure and delight.

Once again, I didn’t want to let go; I was trying to will my dick to remain erect, keep that most intimate connection going.

But I’m only human. I shriveled and fell out. Libby moaned in disappointment as we lost that physical link and clutched me tighter.

After a few minutes, when the endorphin rush subsided, we went through to the bathroom to take a shower together – purely for the fun of gently caressing each other’s bodies with slick soapy hands.

Man, does Libby keep herself in great physical shape! I hadn’t been exaggerating all that much when I suggested that Libby could almost pass for Toni’s sister, rather than mother.

Once we were squeaky clean and out of the shower, huge soft white hotel towels wrapped around our torsos, I used the hairdryer to blow-dry her hair. She purred with pleasure as I massaged her scalp before brushing her golden locks.

Though it was just as well she favors an easy-care style. Anything involving rollers or plaiting / braiding would have been way above my pay grade as an absolute beginner hairstylist...

But now that Laura and Jess have taught me, I can brush a girl’s hair with the best of them.

Yep, no doubt at all. The soft chirps of pleasure Libby was emitting were absolutely the human equivalent of purring. Quite different from the sounds she makes during passion.

Back in the bedroom, we rearranged the pillows, over-sheet and comforter to suit sleep rather than lust.

My hostess made a quick call to the concierge desk downstairs, “Hi, it’s Mrs. Van Allen. Would you please book me a morning call at six? ... Great, thanks.”

Once she’d put the phone back on the hook and was shuffling down the bed, I asked, “Libby, mind if I ask a very personal question?”

“Sure, honey. As long as you don’t mind if I refuse to answer if I decide it’s TOO personal.”

Her response was accompanied by a wide grin, so I reckoned the bar for refusal was set pretty high. It’s not like we hadn’t gotten a whole lot closer in the twelve months since ‘Mrs. Van Allen’ had become ‘Libby’, emotionally as well as physically.

And my question had been triggered by her use of ‘it’s Mrs. Van Allen’.

“Uh, if your divorce was so acrimonious, why on earth did you keep his name?”

She grinned, seeming relieved that it hadn’t been a more intrusive enquiry, “Fair question, Mike. You know something? Originally, I was so angry when I found out he was cheating on me, I was hell bent on reverting to my maiden name to make clear to him he was ancient history, that I didn’t want ANY reminder of him.”

Her smile was now a half-frown, “I was so fricking mad at him I wasn’t thinking straight. Once I found my attorney, she calmed me down, made me think long term. Did I really want to use a different name from my kids? I’d spent years building up my professional reputation as a Van Allen and changing the name would have lost much of that. So I kept the family name, but use it as if I was his widow, you know how etiquette has it? I’m Mrs. Libby Van Allen, not Mrs. Clayton Van Allen. A tiny little thing, but it’s like a persistent irritation in his psyche.”

She let out a small chuckle which matched a twinkle in her eyes, “It seriously pisses him off whenever someone does a web search for ‘Van Allen Attorney’ and gets me as well as him; enough of them ask him if we’re related for it to keep the irritation working. And, as a bonus, The Skank thought SHE would be Mrs. Van Allen and receive prime placement; we were both at a big awards dinner the year after the divorce and I happened to see her face as they announced me as ‘Mrs. Libby Van Allen’ in the shortlist. I almost felt sorry for the bitch. Almost. She looked like she was chewing a lemon, an unripe and especially bitter lemon. I’m guessing he didn’t get laid for quite a few days, not until she’d worked off her anger on his credit cards.”

I laughed as I imagined how that must have looked.

I hadn’t met – and never would meet – ‘The Skank’, as Libby named her ex-husband’s former secretary, but I could almost see that sour expression on the surgically-enhanced face that I remembered from a photo Toni had shown me. Her ex might have a second wife ten years younger than his first, but he had absolutely traded WAY down. What a fool!

“It’s such a shame you didn’t win!”

She laughed out loud, “I never thought I was seriously in the running that year. I was surprised to be nominated; I’d been too distracted with the divorce. I did get together afterwards with a few girlfriends, and we came up with an eloquent acceptance speech which graciously thanked her for ridding me of the two-hundred-ten pounds of useless limp-dicked ballast that had held me back for so long...”

“Ouch! Do you have a copy I could read?”

“No. Unfortunately, we were so intoxicated by the time we’d composed it that nobody could remember much the morning after – though I do recall a whole lot of laughter and shrieks of delight. Knowing my girlfriends, it would have been totally actionable, but nobody would have wanted such assertions read out in court.”