Chapter 10: Revelation

“Claiming the right to exclude you in general, I invite you in for just this one night. You can leave your robe outside.” He looked at her, and then stripped off his robe. He threw it somewhere and stepped through the door. His erection was growing while he walked towards her. She led him by the hand to the chair. He sat straight in it. He was wearing nothing but a bracelet that Valerie must have made for him the same time she had made Diane’s.

With him sitting in the chair seeing his own reflection everywhere he looked, she stepped behind one of the open doors and into that closet. She hung up her robe and stepped around the door -- being careful not to move it and alter the reflections. She was now in front of him stark naked. He could probably see all sides of her nakedness in the mirrors.

“Look up,” she said. When she did, she bent over and kissed him. When his tongue entered her mouth, her tongue pushed against it. She broke the kiss by straightening up. Then she moved forward straddling his legs. Even with her body lowered by that, her nipples were in danger of smearing his glasses. She bent slightly forward, though, and he raised his head. She shifted so that her left nipple entered his mouth.

He licked that nipple and then sucked it. She had intended this game to arouse him, and she could see that it had. It also, however, was arousing her. She shifted so that her right nipple was in his mouth, and the heat built up again. She moved back, held his face in both her hands, and then moved farther forward until his face was buried in her cleavage.

He brushed the backs of his fingers up the insides of her thighs, and she shivered. Then he parted her outer labia with one hand. She could tell he found her wet. She reached down to his penis. He scooted forward in his chair, and that pressed his penis into her fingers. She kept her left hand on his penis as she straightened up. She used her right hand to turn his head.

That way, she could be sure that he was watching as she lowered herself onto him. He parted her labia with one hand, and she adjusted the direction of his penis. Then she lowered herself further and felt his glans between her labia. She moved the penis forward to just the right position. Then she lowered herself more and felt him go in. She relaxed her legs slowly and impaled herself on him.

Finally, she was sitting on his legs with her legs parted around his body and the back of the chair. Her vagina was full of him, and his pubic hair was tickling her clitoris. She kissed his forehead, and he kissed the side of her left breast.

“Can you see us?” she asked.

“Oh, yes.” With that reassurance, she began moving up and then back down. This was for him, but there was no reason she shouldn’t enjoy it, too. She adjusted her motions and her posture to rub her G-spot over his glans, in just the right way. The heat was gathering, from turning him on, from being displayed so wantonly, and finally from the physical stimulation. He had one hand grasping her right glute, but his other went between her legs to stroke her clitoris.

That brought the heat higher, and she gritted her teeth and tensed her muscles to resist the orgasm she could feel coming. One of the muscles she tensed was her vagina, and she felt his rubbing against her G-spot even more intensely. Somehow, Eric’s penis seemed to swell even larger. She was about to lose control, when Eric lost his first.

“Oh, God!” he said. She rose up until only his glans was within, and she felt him pulse within her. Then she dropped down on him and let herself go. The flames began where he was rooted into her at the bottom of her vagina, and they shot all the way up to the top of her head.

Meanwhile, Eric was clutching her right glute in a death grip and was sobbing. When he relaxed that hand and she sagged against him, there didn’t seem to be any muscles in his usually-hard body.

“Darling,” he said much later.

“Merry Christmas,” she said. She started to get up slowly. When his penis slipped out, a good deal of his semen followed. She cupped her hand between her legs and ran into the bathroom. While using the toilet, she ran the water in the sink and rinsed off her hand. Then she used the bidet. She used the hand towel to dry her vulva off. When she came out, she tossed that into the hamper. She didn’t need a hand towel for her hands; she could use the bath towel. After where it had been, moreover, she wasn’t eager to use it on her hands. She dressed in her robe and closed the closet doors she’d used.

When she went into the bedroom, Eric was already under the sheet, but he was still wearing his glasses. She took off her robe and hung it on the clothes tree. She got into bed as though she were indifferent to his ogling.

“You can take your glasses off, now,” she said. “The show is over for the night.” He did take them off, and she heard him set them on the night stand.

“Thank you very much for my Christmas gift,” he said. “It’s what I’ve always wanted.” They shared a little chuckle at his deliberately cliched thanks.

“Well, I’ve always heard about the pleasure of giving. That was a gift that I definitely enjoyed giving.”

“Oh,” he said, “I love you.” He turned off the light, and they settled into a spoon.

If the alarm came too soon, it woke her from a comfortable sleep. Showered, dressed, and carrying her gifts and the stethoscope, she went down for breakfast.

“Do you have a grocery bag and some small boxes?” she asked Mrs. Grant. “I’m going to eat some of these delicious cookies myself, but I’m going to a new service today, and I’ll use judicious shares of them to make friends of three shifts of nurses.”

She brought her the bag, which would conceal what she was bringing with her, and also three Tupperware containers.

“Are you sure?” she asked. “I’m not certain that I can get them back.” Mrs. Grant looked at Eric.

“If that look means that they’re mine to give away, take them with my blessings,” Eric said. “Whether the kitchen equipment is mine or Madeleine’s is a semantic question.”

“It’s all yours, Mr. Barnes,” Mrs. Grant said. “Just don’t mess with it without telling me.” Eric grinned at Diane, and she grinned back.

“Look,” Eric said as they started off in the car, “I’m not allowed to speak to you tonight. So, can we make a date, however tentative and subject to your state in two days, for tomorrow night?”

“You aren’t getting tired of me?”

“I’m not. Did I seem tired of you?”

“Well,” she said, “you suggested that I sleep in another room.”

“Darling. I love to have sex with you. When, for reasons of your own, sex is not permitted me, my next choice is to sleep with you in my arms but chastely. When that isn’t permitted, then you are quite welcome to have dinner at the Barnes house and sleep separately. When that is not permitted, I would also like to have dinner with you if only at the hospital cafeteria. That seems to be forbidden.”

“Well, I actually like sleeping in your arms, too. Stop smirking; there’s a ‘but’ coming. While I enjoy that, I give up a lot for these evenings. I only have so much time away from the hospital, and recently all of that has been spent with you.”

“And I’m grateful,” Eric said. “You gave me a Christmas gift last night. Does that mean I’m allowed to give you my gift?”

“You were supposed to have returned that.”

“Well, I haven’t had enough time.”

“Return it,” she said. “I can just hear, ‘This is my Christmas gift from Eric;’ ‘Oh, what did you give him?’ Anyway, for what I give up, I’m not sure that cuddling is enough. I want the full nine yards.”

“Okay. May I smirk now?”

“Feel free. Anyway, I really have to go to the apartment tomorrow night. My family has sent me Christmas presents, and I haven’t opened them. That was the phone call I got. I was vague, and my sister-in-law twigged that I hadn’t opened them. At which point my other sister-in-law twigged about you.”

“About me?” Eric asked. “She found out that I’m the most charming man on the west coast just from that short conversation?”

“She didn’t even find out how egotistical you are. She figured out that I was seeing a man. That was enough to set off my brother, who shouldn’t even have been on the phone at that time.”

“Well, your car is at your apartment. That’s my fault. I could pick you up and take you there. Then, when you have the packages, we could continue on to the Barnes house.”

“Persistent guy, aren’t you?” she asked.

“Well yes. On the other hand, the last time I was any less persistent, when I suggested as an alternative to what you’d resisted, that you might sleep elsewhere, you saw me as getting colder. I don’t really want to pressure you.”

“You just want me to agree.”

“Precisely,” he said. “You’ve put your finger on the answer. I know that nagging can be annoying. If you would just agree the first time you’re asked, I won’t ever nag you.”

She laughed, and he joined in her laughter. Most of the humor came from the truth of the comment. She could make her own space, what space the hospital wasn’t occupying in her life, but that meant shoving him out of it. Still, if the choice was the annoyance of living with him or the dull ache of living without him, she would choose annoyance for now.

“You’re supposed to honor a line if I draw it firmly enough.”

“I try to. When did I not?”

“Well, the gift,” she said. “You keep bringing that up.”

“I’m sorry, darling. You’re right, and I apologize.”

“If I jumped out of this car the way the cat jumped out of my window, I might cause an accident.”

“Right,” Eric said. “But we have so few places to talk honestly. Will you call me tonight?”

“Well, that’s better. If you get too persistent, I can hang up. But, that’s an alternative to this. So, we won’t talk now.” And, having been given a firm-enough line, Eric said not another word. That’s what she had asked for, if not quite what she needed. But, if she couldn’t say quite what she needed, she couldn’t expect him to intuit it.

Maybe she needed him to be half as intense and stay interested twice as long. If he needed so much from her, why was he going to leave her? Well, maybe he hadn’t left the others; maybe he had driven them away. His wife had stayed with him for years, how many Diane wasn’t sure, but Valerie had been two when she died. That meant three years of marriage unless they had married because he had made her pregnant. Even so, they had been together at least three years. Had Eric been that possessive with her, or is this something he’d developed after her death?

Perhaps, she suddenly thought, he was possessive because of his wife’s death. He’d lost the woman most important in his life, and he wasn’t going to let any other woman go. But hadn’t he told her that his wife had found him too possessive? Of course, that didn’t mean that he’d been this possessive.

Well, he was obeying orders. It really wasn’t all Eric’s fault. The deal was that they would enjoy each other, and then they would part friends. And she had certainly enjoyed Eric the previous night. It wasn’t really something he had plotted that she’d fallen in love with him. When he got her to the entrance she used, she held a finger to his lips to keep him silent. Then she leaned over and kissed him.

Eric savored the kiss as he drove home. It was a pale shadow of the sexual power of the previous night. It felt more married, though. Well, it was a different part of being married. Something was wrong with a marriage where the man wanted the woman sexually and the woman wanted the man’s support. The woman should have sexual desire, too, and occasionally act on it. Laura had. She’d never accepted that her pregnancy had added to her beauty, but she’d tempted him occasionally with tastes of her milk later.

But getting a good-bye kiss when you dropped your spouse off at work, that was almost as good as her wearing his ring. Now, if only he could keep her to that. While this thought was still in his head, his cell rang. It was Murphy’s ring tone. He turned into the nearest alley he could find and answered it.

“Yeah.”

“Boss, call Malleta. It sounds big.” It would be silly to have Murphy screen his calls and not call when she said call. As nothing was coming at him from either side of the alley, he called from there.

“Eric here, Andrew.” Malleta was Dendarii Software Incorporated’s CFO. He was new, as Eric termed anyone who had not known Laura. He was good at his job, but prickly over the easy familiarity among the old timers. So, Eric was careful to always use first names with him.

“You know that the Carlson Solutions had a huge loss over the last six months?” Malleta asked.

“Yeah, they went into a tailspin after Carlson himself had a heart attack. Still, the programmers are there, and the brand is good. I think the merger will open up another kind of market for us.”

“Well, since they’ll have a loss for the year, our taxes will be better if the merger happens this year.”

“This year?” he asked. “As in the next five days?”

“Yeah, and a great deal of their reputation in their market will take a hit if they file their year-end report and the business press gets hold of it.” Malleta was probably right.

“So okay. You in the office?”

“Yeah. Can you get here?” Malleta asked.

“Ten, fifteen minutes.” He called Madeleine to tell her that he wouldn’t be home for Sparky that day -- and maybe not for dinner either. Indeed, he was still in the office when Diane phoned. Murphy got up immediately and led Malleta out.

“Look,” she said. “I really have things to do at the apartment. I can’t stretch myself for another visit tomorrow.”

“It’s probably just as well, really. I’m at the office, and we’re in crisis mode here. It’s opportunity, not disaster, so don’t worry. Look, if I can’t get away tomorrow night, do you want me to send somebody to get you from the hospital to your apartment? It’s my fault that you’re there and the car’s at the apartment.”

“No it’s not. You might be the occasion, but it was my decision. I don’t mind the trip by bus at night. It’s a little different when it’s before dawn and you’re rushing to work. Look, I said I’d hang up if you got too pushy, didn’t I?”

“Yeah,” he said.

“So, I’ll see you the twenty-ninth.” And he was holding a dead phone in his hand. He went out to get Murphy and Malleta.

He was actually out of the office and home when Diane’s ring tone sounded on the twenty-eighth.

“Pardon me, Sparky. Daddy has to get this.” He went into the library. “This doesn’t sound like good news,” he said on his way to the computer room.

“The first rule of salesmanship is, ‘Let the customer say “no.” Never say it for him,’” Diane responded. “You can pick me up tomorrow night. It’s just that you’ll have to come to the apartment. I have things to bring and a car to leave.”

“That’s great. And the time?”

“Aim at six fifteen,” Diane said. “It’s all laid out, and I’ll just grab it and head back down.”

“Love you.”

“Love you, too.” That was something that Diane seldom said.

When Diane had put her things in her room, she had gone to her new assignment. It was the Infectious Diseases service. They kept all the kids in small private rooms, and the anti-contagion precautions which the entire hospital used were intensified. Most of those infections weren’t airborne, but they could be spread by contact. Practicing pediatrics without holding kids was a strain. On the other hand, these kids needed the staff.

Before she went to the service, she checked her cell. There were three calls from Norm’s cell, one from Greg’s, and three from the house in Minneapolis. She deleted all of them. Then she used Eric’s trick. She shuffled those three numbers into a special group called ‘Family’ and set that ring tone as silent. After that, she practiced medicine all day.

Still, when the day ended, she knew that she had to deal with her family, and that meant that she had to be at her apartment to do the dealing. She called Eric to let him know, and Eric said that he was dealing with a crisis himself.

Maybe the secret of dealing with Eric was to refuse him more often. She had provided him with the hottest sex experience she could dream up on Christmas, and, the next morning, he’d pressed her to spend more time with him. She’d said a definite ‘no,’ and he’d said it might be for the best.

She didn’t know the nurses on her new floor. She especially didn’t know the night shift. When she got a call from the floor, she dressed and went down. She filled one of the Tupperware containers with cookies first. She dropped the container at the nurse’s desk before dealing with the issue, and she spent ten minutes socializing with them when the crisis was resolved. She came away with an opinion of which ones she should respect and which she should come down in any dubious situation. She also had a feel for their voices, although voices over the phone could be different. The next call, she could deal with without rising.

The next day, she stopped at her room after lunch and brought the new shift another container of cookies. She dropped back to the floor after she got off, and she handed out the last container of cookies. She’d eat the last few herself.