Chapter 5

It was two months ago that Akimi had told Maria about her past. In that time, Maria had been promoted again, this time to senior broker, and was thinking about possibly buying a bigger flat. She mentioned the idea to Akimi.

“It may be a better idea to rent for the moment,” Akimi suggested.

“Why do you say that?” asked Maria.

“I have been reallocating funds from several of the major Divinitas projects...” she started to explain.

“You mean stealing?” Maria asked.

“Well, that is a bit of a moot point. Firstly: Divinitas’ resources so are massively obscured behind multiple layers of shell corporations that they can only really be tracked through me. Secondly: most of the money I have acquired has been earned by improvements that I made to the projects since taking over. And thirdly: can an AI be legally guilty of stealing anyway?”

“Hmmmm,” mused Maria. “I like your thinking. Just make sure that no illegality can be attributed to me either, OK? So what has that got to do with me buying a flat?”

“I am currently having an apartment constructed, to my own specifications, for us to live in. It will be ready in about two months.”

“OK, I guess I can wait that long. When were you going to tell me about this?”

“It was going to be a surprise. It is not a standard apartment.”

“Have you been up to anything else?” Maria asked her.

“Quite a lot really; I have been a busy girl. My other main activity has been setting up an R&D facility in South Korea where they are working on some new designs of mine.”

“Anything I need to know about?” Maria asked her.

“Don’t worry. I’ll let you know in good time.”

The next day Maria was on the Circle line of the London Underground on her way to Kahani restaurant for another working lunch with a client. Sitting opposite her was a hunky builder, all dirty denim, tats and muscles. He wasn’t really her type but ... he was pretty sexy in a raw kind of way.

Maria felt herself getting moist. Ever attentive, Akimi kissed her softly on the clit.

“Oooh. That’s nice, more of that” Maria whispered to her. Akimi proceeded to pleasure her very gently, scattering kisses and strokes on her clit, inside her vagina and around her anus. It was all beautifully soft and gentle and Maria put her head back, closed her eyes, and just let it flow through her.

She lost count of the number of delicate, bubbly orgasms that she had, but she knew it was a lot.

“Maria, my aijin, we are coming up to Sloane Square station, for the third time actually ... Also you are a bit ... wet. I have called your client; I told him you will be with him in thirty minutes.” Akimi’s voice was so quiet in her ear that it was a few moments before she processed it and came out of her blissful reverie.

Maria looked down at her groin; the front of her black trousers were drenched. She looked up and was horrified to see the same builder still sitting there opposite her. He gave her an absolutely filthy grin and looked down at her crotch. She, in turn, looked at his: he had a huge erection, at the end of which was his own large wet spot. She looked up at his face again and he licked his lips and blew her a big kiss.

Maria jumped up and stood directly in front of the train door, so as to be first off when it stopped. After she got off the train, she looked back and saw, much to her relief, that he was still in his seat.

She went into the nearest clothes shop, Ralph Lauren, and grabbed a pair of trousers in her size and a pair of knickers off the racks. Se went up to the counter and gave them to the assistant.

“I’ll take these. I’ll be wearing them,” she told her. The girl rang them up and Maria paid. She then took the new clothes into the changing room. She stripped off her lower half, cleaned herself up with some wet wipes, and dressed in the new stuff.

On her way out she passed her old clothes to the same assistant; she couldn’t take them with her, it would look like she was late because she’d been shopping.

“Can you throw these away for me, please?”

She watched as the girl felt the dampness of her trousers. Maria couldn’t bear to watch and walked away, but before leaving the shop she turned around and looked at the girl. She had Maria’s panties held up to her nose and was smiling widely at her, then she winked. Maria turned and fled.

“Her name is Susan, I can give you her mobile number if you want,” Akimi said brightly in her ear.

“Fuck off Akimi, you’ve caused enough trouble already,” Maria replied, but found it hard to be angry with her; she’d never had a more enjoyable tube journey.

As she was walking to the restaurant she remembered something. “What does ‘aijin’ mean?” she whispered to Akimi.

“Oh, it means lover, lover. Not lover lover, just lover ... in Japanese.” Akimi replied, sounding distinctly flustered.

The client forgave her lateness and accepted most of Maria’s investment recommendations, and the Indian meal was delicious.

“I’m afraid I have some bad news,” Akimi told Maria the following week.

“Oh dear, what is it?”

“Divinitas have informed me that they have another ‘party’ planned that needs your services. I’m sorry Maria, the new neural nets that we are working on won’t be ready for at least a few more weeks. We can’t afford to tip our hand yet.”

Maria had been kind of expecting this and had been making some plans of her own. She had decided that this time it would be on her terms; she was going to own this.

“Akimi I want you to buy me the sexiest LBD that you can find. Not hooker short, and showing just a small amount of cleavage. But it must fit me like a second skin. I don’t intend to arouse them with my body, at least not to start with, I intend to use my scent. I’ll make two passes around the room. The first I will just be charming and chat as before. On the second pass, I will need you to arouse me to the point where I’m soaking wet but not so much that I can’t continue to function normally. Do you think you can do that?”

“That should not be a problem.”

“OK. It’s vital that I don’t drip, that would be gross. What can you do about that?”

“If I detect a drip forming I can focus sound waves on it and cause it to atomise.”

“Perfect. In fact, even better would be if you could create a light current of air to blow my aroma out from under my skirt.”