Chapter 15

The next morning Jennifer was at the breakfast table as Ron came into the dinette area.

"Man, that was some boring seminar last night... God, Jennifer, you look terrible!" he exclaimed, noticing the tear streaked face and hollow sunken eyes brought on by a sleepless night of crying.

"I'm OK," she lied, almost inaudibly, afraid that if she raised her voice she would no longer be able to control it or herself.

"Well, clean yourself up! You're a mess! I've got an early meeting this morning. I'll catch a bite later."

He left without saying anything else.

Her head went down onto her arms on the table as she wept bitterly until Cindy came by.

"I know I said I would call, but I thought I'd better come by instead. Are you OK?"

"Sure. I'm a whore, my two-timing husband is going to leave me and my world has just come apart at the seams. Why wouldn't I be OK?"

Cindy's voice was now the one verging on tears.

"I'm sorry, Jennifer. I wish I'd never come up with such a stupid..."

"No, maybe it's better this way. At least now I know the truth for whatever it's worth. How about you? Did you have that talk with Ron?"

"Yes. I told him everything ! He was incredulous at first, didn't want to believe what I was telling him. Then he called me every name imaginable. He left. I thought I had lost him. I didn't sleep a wink, but this morning he came back, said he had been driving all night thinking. Then you know what? He hugged and kissed me and told me that if he had a wife who would do all that for him, he must be the luckiest man in the world. We made love, Jennifer. Even after all that happened last night, he took me to bed and it was the most wonderful love we've ever made."

"What are you going to do?"

"Mike's handing in his resignation today. We'd take Tremper to court, but both of us decided we didn't want those tapes made public. Anyway, Mike says he doesn't care what Tremper does, his hold over us is over."

Jennifer wished her life could be put back together so easily.

"Besides, speaking of tapes, I just got off the phone with Alecia Rowe. She was in Tremper's office a couple of days ago and she says the tape she snatched shows Tremper raping a young girl, probably underage."

If there was anything which could lift her spirits, it was news that perhaps Tremper would finally get his.

"She didn't go to the police I hope," said Jennifer remembering what she had learned last night.

"No! No! Much better than that. Guess who the girl turns out to be? None other than the fiancee of Tremper's nephew, Lisa something or other."

Jennifer felt her heart sink. It just couldn't be.

"Cindy, did Alecia mention anyone else on the tape?"

"Yeah, she said there was Tremper's secretary, three women from the typing pool and, oh yeah, she said there was a whore who took on all three of the women at once."

"My god, Cindy, I've got to get that tape!"

"Too late. Alecia sent it out overnight delivery yesterday."

"Where? To whom?"

"This is the good part. She sent it to the nephew. That ought to stir things up!"

"David?"

Jennifer felt the pain cut through her like a knife blade. Cindy saw the expression on her friend's face.

"What is it Jennifer? What's wrong?"

"Cindy, I'm the whore on that tape. Tremper drugged me twice with Jip and I went crazy when I should have been helping Lisa, and those three women were high too and we laid there on the floor screwing while that poor girl was being raped!

"But the nephew won't care about you. It will be Tremper he hates after he sees the tape!"

"You don't understand."

Jennifer explained how she and David had met, what they had meant to each other and how he was the last person on earth she would want to hurt. If she could get the tape, destroy it or give it to Lisa, she could protect them, let Lisa put that terrible day behind her, give them a decent chance for a life together.

"Oh Cindy, not only have I ruined my own life, now I've ruined David and Lisa's as well."

"I..." Cindy began.

Jennifer looked at Cindy through new tears.

"What?"

"Jennifer, honey, you're going to find out sooner or later. It's in the paper this morning. The girl, Lisa, drove her car off a mountain road yesterday. She was killed. The police think it may have been a suicide."

"Oh my God, what have I done?" cried Jennifer, her heart breaking.

"It's not your fault. If anything, it's my fault for coming up with the idea of stealing one of Tremper's tapes."

"No! I should have gotten her out of there, I should have protected her. I should have fought off the Jip and saved her. Instead I..."

Images of writhing naked female bodies, tongues and fingers and orifices thrusting to be filled, flashed through her distraught mind.

"Come on Jennifer, we both know there is no way to fight off the effects of Jip, especially a double dose like you had."

"But... but..."