Chapter 33: All About Stella

Four forty-five came 'WAY too damned early; Ed woke to a loud yammering. "What the fuck! Where is that goddamned thing?" He reached out blindly, but couldn't find it with his hand -- but there was a lamp there... Funny, his night table was on the other side...

The light flared just as a plaintive voice whined, "Ah cain't reach it wit' yo' on toppa me..." Startled, Ed found himself looking into Big Velma's soft brown eyes... Recovering himself, he snatched the noisy alarm clock off the night table, "Kill it!" Into the sudden silence, he muttered, "Damn, it ain't even five yet!"

"Ah gots folk ta feed..."

"Not for a while, you don't!"

Well, that was true. But Velma had her pattern, which included a little masturbation, and a nice long shower, afterward... This morning, well, she could pass on the masturbation -- but the shower was going to be necessary to work the soreness out of some muscles that hadn't seen that kind of use before -- and besides, she was lying in a puddle... "Ah gotta clean up afore Ah goes ta work -- bein' some big bastid done raped me..."

"I didn't rape your big black ass -- can't rape the willing! I've probably got finger marks where a certain hippo grabbed my damned arm! Besides, I was drunk!"

"Yo' wasn't no drunk!"

"That's my story, and I'm stickin' with it!"

"An' Ah was raped! Dat's MY story, an' Ah'm stickin' wit' IT, too!" Velma's eyes were dancing.

Time to move -- bitch was gonna kiss him in a minute, if he didn't. Ed got an evil grin on his face and rose straight up, taking the sheet -- and baring the big black woman to his gaze... Sheeit! Bitch was HUGE! Funny how that wasn't as important once you'd stuck your dick in it a couple of times, though...

Velma was ranting and raving and trying to cover up fourteen square feet of skin with two square feet of hand, scrunching up and babbling. "Shut the fuck up, woman -- I sucked them titties last night and I laid all over the rest of that shit! The least you can do is let me look at it!"

"You know Ah'm fat, an' Ah know Ah'm fat..."

"So what's the problem?"

"Ya don' havta embarrass da fook outta me wit' it!"

Shit. Now he WANTED to kiss her! Time to get out of here... "Awright, awright! Jeez! You gotta show a man what you look like, eventually!" He backed off the bed while she scrambled for coverage, hunting on the floor for his discarded jeans and shorts.

The realization that he was about to leave turned on the brave front: "You ol' bastid! Rapist! Ah'm ruined! Defiled! Yo' git yo' sorry ass outta here! An' don' come back!" Velma sat there in bed with her sheet pulled up over her ponderous breasts and pretended that she'd been taken advantage of -- because she KNEW if she made ANY move to keep him, Ed would be gone forever. As it was, Ed backed out of the room, grinning, his shoes in his hand, listening to all that manufactured outrage and knowing it for what it was... After the door clicked shut and Ed set off down the hall, grinning, the tears started, despite the smile on her face, "Yo' big beautiful fookin' bastid..."

When Inez staggered in at six, blinking the sleep from her eyes, Velma was humming to herself as she made biscuits. "Dat boy Nate, he lahks biscuits. Why don' yo' make somea dem tortilla things fo' da Boss, Honey?"

Inez watched Velma waddle across the kitchen, her gait reminiscent of her own after Master rode her AGAIN in his bed last night. If she didn't know any better...

Bianca, Nate, and Nora arrived almost simultaneously at six-thirty; the younger set had decided that aside from dinner, the dining room was a waste of time. Ed staggered in about six forty-five, looking extremely self-satisfied; Phillippe, Pete, and Jorge wandered in over the next few minutes. Ed made no move or statement that might have alluded to the activity of the previous night, but he was grinning like a Cheshire cat; Velma took it for a bit, then lumbered over to him and reached in her apron and tossed something at him. Ed found himself looking at a pair of wadded socks; Velma murmured, "Ah foun' dem..." and turned away, apparently unconcerned...

There wasn't an eye in the place that wasn't drawn to the action. The guys just didn't get it, the primary response being a mild question from Pete, "How'd she know they were yours?" None of them put two and two together -- Velma was unfuckable. But Inez took one look and her eyes got round; she glanced at Bianca, and HER eyes got round and swung to Velma, whose stance told her everything she needed to know...

"Velma?" Bianca asked timidly.

Velma shook her head fractionally -- not now! "What, Honey?"

Bianca thought fast, "Uh, do we have any bananas?"

"Shoah," Velma replied. "C'mere, Ah'll show ya where dey are..." She headed for the pantry.

Even Nora knew something was up by the way Bianca stumbled up to follow -- everyone female did, anyway. Inez merely watched, wide-eyed as her daughter followed the cook into the pantry. "Dey raht dere," Velma announced loudly as the door closed.

Bianca whirled on the big woman and hissed, "You and Ed?" Velma nodded gravely, and Bianca giggled, "How was it?"

"It was good, Honey. It was VERY good. Ah dunno how Ah's goin' do wit'out it, now..." Velma sighed, "We cain't talk, now -- mebbe later..."

The pair exited the pantry, but it took Bianca a moment to cover her look of absolute glee. Inez, who was watching, picked it up, and her eyes popped. The flick of a glance between them, Inez's eyes flicking from Velma to Ed and Bianca's nod told Nora what had happened as clearly as if it had been printed on a billboard. Suddenly, every female eye in the place was on Ed, who was watching for something similar, anyway, after the socks. "What?" he grunted, his tone guarded. "They're just socks..." Grabbing his coffee cup, he got out of there. At least three women were moved to titter, while the remaining males -- Nate included -- worried at what was so exciting about a pair of dirty socks?

Things glossed over about ten seconds later, when Sharon staggered in, barefoot in a thin robe, rubbing sleep from her eyes. "Armand wants coffee," she mumbled, "And those flat thi -- oh, good!" Her eyes swept over Inez removing a tortilla from the griddle. "And what the Hell is chorizo?"

"Mom?" Nora regarded her mother, eyes wide.

"Does it show?" Sharon replied, looking back. Ten minutes before, Sharon had flashed back almost two decades, waking to a swat on the rump and a grunt of, "Go get my breakfast, Bitch!" Armand had basically put a foot on her ass then and pushed her out of his bed; she'd gotten re-oriented while she got her feet under her, remembering a long, happy missionary-style pounding from Armand that eclipsed anything she'd had in a LOOOONG time...

Nora's eyes lidded. "Yeah, it shows." She turned a grin on Nate, who grinned back. EVERYBODY got it.

Sharon turned red. "You'd better give me that coffee, or he's likely to find a flogger. I'm sure he's probably decided he was too soft on me..." Velma chuckled and set her up with the Boss' needs, then returned to her other work as Sharon padded out, waddling a bit for what was obviously the same reason that apparently three-quarters of the other women in the house were...

Nate couldn't complain. Nora had gone to some lengths to remind him why he needn't look elsewhere -- like he had any urge to! The episode with Stella had been more or less accidental; if he'd had any inkling that he was going to end up in trouble from it, it would have never happened. Nora asked him to talk dirty to her, and he tried -- but it was HARD! There was a whole list of names his throat closed on when he tried to call her them. Bitch, slut, cunt, whore, twat... They wouldn't come out of his mouth! He settled for telling her things HE was going to do to her, someday -- fuck her ass, make her fat with babies, drink milk from her titties, pound her with his cock until she passed out from joy... There was nothing in there like the crap he told Stella; in the first place, he wasn't sharing Nora, period! When it was over, Nora eyed him sidelong and asked, "Nate, Honey, why didn't you call me dirty names?"

" 'Cause you ain't into it, an' it ain't how I think of ya," he replied evenly.

"Why didn't you talk about putting me out naked for others?" she prodded.

" 'Cause it's NOT FUCKING GONNA HAPPEN!" he roared.

"Oh, okay," she replied lightly, with a Mona Lisa smile, then proceeded to vacuum a second load out of his cock with her mouth. Nate pulled her ass around and drank pussy juice until they both were sated, and they went to sleep cuddled. The way things were going, when he had to move out of here, he was gonna be miserable... Nate nodded at Nora and the pair rose from the table and headed for school without a word being uttered.

Thursday morning was the worst morning of Darla Jean Nevins' young life! It seemed as if the events of the night before -- Ted's version, naturally -- were all over school by nine o'clock! Claudette Pinkersley had declaimed to all and sundry that she was a complete slut before lunchtime and she was unable to hold her head up. The one bright spot in the entire mess was the rumor that Dwayne had publicly taken issue with Ted's tale in gym class, leaving some of the boys, at least, confused as to what Darla Jean's actual status might be -- but the whole thing was somewhat undercut by the admission under pressure that, yes, they HAD had sex... Lunch time came, and Darla Jean discovered that she might possess six friends in the whole world -- two of them named Mary -- but they ALL wanted to know what had really happened!

Mary Eikenberry descended on her first. "Welcome to the Slut Patrol," she murmured, smiling crookedly. "So what REALLY happened?"

"Well, Dwayne and I were... you know... and Ted shows up... Basically, we weren't in a position to do a whole lot..."

"Why didn't Dwayne do anything?"

"You're kidding, right?" Darla Jean replied. "In the first place, we were, uhh, close, you know? In the second, well, Dwayne isn't up to taking Ted out..."

"That's what it would take?"

"You don't deal with Ted much, do you? He's just a little bit extreme... Asking him to leave merely got a grin from him."

"Uh huh," Mary replied, sidelong. "So, okay, what did he do, then?"

"Well, he, uhh, stuck his cock down my throat..." Mary tilted her head and her eyes popped, but another voice behind Darla Jean said, "Ummm, that's different..."

"Yikes!" Darla Jean jumped a foot! Behind her, grinning, stood Mary Nally. And behind HER stood Nora, Amy Kelleher, and Thelma Franken! "Oh, shit!"

"This is my fault," Mary Nally sighed. "I conspired to create a monster..."

"WE conspired!" Amy insisted, "I was in on it, too! And Thelma helped!"

"I did?" Thelma looked bemused.

"Well, I didn't!" Nora complained. "Will SOMEBODY tell me what's going on? Darla Jean?"

"I have NO IDEA what THEY'RE talking about, but my life is ruined!" Darla Jean replied.

"Because Ted stuck his dick down your throat?" Mary Nally rolled her eyes. "Okay, show of hands -- who here has sucked a cock..." It was unanimous. Darla Jean's eyebrows went up. Mary grinned. "What else?"

"Ummm, two guys at one time?"

Mary frowned. "Well, that's a shorter list, I bet. But I'm on it. In fact, Hon, that's what I was doing last weekend while you and Randall were playing hide the telescope..."

"You were?" Darla Jean was aghast.

"Yeah." Mary had the grace to color. "It wasn't the first time, and it wasn't the last. The, uh, rumors about me and Teddy and Stick Williams are true, mostly..." She shrugged. "Next!"

"Well, that's probably the bulk of it," Darla Jean sighed, "except for the fact that he was a total bastard about it. This blow-job..."

"Can I butt in, too?" Peggy's head appeared in the back.

Darla Jean rubbed her forehead. "Anyone got a loudspeaker?"

"Ted does," Mary Eikenberry offered. Everyone cracked up.

"Okay," Darla Jean sighed. "Fact is, Ted showed up while we were VERY busy, and he wouldn't leave. He wouldn't even be nice. He just basically took over, and neither of us was in any position to do much about it. The blowjob? It wasn't one, in MY book. He dragged me to the end of the bench so my head hung over, and just started ramming it down my throat..."

"EWWWWW!" Thelma exclaimed. "Nasty!"

"That's our Mr. Phipps," Mary Nally opined. "Did he cum?"

"No. Dwayne... finished first."

"And did you, Hon? With Dwayne?"

"Yeah. I made it -- no thanks to Ted!"

Since Mary Nally had taken over the interrogation, everybody else hung back and let her work. Eyeing her manicure, she said, "Ted says he fucked you, and that you put the rubber on him..."

"Well, yeah..." Darla Jean replied, defensively. "It was that or go bareback! Would YOU want to carry his bastards? He made it clear that we were gonna fuck, anyway..."

"You know how he makes it sound," Mary replied.

"Yeah. He dreamed it up on the spot, and had a gay old time telling me how he was going to present it -- but what could I do?" Darla Jean rubbed her face.

"Stop that, you're ruining your makeup," Mary admonished. "He says you came -- twice!"

Darla Jean hung her head. "True. He's a bastard, but I like it fast and furious -- and he was good that way..." She couldn't look up, but Mary Eikenberry rubbed her shoulders. Amy piped up, "It's true -- I thought she and Randall were gonna cause a cave in... Oops!"

Mary Nally chuckled. "Well, it wasn't THAT big a secret, although Randall managed to BASICALLY keep it under his hat. Dwayne might have, too, given a choice..."

"I think so," Darla Jean agreed.

"Okay," Mary prompted, "what DIDN'T Dear Ted tell the world?"

"I dunno if I ought to go on -- it probably won't help my case..." Darla Jean hedged.

"Confession is good for the soul -- Hell, we're your fan club, Hon..."

"Well, he got me going again, and then he pulled out and ripped off the rubber, and he shot it all over me -- and Dwayne, too. Dwayne took that pretty hard..."

"That's pretty sorry," Mary agreed. "So he left you hanging?"

"Yeah, he went off, laughing. But Dwayne came back and... finished me..." Darla Jean was hanging her head again. "Then he helped me clean up..."

"So, lemme get this straight," Mary recapped, "Ted's a bastard, but Dwayne's pretty decent?"

"Uh huh," Darla Jean agreed. "He's not my type, but he's okay. Gentle. Pretty good, if you like it slow and easy. He'll probably get better, too -- I think he was afraid he'd hurt me..." She shook her head. "And he DIDN'T treat me like garbage, afterward!"

"Well, girls," Mary Nally looked around, "it's time for the counterattack. The word needs to go out that Ted is a user and an abuser, and he twists the truth. We don't want anyone ELSE being taken in! Honey, you've got a little bit of nympho in you, but I do, too..."

"Me, too," Mary Eikenberry swore.

"I can't get enough," blushed Thelma.

"Me, too!" Nora added.

"... So I wouldn't get too upset about it," Mary finished. "We'll just have to find you a new man. By the way -- what was wrong with Randall?"

"Nothing," Darla Jean whispered, "Absolutely nothing."

Nonetheless, the afternoon sucked for Darla Jean. She was approached by several male 'volunteers' -- guys who wanted to take advantage of Darla Jean's apparent interest in cock. Some of them were pretty graphic about it, especially the REAL losers what had nothing to lose by doing it. Randall, standing down the hall, took in one of these episodes at a distance. "That sucks," he commented. "I feel responsible."

"Not your fault, Man," Jimmy Hightower replied. "The girls say she was as ready as you were. As for last night, Amy says Darla Jean's story is a good bit different than Ted's. It wasn't consensual, at least where Ted was concerned. Darla Jean and Dwayne were at it, and Darla Jean admits that wasn't the smartest thing -- but Ted just horned in and wouldn't leave, blackmailing and browbeating them both until they let it happen. Then he treated Darla Jean like shit and left Dwayne to clean up the mess. Toby says Dwayne's version matches Darla Jean's."

"This shit isn't all it's cracked up to be," Randall grunted. Louise Bryant had been appearing at odd intervals all day -- and she just did nothing for him.

"Well," chuckled Jimmy, who'd noticed, too, "if you're not going to be the senior class stud, you need to take yourself out of circulation."

"Assuming I'd want to, how the Hell would I do that?" Randall groused.

"Duh!" Jimmy rolled his eyes. "Get a girlfriend!"

Randall scratched his head -- not easy with his hair. "I think we need to do another Astronomy Club meeting. An inside thing, maybe? Image analysis? And try to get EVERYBODY..."

"Kewl. My place? I'll put out the word..." Jimmy moved off.

That morning, the "three Cucumbers" picture went out on the street, in eight-by-ten color glossy, with the caption, "This is what Rodday calls 'protection'." Paul Matheson had a long talk with Tabitha, and they checked her out of the hospital around noon and set her up with a room in Witherspoon's main safe house on the east side. Based on an idea Tabitha had in the car, a second photo was taken of Tabitha, proudly displaying her nipple studs and her tongue piercing (by going naked and unbandaged above the waist and sticking out her tongue), and throwing the finger at the camera. The implications were obvious... Her IV pole was carefully hidden, to maximize the effect.

When the photo shoot was over, Tabitha sidled up to Matheson, "Paul? When you gonna ask me for a little?"

Matheson looked flustered, something odd in a big guy with a brush cut and a moustache, "You don't owe me anything."

"Okay, I don't owe you anything," Tabitha agreed nonchalantly. "So when you gonna ask for a little?" She ran a finger along his jaw line.

Paul eyed the black woman. At the moment, she was fairly poorly displayed -- skinny, somewhat wasted, her saggy tits displaying their wounds (although they'd been minimized for the photo with makeup and other tricks). Still, the woman displayed a certain raw power, some of it sexual, and some of it just iron will... "When you've filled out a bit. Didn't the doctor say you needed to be down for a month?"

"Honey, I ain't gonna last no month without a dick! Ya forget when you're workin' it all the time that there's an itch ta be scratched in there -- it won't wait no month..."

Paul pulled a face. "Then I guess you'd better put on some weight, then, huh? You look like a bundle of sticks, and I've got a lot of stuff stored up and might get rowdy..."

"Oh, really? You gotta lotta stuff stored up?" Tabitha stepped in close and rubbed his crotch. "Mebbe we should see if this tongue thing," she stuck out her tongue and displayed the stud, "does anything for ya..."

"Tabitha!" Paul grabbed the offending wrist. "Behave yourself! Your tongue isn't healed, either -- I don't need to be pouring spunk over it!"

"Oh, c'mere, ya big pussy! We can at least try it out with a coupla things..." Tabitha pulled him down and started working his neck with her lips. Surprise pinned him for a moment, and pleasure for another -- and the battle was over. Paul carefully wrapped his arms around Tabitha's bare back. Tabitha backed off enough to regard him with heavy-lidded eyes and husked, "We could try a little kissin'..."

For such a skinny woman, Tabitha had plush lips. Paul found that he didn't have any problem with tongue-wrestling her -- but from his perspective, the stud got in the way. She winced a couple of times in the next thirty seconds, and Paul hunted some for blood, but didn't positively identify any. When she pulled back, she murmured, "That wasn't bad; I could probably give head, if I was careful -- but maybe you're right. Dammit, I'm awful itchy..."

"You're healing." Somehow, Paul hadn't let go. Tabitha didn't meet his concept of the ideal woman, but she brought some strange things to the table... He found himself rubbing her thin back.

Tabitha purred, "I'll give ya forty-five minutes to stop that..."

Paul smiled in spite of himself. "How are the breasts?"

Tabitha stepped back. "They're tits. Or jugs -- or mebbe udders, in my case. They hurt some. Check one out fer yourself..." Her eyes dared him to touch her.

"Crazy bitch," Paul murmured quietly, reaching out to cradle Tabitha's left breast. He pretended to be clinical about the examination, but spent most of the time wondering why the soft flesh aroused him -- certainly, it wasn't the most attractive one he'd ever seen -- or even handled. "How's the nail thing?"

"It's gonna be a little while..." Tabitha admitted.

"And the piercings? I like to play with nipples..."

"You want I should take 'em out?"

Paul blinked. "Why would you do that for me?"

"You ain't caught on, yet, have ya, ya silly bastard? I LIKE ya! Ya make me horny ta look at ya. Sumpthin... I cain't put a finger on it..."

"Oh." Surprise made him poker-faced. "THAT's new..."

"Kinda bass-ackwards, ain't it? Bein' chased..."

"Yeah." Paul pondered a minute. This had to be weird... "Look, we've got no future. Drugs..."

Tabitha waved it away. "I'm halfway ta clean already. But I need sumpthin' ta look forward to..."

"Hey, no guilt trips," Paul rolled his eyes. "What about when you go back to work?"

"I dunno." Tabitha shrugged. "You gotta thing 'bout hookers?"

"Not as a customer." Paul scratched his head. "I couldn't afford to. As a boyfriend, well, I'm not a pimp... How much do work and play get mixed up?"

Tabitha sucked her teeth. "I didn't play much," she admitted. "Work kinda took the fun outta it." She eyed him slyly, "Mebbe you'd take me away from alla this?"

"One crazy idea after another..." Paul chuckled. Still, there was something going on underneath all of this...

"I go wit' the flow," Tabitha mumbled. "Seems like the flow is goin' a different direction this week..."

"I guess. Still, it's the best offer I've had in a long time..."

"You don' wanna look a gift whore in the mouth!" Tabitha stuck out her tongue. Paul laughed, and she stepped in close, "C'mere, Baby." Paul wrapped his arms around her, and she whispered in his ear, "Are folk listenin' ta this?"

"Yeah." Paul found himself surprised. "There is monitoring," he whispered.

"Baby, you don' hafta buy the whole pig. I gotta itchy clit, an' I ain't used ta doin' myself. Why don' you come by tonight an' get em' ta turn off alla that crap, and we can find some way an' ol' broken-down whore can have fun?"

"Is that all there is to it?"

"Fer now..."

"Let me see what I can do." Paul turned his head and deliberately stuck his tongue in the black woman's ear.

"Eeek!" she shrieked, jumping back. "You silly bastard! Now my nipples is all hard!" She covered one, and waved a finger with her other hand, "I ain't mad, but I'll get even!"

"Trying to give me a hard-on isn't bad enough?" Paul laughed.

"Huh!" Tabitha twitched her head, nose in the air. "That's only a start!" She turned and grabbed up a towel, "Guess it's time to pack this shit back up." She covered her breasts. "You wanna send in whoever is gonna put me back in bandages?"

"Sure." Grinning, Paul backed out of the room.

Scott met him in the hallway. "What was THAT all about?" he asked, grinning.

Paul shrugged. "You undoubtedly heard what I heard..."

"So, she wants your pasty-white bod?"

"So she says..."

"And the whisper?"

"Caught that, did you?" Paul grinned. "She wants me to come back tonight and diddle her -- preferably without a lot of surveillance."

"Maybe she just wants to bust out."

"Why go to all that trouble? She could just ask Mr. Wilson. No, there is something else." Paul pondered a moment. "She's been standing on her own two feet for a long time -- but maybe this thing made her have second thoughts..."

"Can't be YOUR looks -- that's for DAMNED sure!" Scott chuckled.

"You're just jealous," Paul replied. "But it is interesting that she didn't pick you or one of the other black guys to snuggle up to. I'm a lot of things, but black isn't one of them -- no offense..."

"Yeah. Odd..." Scott waved the thing off as a source of offense -- he and Matheson had worked together a while, and he knew Paul was merely airing an interesting datum. "Maybe you DO trip her trigger..."

"Can't imagine why..."

"What about her? You were pretty busy ducking, in there..."

"Well, she wouldn't make my top ten list if I met her on the street, but she's got something... She's kind of wide open. And I don't exactly get, 'Hey, wanna fuck?' daily..."

"She's something else," Scott agreed.

"Back where I come from, they'd say she's got moxie. She takes no prisoners, and wants it straight. I dunno -- it's attractive..."

"How was the liplock?"

"Very nice, actually. She knows her tools, too -- got me charged up a couple of times with obvious stuff, and then slipped in a couple of sneaky things."

Scott eyed him. "You know, hookers very seldom kiss -- not street hookers, anyway. And Mr. Wilson had her tested for everything under the sun..."

"What're you saying?"

"Why don't you dip her?"

"It's unprofessional."

"You're not a cop. And she's asking..."

"And if I start something stupid?"

"She'll know before you do, Man. You said it yourself -- she's been around the block." Scott clapped him on the shoulder. "I'll tell Chase. You do what you want -- but don't worry about eavesdropping. Drag her out to room three -- it's not monitored, anyway."

Matheson just waved his hands and hit the door.

About one p.m., Velma, after serious thought, put in an appearance in Sharon's office. "Miz Sharon, yo' gotta minute?"

"Sure," Sharon replied, "What's up?"

"Ah need ta go ta the doctor," Velma announced diffidently. "Mistah Jason used ta make the arrangements... Now I figger yo' will. Better dat way anyways -- less embarrasin'."

"Uh, okay." Sharon was in the dark. "What doctor? What's the problem?"

"Uhhh, Doc Beckman, Ah think. Da cooze doctor," Velma related diffidently. "Ah let mah pills go awhile back, an', uh, mebbe Ah need 'em..." She stood there, wringing her hands.

Sharon thought about it. Beckman was a gynecologist; she used him, and Nora had recently, also, so it was no surprise that Armand's staff did, too, since Armand had arranged it. Still, Velma? "How long has it been?"

"Coupla years."

"Okay," Sharon mused. "Is it urgent?"

"Uh, mebbe. Ah dunno..."

Being black didn't seem to save Velma from blushing. Putting two and two together, Sharon decided that either Velma had suddenly been sexually active and was looking forward to a rematch, or someone had made a serious offer. "Do you think you might need anything else?" Sharon asked carefully.

"Ah might." Velma appeared to nearly strangle on the admission.

"Um." Sharon picked up the phone and called Jason. "Jason, I need to schedule an appointment with Dr. Beckman - fairly urgently, apparently."

Jason, in his office downtown, blinked. "For yourself?"

"No, for Velma, actually..."

"Velma?" Jason was somewhat taken aback.

"Velma," Sharon confirmed. "Am I correct in assuming that we have a handle on him? I know that he doesn't respond to me as quickly as he does to Armand..."

Jason showed his teeth in his characteristic rictus. "You would be correct. Does Velma require a morning after aid?"

"I think so. The answers I'm getting out of her would indicate that."

"I'll make the call. Later, we'll discuss the good doctor so that you have the proper tools to deal with him," Jason chuckled. "I'll try to get Inez in, too, for that paternity test -- not that I disbelieve her, but she needs to know I'll follow through. I'll call back in a few minutes."

"Thank you," Sharon replied, and hung up. Turning her attention to Velma, she informed her, "Jason will call back in a bit. Do you want to wait, or..."

"Ah need ta clean up lunch," Velma replied uneasily.

"I'll stop by, then."

"Thank ya." Velma made to back out of the room.

"Velma? Is there likely to be a problem?" Sharon asked.

"Ah hope not. Ain't been yet..." Velma replied diffidently, and turned away.

Jason entered Armand's office unannounced. "Velma has asked to see Dr. Beckman. Apparently it's urgent..."

"Oh?" Armand looked up and smiled. "I'll have to check the internal surveillance data. All things being equal, though, it probably means that Ed took something I said to him the other day seriously."

"I knew that Ed was getting less than he likes - but Velma?" Jason shook his head.

"Well, I recently discovered while keeping an eye on Bianca that Velma isn't asexual, either," Armand chuckled. "Which reminds me -- Bianca has a long-running crush on Pete that might germinate into a relationship."