Chapter 3

I know you've waited a long time for the sex to get here. You've been very patient, and I appreciate it.

Unfortunately, you have to wait just a little longer. It's necessary, and good things really do come to those who wait.

What happened next was about three hours after she got back in her shiny red sports car that her husband gave her for their last anniversary, and drove off. That would have made it two hours after I left the parking lot where my beat up Toyota had sat next to her Mustang (Buy American!) in the parking lot of the walking trail. That was because it took my 22 year old body an hour to recuperate from the last part of our walk, which left the thirty-ish honey blond housewife barely breathing hard. She tried to apologize again, but I waved her off. She had taken a hell of a risk saying what she had said, and I didn't want to stress her out any more than she was already stressed. I did look at her ass as she walked away, though. It was a nice ass, at least as nice as that of any tight-assed intern. If it was true that her husband wasn't hitting on that ass, he was an idiot and had his priorities all wrong.

Oh yeah... he was a politician. When did you ever see a politician that had the right priorities?

Anyway, I returned to my apartment, and stood under the hot water for another hour, during which I had my first fantasy about Jane and promptly beat off. Being told you make a woman's panties wet will do that to a guy.

It was early afternoon about then, so I grabbed a bite and was getting ready to take a little nap. I had an interview with another couple that evening.

My door shook as something thudded repeatedly against it. I thought briefly of the duck and cover exercises I had practiced in grade school, where you crawl under the desk to protect yourself from a nuclear explosion. Yeah, I know how stupid that sounds, but that's what we did. The door shook like there had been a nuclear explosion, though, so I thought of that.

I was standing there in the gym shorts I take naps in, with a peanut butter sandwich in my hand. There was no flash of light, or boom, so I went to the door and looked through the peephole. There was the biggest, blackest, meanest looking motherfucker out in the hall I had ever seen in my life. I had to look UP into the peephole to see his head.

"Who is it?" I asked, like one of the three little pigs.

"Mister Thompson? May I have a few moments of your time?" came the deep bass rumble I could feel in my bones.

"What do you want?" I asked. He looked like somebody Vito would send over to collect a bad debt, if Vito was African American. I didn't owe Vito any money, though.

"I'm with Senator Doe's office. May I come in please?" The doorknob rattled in sympathetic vibration with his voice.

(Doe... get it? John and Jane Doe? I told you not to try to figure out who they were.)

I was almost peeing-in-my-shorts glad that Jane had told me about the memoirs angle. Otherwise I would have been worried. I opened the door and stood aside as King Kong stepped delicately into my apartment.

If you ever see a really big guy who's really light on his feet, take note of that. It usually means he's got the kind of training that Uncle Sam or the CIA give those guys to enable them to tiptoe in and out of the killing fields, with none the wiser... except for the victim, of course. I did some martial arts training in the past, and recognized the kind of control he had about his body. I thought it was high time I got back into martial arts too. Not only had a housewife almost walked me into the dirt, but self defense skills erode without practice.

The first thing he did was swivel that big head of his, taking in everything and ignoring me. How dangerous is a skinny guy in gym shorts with a peanut butter sandwich in his hand? It's pretty hard to do lots of damage with a peanut butter sandwich. He looked at the door to my bedroom, which was open, and then into the kitchen, which was empty except for the knife I had left there after making my sandwich. The bathroom door was closed, and he went and opened it to look inside.

I admit I was feeling a little cocky, despite the fact that this guy could crush me like a mosquito.

"You got a warrant?" I asked him jokingly.

He wasn't in the mood to laugh.

"Sit down," he said. He decided my furniture wouldn't hold him, and stayed in the control position - standing. "You've met Senator Doe's wife twice, for about three hours each time. Senator Doe wasn't aware that his wife was conducting any... business with you," he said. "He's asked me to inquire."

Now you might think that I'd be a simpering fool with King Kong looming over me. Call me crazy, but I hadn't done anything wrong. I hadn't touched a hair on Jane's beautiful body. Nor could they have known that I... made her panties wet. So I felt pretty comfortable about things, all in all.

"Shouldn't Senator Doe be the one... inquiring... of his wife?" I asked smoothly.

He looked down at me, sitting half naked in a ratty old arm chair that someone else threw away years ago, the limp, half-eaten sandwich still in my hand.

"Look, Pal," he said. "I don't know you, and I don't want to know you. I solve problems for the Senator, and I have to decide whether or not you're a problem. Getting cute with me isn't going to make this any easier. What do you want with the Senator's wife?"

I heard the doorknob rattle again while he spoke.

The better part of valor is discretion. Shakespeare had Falstaff say that in one of his plays, and anybody who has a beer named after him has my confidence. I decided to play dead, like Falstaff.

"Nothing. She asked me if I could write her memoirs and we've been talking about that." I thought that was pretty smoothly delivered.

He wasn't impressed with my literary expertise.

"Nobody writes memoirs of a junior Senator's wife while he's still a junior Senator," he growled. "You're in college, so you can't be a complete idiot. What's going on?"

It was time to stop acting like a bumpkin.

"Mrs. Doe must be the complete idiot then, because she's the one who brought it up. She even told me her personal assistant... Donna, or something like that... said it was a great idea. I know I'm not going to publish anything in the next year, but what if her husband becomes a SENIOR Senator, and goes on to become somebody actually important? A lot of guys would love to be writing her memoirs then, but I'll have the advantage of already having been hired."

"What's she paying you?" he asked.

"That hasn't been negotiated yet," I said promptly. Stay with the truth. It's easier and you can't screw it up.

"Where are your notes?" he asked.

I did NOT look toward my clipboard, which was sitting beside my computer on top of all the data I had gathered, thus far, for the study. There still wasn't anything in that pile with her name on it. I had just put a subject number on each group of data. I had names and addresses and phone numbers, but they were in a computer file that was password locked.

"I haven't taken any yet," I said.

"Why not?" he asked.

"How long have you worked for the Senator?" I asked, instead of answering his question.

"Two years," came his reply. I was actually surprised he answered.

"In those two years have you learned anything about Mrs. Doe that would make for riveting reading in a Memoir?" I asked.

"No."

"Then you now know why I haven't kept any notes. We're just talking about things. I'm getting to know her. If it looks like her memoirs will actually get written, then I'll sit down with her and start that process."

"You spent a lot of time with her," he pointed out.

"She's a woman." I took a bite. The bread was getting all dry. I hate that. "Women talk for hours and rarely say anything."

I was banking that this man held the view that he was powerful and important. Such men quite often think that women talk for hours and say little. That's why men like that work for other men. The time they spend with women is for sex, not work. I must have guessed correctly, because I could actually see him get bored.

"OK, here's how this works," he said. "No money changes hands unless the Senator approves it. If you're going to be writing about her, you'll have to be writing about him too. Nothing gets written about either of them without approval of the Senator. He thinks this is a stupid idea, and so do I, but it's making her happy. If you tell her that either him or I think it's a stupid idea I will personally make things difficult for you."

He went on like that for another minute or so, laying down the rules. I was fascinated that he had been so quick on his feet to make the mistake of telling me something he shouldn't have - that the Senator thought it was a stupid idea - and then covering with an immediate threat of what would happen if she found out her husband thought she was stupid.

"Got that?" he asked.

"Sure," I said easily.

"We're going to do a criminal background check on you," he said, like he expected me to jump and call the whole thing off.

"Whatever." I took another bite of my sandwich.

"One last thing," he said. "She's a nice lady, and he's a good guy. Don't fuck things up."

"She IS a nice lady," I agreed. "I don't know about him. I've never met the man."

"You will," he said. "The next time you talk to her is at the house. We'll be in touch."

The way he said "the house" made it clear there was only one house in the whole state of Washington that counted, and it was the one the senator and his wife lived in.

I can't say I was sad to see King Kong go back out into the jungle.

I got a call later that night.

"Bob?" came Jane's voice.

"Hi," I said back. I wondered if my phone was tapped.

"Sorry about Geoffrey," she said. She pronounced it 'Jaw-free'. "Carla ratted me out after the first time and I didn't know it. Geoffrey is an ex-detective who works for John. He put surveillance on me! I'm so mad I could just spit!"

There was a moment of silence. That's because I didn't know exactly what to say to her. If he'd pull surveillance on Jane without her knowing it, he'd think nothing of tapping the phone.

"Are you angry?" she asked.

"No." I said it a little shortly. I was suddenly cognizant of the fact that if I didn't say anything at all, it would seem just as odd as if I professed my undying love for her. If all this was being recorded.

"He's big," I added.

"He's really a sweetheart under all that muscle," she said. Maybe she was worried about the phone being tapped too. Only his mother would think Geoffrey was a 'sweetheart'.

"I guess I'm still writing your memoirs," I said. That seemed like what someone would expect to hear me say.

"Yes, I had a talk with John. He won't admit it, but he thinks I'm being silly. But I'm very excited about going on with our project."

Now I hoped Geoffrey WAS listening. It was important to me for him to know I hadn't ratted him out, and that Jane wasn't as dumb as they thought she was.

She went on like a nattering woman. Her tone of voice made me think she was speaking that way because someone was in the room with her, listening. "I've been thinking about the background information you mentioned. I think I can get my thoughts together and cover that in our next interview. When are you free to come to the house?"

It was obvious that the rules had been laid out for her too, and that she was playing by them. I didn't really care. I liked being around her, and if she needed a friend to talk to then I could make myself available now and then. It wasn't like I had a hundred other things to do. It was kind of strange, but I didn't really think of that comment she had made about me making her panties wet. I suppose I thought of that as teasing, or a weird kind of compliment. Besides, nothing could happen at her house, with all her servants around, right?

I put on my best pullover and my khakis, and my dress tennis shoes to go to the Senator's house. I had to stop at the gate, where a no-nonsense fellow in a starched uniform checked to see if my name was on his list. It was. I had to surrender my license. The guy kept checking the list and my license, interspersed with doubtful looks at my Toyota, which was mostly white, but had one red fender. Finally he handed me back my license and opened the gate. Then he made quite sure that I knew how to find their house, and politely asked me not to sightsee on the way there or back, and reminded me that I had to check out when I left.

I looked for machinegun nests in the bushes as I proceeded, trying to make sure I didn't stray. I didn't want to make a wrong turn and get ambushed.

A maid met me at the door. She was wearing the outfit and everything, even the little lacy cap. I knew that John had made a fortune in business before he got into politics, but I figured the maid was because he was a Senator. They have to put on airs. Jane was waiting patiently in the hallway that led off from the foyer.

"Let's talk in the library," she said, her voice cultured and proper. "Daphne, would you bring us some refreshments please?"

"Right away mum," said the maid.

I have always loved books, and the smell of leather. I've been in some pretty nice libraries, both private and not. Theirs would have stacked up nicely. Jane waved her hand at a pair of huge chairs covered in thick maroon leather and gracefully settled into one of them. She crossed her ankles. I sat down. I had my clipboard, and some blank pages.

"Well, here we are," she said airily.

Daphne breezed into the room through another door, with a silver platter. When she set it down the first thing I thought of was Kent and Lisa, the nudists, who had served me squirrel food on a silver platter. No squirrels were permitted in the Doe residence. There were little hot dogs, and some kind of white stuff rolled in ham slices, with four different kinds of cheese and six different kinds of crackers. Everything was laid out in a geometric pattern. In the middle was a silver cup with steaming meatballs in a sauce. Each meatball was neatly skewered with a toothpick. Daphne set the tray down and sidled over to a wet bar that was hidden behind a shelf of books.

"Fruit juice for me," said Jane. She looked at me and arched one eyebrow.

"Uh... do you have Coke?" I asked.

I was presented with four different kinds of Coke, and a glass filled with ice cubes.

Daphne backed out of the room and Jane relaxed.

"This is my life," she moaned.

"Seems kind of nice to a guy like me," I said, leaning forward to start eating.

"It's stifling," she said. Daphne had placed her fruit juice on an end table within reach, and she picked it up and sipped. "I feel like a prisoner."

"In my world they call tenure 'the velvet prison'," I said. She looked up. "When you finally get tenure, you have a job for life. You are so secure that you won't do anything to hazard it. You can't leave, and go someplace more interesting because you'll lose your tenure unless some other institution will honor it. You're stuck there. A lot of professors just fade away. They don't do any more research, they don't teach much, they just exist in the velvet prison." I waved my hand around the sumptuous library. "You're in a velvet prison of sorts too."

She stared at me. She didn't look all that happy. It was then that the door opened and Senator Doe made his entrance.

"Good evening Darling." His voice was smooth and perfect. "And you must be Bob Thompson." I struggled up out of the chair. My fingers had sauce on them from the meatballs. I couldn't offer my hand. I held it out instead, so he could see it.

"Uh... sorry," I said. There was a napkin lying right on the table beside the tray. I hadn't noticed Daphne put it there. I felt pretty stupid.

"Don't worry about it," said the Senator expansively. "So, you're going to make my wife famous some day."

He was pretty good. He used his people skills to put me in his debt within fifteen seconds of meeting me. Then he told me what I was going to do, and made it clear it wouldn't be happening for a while. And all it took him was fourteen words.

It kind of pissed me off. I mean I knew how he treated his wife. I wasn't the best guy in the world, but he didn't have much on me. He had more money. He had more power. He was better looking.