Chapter 56

TUESDAY MORNING — SEPTEMBER 17

Four bubbling, bright-eyed teenagers, braless, wearing shorts and tight tops, swarmed into Caitlin and Joyce's bedroom at five-thirty, Tuesday morning. Arlene flipped the light on as Jennie and Melissa piled onto the bed bouncing on their knees. Ann plopped down beside a suddenly wide-eyed Caitlin as Arlene dragged up a chair and sat grinning.

The giggles and laughter from the teenagers quickly caught on and both women smiled despite the rude awakening.

"It's five thirty," Arlene said, glancing at her watch for effect, although she knew exactly what time it was. "Dad will be back from his run in a little while. If you hurry, you can be in the kitchen when he stops by for his coffee before he takes his shower. He'll be nice and sweaty."

Caitlin couldn't help it, "'He'll be nice and sweaty, and..."

"Oh, it's clean sweat," Ann said. "He smells like a man." Standing, she yanked the sheet to the bottom of the bed. "Hurry up. We eat at six, but he'll be back before then. If you don't hurry, you'll miss him."

"But why are you doing this?" Caitlin asked, as Joyce grinned.

"Oh, you will be wives, soon," Arlene said, as if that explained everything. "Now get your butts up and hurry," she finished, pulling Caitlin, vehemently denying that she was going to be anyone's wife in the near future, out of bed and ushering her toward the bathroom as Jennie did the same with Joyce.

A few minutes later as the women were showering, trying not to get their hair wet, Caitlin turned to look at Joyce. "I can't believe these people — this place. This is insane. You drag me up here and bam, I'm supposed to join this guy's harem."

"You just need a refresher," Joyce grinned, turning Caitlin to quickly wash her back. "Now mine," she said, presenting hers, "and let's get our clothes on in a hurry. I think I can find the kitchen."

"I can't believe I'm hurrying to smell a guy's sweat," Caitlin grumped. "I still say it's insane. No man..."

" ... kisses women unconscious," Joyce interjected, although that wasn't what Caitlin was going to say. "And we just happened to have the same dream at the same time. Uh huh. If he can make us faint with his mouth, I just wonder what he could do with his..."

"Joyce. I thought you still missed Dad. Are you forgetting all about him?"

Joyce turned to her friend and hugged her hard. "I'll never forget him. I still cry for him, and you know it. But I'm falling in love with this man, and Diana is so beautiful and sweet, as are Helen and Laura, and the girls just make me want to jump right in with them. I'm still somewhat confused, too, but Diana will probably do a better job of telling their story than I can, and will make it a whole lot more believable. Now hurry. I want to be there when Jeff gets back from his run."

Caitlin, mumbling a little about going to smell someone's sweat, nevertheless began to get ready.

When Joyce and Caitlin cautiously walked into the kitchen a few minutes later, the "machine" was putting breakfast together. The breakfast bar had been moved into place and the smell was already beginning to be enticing. Evie waved to them from the other end of the kitchen, then quickly came over to be introduced to Caitlin.

Shortly Evie was back with the others as Diana hugged Joyce and Caitlin. "Jeff is just coming in the back. The girls are in rare form this morning. They're liable to mob him as soon as he comes in here."

Unsure just how to respond to that, "What can we do to help?" Joyce asked, looking at the bustling activity farther into the kitchen.

"Nothing right now," Diana answered. "We'll let you help for supper, if we don't eat out. I don't know how long it will take at the lawyer's office, plus we have a computer system to pick up and some other things to do."

All of Jeff's wives looked toward the door. A few seconds later, it opened and Jeff walked in wearing a light tee-shirt and running shorts, although it was almost down to freezing outside. He grinned at them and sat at the head of the table, his chair pushed a little out. Helen promptly sat in his lap, unashamedly pushing her breasts against his chest, then kissing him with hunger. After a moment, sighing, she got up as Laura took her place.

Diana was last. When she finished, she got up and took Joyce's hand. Leading her to Jeff, she ushered her onto his lap. Jeff tenderly kissed her for a half-minute, then quietly said, "Good morning, pretty lady."

Joyce leaned against him and whispered, "You're like coming home. I feel safe here. I'm just going to stop thinking and feel. Intellectually I can't believe this is happening, but I can feel your love when we kiss."

Jeff smiled at her and briefly touched his lips to hers again.

As Joyce got up, Diana led a very not-sure Caitlin to Jeff. Seeing her reluctance, he quietly said, "Please. I won't attack you. I think I proved that last night. Just sit here and let me hold you for a moment."

Caitlin found herself sitting. If that's his dick I feel, I need to run screaming right now. If it's half as big as it feels, he'll rip me apart for sure. Crap, what am I thinking? No way is he ever doing that to me. I don't want anyone after Daddy.

His powerful arms encircled her, tugged her toward him, then stopped, their mouths inches apart. Seemingly drawn to him, she initiated the kiss, her lips parting slightly, his being seeming to surround her. An interminable time later, she found herself on her feet, her fingertips touching her mouth. Embarrassed, she was positive that everyone would at least be looking at her, probably even laughing. But when she looked around, everyone was busy, Joyce included.

Jeff downed half a cup of coffee, excused himself and went for his shower. Caitlin realized that her hand was damp from his shoulder. She couldn't quite remember whether she had smelled his sweat or not. She wanted to smell her hand, but was afraid that someone would see her.

Dave came in and was introduced by Ann, who happened to be nearby. It didn't take Caitlin long to realize that he was a hunk, too. As he seated himself at the big table, Evie plopped into his lap and kissed him so eagerly that Caitlin was almost embarrassed. Evie got up, winked at her, then grabbed her hand, pulling the stunned young woman into the melee, or what at first seemed to her to be one.

Despite what Diana had earlier said, Caitlin found herself helping set the table with someone seeming to always be beside her just as she started to ask where something else was. Remembering what Diana had said about the girls mobbing Jeff, she realized that they had probably toned it down because of Joyce and herself.

In minutes everyone was sitting. Arlene and Ann, on either side of her, suddenly took her hands as Jeff said the blessing. Caitlin's eyes welled over. Quietly she said to no one in particular, "Those were exactly the words that Ben frequently used," but everyone heard her.

When she glanced at Joyce who was sitting across the table, her eyes were wet, too.

"Come on," Arlene said, taking Caitlin's hand. "We have some great little watermelons to go with our breakfast fruit. They're called sugar babies. They're so sweet that it's unbelievable."

Before she knew it, Caitlin was swept into the conversation, laughter and good-natured jibes. Glancing over at a laughing Joyce, Caitlin remembered that she had laughed, even giggled almost throughout the meal. Realizing that she had laughed more in the last little while than she had all together since Ben died, she meant to just glance at Jeff, but their eyes met and locked.

Damn, he's good looking. He kissed me unconscious, she remembered, incredulous. And ... I sat on his cock at this table, in front of all his wives. And ... they're acting like my sitting in his lap was the most natural thing in the world. Tearing her eyes away from Jeff, she stared at a laughing Joyce as she bantered with Jennie. She's accepting this, but I still love Ben. I just can't be untrue to him. I can feel Jeff's love, or I think I can. Oh, I'm all mixed up...

Arlene suddenly hugged her. "It will be okay. We know that you miss your dad — that you love him. That's fine. It's the way it should be," she said, seeming much older than her sixteen years. "Dad understands, too. He won't push you," she whispered. "Just relax and let us enjoy your company. Before you know it, you'll be part of us. Watch and see."

After the meal, Diana tried to get Joyce and Caitlin to go to the living room with the men, but they refused, wanting to help, although both were leery of the precision chaos that the women called cleanup. They were soon sucked into it, though, the good mood and laughter as well.

When cleanup was over, Diana looked around her. "Okay, let's get dressed. We need to be rolling by eight. The appointment with the lawyers is at ten."

Joyce and Caitlin looked at each other, knowing that they stood little chance of getting out of the trip. "Uh, Diana," Joyce hesitantly said, "we only brought casual things. We can just sit in the car while..."

"Nonsense," Diana broke in. "We're all wearing jeans," she said, already having realized that the two young women hadn't brought much.

"But, if I understand correctly, there's going to be at least a couple of lawyers, the property owners, oh, a bunch of people..." Joyce tried.

"Yeah, so what?" Diana smiled. "And we're going to be spending — well preparing to spend — a lot of money. This is just to get the ball rolling today. But who cares what a couple of lawyers think. Besides, we kinda like this guy. He enjoyed himself so much on the last deal that he charged a whole dollar," she finished, laughing.

"Oh, he'll probably make up for it this time. But he couldn't care less what we have on. Beside, I don't know how the farmers that we're buying the place from will be dressed, so we don't want to overdress. Now quit stalling. We'll meet you in the living room when you're finished. If you take too long, I'll send the girls after you," she teased.

Turning away, Diana hurried after her sister-wives, her long hair drifting gently from side to side as she quickly walked down the hall.

At the garage, later, Diana backed the Expedition out. As the others got in, she said, "Jeff used to drive this one a lot, but lately we've just taken the Escalades. We need to drive it some, and it's pretty nice, too."

"Sure beats what we drive," Joyce said, sitting behind Diana. Laura tried to get Caitlin to sit in the front seat, but she got in beside Joyce, instead. Laura took the front seat, Helen got in and they were off, second in the little caravan.

As Diana followed Jeff and the girls in his pickup, Joyce looked behind her at Dave and Evie in his Escalade. "We could all have gotten in the two vehicles, couldn't we?"

"Yeah," Diana laughed, testing her brakes as they passed in front of the retreat before starting down the driveway. "But remember, we've got to pick up a computer system for Linda, then stop by the grocery store. We have a lot of the staples delivered by the company that serviced the kitchen when Frank Wainwright owned the retreat, but we enjoy picking out the other things ourselves. As many of us as there are, even those take up a lot of room."

Caitlin started to comment but the second switchback put her on the outside of the curve, giving her a view of the abyss. "Shit," she quietly hissed.

The women all laughed. "We had a bet going on about what the first word you would say would be," Helen said, the laughter still in her voice. "But it wasn't much of a bet, since just about everybody thought that would be your comment."

Caitlin wasn't quite as amused as the rest of them. When Helen noticed her staring at the guardrails, she reassured her, "Dave's company put those up. He swears that you couldn't drive one of these SUVs through them if you tried. He says that the vertical supports are buried many feet down in solid rock, and the whole barrier is designed to stop a fully-loaded dump truck. The drive scared the wax out of me the first few times, but it doesn't bother me now... much," she finished, laughing.

Caitlin managed a sick little chuckle and averted her eyes. Trying to get her mind off the drop, she desperately thought about the five-hundred-and-sixty pound ox she had tried to keep alive all yesterday in her surgical intensive care unit, only to have him code just before the shift was over. You couldn't tell his family that the idiot had basically eaten himself to death, but even so, that's what it was. The human body wasn't designed to be that fat. Why would a family continue to bring those volumes of food to a person once they had gotten so big that they couldn't even get out of bed? For that matter, how did they get close enough to a commode to sit down even before becoming totally bedfast? Smiling, she wondered how many grossly obese people she had heard saying that they ate like a bird. Yeah, right. But a lot of birds eat several times their weight each day. She agreed, though, some of these people must, indeed, eat like birds.

Finally, as far as Caitlin was concerned, Diana got to the bottom of the drive, then followed Jeff onto the first of the county roads.

They stopped to get coffee to go before leaving Winter Park. As they pulled back onto the road toward the next mountain, then on to the interstate, Diana, Laura and Helen gave Caitlin the talk that Joyce got yesterday, and since there was a lot of time, they went into more detail.

Caitlin, though skeptical at first, began to come to a grudging belief, at least on some of the things. Looking over at her longtime friend and lover, Joyce is a lot more calm about this than I am. Of course she's been around them longer than I have. Perhaps it's because I'm a nurse. Then again, maybe I should have read more science fiction like Joyce did. Musing for a moment, she continued thinking, There's just enough logic to the whole thing to touch the edge of credibility. I really don't think they're lying, but I can't help feeling that they're not telling everything. Joyce said she thought that might be true, and now after hearing Diana, I tend to agree. I wonder what it is. Crap, everything Diana has said is so wild, why would they leave out something?

She was brought out of her rumination as Diana followed Jeff's pickup into a parking deck in downtown Denver. Ahead of them Jeff tooted his horn at an older couple and a suit walking toward the elevator. Diana waved at the group as they passed. "Those are the people that we're going to buy the land from. There are some complications, so we're all getting together with the lawyers today to get things ironed out," Diana said as she pulled into a parking place next to Jeff's pickup.

Getting out, everyone hurried to catch up with the Thompsons and their attorney.

A couple of minutes later, Joyce stepped closer to Diana as they waited for the elevator to come back for them, one elevator load having already gone. "Are you sure it's not going to be awkward with us being here? I mean, you people are going to be discussing business..."

"So?" Diana grinned at her. "It will be your business before you know it. Besides, Jeff has already called and told them how many there will be. They have a conference room that will easily hold us. Jeff said that Fontaine, our attorney, didn't hesitate in the slightest. Besides, he's seen our group before when we helped Carla out with her farm. Now quit worrying. You're quickly becoming part of us, even in your mind. In ours, you're already there."

The elevator door opened and it was time for their group to crowd on.

The conference table wouldn't quite seat everyone, although there were plenty of chairs along the wall. The girls had started to sit at the table, but looked at each other and diverted to the other seats, carrying Joyce and Caitlin with them. As everyone relaxed into their seats, the girls made sure that the two young women had one of the young wives on either side of them. Then they all locked hands. Caitlin started to pull her hands away from Arlene on one side and Ann on the other, but she stopped herself. It felt ... good to be accepted as part of them. She decided to wait a moment before pulling away, then forgot it. Somehow, she felt at peace.

Joyce, between Jennie and Melissa, just smiled and felt content.

The two young women listened with growing respect as the meeting went on. Jeff repeatedly accepted the Thompsons' provisions. His only real proviso was that he would receive the first option to purchase the remaining four hundred acres, should something happen, or the Thompsons change their mind about retaining their part. "I want this to remain farmland. I don't want a subdivision built in the middle of the property. Ed, Jody and all of us feel the same, so we need to make the contract reflect this."

Later in the parking lot, Jeff asked, "Who's hungry?"

"Uh, Jeff," Dave said, "we're going to stop by the office. Carmen needs to talk with us about a problem. We'll take her out to eat while we have our meeting. We'll just meet you back at home."

Helen smiled at the Henson's, "You're going to miss out on some excellent Chinese food. We're going to this little place that ... John, Martha and I used to go to a lot."

Evie took her hand for a moment. "We really would like to go, but Carmen sounded upset. She wanted to talk privately with us, so we better take care of that. She's our office manager. She doesn't let much get to her."

"If I can help, you know my cell number," Jeff interjected, a frown on his face.

As they parked in the little lot and got out, Jeff looked at Helen. "This is the place, right?"

"Yes, Baby, it's the place," Helen said, putting her arm around her husband and looking up at him as they walked toward the door. "It's small and not in the best location — shall we say — but the restaurant is owned by a family that has been doing this for many years. It's real Chinese food, not an Americanized version. You will love it."