Peter Morrow rubbed his eyes with his fingers, trying desperately to get the sleep dust out and make them stop itching. He glanced over at his traveling companion. He had to admit, she was a beautiful young woman. Peter knew he had been away from home for way too long when he started noticing other women. His wife was the love of his life, his soul mate, his best friend, and the most beautiful woman he had ever met. Only when he was away from home for too long did he consider cheating on her.

"I would never do that to Dorothy, " he told himself and turned back towards the window.

Angie McGee sat on the other side of the torn bench seat of the cab. Peter was, technically, her supervisor and was significantly older than her. She guessed he was in his early to mid fifties while she was still in her early twenties but she did find him very attractive. He was charming, witty, handsome and still in pretty good shape for a man his age.

The two had been traveling from city to city. Most of their time was taken scouting locations for distribution nodes, warehouses and delivery services which would be vital to the new on-line sales company they would be opening soon. It meant a lot of time on airplanes, in cabs, in hotel rooms, and in board meetings, or bored meetings, as she and Peter had jokingly started calling them.

The two traveling companions, supervisor and assistant, had arrived in Dallas only twenty minutes earlier. They were supposed to catch a connecting flight back to Dulles National in Northern Virginia. From there they would get in their own cars and go home. But that wasn't going to happen. Severe winter weather had snarled pretty much everything from Winston-Salem up to Maine and from Knoxville to the Atlantic Ocean. Landing at Dulles was not only dangerous, but, from what the radio had said, next to impossible.

So instead of going home after almost a full month on the road, or was that in the air, the two companions were in a cab leaving the Dallas-Fort Worth Airport and heading for a small hotel near the airport where they would stay for the night. Every hotel for miles was booked up with passengers who were stranded. Peter and Angie both considered themselves lucky to have gotten a room at all. They had seen lots of people, even some families with young children, who either didn't have the luck or the money to leave the airport and get a hotel room. Peter and Angie had both slept in an airport in the last month and neither would wish it on their worst enemy.

It was going to be awkward. They both knew that. They only had one room. Lucky for both, it was a room with two double beds so while they might have to share a room, they wouldn't be sharing a bed. While Peter had been happily married for twenty plus years and Angie was in a long-term loving relationship, both of them were homesick, lonely, and, if the truth were to be told, just a little horny and attracted to the other. Still, neither of them wanted to make that mistake now, only a day or so before going home.

The cab pulled up in front of the Longhorn Motel and Restaurant and came to a stop. Angie already had a fifty dollar bill from her purse. She leaned forward and paid the driver.

"Keep the change," she told the young man in Spanish.

The two got out of the cab. They had left their suitcases at the airport, locked in lockers. Instead each had packed their necessities into a single small overnight bag so they wouldn't need to drag around the heavy suitcases. They could simply pull the suitcases from the locker, check them and be on their way.

The two stepped out of the car, slung their overnight bags over their shoulders, and closed the car doors.

"I'll pay my half of the cab, Angie."

Angie smiled as Peter circled around the back of the cab and came to stand beside her. Her eyes were burning and itching. She really needed to get her contacts out and go to sleep.

"Don't worry about it, Peter," Angie said.

When the trip had started a month ago, the two were very formal. She would never have thought of using his first name. Now, after a month of constant togetherness, she had stopped thinking of Peter as a boss and instead thought of him as a friend who had been there for her during some very rough times. Like that night they had spent in a small airport in Iowa. Both agreed that was the single worst night of the whole trip. Even not getting home tonight didn't top that one.

"You bought me breakfast this morning. This is my way of repaying you."

Peter smiled at the younger woman and then led the way into the office to check in and get their room key. As they had told him on the phone, they had only one room left. Peter used his company credit card to pay for the room and the two trudged across the rain soaked parking lot, up the metal steps, down the metal walkway and stopped in front of room 217.

"This is it," Peter said, checking the room number on the door against the room number on the key. He slipped the key into the lock, twisted, and the door popped open.

"Oh, thank God," Angie whispered.

Peter smiled and chuckled at her. Angie was a pessimist. He found it hard to believe that someone so young and so pretty could be so jaded this early in life. At first he didn't understand it but he had stopped worrying about it and now just found it amusing. He reached in and turned on the lights.

It was a standard hotel room - two double beds with a nightstand between them, a phone, an alarm clock and a Gideon Bible atop the nightstand. There was a small table just inside the door with a black, plastic ashtray and some menus from local restaurants that delivered spread out over the tabletop. One side of the table pressed against the wall beneath the window with two uncomfortable looking, straight-backed cushioned chairs on either side of it. There was a six drawer side-by-side dresser against the wall at the foot of the beds with a television set on it, the remote control for the television sitting atop the TV. There was another cushioned chair, this one looking somewhat more comfortable, beside the far end of the dresser. Beyond that was a stand to hang clothes and a counter with a sink in it with a large mirror hung over it. Just to the left of the sink, was the small bathroom with a toilet and a bathtub shower in it.

Peter held open the door and allowed Angie to go in first, and then followed her in and closed the door.

"Your decision. Which bed do you want?" he asked.

"I'll take this one," Angie said, setting her bag down on the bed closest to the door.

Peter nodded and set his bag down on the other bed.

"You hungry?"

"Starving," Angie said as she opened her bag.

"One of us should run down to the restaurant and get us some food while the other goes and gets a shower. You wanna shower or deliver?"

"Peter, would you please go and get the food? My eyes are killing me. If I don't get these contacts out soon, I think my eyeballs are going to come out with them."

Peter laughed.

"Alright, I'll go food shopping. Can't let those pretty green eyes be wasted on a place like this."

Angie laughed.

"So, what do you want to eat?"

"Anything but roast beef."

Both laughed. The last three planes they had been on had served a meal. All three had served the exact same roast beef dinner. The other meal that had been available was some sort of fish that didn't smell very good.

"Alright, no roast beef. Any other restrictions?"

Angie flopped down on the bed beside her bag.

"I want chicken. I don't care how it's cooked. Even if you have to get me chicken nuggets, I want chicken." She closed her eyes and let her imagination run. "A baked potato, fully loaded, butter, sour cream, cheese and bacon bits."

"Oh, sounds good," Peter said, now standing at the door.

"And some peas. No, string beans. Oh, my God, I think I'm about to have an orgasm from thinking of food."

Angie opened her eyes and they both laughed.

"Okay, so chicken, a baked potato, fully loaded and string beans. Anything else?"

"Yeah," Angie said, nodding. "Get me the biggest thing of sweet tea you can find. If they sell a gallon jug of it, I'll take it. It'll be worth wetting the bed."

"Got it. You get your contacts out and get in the shower. I'll knock and holler when I get back so you know who's coming in. I'll lock the door behind me."

"Thank you, Peter. You're a godsend."

"My wife sure thinks so."

He gave her a smile and a wink and then was out the door.

Angie went through her bag, getting out the necessities for her shower. Within minutes, she breathed a sigh of relief as she got her contacts out. She rinsed them off and put them into the cleaning solution. She picked up her clothes and made her way into the bathroom. Angie had to fiddle with the controls on the tub for a few minutes. Without her contacts she couldn't read which way to push the lever for hot and cold water and the red and blue markings had faded long ago. She eventually got a good temperature, pulled the tab to send the water to the shower head, and stood up to undress.

Angie was a beautiful woman of twenty-two years. She had short brown hair, that shined when it was freshly washed, beautiful green eyes, which even Angie admitted were probably her best feature, shoulders that were broad for a woman and large breasts that sagged only a little with large areolas and pink nipples that stuck almost straight up when she got cold or sexually excited. She had a flat stomach, thanks to lots of working out in the company gym, a heart shaped ass, and long, shapely legs. Her lover called her buxom. She thought of herself as curvaceous.

Angie stripped off the suit jacket and blouse and then the bra. She stepped out of her shoes, allowed the skirt to fall, and then pushed her pantyhose and boy-shorts panties down her legs. Angie stepped into the shower and breathed a sigh of relief as the hot water washed over her.

"Oh, fuck me, that feels good," Angie sighed.

Twenty minutes later, Angie stepped out of the shower, clean, wet and feeling exhilarated. She felt like she could get back on another airplane right then if she had to, though she was glad that she didn't have to. Angie dried herself off, singing a Kenny Rogers song as she slipped on a pair of panties and a knee-length, plaid flannel nightgown. Angie stepped out of the bathroom, followed by a cloud of hot steam that had built up.

"Peter, are you back yet?" she called.

Not getting a response and not seeing him in the room, she shrugged. She figured there must be a long line or he had to wait for the food. Angie moved to the counter, picked up her hairbrush, and began brushing out her short brown hair.

Ten minutes later, Angie was laying on her bed in her nightgown and socks when there was a knock at the door.

"Angie, it's Peter," Peter called from outside. "Is it safe to come in?"

Angie smiled at his thoughtfulness.

"Come on in, Peter."

She heard him slip the key into the lock, twist the knob, and push the door open. Peter carried two plastic bags. Angie could smell food even before he managed to kick the door closed. She scrambled off of the bed, took one of the bags from Peter, and locked the door behind him.

"Thank you," Peter said with a nod of his head. He peeked into the bag he still held. "Let's see. This one is yours."

"How can you tell?"

"There's a two liter bottle of Pepsi in mine."

Angie opened the bag in her hand and saw a two liter bottle of soda.

"Unfortunately, they do not sell sweet tea by the gallon. They do, however, sell it by the barrel. But I have no idea how I would explain that to the suits when it came time to justify the expense."

Angie laughed at him as they switched bags.

"I did however get you the biggest cup of sweet tea they sold."

He handed her a sixty-two ounce cup full of iced sweet tea.

Angie brought it to her lips and took a sip. She smiled and sighed loudly.

"You are a lifesaver."

"I'm a candy? Thanks a lot," Peter said, feigning insult.

He gave her a smile, which Angie saw, and a wink, which she couldn't see without her contacts.

The two traveling companions carried their bag of food back to their chosen beds and began taking out the cartons of food.

"I need to get my glasses. I hate eating what I can't see," Angie said.

She moved over to the table where she had set her bag, dug a hand in, and came out with a pink, flower covered case. She popped it open and pulled out wire-rim glasses.

"All this time we've been traveling together and this is the first time I've seen you wearing glasses. I didn't even know you had any."

"I always carry a pair in case the contacts irritate my eyes."

They started eating. The two stopped talking and turned their attention to the TV. They ate right through Wheel of Fortune and half of Jeopardy. Peter surprised Angie with two pieces of pie, one Dutch Apple and the other a Boston Cream. He let her pick the one she wanted.

"I like both so it really doesn't matter to me," he told her as he held them out.

Angie decided to screw her diet for one night and chose the slice of Boston Cream pie. The piece of pie had gotten pretty well torn up between being cut, shoved into the foam carton, and Peter's long walk back to the motel room, but it tasted fantastic.

"I think this is the first cream pie I've had in ... five years," Angie said after a moment of thought. "The last time was my first year in college. I ate my stress away back then. Came out of my freshman year weighing nearly two hundred pounds. Spent the next five years trying to get back to one-thirty-five."

"Don't take this as sexual harassment but you look pretty good to me."

Angie gave Peter a pretty smile.

"Thank you, Peter. That's very sweet. I still need to lose another couple pounds but I'm pretty satisfied with the way I look for now."

"What does that mean," Peter asked. "For now?"

Angie smiled. "I plan to have breast reduction at some point. But the company medical insurance won't cover cosmetic surgery so I'm saving up."

"Why wait?" Peter asked. "You know Elizabeth Light?"

Angie thought for a second but couldn't place the name.

"No, I don't think so."

"Doesn't matter. Elizabeth works over in properties management. I've known her for probably ten years. When I first met her, she had a ... well, she was bigger in the chest than you are."

Angie smiled when Peter blushed. He had embarrassed himself.

"Anyway, she wanted to go smaller also and had the same problem. She got around it, though, by going to her regular doctor and complaining of a sore lower back. They did tests looking for the problem. There, of course, was nothing wrong with her back. Eventually the doctor came to the conclusion that Elizabeth was ... front heavy. Elizabeth, innocently, asked what could be done. The doctor said he'd recommend breast reduction."

"I don't understand how that gets around the insurance issue," Angie said, shaking her head.

"Oh, simple. If your doctor recommends the surgery to relieve back pain, it's no longer cosmetic and the insurance will pay for it."

Angie's jaw dropped open.

"That'll work?"

Peter nodded and smiled. Angie considered this for a moment.

"My doctor is one of my best friends."

"Have you ever mentioned this problem to him before?"

"Her, and no. I've never mentioned I was even thinking of breast reduction to her. Thanks Peter. I'll talk to Carolyn. Maybe I can get that breast reduction a little sooner than I thought."

"No problem. Just don't tell the insurance it was me who put you onto the idea if they catch on."

"Don't worry. I'm just like a reporter. I always protect my sources."

"Good girl," Peter said with a smile.

After that, things were pretty quiet. They cleaned up their dinner mess and then each sat on their respective bed watching TV, compromising on what to watch. By ten o'clock, Angie was having trouble keeping her eyes open.

"I think I'm gonna go to sleep."

"Do you need me to turn off the lights and TV?"

"No," Angie said, getting up out of bed. "The TV won't bother me at all." She reached into her overnight bag and drew out a light blue night mask that would cover her eyes. "And the lights, that's what this is for. You go ahead and stay up. Keep the lights on whatever, as long as you want. Won't bother me a bit."

"You're sure?"

"Peter, we've been together much too long for me to lie to you about something this silly," she told him as she pulled down the blankets and slipped into the bed.

"Well, I'm going to turn off the TV. There's nothing I want to watch and I need to finish reading that report."

Peter picked up the remote from the nightstand and turned off the TV. He picked up the thirty-two page report that had been faxed to him from the corporate headquarters in Annandale, Virginia at their last stop in San Francisco, California.

Angie removed her glasses and set them carefully on the nightstand. She pulled the night mask down over her eyes and squirmed her way down until the covers covered her all the way to her shoulders leaving only her head visible.