Chapter 1

Guinevere was terrified. She kept looking in the rear view mirror of her new, white fifteen passenger van. It had been modified by the federal officials to be as utilitarian as possible. The inconspicuous van had no windows beyond the driver and passenger seats. It had been equipped with a series of backup cameras to help make the driving easier. It had GPS, a small refrigerator and storage cabinets under the beds built along the sides for her and her fourteen-year-old daughter, Stephanie. They were on the run. The federal government had put them in the witness protection program. They had been issued about eight different passports, driver's licenses, and international driver's license, and a number of different cell phones and computers. The cell phones had chips for quite a number of countries. She had plane tickets from a number of cities, under different names. Even the federal officials didn't know exactly where she was or where she was going. She had a number of credit cards under corresponding names with the passports.

Although her official name was Guinevere, she had been called Gwen all her life. Her daughter Stephanie was asleep in the back.

She had been issued mailboxes to a number of cities so once she knew where she wanted to go, she could mail everything except the ID she was currently using, and not get caught with multiple identities.

The first thing to do was try to get out of the country. She and Stephanie drove in four hour shifts from Kansas City to Seattle. They put the van on the ferry and got to Vancouver Island. From there, they continued from Victoria to Nanaimo, where they boarded another ferry to Vancouver. They were in Canada now. From there they traveled across the country to Prince Edward Island. They spent a few days at the hostel in Charlottetown. The sold the van to some local trash haulers for cash. From there, they boarded an international flight to France. Once they had made it through the maze of escalators, they got two Euro Rail passes for the summer. They could travel and sightsee all day and sleep on the train. Anybody trying to trace their traveling would have no idea where they went or got off.

Gwen and Stephanie finally got off of the train in Marbella, near the Rock of Gibraltar. From there they bought a couple old Vespas. They traveled up the coast, staying in private homes listed on Craigslist under couchsurf.com. They ended up in Mijas.

Mijas is a small town. It is a small town in number of inhabitants and size. It is sited in some mountains. The houses are all adobe structures of one story. The roof of one house is the patio of the next, which steps back on the sides of the mountain. The white stucco houses seem to have been there for hundreds if not a thousand years. The streets are so narrow that if a car meets another coming from the other direction, somebody has to back up. There is not room to pass. There is not room to turn around.

The Vespa scooters were a good choice. Gwen and Stephanie were able to get a small house at the top of the hill at the end of the street. Nobody ever came up there in a car, because it would not have space to turn around. The floors were brick pavers placed tight together. If anything was spilled, you just poured water on it to wash it off. Stephanie liked this.

Gwen was apprehensive about staying in one place, but they needed to do something besides travel. She was skittish about being in one place too long. Her husband was in jail, but was filing for an appeal. As long as he was in prison, she had a chance, even though he had friends who were determined to keep her from testifying if a retrial came up.

Gwen had married Joe about five years ago. Her original husband had died, leaving her a single mother struggling to make ends meet. She had been working as a waitress in a very exclusive country club. All she knew was that he was a very successful lawyer and stockbroker. He was a tall athletic man with graying hair and slight beard. She was not particularly in love with him as much as her first husband, but needed some security for her daughter. Joe was about fifty. Although he was reasonably fit when they married, he seemed to need more and more stimulation to keep up his sex life.

He had become more critical and more demanding of her. Gwen had to go out of her way to assure him that she loved him. She soon found out that he was not as successful a lawyer and stockbroker as she thought. She finally figured out that he was a bookmaker who ran a large offshore betting business.

As his sexual appetite became more and more insatiable, Gwen had to go overboard more and more to prove her love. Of course she wasn't that deeply committed to him, so she tried harder to offset her lack of enthusiasm for him.

One night, he called to say they were going to have a few of his friends over for dinner and could she go out and get a bunch of Chinese dishes to serve buffet style. Gwen was not happy about the unexpected company, but with Stephanie spending the night with friends, it wouldn't be too bad.

When she saw the lights of the Mercedes in the driveway, she put down her dishtowel and went to the door to greet everybody. When Joe came in, he introduced the three men to his beautiful forty year old wife and handed her a shopping bag from Pygmalion's. These were probably the most expensive dresses in the country. The only thing about them was that they were also notorious about outrageously sexy and provocative clothing.

Gwen was flattered but puzzled. Joe never bought her presents. He certainly had never bought her anything provocative or suggestive either.

"Go upstairs and put this on, honey. I think you will look great in these clothes. I think it is important for our hostess to look incredible tonight. These men are bankers from the Cayman Islands and manage a good amount of my money.

Joe knew she was disgusted with his business once she knew what was going on. She went upstairs to see what was in the box. She poured the boxes out onto the bed. A hand written letter fluttered out of the bag onto the floor.

"I have not asked you to do much in our marriage. These business partners are important to me. I want you to wear the contents of these boxes and NOTHING more."

Gwen opened the boxes one by one. She was a little startled at the contents.

There was a grey silk dress that buttoned up the front; high heeled grey suede boots that zippered up the side; a long strand of pearls and some large hoop ear rings, and some long grey silk stockings. The stockings had a decorative elastic top. She was a little offended that he would tell her what to wear, but this was the least she thought she could do for him.

There was no bra or panties, so she thought he meant for her to wear her own. Jenny put the clothes on as ordered. The only outrageous thing seemed to be that the dress barely came to her thumbs. It seemed to short, but the grey silk stockings covered her more than enough. To her surprise, the buttons on the front did not go all the way down. The last two buttons were missing, which made it close to obscene.

Gwen would be standing to help serve food, and would not eat with them. At least, she did not plan on sitting down in this dress. Other than that, the clothes were spectacular. The dress fit like a glove. If it weren't for being ordered, she would love to have it.

Shyly, Gwen came down the stairs. The men whistled and clapped their approval. Gwen smiled and looked over to her husband for his approval. Instead, her eyes met a cold stare from him. What was wrong?

"Gwen! Go back upstairs and bring down that set of instructions!"

Gwen was humiliated to be called out like that in front of their guests. Humiliated, she turned and went back up the stairs; took the note and brought it back down.

"What does it say?"

"It says to wear the clothes in the box."

"Did it say to wear those panties and bra?"

"I ... I ... I ... th ... thought..."

"Don't think! Do what you're told. Now take off the bra and panties."

Humiliated, Gwen turned with tears in her eyes to go back upstairs. "Where are you going?"

"I'm going upstairs to change."

"No you're not. Do it here. Do it now." Gwen was thunderstruck. He had never talked to her like that.

The room was silent. Their guests sensed the tension. What was going to happen next? Gwen looked around into the faces of the different men and the anger in her husband. She desperately wanted to please him, but not like this. Slowly, she realized that he had been having trouble "getting it up." This must be his way of supplementing his arousal.

Gwen made eye contact with her husband. It was a hurtful, injured and humiliated look in her eyes as she unbuttoned her dress, starting at the top. She unbuttoned it to the waist. She arched her back and peeled one side of her dress over that shoulder. She repeated her movements with the other side. The beautiful dress dropped to her waist.

Gwen stood there for a few moments with her arms at her sides. The bra was the sheer stretch fabric type made like women's hose. It was a quarter cup strapless one from Victoria's Secret. The bra had cutouts that matched the diameter of the pink areolas so that it had a nude effect under a thin top ... Her long-stemmed pink nipples were peeking through the sheer fabric. She stood there under their gaze humiliated. She had hoped this provocative top would entice him in the bedroom. She was not counting on the public scrutiny.

Gwen reached around behind her for the clasp as the tears started to form in the corners of her eyes. She had her eyes locked into contact with her husband, as the bra came loose. She must have felt that if she had an intensive enough eye contact with him, she could shut out the other men in the room.