Chapter 2

The town car had arrived about 8:30. By 9 they were on their way to Las Vegas. After take off, they settled in together in one chair, with Mandy on Bob's lap. It was then she asked him a question that had been floating in the back of her mind.

"Bob, we've been having sex, several times a day for three months. Is there something wrong with me? I thought I'd be pregnant by now."

"Do you want to be pregnant?" he'd asked.

"Yes, I want to have our child. I want to have one soon. No ... I want one now!"

"Well," Bob explained. "I didn't think you should get pregnant before we were married. I just didn't want people to talk. Remember, I'm almost old enough to be your grandfather.

"I didn't think it would be a good idea for you to be pregnant before we were married. People would definitely talk and not very nicely about us either.

"I don't want people to say that I'm a letch, which I am, but I'm a letch that loves you and only you. Nor do I want anyone to say that either one of us HAD to marry the other because you were pregnant.

"If we were married before anything happened, then all the speculation and guessing goes away. Same with the money thing -- Where one of us married the other for their money -- We're both quite well off now.

"You do know that when you marry, your husband gets the balance of the conservator's account ... immediately!"

"No, I didn't catch that but it sounds great!"

"With everything put together, I've got about three million."

"And I've got almost twice that!" Mandy said, sticking out her tongue at Bob. He swatted the side of her butt and told her to behave. Mandy giggled at him and said, "If you do that any more, we'll have to make love right here! That makes me real horny!"

"Now. Lets, see," Bob said. "You asked why you weren't pregnant." After pausing to gather his thoughts, he continued with, "How do I explain this. Well, just before I got divorced, my wife was pregnant. She'd told me she didn't want any more children. So while she was carrying my son she demanded I have a vasectomy.

"That way, by the time the baby was born and we started having sex again, I wouldn't be producing any sperm. She wouldn't have to worry about getting pregnant again. Claire really didn't want to get pregnant in the first place and certainly didn't want it to happen again.

"Don't ever tell anyone this," Bob had told Mandy, "I'm sure Jason was an accident. Claire must have missed some pills or whatever. But none-the-less, she did get pregnant and held it against me ... Always!

"Anyway, as her pregnancy progressed, she got very mean, downright hostile, and very volatile. She told me I'd ruined her by talking her into getting pregnant, she hated me, and wanted a divorce.

"She hired a lawyer and filed suit for cruel and unusual punishment. Her claim was I forced her to get pregnant and it destroyed her 'Model's Figure.'

"I was crushed by all the mean things she said and I didn't contest the divorce. Even against Stan's advice, I pretty much gave her everything she wanted. Even sole custody of our son, Jason, who she really never let me see very often."

"That's so sad," Mandy simply said.

"Yes it was. Even though I saw him very infrequently, I grew to love him very strongly. I won't say I didn't screw up time and again. Remember, it was his birthday when I met you. You know. At the liquor store.

"Well, I had just gotten a big assignment and it had me preoccupied with appointments and arrangements about what I would cover and how. I had background information I needed to get. It was to be a feature piece, long on text, story, and longer on pictures.

It was for the Sunday Magazine. Very lucrative. You know what I'm talking about. It was the park dedication where you and I took plenty of pictures and we wrote the article together. Man that was fun.