Chapter 5: Sheila Renée Schwartz, hereinafter the Bride...

Interlude: 25^th Anniversary

Cindy:

"When Mom talks about the Merger, she is referring to the household staff. Dad means business. After all, it's still his thing. Mom had all real property. Dad wanted to make sure they both got a fair share of the company. I gather this was not trivial."

Sheila:

Showering together was nice. There was no sex, though a fair amount of pinch and tickle went on. What was nice was having someone to shave my hard to see places. In return, I lathered Sean and shaved him, top and bottom. Actually, I only trimmed the pubic hair, but I had his undivided attention.

Once we had dried each other, it was time for my daily ordeal with the bustier. This was made immeasurably better by having two sets of hands. Sean had me sit at the vanity, while he fastened me up the back. Once it was hooked, he leaned forward and told me to enjoy it. Once I became pregnant it would no longer fit. That sent waves of conflicting emotions through me. I was still conflicted when Sean showed me the small kitchen, where I found hot water on demand.

Then it was off to the gym. I half expected to find Christine waiting outside, but kneeling in the workout area would have been second choice. I told her to take ten minutes and email me a report. I caught a slight twitch of her lips. Christine already had one sent, or at least ready. I was loving that, not that I would tell her for a while.

Shortly after, I led Christine through the rabbit hole. On the other end, I found Claudia Johnson waiting. I forestalled anything she might say with a smile, a wink and finger to my lips. As I moved past, I grinned to myself. The cruelest thing you can do to a bright person is give them a little information, but not enough. Claudia did not know it, but she was in the middle of a job interview.

My morning was booked solid. After last week, it was inevitable. This was stressful, but it allowed me to quietly pass word along about both my nuptials and the pending move. Christine did a very nice impression of furniture.

I made a point of looking up Sharon, the yoga instructor. I thanked her for her time the week before and informally invited her to the wedding. Sharon surprised me greatly by throwing her arms around me and exclaiming how happy that made her. Since we had never been close, I was taken aback. I was not sure what role Sharon would take in my life, but I planned on finding her a bigger one. Good friends are worth gold, and I was surprised to find one had been next to me all along.

Once my chores at XTreme Fitness were complete, I drove Christine to Martha's clinic. Martha was another friend and I wanted to invite her personally. It took a few minutes, but finally Martha poked her head out, with a worried expression. I ran up to her and gave her the hug I had gotten from Sharon. The mother's in the waiting room stared at us, some with hostility, until I held up my ring finger. Then everyone wanted to congratulate me. When I mentioned Sean's name, some of the smiles turned plastic.

Martha's reaction was more telling. She heaved a big sigh and hugged me for real. That got some interesting expressions from the ladies. At least two of the ones that that had frowned at Sean's name looked shocked when Martha hugged me. Then Martha introduced me to the group.

"Ladies, this is Sheila Schwartz, the best personal trainer in town and a genuine good egg. She is marrying one of the few men in town that might be able to do her justice. Hopefully, in a few years, she will be sitting where you are now." She turned to her receptionist. "Carol, give Miss Schwartz my cell. Whenever the wedding is, clear my schedule." Oh my stars. The rumor mill just shifted up a couple of gears.

As we left, I could not help but notice Christine's expression. She practically glowed. When Christine saw me looking, her face became more controlled, but I could still see that she was deeply pleased. For a moment, that made no sense. Then I realized that Christine linked her status to mine. In her own subtle way, Martha had just given my debut party. G_d, I loved that woman.

Our next stop was Richards Enterprises. At Christine's urging, I took out Sean's card, which he had put in my pay envelope. The two of us went to Human Resources. I went up to a woman, whose desk ID said Barbara Johnson. When she looked up, I handed her the card. Another woman, whose desk ID said Barbara Kennedy, came over to look.

Barbara Johnson cleared her throat. "When did he give you this?"

I said, "It was in my pay envelope last Friday."

Ms. Kennedy said, "Pay envelope? What is your job here?"

"I was a contract hire: Art Director for the auction."

Ms. Johnson asked, "So you worked for Justin?"

"Well, technically, Justin reported to me. Christine said I should bring the card straight here." Ms. Kennedy was openly staring, with her mouth slightly ajar. Ms. Johnson swallowed before she spoke.

"Did Mr. Richards say anything about your position?"

Without a word I pulled out the antique ring. By this time, there were three other women and a man hovering nearby. Another woman, whose demeanor said Boss, was walking up. Even she stopped and stared.

I said, "Sean Richards and I are engaged. Christine thought this would be a good way to let everyone know. She may have been right about that. It was fun. Now, would someone get Helen on the line?"

The woman who looked to be the department manager waived me forward. She held out her hand, which I shook. "Emilia Lucann, HR Coordinator. I suspect we will be working together. You can call from my office." As we went to the office, Emilia noted, "You know that they will be useless until everyone in the building knows?" I said nothing, but Christine looked smug.

My conversation with Helen was typically one sided. "Helen, Sheila here. Let Sean know I am in the building. I have a drawing of our invitations for his approval. We will need a mailing list no later than close of business. Do you have a preliminary copy?" Helen grunted an affirmative. "Good. I will take a look at it when I get there. Do Sean and I have any appointments?" Another affirmative sound. "Just text me the details. Christine and I let the cat out in HR. You should be getting feedback by now. Anything else?" Negative sound. "I'll be there in five."

Ms. Lucann was watching in open admiration. "How long have you known Helen?"

"We met last week. Helen does not waste words. Now, I have something for your department. Sean's sister Siobhan will be arriving later today or tomorrow, along with a dozen grad students. They are going to help set up the wedding. It would be helpful to put them on as minimum wage general labor, so that they get worker's compensation coverage. Run it past Legal and copy Sean, on my say so. By the way, the wedding is Saturday at the Residence. Any questions I can handle?"

Ms. Lucann stared at me for a moment, then shook her head, as if to clear it. "If I did not know you weren't related, I would ask which branch of the family you were from. It is funny that you mention Miss Jo. You sound just like her. To answer your question, no. This will keep me busy for a while. Helen will keep me up to date. Everything goes through Helen, but you already seem to know that. By the way, congratulations. He is a good boss and seems to be a good man." I thanked her and we left. Outside, I complimented Christine on her instincts. That had made the right sort of waves.

When we reached Helen's desk, Helen handed me a list of names and I handed Helen the two rings. I was pleased to see that no one obvious had been omitted. Many of my clients were on the list, including Harold and Martha. Also included were my mother, Claudia Johnson, even Sharon. Lower down was a list of names with question marks. This list included Mario and Charles. I checked off all but a couple of those names. The only name I added was my landlady, Rosa Danvers. It was a long list, but still short of 200 names. Somehow I expected 200 would not scratch the surface of the attendees. For one thing, there was no media names that I could see.

Then, it was time to face the lawyers.

Sean:

Saturday had been a special wake up. Sheila had climbed aboard and played cowgirl. Monday was more of a traditional fantasy. Sheila woke me with a blow job. It was so sweet, but I really had to pee. I came back and we made love. This time, Sheila put her leg on my shoulder, much like she had done the day before in the cloak room. She informed me it was called Splitting the Bamboo in the Kama Sutra. I suspected we would need a lot of bamboo halves.

In the shower we had a lot of touchy/feely, but no sex. Instead, she shaved me, including a trim down under. I shaved her more difficult places. It was comfortable and unforced. Helping her don the foundation garment was less comfortable. I reminded Sheila that a baby would change her figure. Sheila's expression would have gone perfectly next to a dictionary definition of ambivalent. That was good with me. I also had mixed feelings about my fiancée's passion for intricate, and difficult, support undergarments. I resolved to inquire about maternity wear, if such a thing existed.

At the time I simply introduced her to my favorite morning toy, the flash boiler. Sheila loved it—no waiting for tea water. I made a mental note to get an egg cooker. Sheila does oatmeal and a boiled egg religiously. My preference is whole grain toast, with a sunny side egg face down in the middle. We agreed on the orange juice. As the saying goes, I could get used to mornings like that.

Someone once said, "If all work is play, then play would indeed be work." I had a job and so did Sheila. Actually, Sheila had three jobs. Given our schedules, it was amazing how much quality time we had already managed. Fiery, I use the term advisedly, orgasms were wonderful, but intimacy is made up of little courtesies and helpful thoughts.

In a small epiphany, I realized that this is what was lacking in all my previous lovers. They may have been technically gifted, but they were not putting me before themselves. To be fair, neither had I. With Sheila, it seemed the natural thing to do. It also gave me a chance to play with her tits, which she liked to hide in a bank vault. As I gave her our parting hug, an evil thought was growing in my mind.

Work was an odd hash that morning. The weekend had been uneventful, in many ways, at least for the businesses. With the catalog finally approved, nothing significant was pending on the auction. No major overseas issues were underway, and the routine dealings were handled at a lower level. It was, for my job as CEO, a slack period. Ordinarily, this would mean several meetings where various people pitched ideas.

Instead, I was on the phone with bankers and local businessmen—Sheila was the only female expected to attend—discussing the agenda for our meeting that afternoon. Attendance required $50,000, paid into an escrow account. When it comes to separating businessmen from dalliers, all that is needed is a demand for money. When I am doing a deal, talk is not cheap. It says something about my reputation that only one potential player begged off.

Sheila did not know about the cash up front requirement, yet, because I posted her portion as well as my own. It was one of the details we would need to iron out, which was why I went to Legal. Curtis had several things for my attention, beginning with Sheila's prenuptial agreement. That went quickly. After that, Curtis and I discussed Sheila's idea about forming an LLC. Curtis promised to get busy on a set of charter documents, which meant he was 100% behind the idea. In passing, I mentioned the day we met at the DMV. Curtis gave me an odd look. He told me that except for the birth of his son, it had been the most important day in his life. Everyone's mind seemed to be on babies.

Helen had her usual list of items, broken down by priority. LM Bujold had a wonderful rating system—garden snake, venomous snake, hissing venomous snake. I added a fourth level, involving the hissing snake and soft anatomical parts. For an important day, the herpetarium was surprisingly quiet. There was a pair of messages from Francine. One was a note mentioning $100,000 and requesting bank routing. The other was contact information for her costume and construction people. Down the list a ways was arrival information from my sister Jo. I had to get those two together.

Getting Jo was easy. We kept up with each other, so her private number was on my cell. I told Helen to work the numbers Francine had provided til she got her in person. Twenty minutes later the three of us were conference calling. My part was purely for introductions. After that, I barely managed the proverbial edgewise word. Given that Francine has a high school education and Jo is an Ivy League PhD, the two sound surprisingly alike. It got worse. The longer they talked, the more the similarity grew. Sheila was taking both of them to get corsets fitted for the bridesmaid dresses. The thought of the three together was frightening.

Eventually, the first rush wound down. Francine would have people swarming by morning. Jo and her dozen of handpicked graduate students were arriving that evening. I mentioned Sheila's idea of using the party boat as a floating stage. That had both of them going for a while. Jo had some interesting ideas for fun and games. It seemed that one of her grad students specialized in the Amish lifestyle, which uses no electricity. She gave me a list of people to contact.