"Skin summer" - читать интересную книгу автора (Griffin Ann)

CHAPTER ELEVEN

He rapped on the door of Brenda Markwell's cabin. The echo seemed unusually loud. He was nervous, his hands trembling slightly. In his left hand, he held the hundred and seventy dollars, tightly folded. It burned his flesh, pricked him like a thousand pins. Somehow, he felt the transfer of the money back to Brenda Markwell was the point at which his lifestyle would really be changing. True, he had made the decision to try to love when he had first met Susan. But now, getting rid of this cash was the symbol that made the decision real. Years from now, it would be this moment that thrust out of his memory as the turning point in his life.

The door opened, and Brenda smiled at him. She was wearing a white blouse without a bra. He could see the nubs of her nipples against it. She had on shorts, was barefooted. She was an exceedingly pretty girl, all yellow-haired and tan skinned, her blue eyes flashing, animated, warmer than he remembered them. "Come in," she said.

He hesitated, then stepped past her, into the living room. There was one reading light on over a stuffed chair. A copy of an adventure novel was spread on the seat. There was a bottle of cola on the stand beside the chair. He looked around for her roommate, could not find her.

"She's at the pool again," Brenda said, coming up behind him and closing her arms around him.

"She's coming back, isn't she?" he asked, anxious. He was not sure he trusted himself to go through with what he had planned. Was his will strong, or had all these years weakened it beyond repair?

"No," Brenda said, laughing deep in her throat. "At least not in the immediate future." She came around before him, unbuttoning her blouse. Her lovely teacup breasts were buoyant before him.

"Wait," he said.

She dropped her hands from her open blouse. "What?"

"There's something I have to…"

"Money," she said. "Of course. Wait, and I'll get you some. How much do you want?"

"It's not that," he said.

"It's not?"

"No."

"What then?"

"Brenda…" He hesitated again.

"You're acting funny."

"I came to give you this," lie said, holding out his tightly clenched fist.

"What? You're hand?" She laughed.

"Don't laugh at me," he said. He was obviously quite embarrassed, and he was trembling.

She stopped laughing and eyed his hand. "Well, you'll have to open it for me."

He did.

"The money," she said. "Is that the money I gave you for… For doing those things?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"A hundred and seventy dollars," he said, thrusting it into her hands, sighing heavily when he no longer held the sweaty cash. The burden had been raised. The symbolic moment had come and had passed, and his decision had been attested to with this ceremony.

"But why?" she asked again, staring un-comprehendingly at the bills, then up at him.

"I hustled you," he said.

"So?"

"I hustled you. Don't you understand?"

"You don't make any sense, Sam."

He was exasperated now. He grabbed her shoulders, squeezed them to emphasize what he had to say. "I saw you and set out after you to play you for cash."

"I knew that," she said.

"I shouldn't have," he said.

"But I knew. It didn't matter to me. I've told you how I've always paid to have those things done. There's no reason why I should not pay you. I don't care."

He shook his head. "But I do."

She held the money out to him. "Take this. It doesn't mean much to me. You can use it. And you earned it, after all. Here, take it back and forget it."

"You're not listening to me!" he shouted, shaking her by the shoulders. Her hair flew about her head, and her green-blue eyes danced. "You don't understand."

She looked frightened, her eyes very wide, her lips trembling just the slightest bit.

He let go of her.

She still held the money towards him.

"You don't care that I hustled you," he said. "But I care. I don't want to be a hustler. I don't want to be what I was. Things… Wells things have changed."

"There's nothing wrong with hustling," she said.

"Yes, Brenda. Yes there is."

"What?"

"Sex for money is wrong."

She shook her head negatively. Her breasts quivered deliciously. "No. You're wrong, Sam. There are people like me who need things that we can only get if we are willing to pay well for them. Without hustlers, we'd never be satisfied."

"I tried to justify my actions with lines like that," he said. "But it doesn't work anymore."

"But it's true!"

"No. Hustling you because you are sick, because you are hung up on masochism is wrong. Brenda. Terribly wrong. I am only using you. If I cared for you, I would not hustle, but would love you and help you, and try to find some way to help you understand yourself."

"Shit!" she snapped, tossing the money across the room. "You sound like you've just been to some wildass tent meeting and got your first taste of religion!"

"It's not like that."

"It sounds that way. It sure as hell does."

"You're afraid," he said. "You're afraid of anyone trying to help you. You want only the humiliation of having obscene, debasing things done for you. You want the need filled, but you don't want to dare to search for the cause of the need."

She came up against him, rubbing her resilient boobs against his chest. The smell of her warm flesh was heady, the strongest perfume a man could breathe in. She ground her pelvis against him, pressed him backwards toward the couch.

"Brenda…"

"Fuck me," she said. "You just need to get hot. Then all this bullshit won't mean anything."

"No," he said, pushing her to arm's length.

"I'll pay you twice as much as before," she said.

"Brenda, try to understand…"

"Twice as much, damn you!"

When he shook his head sadly, negatively, she struck at his arms and knocked them away from her. She came in, dropped to her knees tore open the snaps and zippers of his jeans. His cock sprung forth, limp. She stuffed it into her mouth, and felt it grow.

"Brenda…" he said.

She sucked.

He pulled her head away from his erect penis, dizzy, wanting her to continue but afraid he would not be able to make his point, to continue the break into a new lifestyle.

"What's the matter with you?" she hissed.

He pulled her up, her breasts in his hands. "I'd love to screw you, Brenda. More than ever now, because I feel something for you. But not under these conditions. Not as a paid hand."

"You can do it for nothing, then."

"No," he said. "You'd still want to be punished, debased. And I am no longer a hustler. I respect you as a person now. I can't do it. I can only love you and please you as I would a woman without your hangups. And that would not satisfy you."

"Damn right!" she said, furious now, her eyes wild, her hair hanging down over her flushed and contorted face.

"Let me love you," he said. "Let me try to help you. There must be some reason for your masochism. Something we can dig up. Let me help you find out what it is."

"Go to hell," she said.

"Brenda…"

"Go to hell!"

The shout echoed about the room.

"Please," he said.

"Get out of here." She had the look of a wild-woman, of someone close to violence. It was wise to move, to get out, as much as he hated to leave her like this.

"I'll go," he said.

"Fast!"

He put his limp organ into his trousers and zipped up. "Look, Brenda, if you change your mind…"

She spat on him. "Come to me if you want."

"Damn you!" she whined, crying now.

"Anything you want. You know where my cabin is. But no ugly stuff. Just love."

She grabbed a glass ashtray and threw it.

It missed him by inches.

He went out the door.

She slammed it behind.