The Sex Life of the Gods

  CHAPTER SIX

  Nick awoke to sunlight streaming into his face and had a momentaryimpression that it was dawn; then he realized that the sunlight had areddish cast to it. He blinked at the bedroom clock, amazed to find thathe had slept until late afternoon.

  My God, he thought groggily.

  His headache was nearly gone, he noticed as he threw off the covers andswung his long legs to the floor. The soreness was still there, thumpingdully in his stiff muscles, but sleep had been deep and brought no freshnightmares to worry about. He cleaned himself up in the bathroom and gota pair of slacks and a shirt from the closet, still feeling somewhatlike a stranger. While he dressed himself, he thought of the woman hewas married to.

  Despite the feeling of being a stranger in a strange world, and of beingcaught up in a strange set of circumstances, he found himself feelingdelightful tremors when he thought of Beth. Even now, there was a tight,fluttering sensation in his insides when he thought of the talcumedsatin of her skin, the warm lift of her brightly nippled breasts and thestrong response of her rounded thighs. She was a beautiful woman. Shewas sex all rolled up in a frame of gentle curves and soft flesh, and hecould see that to love a woman like her would not only be easy, it wouldbe a privilege.

  He buckled the belt about his waist, trying to dispel the thoughts ofthe woman, and went downstairs to the kitchen. Hunger gnawed at himviolently.

  The coffee was cold. He turned the gas on under it and the note on thetable caught his eye. He picked it up to scan it briefly.

  DARLING,

  HAD TO RUSH OFF TO WORK. KISSED YOU GOOD-BY AND YOU SAID "GLUMPTH". BE HOME SOON. LOVE YOU TERRIBLY.

  BETH

  He grinned at the note, balled it into his fist and threw it into thepaper can. When the coffee was hot, he poured himself a cup and fixed acouple of sandwiches with what was left of the package of cold meat. Ashe was finishing the last couple of bites of the sandwich, he heard thethud of the evening paper against the front door. For a moment, itstartled him, then, when he had realized what it was, he was half out ofthe chair... He paused there momentarily, then sank back into his seat.He _couldn't_ go out there and get the paper - if the neighbors saw himpicking it up ... He sat there, waiting for Beth to come home, thesuspense digging into his guts with ragged teeth. Had they found theplane? Were they onto him? Who were those two men? How did they knowwhere to find him? Why were they looking for him?

  He drank damned near the whole pot of coffee and watched the hands ofthe electric clock move with agonizing slowness. Finally, at five forty,Beth drove up to the house and came through the door. Nick leaped fromthe chair.

  "The paper!" He snatched it from her hands and began tearing it open.Damn newsboys for folding them!

  "Nick! Aren't you going to kiss me?"

  "Huh? Oh." He kissed her briefly, fleetingly, and returned to the paper.The crash was on page one.

  WRECKAGE OF PRIVATE AIRCRAFT FOUND

  Everett, Pa. The smouldering wreckage of what was apparently a private plane was found late yesterday evening in the heavily wooded area north of the city by a young Boy Scout looking for a campsite.

  Benjamin Talbot, aged 13, after locating the mangled aircraft, promptly called local police who dispatched Detective Lieutenant Nolan Brice, Everett Rescue Squad and FAA investigator Arron P. Dickson to examine the wreckage.

  "It's the most unusual crash site I've ever seen," FAA investigator Dickson told local newsmen. "There's no evidence of wings or tail assembly. The fuselage is also of a strange design."

  Detective Lieutenant Brice, after checking with the airport tower at Everett, and with CAP officials, informed newsmen that no private aircraft had been reported in trouble, or even over the particular area in which the craft was found. "Of course," Lieutenant Brice added, "one plane may have gone unnoticed. This is highly unlikely, but we cannot overlook the possibility. What is puzzling, to me, is that the aircraft has not been identified and there have been no bodies found."

  "The Civil Air Patrol," Mr. Dickson commented, "has been most cooperative and are now engaged in an air search of the area, while rescue squads work in the mountains."

  Mr. Dickson went on to state that the mystery crash will be thoroughly investigated by authorities in an effort to determine the make and model of the plane, as well as the fate of its occupants.

  At present, the crash site has been roped off and placed under guard by local Militiamen. Only authorized personnel will be allowed to view the wreckage. Major Gilbert Donnoue, of the Air Force Experimental Wing, refused to make a statement as to whether the plane was of Air Force origin. "To my knowledge, we have lost no test planes. However, an extensive check will undoubtedly be run to verify this."

  Test plane? Nick stared in amazement at the words that leaped at himfrom the printed page. Test plane? What the hell was going on in thisscrewy world? No wings? No tail assembly? No Mayday calls? No record ofthe plane? The whole damned thing sounded ridiculous. Coupled with thefact that he had been out of touch for thirteen months, it all becameweird.

  And to top it all off, Nolan Brice was one of the men who had beenplaced on the investigating staff at the crash scene. Suppose he, Nick,had left something at the scene ... a fraternity pin, a slip of paper... anything that would link the crash to the fact that he was alive andin Everett. The whole damned bunch would be on his tail, before youcould say, "Jack Robinson." He...

  "Nick," Beth pouted. "Will you pay a little attention to me for achange?"

  "I'm sorry, honey, but it's the plane." While she listened he read theaccount aloud and, when he'd finished, they exchanged glances. "That'sthe plane I was in," he told her.

  "But you don't know how to fly."

  "I must know, unless someone else flew it. That's the plane I woke upbeside. I must have been in the damned thing. But I don't know if anyoneelse was." He buried his face in his hands.

  "Nick. Should we call the police?"

  "No!"

  Alarmed at his violent outburst, she put her hand on his shoulder tocomfort him. "All right dear. I'm sorry."

  "It'd been different, if those men weren't after me. I'd call the policeif they weren't dogging my tracks. I'd turn myself in just to find outwhat the hell's going on."

  "Me too," she said softly.

  At first he didn't catch the meaning behind her words, then he blinked."What?" He asked.

  "The car, the black one. It followed me to work this morning." Shepaused, then added, "It didn't follow me home though."

  Nick slammed the paper to the floor, his lean jaw muscles knotted inanger. "That settles it," he snapped. "I can face whatever I'm mixed upin, but there's no earthly reason why you should be subjected to it!I'll have to get out!"

  Beth threw herself into his arms, the ever ready tears welling in hereyes. "No, Nick," she pleaded. "Whatever it is, we'll fight it. We'llmake out, but darling, don't leave me again!"

  He held her tightly against him, his hands stroking the warm softness ofher back and spine. The perfume of her hair filled him with a headythought of summer fields of flowers, of sweetness and tenderness, of ...love. Love. Nick Danson, he told himself, you _are_ mixed up. You'refalling in love with your own wife.

  "... and we'll go away," Beth was whispering in his ear. "We'll packeverything and go far away, where we'll never see these men again. Nick.Please. Oh, please keep me with you."

  "Going away won't settle anything, sweetheart. They'll always be there,just outside the door. I've got to do something..."

  He broke off suddenly and it flicked into his mind like a film of thepast, like a memory. The soft face of the girl, her hair a golden coloragainst the backdrop of the ochre mountains ... the softness of the paleblue-green tree... She spun away from him, the loose, filmy blue dresswhirling about her trim ankles ... then she was coming back to him, armsoutstretched ... kissing him lovingly...

  He shut it off,
clamped it from his mind. A memory! A memory that madeno sense at all. A tremor of fear ran along his spine and trembled inhis flesh. What did it mean? What was happening to him?

  "Nick?" It was Beth. "What is it, Nick? You look pale and frightened."

  "Nothing. We'll go away."

  She beamed. "I know just the place. The cabin. Far up in the mountains.No one will know we're there. We'll learn to love each other again."

  "You have to work," he pointed out.

  She nodded. "That's true, still _you_ could go up there and try topuzzle this all out. I can come up in the evenings, and on weekends."

  "Might be a good idea," he admitted, thinking that at least, he'd besafe from prying eyes.

  "Then it's settled. You go sit somewhere and I'll get things packed."

  She whisked away, almost running up the stairs to pack some things forhim. He walked to the kitchen, without turning on a light, and pouredhimself a glass of water. Outside, through the window, he could see thetwilight fading into evening, the heavy purple clouds of night sweepingsteadily across the sky. A star winked later and he knew it. Venus. Hestood there in the darkness and picked out many of them as theyflickered into being. Mars. Sirius, Vega and others. There were...

  * * * * *

  ... She came into his arms and talk was insignificant and quiteunnecessary. The soft, white arms wound about his neck, tugging fingerspulled playfully at his hair and she smiled at him. His lips moved downagainst hers and they were lost in themselves. He could feel the tautpressure of her breasts playing against his chest and the firm roundnessof her thighs working against his.

  Her strong fingers worked against the muscles of his shoulders, pullinghim down onto the cottony moss beneath the strange tree. The smalllitheness of her body molded into his and his hands stroked her breastsbeneath the filmy cloth that covered them. Her hands moved upward to thestraps that swept over her shoulders and pulled them down. His eagerfingers helped her, working the straps down until the firm mounds of herbreasts lifted their rubbery, coral tipped nipples toward the sky. Hisfingers worked them, kneaded the warm muscles, while his mouth worked onhers. When he had released her lips, she pulled his face down into thetwin cushions of her breasts. His hand moved against the flesh of herthighs, caressingly...

  * * * * *

  "Ready, dear?"

  It was gone. Like that. A sudden flickering memory of some long vanishedevent that might have given him some hope. It had been fantastic again,the strange colors and the weird landscape, but he wanted it despitethat. She had stolen it, ripped it viciously from his mind; but she wasnot to blame. He turned and smiled at her as she came into the kitchen.

  She had turned on a soft light in the front room, but had allowed thekitchen to remain dark. In the half-light of the room, he thought thatshe was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. It would not be hardto love her, he thought again.

  He reached out and took her by the shoulders, pulling her gently againsthim to kiss her. Her mouth moved against his, satiny with desire, untilthey parted.

  "I'm ready, if you are," he said.

  "For what, darling? The bedroom, or the car?"

  He chuckled. "The car. The bedroom will keep until we're up in thewoods."