Deadly Embrace

  My luck, Michael thought. This has gotta be the one night Max isn’t working.

  Just as he was swallowing his disappointment, Max came walking in, carrying two mugs of steaming hot coffee. Max, who was no slouch in the getting-it department, took one look and quickly handed the old man one of the mugs of coffee. “Here you go, Burt,” he said cheerfully. “Take a break. You look like you could use it.”

  “Don’t mind if I do,” Burt said, getting up and shuffling into a back room.

  “Hey,” Michael said to his friend.

  “Hey,” Max responded, fighting to keep the knowing look off his face. Their eyes met, acknowledging the situation.

  “I’d, uh . . . like a room,” Michael said, attempting to sound worldly.

  “Sure,” Max said, picking up a stained and torn reservation book and staring at the blank pages. “Got a nice one on the first floor, room number eight.” He reached back to one of the slots behind him. “Here’s the key,” he said, handing it to Michael while giving Polly a furtive once-over.

  She stared at him defiantly, daring him to say something.

  Michael took her hand and led her to the stairs.

  “You didn’t tell me you had a friend who worked in a hotel,” she said accusingly. “No wonder you were so anxious.”

  “Not that I come here often,” he explained with a sheepish grin.

  “Often enough to know what you’re doing, I hope,” she said, deciding that if she was going to cheat on Cyril, she might as well make sure it was worthwhile.

  “I can find my way around,” he boasted.

  “I’m sure you can,” she replied flirtatiously.

  The room—painted a dull green—was small and depressing. In the center was a narrow bed covered with a patchwork bedspread that had seen better days. A small window overlooked nothing.

  “Hmmm . . . ,” Polly said, glancing around. “Not exactly the Plaza, is it?”

  “Didn’t know you were here for the fancy trimmings,” Michael said, burning up with anticipation.

  “Ha! Let’s see what kind of fancy trimmings you’ve got,” she said, licking her lips in a very suggestive way.

  He was breathing fast. This was quite an experience. He had a girl, his fantasy girl, right in front of him in a hotel room with a bed. And now it occurred to him that he wasn’t exactly sure what he was supposed to do. Yes, he knew he had to touch her tits. Yes, he knew he had to kiss her in a passionate way. But what did he do after that? Just shove it in? Was that what she expected?

  It would have been nice if his dad had given him some guidelines. His pals at school weren’t much help either. Virgins—every one—much as they claimed otherwise. He was the first one doing the dirty deed and he couldn’t wait.

  Polly sashayed into the tiny bathroom. “I’ll be right out,” she called, shutting the door behind her.

  He hurriedly pulled the bedspread off the bed. A roach ran across the once-white sheets. He hit it with his shoe and flipped the body behind a chair. Girls didn’t like crawly things, he knew that.

  Should he take his pants off, or keep ’em on? That was the burning question. He decided to keep them on.

  When Polly emerged a few minutes later she’d removed her sweater, but she still had on her knee-high white boots, fake leather miniskirt, and a white bra. “So,” she said, facing him, a challenging look in her eyes. “You gonna fly me to the moon, or what?”

  He grabbed her with a show of strength and began kissing her again, pushing his tongue around her teeth, kneading her breasts, reaching for the clip at the back of her bra, struggling to get it off.

  Impatiently, she helped him. The bra came off and her breasts tumbled out, big and round, with enormous nipples.

  Jeez! Once again, he almost came in his pants.

  Somehow he managed to maintain control, and by the time the two of them fell back on the bed, he’d decided he was going to try and savor every moment of this fantastic new experience, make it last as long as he could. Which, the way he was going, was not about to be too long.

  “Where you been?” Grandma Lani demanded the moment Michael walked through the door. She was always questioning him, criticizing his friends, and trying to find out what he was up to. She drove him nuts.

  “What?” he mumbled, hardly in the mood for conversation. He had one goal, and that was to make it to the safety of his room, where he could relive the whole incredible experience with Polly, and maybe jerk off, because he was already horny again.

  “I said, where you been, young man?” Lani repeated, folding her arms across her chest.

  He wondered if she suspected he’d just gotten laid. Grandma Lani was very intuitive.

  Vinny, glued to the TV, watching The Andy Griffith Show, didn’t bother looking up.

  “I was, uh . . . out with some pals,” Michael said.

  “Those boys you hang around with are nothing but trouble,” Lani complained. “You should spend more time at home with us.”

  Sure, he thought. That’d be a laugh a minute.

  “Anyway,” she continued. “Some girl dropped by with cookies for you. Seemed sweet enough.”

  “Who was she?”

  “I think her name was Tina.”

  “Oh, yeah,” he said, suddenly remembering that he’d promised to call her and hadn’t. She’d probably come snooping around to see what he was up to. Girls were like that, always wanting to know everything. “She ask where I was?”

  “She did,” Lani said. “Only, I couldn’t tell her, could I? ’Cause you don’t tell me anything, do you?”

  “I was with the guys,” he said, repeating himself. “Y’know, Max an’ Charlie.”

  “Those two louts,” Lani said, her voice full of disapproval. “I hope you weren’t smoking.”

  “Who, me?” he said innocently.

  “All boys smoke,” Lani grumbled. “Don’t think I don’t know what you get up to, young man. And you’d better not let me catch you. Smokin’s a filthy habit. I hate filthy habits.”

  I know that, he thought, attempting to slide out of the room.

  “Don’t you want your cookies?” she asked, coming after him.

  He mumbled a quick “No.”

  “And you’d better not forget, you’re working in the store tomorrow.”

  “How many times I gotta tell you?” Vinny said, dragging his eyes away from the TV. “Michael does not work at the store on Saturdays.”

  “That’s ridiculous!” Lani snorted. “It’s just a superstition on your part.”

  “No, it’s not,” he said, turning to his son. “You hear me, Michael? You will not work there on a Saturday. Don’t listen to her.”

  “God help me!” Lani sighed, throwing her hands in the air. “Somebody save me from these two impossible men.”

  “It’s all right, Grams,” Michael said, trying to placate her. “I’ll do whatever you want.”

  “No, you won’t,” Vinny interrupted fiercely. “You do not go near that place on a Saturday as a sign of respect for your dead mother. You understand me?”

  “Yes, yes,” Lani said irritably. “He understands. I’ll get extra help if you force me to. Things are bad enough, but what do you care if I have to pay for another pair of hands?”

  “Do that,” Vinny said, returning his attention to the TV.

  Michael escaped to his bedroom and slammed the door. The room was small, but at least it was all his. On the wall he had a large blowup poster of Wilt Chamberlain tacked up next to a glamorous picture of Elizabeth Taylor lounging on a leopard print couch in a sexy white swimsuit.

  Tonight he didn’t need the inspiration of Elizabeth.

  Tonight he would sleep like the man he now was.

  Dani—1961

  The day she got her period, Dani knew she had to escape from the god-awful place she called home. At thirteen she was still a child, although physically she looked like a young woman, with her blossoming body, gossamer yellow hair, clear blue eyes, and fine features.

/>   “Can’t wait for this one t’ be of an age,” her daddy often said to anyone who’d listen. “She’s as ripe as a peach ready for the pickin’.”

  “You’d better watch out,” Emily, one of her older half sisters, warned her. “Soon’s he knows you’re bleedin’, he’ll be at you.”

  “No,” Dani said defiantly. “I won’t let him.”

  “Try stoppin’ him,” Emily said. “He’ll force you, exactly the same as he did me.”

  Little did Emily know that Dashell had already molested Dani. When she was younger he’d sometimes take her into his bedroom, lock the door, and make her touch him. “When you’re a big girl we’ll do a lot more than this,” he’d promised with an evil chuckle.

  “You mean y—you’ve slept with him?” Dani stammered, keeping her secret to herself.

  “Wasn’t my choice,” Emily said, turning up her nose at the memory. “He’s a pig.”

  “That’s horrible! Disgusting!” Dani said, shuddering.

  “It’ll be your turn next,” Emily warned.

  Emily was short, with light brown frizzy hair, a compact body, and big breasts. She was seventeen and quite smart. Dani worshiped her and followed her around whenever she could.

  Although over seventy, Dashell took advantage of all the female members of his family. Since Lucy’s unfortunate death (they’d buried her in the back garden and told Dani when she was old enough that Olive was her mother), he’d taken on two more wives. One was an ex-prostitute, the other a teenage runaway. Between them they’d given him five more children.

  Dashell ruled his large household like the pasha he imagined himself to be. All seven of the older girls had to sleep with him whenever he summoned them, and so did his four wives. Recently two of his daughters had become pregnant by him. He called it “the grand circle of life.”

  Dani dreaded the day when he would come after her. Emily was right, she knew it would be soon.

  “If you don’t want him on top of you, you’d better run,” Emily said. “God! I wish I had.”

  “Run where?” she asked.

  “Anywhere—’s long as it’s away from here.”

  “Will you come with me?”

  “I might,” Emily answered mysteriously. “The thing is, if we get caught he’ll beat the bejesus out of us. That man is full of vengeance, and he don’t care what he does.”

  Emily knew things the others didn’t because she’d palled up with Sam Froog, a cocky young man with bright red hair who occasionally worked part time at the ranch and had eyes for Emily; she liked him too. He smuggled her books and magazines, and from them she learned plenty about the outside world, information she sometimes shared with Dani.

  Sam rode in on his motorcycle for a few days every month. He’d sat next to Dashell at the roulette table in Vegas, and the old man had offered him good money to come out to the ranch and help out. Mostly he took care of the horses, cleaning their stalls, grooming them, and stocking up on feed.

  “Your old man’s a perv,” he told Emily one day when they were getting more than friendly in the back of the barn.

  “What’s that mean?” she asked, picking straw out of her hair.

  “He’s screwin’ all these women. Whadda you think that makes him?”

  “A pig!” Emily said.

  “A perv,” Sam said.

  And then they began necking again.

  Soon Sam began telling her all kinds of stories about Las Vegas and life outside the ranch. Emily couldn’t believe how exciting it all sounded.

  “Y’know, there is a better way of living out there,” she confided to Dani, passing on her knowledge. “I’ve been thinking that maybe we should go find it. We’ve got nothing to lose.”

  “Yes,” Dani said, nodding fervently. “I want to get away from here more than anything!”

  So they made their plans, eliciting the help of Sam, who was sure he could squeeze them both on the back of his motorcycle as long as they were really serious about splitting.

  “If I help you, I can’t ever come back here,” he said. “The old geezer pays me plenty, so I’ll be losin’ out.”

  “Think of it this way,” Emily said persuasively. “You’ll be rescuing Dani and me. That makes you a real hero.”

  “It does?” Sam said, liking the hero idea.

  “Oh, yes,” Emily said encouragingly, giving him a quick peck on the cheek.

  “It’s not like he knows where I live or anything,” Sam mused. “He only comes t’ town every coupla months—so he’ll never track us. We’ll see him before he sees us.”

  “Then you’ll take us?” Emily asked.

  “Why not?” Sam said, imagining himself as a kind of superman figure. “I’ll help you.”

  “We’ll pay you back,” Emily promised.

  “You bet you will!” he joked.

  Two days later they took off in the middle of the night while everyone was sleeping. Sam wheeled his motorcycle a good distance from the property before he dared start it.

  “Don’t worry about waking him,” Emily said, climbing on the back and helping Dani aboard. “He sleeps like the dead; snores so loud he wouldn’t hear a bear fart if it was standing next to him.”

  “I know, but the old guy’s some kinda wacko,” Sam said, experiencing second thoughts. “We don’t want him catching us.”

  “He won’t,” Emily assured him.

  “I could give him up to the cops, you know,” Sam said. “Havin’ all those wives—it’s gotta be against the law.”

  “Really?” Dani said, thinking how satisfying it would be to see Dashell led off in handcuffs.

  “Oh yeah,” Sam said confidently. “An’ how about none of you goin’ t’ school? That’s not legal, for sure.”

  “I taught Dani to read and write,” Emily said proudly. “She learned good.”

  Dani’s heart was fluttering at the thought of this new adventure. All she’d ever known was the ranch, and Olive forcing her to work. Every day she’d had to feed the animals, clean the house, do the cooking, washing, sewing, and scrubbing. Her workload was endless.

  She clung on to Emily, her arms around her sister’s waist, hoping and praying that they’d make a clean getaway and Dashell wouldn’t come after them.

  As they neared the bright lights of Vegas she went into shock. “It’s . . . it’s like a fairyland,” she gasped, darting her head this way and that.

  “Just you wait,” Sam said, chuckling. “You got the good stuff to come.”

  “I do?”

  “Bet on it.”

  And sure enough, the moment they hit the Strip she could barely speak. “Oh my Lord!” she exclaimed. “Look at all these people.”

  After driving up and down a couple of times, they stopped at a coffee shop, where Sam bought them all hamburgers, milk shakes, and big slices of apple pie.

  “What’m I gonna do with you two now I got you here?” he said, realizing that he might have made a rash move.

  “You can let us sleep on your floor for a couple of days,” Emily suggested. “I promise we’ll stay out of your way.”

  “It’s not like I got a palace or anything,” Sam explained. “It’s only one bedroom, so that means we’ll all havta sleep in together.”

  Emily giggled and gave him a knowing look. “Sounds like fun to me.”

  “Yeah, but not with your sister watching.”

  “Dani won’t watch,” Emily promised. “She’ll curl up in a corner and go to sleep.”

  “Honestly,” Dani agreed, wolfing down her pie. “I’ll make sure I don’t bother you.”

  “Tomorrow we’ll both go out and find jobs, then we’ll look for somewhere to live,” Emily said. “You won’t be sorry you brought us here.”

  “You can’t get a job unless you got a Social Security card,” Sam pointed out.

  “What’s that?” Dani asked.

  “Somethin’ you gotta have.”

  “How do we get one?” Emily wanted to know.

  “Well.” S
am hesitated for a moment. “I know a man who knows someone who might be able to fix it. Don’t suppose you got birth certificates?”

  “No,” Emily said. “We’re lucky to have clothes.”

  Ten days later Sam came up with two fake Social Security cards.

  “You’re the best!” Emily squealed, kissing him soundly on the lips.

  “Thanks,” he said, looking embarrassed. “Now you really owe me.”

  “I don’t mind that,” Emily said with a half smile.

  “You’re so nice,” Dani added shyly. “God will reward you for being so nice.”

  “Don’t go spouting all that God crap,” Emily said crossly, glaring at her younger sister. “We’re not at the ranch now, so drop it.”

  “Sorry,” Dani muttered.

  “That’s how he kept us in line,” Emily continued. “Threatening us, telling us that everything was God’s will. It’s not God’s will that he was poking us.”

  “That’s incest, y’know,” Sam said knowledgeably.

  “What does ‘incest’ mean?” Dani asked.

  “Go to the library and find out,” Sam said.

  “What’s a library?”

  “Oh my!” Emily exclaimed, exasperated. “I thought I taught you stuff like that.”

  “Not well enough,” Sam said, chuckling.

  Armed with her forged Social Security card, Dani passed as seventeen and got a job working as a maid at one of the big hotels. Emily scored a job as a waitress at the same hotel. With their combined wages they were able to move out of Sam’s room and rent a tiny apartment, although Emily spent most of her spare time over at Sam’s.

  When Dani wasn’t working she visited the public library, soaking up information. Being ignorant was not a good thing. She was thirsty for knowledge and determined to get it.

  Unaware of her tender age, but well aware of her beauty, men began coming on to her.

  She shuddered at the thought of being with a man. Dashell, her illustrious father, had put her off men forever.

  Many nights she lay in bed experiencing nightmares about the things he’d made her do when she was younger. Touch this, stroke that, lick this.