Taking off her nightgown, she got under the shower and made it as cold as she could stand, then hastily toweled herself and, going to the closet, took off a hanger a freshly laundered peach-colored satin slip which she drew over her voluptuous body.
Just as she was turning back to her dresser, the door flung open and both Heather and young Tim stood there smirking at her.
"Good morning, Mummy. Or rather, I ought to say, good afternoon," the red-haired young woman drawled. "We looked In earlier, but you were still pounding your ear. Besides, you sort of earned a late sleep-in."
Rachel bit her lips and could not help blushing at the amused, cynical look of her amoral stepdaughter. "What-what do you want of me now, Heather?"
"Not much, really, Mummy." Again, Heather underlined that endearment with dripping sarcasm. "Just to tell you that we looked at the movies Tim and I took last night. Wow, they're really sexy, Rachel! I figure that you'd want a chance to pack and write Daddy a note that you're leaving him, rather than have us show them to him when he gets back home. By the way, he just talked to me on the phone and he'll probably be home in time for dinner. So you've got maybe six hours to make a clean break."
Rachel Woodling drew a deep breath, her arms at her sides, trying to ignore the lecherous grin of the blond boy lolling against the side of the door. "Look," she falteringly began, "let's be rational about this, please, Heather. I told you last night, I happen to be in love with your father. At least, give me a fighting chance to prove to you that he loves me, too. Is that asking too much?''
"Oh, sure, I know your kind," the redhead sneered, "You'll probably tell him what we did to you last night and make it look as if we're a couple of sex fiends. He'll get all sympathetic and give us hell, and then you'll figure you're safe."
"No-it-it won't be like that at all, I give you my word."
Heather stared suspiciously at her stepmother. "What's that supposed to mean?"
The tall brunette matron clenched her fists and drew another deep breath, her head high as she looked levelly back at her taunting young tormenters. "I mean, I'm not going to tell him anything. I-I think I can understand why you both hate me, and I'm not quite so prudish as you both may think."
"I'll say you're not, Rachel girl," young Tim snickered. "Boy, did you ever shake that gorgeous ass of yours when I started banging you!"
Heather was frowning now, glanced quickly at her brother and shook her head impatiently. "Can it, Tim! Now let's get this straight, Rachel. You mean to tell me you'd dare to show your face in this house after the way we treated you last night, and still make a play for Dad?"
"I don't have to make a play for your father, Heather. I'm his wife. I married him for better or for worse, and I'm going to try to make it better for all of us-if you'll only give me a chance."
"I don't get that at all," Heather's frown deepened. "Unless you're just a little kinky. Maybe that's it! Just maybe," she moved mockingly forward, till she stood inches away from the blushing mature brunette, "just maybe you got a real kick out of what we did to you, and maybe you'd like some more, him?"
Rachel faced the girl unflinchingly, though her fingernails dug into her palms as she steadied herself to confront the redhead. "All I ask for is a chance to make this marriage last, Heather. Please. You see, whether you believe it or not, both you and Tim, I really am very much in love with your father. Just as maybe I think you are."
"That's got all the earmarks of a dirty crack, bitch!" Heather hissed, her cat-green eyes narrowing. "Are you suggesting that maybe I've got the hots for Dad?"
"I'm not saying anything, Heather. Except that it wouldn't be unusual for a fine loyal girl to admire her father so much that she would measure anyone who appeals to her sexually by his standards. That's happened for hundreds of years, in case you don't know it."
"I don't need casebook psychology from you, Mummy," Heather sneered. Now it was her turn to flush slightly and to lower her eyes. "Anyhow, tell you what. Tim and I will give you just a month from today, savvy? And if by that time Daddy doesn't convince us that he's really in love with you and we can't see it for ourselves, we're going to rape you again and then kick your ass out of here. Just so long as you understand it, Rachel."
"In other words, you want to make a bargain with me?"
"Yeah, I sure do, Mummy," the redhead jeered. "You know, Timmy said to me after he banged you that he thought it was a real nice piece of Rachel, and if you know German, that's the word for revenge. Well, that's not too bad for a kid, is it, Mummy? So just you remember you've got a mouth. Oh yes, there's one thing more."
Rachel Woodling was nearly at the breaking point, and she felt her thighs trembling as she forced herself to stand calmly and confront her spiteful stepdaughter. "Go ahead, Heather. I want to be as fair as I can, so you haven't any grounds to hate me as a person.
"I don't especially hate you or like you or anything else, Mummy. It's just that we've had Dad to ourselves all this time, and he really didn't have to go and get himself a permanent piece of tail. But since he's gone and done it, what's done is done. Only, we'll give you that month, see? But if Timmy or I happen to want a little fun with you, Mummy, you're going to give. Is that understood? And you're not going to tell Dad either. That's the bargain, take it or leave it."
Rachel Woodling shuddered, her face was scarlet and she lowered her eyes for a moment. Then very bravely, she looked at Heather and nodded: "I'll agree to that. But you won't have to take any more moving pictures, you know. First of all, if you're trying to blackmail me that way, I think your father has brains enough to see through something like that, and he wouldn't think very much of either of you for dreaming up such a stunt. As I told you, I'm not a prude. And maybe if I do let you have your revenge on me, even though it's very adolescent, maybe that will help convince you I really do want to stay and be a good wife to your father."
Heather exchanged a mystified glance with her younger brother, then shrugged. "All right, Mummy. We'll leave it at that. Just you remember today's date. You've got exactly one month. And if some night next week we come barging into your room, Timmy and I, that is if Daddy isn't keeping you busy that particular night, you'd better get ready to put out or else. Come on, little brother, let's give Mummy a chance to put on her glad rags and welcome Daddy back home."
It had been a trying evening for Timothy Woodling's beautiful new wife. She herself had prepared a light supper, and served her gray-haired husband, as well as Tim Jr. and Heather while they ignored her during their conversation with their father to ask him about his New York trip, the sights, the fine restaurants and what was playing on Broadway. From time to time, he had sent her an apologetic look and she had smiled and nodded understandingly. Then finally they had been alone together in the living room, young Tim professing a date to listen to some new rock records with a boyfriend of his down the street, and Heather to give herself a shampoo and set.
"I missed you, Rachel," he sat down beside her on the couch and put his arm around her waist, kissed her gently on the mouth. "Did the kids give you a hard timer?"
"Not really, Tim darling. It's good to have you back home again. And your news is certainly wonderful. It's quite a feather in your cap to have got that account away from all those big New York agencies."
"I know. And if I can handle it on a commuting basis to their satisfaction, it's just possible we might be able to open up a New York branch. It would mean a lot of money for everybody and we might even have an apartment on Riverside Drive some day. But that's for the future. Right now, what I'm concerned about is those kids of mine. I felt sort of uncomfortable at the table tonight when they were talking to me and not including you, Rachel."
"It'll take time, darling. We both know that They're bound to feel hostile towards me. And it's only proof that they loved their mother very much and that they miss her. I couldn't expect to take her place, not ever. But if they'll look on me as a sort of older and wiser friend who can help them along and solve their problems, then that's something to work for."
"You're a wonderful girl, Rachel, and that's why I did marry you. Let's just sit here like old married folks and watch the movie, and then we'll go to bed and it'll just be the two of us and we won't think about the kids." He hugged and kissed her again, and Rachel quivered with anticipation. A strange sensual aura had pervaded her, remembering as she did the unholy bargain she had made with young Tim and Heather. Now that she could sit back and think about it, she had virtually offered to be their whore if they would give her a month's trial as their father's new wife. And there was always the terrible danger that somehow they might betray her and actually tell Tim how they had entrapped her and perhaps accomplish their original purpose of having her driven out of the house as an unfit wife and mother. No, she would just have to take that chance. She knew that she needed love and the security of being wanted by this gentle, intellectual man who shared so much in common with her. It was true that she had her own shop and could earn a good living, but the prospect of lonely years as a career girl-and at thirty-four she couldn't really call herself a girl any longer-frightened her. No, she had made a bargain, and she would keep it, cost what it may…
She had left him watching the ending of the late show to go to her room and to change into a seductive black nylon nightie and open-toe sandals, applying perfume to her armpits and the valley of her breasts as well as the insides of her thighs. Glancing down at herself, she could see a few faint bruises on her shoulders and the insides of her thighs where young Tim's sinewy fingers had gripped her last night. And a wave of lascivious awareness came over her as she hastily drew on the filmy sheath which outlined the magnificence of her breasts, the smoothness of her round belly, the litheness of her waist and the jouncy hillocks of her bottom. Then quickly she moved down the hall into her husband's room and, drawing back the covers, got quickly into bed and waited for him.
When the door opened about ten minutes later, she whispered huskily, "Hurry, darling, I'm ready for you, I need you so."
His eyes widened with surprise at the sight of the gauzy nightie, for it was one she hadn't worn fill now. "It won't take me a minute, Rachel darling," he said, his voice thickening with anticipation. In his mind there swirled the exotic night with Eleanor, the meaningful restoration of his virility. He went to his dresser and took out a pair of pajamas, then hurried into the bathroom to shower and to be ready for her. A few minutes later, wearing just the pajama bottoms, he came out and went to the bed, took her by the shoulders, bent down and kissed her on the mouth. Rachel closed her eyes, linking her soft arms round his neck as she drew him down to her. "My darling husband," she breathed. "It feels like ages since we were alone together. Do get in beside me, hurry, darling!"
He reached to turn out the little night lamp beside the bed, and then joined her. He turned, on his left side to her, his left arm under her shoulders, his right hand gently stroked her swelling breasts, then the supple contour of one lovely hip as their lips met in a long ardent kiss.
Rachel felt the flesh of her inner thighs twitching and prickling with a new desire. What had taken place last night came back into her senses now, but with a new and singular meaning. She still believed that it was the male's traditional prerogative to take the initiative. And until now, he always had, even though they hadn't yet achieved the successful union she had dreamed of. But she felt that it was terribly vital that he continue in his right until at last their magical moment would come upon them both, and then there would be no problems left in this household.
Certainly he was proceeding satisfactorily. Without haste, his right hand squeezing each of her swelling breasts in turn, plying her with long hot kisses, delicately probing the tip of his tongue just between her eagerly parted lips, Tim Woodling wooed his beautiful brunette wife. She had turned on her left side to be closer to him, till their bellies pressed together and till she could feel the hard structure of his legs against the soft, round yielding columns of her quivering thighs. His right hand moved now to her buttocks, kneading them, and she caught her breath with a little gasp and pressed herself ardently against him. Her eyes widened with joy to feel the significant turgidity of his maleness against the filmy crotch of the nightie. Oh, let it be right for them both tonight, she prayed.
Her hands stroked his back, and she could feel the muscular tension of his body as he strained against her. Now his penis was gloriously hard, prodding against the plumb mound of her vulva, and she turned scarlet in the darkness with the knowledge of her desire for him, an almost shameless and eager desire. With it came the knowledge, too, that she was remembering how his own son had used her, and as she tried frantically to examine her feelings about what had taken place last night, she was almost shocked to feel that she had not the slightest inclination to reveal that usage to the father of that boy who had actually made her the medium of his first successful act of intercourse. That awareness made her squirm and arch against her husband now with a kind of subconscious longing that was not far from incestuous anticipation.
And when at last she felt her husband's hand lofting the fragile sheath above her waist and baring her loins and buttocks and thighs, she whimpered, "Yes, now, my sweetest darling, oh yes, Tim, please!" With a fervent exultance that made her blush all the more in this welcoming privacy which the darkness procured.
His fingertips glided over her quivering belly, and thence to the thick bush of her mount, tickling the soft lips of her vulva, then moving quickly to stroke the insides of her willingly parted thighs. She felt herself moist there, and knew that she was ready for him. There was a throbbing between her thighs, a longing that was as concrete and specific as her love for him and her determination to withstand the storm of hostility which his two children had brought down upon her.