"I guess that settles that" I said. "Welcome aboard."
Ann and I left the lounge in silence and we headed toward our suite. I was angry and a bit frustrated. I knew we had not taken things as far as I would have liked them to go with the nameless couple we had encountered in the bar. But more than that, I was not happy that it was Ann who called a peremptory stop to the development of this encounter.
We entered our suite and, without comment, I went to the closet to hang up the sport jacket I had been wearing. Ann must have sensed from my manner and look that I was displeased. "Bob, didn't I do enough tonight? I f ought for you, I displayed myself for you in front of all those people in the club and I let you undress me in the middle of the bar downstairs."
I turned to answer Ann and so that she was seated on the edge of the bed and that her eyes were red-rimmed with tears brimming. I knew there was something else going on in her mind.
"Look, Ann, I really don't understand. I hardly had to twist your arm to do any of those things and we both know that as much as I like exhibiting you, you like having people watch and admire you. So what is this all a bout?"
Ann did not immediately answer me. She sat in the edge of the bed, sobbing softly. Finally, she spoke. "I guess it is because I wonder sometimes what I am to you. Sometimes I think you think of me only as a body or a performer that you can place in different roles."
My response was not sympathetic. "Ann, after eleven years you don't know how I feel about you? No one else has been as much a part of my life as you have been. You know that."
And then I took a chance. "Look if being with me and the life we have worked out together does not suit you, I'm not holding you back. You're free to do whatever you want. You've made enough money with me over the yea rs so that you never have to work another day in your life. If our life together is not enough for you, well then I am not going to hold you back."
Neither I nor Ann could believe what I had just said. For my part, I could not imagine life without Ann and the last thing in the world I would have wanted would have been for Ann to have said "Fine, I'm leaving." And
Ann look absolutely terrified that I might have meant what I said.
"No Bob. No Bob. No." Ann answered me. "I don't think I could bear to be away from you." I sensed Ann's self-protective reaction as she seemed to pull herself, at least outwardly, together. Ann regained a sense of pur pose. "Look Bob, I guess I was thinking a bit too much about myself." She continued: "You know I only want to find ways to please you. Forget about my tantrum. Let me make it up to you."
At that point Ann, who had been sitting on the edge of the bed, slithered off the end of the bed, and literally on all fours crawled over to where I was standing. Now on her knees before me, Ann grabbed the front of her blouse ripping it open in one violent tug with the buttons flying off in different directions. Now bare chested, she tried to insinuate herself against me and opening her mouth while tugging at my pants, she drew me in to her. I leaned back against a chest of drawers and remained standing while Ann kneeled before me. Feeling a profound sense of power, uncharacteristically I found myself grabbing Ann by the hair and back of her head an d I took over control of the rhythm with which she was drawing me in and out of her mouth. As a result the normal languid, warm and liquid sensation I was used to in these circumstances was disrupted by the gentle abrasi on of teeth and the guttural sounds Ann made as I bumped against the back of her palate or her throat or as her breathing patterns were interrupted. At the end, acting more in the emotion of the moment than by plan, I w ithdrew just as I started to come and in so doing, and in the same way that certain feral animals mark their territory, I sprayed my essence all over Ann's face and hair.
We did not talk much more that night and I went to sleep with some little unease.
The vague sense of things being not quite right was with me when I woke in the morning. I tried to place or explain in my own mind what was going on, but I was not quite able to do it. At least not then. Initially, I thought the hostility I felt was towards Ann. When room service knocked at the door with our breakfast, I told Ann to answer the door. She was in the process of getting dressed and at that point she had been standing in front of a mirror brushing her hair while wearing slacks and a bra which was sufficiently sheer that her nipples were easily discerned. When I told her to answer the door, Ann reached for her blouse, but I indicated tha t she should just open the door as she was. Ann complied and opened the door to our suite. The room service waiter tried to be nonchalant about things as he arranged our breakfast service, but the frequent glances he gave in Ann's direction let me know that this was not within that waiter's normal routine.