All right then! Maybe Dr. Golden was right! Maybe he did have a Don Juan complex! Suppose he did? What did she know, anyway? She was just a woman like all the rest!
Yes, that she was. And not a bad-looking head at that. The way she didn’t care how high her skirt rode up her shapely legs, the way her bosom rose and fell, pushing out against the white silk blouses she wore so that the outline of her nipples appeared and disappeared and appeared again the way her gray-green eyes focused on him so intently when he was relating some particularly choice sex experience — yes, she was all woman. And she was attracted to him, Reggie told himself. He could tell.
And that talk about a Don Juan complex. He should have realized what was motivating her at the time. Sure! She had the hots for him. How could he have been so dense as not to realize it before?
From this building certainty, Reggie's mind pushed forward to erect a fantasy. He’d drive down to her place. Her husband wasn’t home. He knew that because she’d told him. And of course he should have seen that in telling him she was issuing an invitation.
When he got there, he’d go straight up to her apartment. Maybe the door would be open. It was always left open during, her office hours. It might well be that she’d leave it open just because she was expecting him. If not, if he had to ring, if she really hadn’t been expecting him, he’d make some excuse about a psychological trauma, make up some story that could lead easily into making his pitch for her.
It was late, so she’d probably be in a nightgown. Maybe she’d throw a robe over it. Maybe not. Either way, he’d find his way to her flesh. His hands would caress those intriguing breasts. His mouth would drink deep of her warm lips. His body would move over hers until her professional composure was a dim memory and she was no longer a doctor, but a woman screaming out her ecstasy in his ears. At last Dr. Mavis Golden would be made aware that Reginald Ivers was no mere braggart, but a lover the likes of which hadn’t been dreamed of by either her or Freud.
Reggie paid the check and left the drug store. He got back in his car and pushed down Broadway through the storm. One hand stayed in his pocket, reassuring himself of the magnificence of the weapon with which Dr. Golden would soon be assailed.
At last, he’d prove to her what a man he really was. At last her body would be his, warm and alive in his arms. Warm and alive . . .
Reggie’s plans didn’t include the premonition that the body he was picturing would soon be cold and dead!
Very cold!
Very dead!
CHAPTER 9
Bull in a China Swap
“. . . I’M BRENDA HALEY. I’m twenty-eight years old. I’m a lesbian. What they call a dyke . . .”
Brenda stalled until the rest of the group had left. She stood in the hallway outside Dr. Golden’s apartment and watched the elevator dial until it settled at “L” and she was sure that the car had been in the lobby long enough to discharge all its passengers. Then she pressed the button and waited for the car to come up again.
When it did, Brenda stepped inside and pushed for the fourteenth floor. The elevator rose slowly, and she hummed to herself in anticipation. Ling-Foi would be waiting.
So she was. The Chinese girl opened the door to her apartment as Brenda stepped from the elevator. “Good evening." She bowed low from the waist. “And welcome to my humble house.” Her English was flawless. She backed through the doorway and made a sweeping gesture for Brenda to enter.
“Why do you do that?” Brenda was half annoyed, half amused.
“It is the custom in my humble homeland,”
“Nuts! You were born in San Francisco. You’ve never been any closer to China than I have. You’re just putting me on.”
“Never would I do such a thing. This worthless Chinese maiden lives only to serve you. If my greeting does not please you, then let the life flow from my un-loved body.”
“Now let's not get drastic. Besides your body is far form unloved. I’ll prove that to you soon enough. What I want to know is why you knock yourself out conforming to the stereotype of Lotus Blossom, the China Doll?”
“It’s not a bad stereotype.” Ling-Foi shrugged.
“But you don’t have to put on an act with me.”
“Why not? It is a part of our relationship, isn’t it? My enjoyment comes from catering to my master. Not only in bed, but out as well. I’m sorry you feel it is false. I only want to please you. And I’m not putting you on with the stereotype now. I mean that.”
“All right, honey, I know you do. I‘m sorry I barked at you. I guess I’m just in a nasty mood.”
“You are tired. It is only natural at the end of the day. Come, I have a drink waiting for you and I will draw you a hot bath. It will relax you.”
“I guess you’re right.” Brenda laughed. “It’s a very lovely stereotype indeed. I wouldn’t change you for the world, Ling-Foi.”
She looked lovingly at the Chinese girl, and her heart fluttered as it always did when Brenda was struck with Ling-Foi’s delicate beauty. She supposed this beauty too was a part of the stereotype. If it was, Brenda was all for it.
She adored Ling-Foi’s small, slender figure. Her body looked so petite in the flowered kimono she was wearing, and yet Brenda knew how deceptive this appearance of slightness was. Ling-Foi’s breasts, for instance, were quite large for her body. Her hips were almost plump, and her buttocks definitely were, jiggling with an excess of flesh which Brenda found endearing. Her legs too were sturdy, albeit girlishly curved. And_ all the flesh of her body was sensual and ripe to the touch and always fragrant with exotic perfume. Most of all, Brenda loved the small roundness of Ling-Foi’s belly, and the way it seemed to ripple under her touch until the pinkness beneath it blossomed into scarlet and quivered open like a flower opening its petals wide as it absorbs the heat of the summer sun.
Brenda’s, mind dwelt on the charms of Ling-Foi with both recollection and anticipation as she soaked in her tub. Finally her anticipation won out and she cut her bath short. She got out of the tub, dried herself. and pulled on the sweater and slacks she’d been wearing. Then she went into the bedroom where Ling-Foi awaited her.
This room too reflected Ling-Foi‘s inclination to stress her Oriental heritage. It was dimly flit by two Chinese lanterns on low tables standing on either side of the bed. The bed itself was very low and very wide, and the sheets and pillowcases were of pale green. The red glow of the lanterns was lost before it reached the drapes drawn over the windows. Only memory told Brenda that they were of heavy gold velvet. Across from the bed, on a carved teakwood bureau, a large jade Buddha, reflected in the mirror over the bureau, contemplated its navel in duplicate. The mirror also gave back a part of the reflection of Ling-Foi. She was propped up on the pillows in the center of the bed, more sitting than lying, and her skin glowed like pale ivory where the slit down the middle of the black silk kimono into which she’d changed had parted. Brenda knew that Ling-Foi had arranged herself on the bed to impress her, and so she stared at her a moment, letting her appreciation of the pose show.
Brenda started for the bed then, but Ling-Foi raised a hand to stop her. “Just a moment,” she said. “I have a surprise for you.”
“A surprise?”
“Yes.” Ling-Foi rose from the bed, her body seeming to flow into an erect position. “I have bought you a present.”
“You shouldn’t have. You can’t afford it.”
“And why not? After all the gifts you have given me.”