“I told you, dearie,” Stone said. Meredith looked down and instinctively pulled her skirt toward her knees.
Stone had dimmed the lights during the short speech. It was clear he had not listened. She looked at the second bottle of champagne. He had nearly sucked it dry, and she cringed at the thought of his operating on a bottle and a half of alcohol. She had eluded several college men in similar circumstances, but never did she imagine she would have to pull the plug on the sexual batteries of the secretary of defense.
“The study, darling, or would you prefer to use — stay on the couch?” Stone said.
She sensed he was on testosterone override. The alcohol had flipped a switch in his brain, sending an electrical current to his penis, thereby relinquishing all control to the lower appendage for the time being.
She looked at her watch and said, lamely, “Sir, I must really be going. You know what they say about wearing out—”
“The sofa?” Stone said, moving around to her front, intercepting her before she could escape. He grabbed her arm and sat next to her. He stared wildly at her breasts, which she instinctively covered.
“Sir!” Meredith said, weakly.
A weak protest. It always means they want it.
“Don’t you want to make love to one of the most powerful men in the world, Meredith?” Stone asked, sounding a bit like Jack Nicholson might. His fingers pressed into the flesh of her slender arm. His breath was sour with the musty odor of the cham-pagne fermenting in his belly.
“Sir, really. This is inappropriate,” she said, pushing him away and snatching her arm back. She looked at the bruises.
Then leave. Why are you just sitting there? Because you want it. That’s why. “You want me, don’t you. You’ve wanted me since you showed up in my office. Now let’s get down to business, Meredith. Let’s cut to the chase. I’m Mick Jagger,” Stone said, hungrily. He pulled at her dress and a naked breast popped out of the fabric.
Yes, that’s more like it. I knew you wanted me.
He grabbed her arms and lay on top of her, hiking her dress all the way up to her waist. He looked down at her panty hose and pulled at them with his fingers, wanting to secure his prize. He deserved it, he figured. It had been a hard week at the office.
Meredith, you stupid bitch, why are just taking this? Do something! He’s raping you! she thought.
Meredith used her strength to push Stone’s heavy body off her and onto the floor. She stood, stepping over him.
“Oh, want to get on top, huh. I should have guessed,” Stone said.
She pulled her panty hose up, grabbed her purse, and tried to run. Stone grabbed at her legs, causing her to fall and strike her forehead on the oak coffee table, leaving a huge gash, which gushed blood onto her face.
“You son of a bitch!” Meredith screamed, run-ning from the study. She bumped into Andre, who had awakened to the commotion, splattering blood onto his white T-shirt.
“He tried to rape me!” she said, running from the house and getting into her car. She sat in the car and cried for a moment.
When she looked up, Stone’s face was at the driver’s side window.
She locked the doors and cranked the engine. Typically, as in the movies, the car did not start, and the engine kept turning over.
Finally, she floored the gas pedal, flooding the engine. It cranked, pouring white smoke from the exhaust, and she sped away, purposely veering the car into Stone, knocking him on his rear.
He did not care.
She’s just playing hard to get. Mick Jagger never gets rejected.
Stone picked himself up, ascended the steps on his porch, and saw a small metal object in the dim light. Wobbling, he bent over and picked up the small device.
“What’s this?” he asked himself, his words slurring a bit as he pocketed an object about the size of his thumb.
“Brian Jones,” the newest member of the Rolling Stones, had received a call from Ronnie Wood, who was truthfully not too far away. It seemed he needed some assistance. A jam session, so to speak.
“Mick’s going a little crazy, and we will need to clean up after him,” Ronnie Wood had said.
“Just tell me where. I always have my axe to grind,” Brian Jones said.
And so Brian sat in his Buick Electra 225. “Gets about two gallons to the mile,” he always remarked to those who ogled the beast. And it was perfect when he wanted to play bumper cars.
He followed her off of Old Dominion onto Swinks Mill, then onto Lewinsville, where she curled onto the I-495 in preparation, he presumed, for entry onto the George Washington Parkway.
Brian Jones looked at his watch: almost 11:00 p.m. He saw the occasional car, but nothing that bothered him. He tailed the slow-moving Prelude at about a quarter mile distance. By the way she was driving, he wasn’t concerned about being noticed. She sped up to ninety miles an hour on I-495 and almost missed the entrance to the parkway, but caught it at the last minute, her wheels nearly leaving the pavement.
Mick must have put a good licking on her, he thought.
It was his time to inch closer. They were barreling down the parkway past Turkey Run Park and approaching the exit for Dolley Madison Boulevard. A sharp turn was approaching, which was followed by a bridge.
He was now less than five car lengths behind her and he flashed his bright lights at her, which caused her to speed up, as he had anticipated. Jones believed that Meredith would be fearful that Stone was following her, so he pulled up directly behind her as they were approaching 100 mph on the narrow road.
She accelerated into the turn and the Prelude left the road.
Jones slowed a bit and watched as the car failed to negotiate the turn and flipped onto its side. The low roof crumpled and sparks were flying every-where, then the vehicle skidded off the road, falling thirty feet below into a ditch just before the bridge.
Close enough, Brian Jones thought, so he kept driving.
The Electra didn’t have a scratch.
Chapter 78
The attack had been successful. Takishi sat atop the turret of a brand-new, Japanese Type 90 tank with its 120mm smoothbore gun.
It seemed they could not miss. They had secured the Presidential Palace early in the operation. He had flown in the Mistubishi AH-X attack helicopter, still in its experimental phase. It had performed beautifully. Hellfire missiles reduced the thin-skinned rebel vehicles to burning hulks in seconds. The captured Scorpion tanks and old American M-113 Armored Personnel Carriers were no match for the new and improved version of the Japanese Imperial Army.
Once in the compound, they had completely destroyed the radio television stations. A holdover from the Marcos era was the fact that the government controlled the only two means of real-time communication to the people. Takishi had them destroyed immediately, preventing incoming or outgoing television or radio reports. Talbosa was most shocked of all to see Takishi enter the presidential grounds with nearly two hundred Japanese infantrymen trotting beside him carrying American M16 rifles. Takishi was wielding his New Nambu revolver, waving it and smiling at Talbosa.
“Let’s go, my friend. It is time to move on to another life,” Takishi said, pointing the revolver in Talbosa’s face.
“What are you doing, you fool?” Talbosa screamed.
“You are the fool, letting us build weapons in your own backyard. You idiot,” Takishi laughed.
Talbosa’s eyes sank to the ground, as did his hopes for a new Philippines, independent of imperialism. But once again, it appeared that the Japanese would write another Chapter in the historical journal of Philippine conquest. First the Spanish, then the Americans, then the Japanese, then the Americans, and now the Japanese again.