By Vince Grayson
It's a warm summer night and Fairmount Park is dark. Dick Harden's sleek silver roadster darts daringly along the winding vista. His fingers dart daringly, too.
He drives with his left hand while his right teases playfully at the low neckline of Ashley's white silk blouse. She never wears a brassiere, summer or winter. The firm globes of her unconfined breasts form twin arches of warm flesh punctuated by tiny, pink, circular crests. Harden's free hand presses eagerly against them. First through the silk, then against naked flesh.
Ashley allows his exploring caress until she can bear no more. She pushes him away.
"That's all you get. You've gone far enough."
Harden turns and faces her for a brief instant.
"Do you know what you are? You're a little blonde tease. You let me do things to stoke the flames of passion. Then you shut down, cold as ice."
Ashley stretches her long and lithe legs.
"I still remember that bet."
Harden grins devilishly.
"You'll never forgive me for that, will you?"
"I might... but not tonight."
"Why not tonight? Why is tonight different from any other?"
Now, Ashley grins devilishly.
"Have you forgotten? This is the last night of that bet. When we first met, you and those high-powered salesmen decided that I was just another dame. Being the quintessential playboy, you figured you'd pillow me without any trouble. Unfortunately for you, I happened to overhear you making that bet with those salesmen. You boasted that you'd have me in your bed within thirty days and laid a wager on it."
Harden groans with intense exasperation, irritation, and annoyance.
"How many times must I tell you? That whole thing is called off. Damn it, girl! I've fallen in love with you! I want you to marry me. Do you think I'd let a wager like that stand when it involves the girl who's going to be my wife?"
Ashley flashes a wicked smile.
"I love you, too. That's why I've granted you plenty of liberties. Nevertheless, I don't trust you, Dick. You're slick and probably lying just to win that bet."
"I've told you a hundred times that bet was canceled long ago! If you don't believe me..."
"I'll believe you... after tonight. Tonight ends the thirty days covered by your nasty little wager. After tonight, I might give you what you want. I might even marry you."
Harden's arm slides about Ashley's slender waist. Draws her close to him. He leans his face even closer and softly whispers.
"Darling, what do you say we buy a spectacular solitaire tomorrow?"
Ashley glances down at the heavy ring on his finger.
"Well..."
She hesitates.
At that instant, a big black sedan whizzes past Harden's sporty little roadster and crowds it toward the edge of that dark road.
Harden grunts and seizes the emergency brake. He yanks it hard. The rear wheels lock up. The roadster skids and slides obliquely to a screeching halt.
The sedan blocks its path just ahead. This is the darkest and most secluded section of Fairmount Park. No other traffic is in sight.
A man leaps from the black sedan and dashes menacingly toward them.
"What's the idea, smashing up my fender?"
He snarls and gestures toward a crumpled rear panel.
Dick Harden's scowl protests hotly
"Who do you think you're fooling? Go run your little scam on somebody else, fella."
The strange man growls.
"Oh! You deny it, huh? Well, just step out here and we'll settle this thing right now!"
Harden opens the door of his roadster. Then he turns to Ashley and grins widely.
"Excuse me, while I fix this guy's teeth."
As Harden squares off with the angry man, Ashley notices the man reaching into his pocket. She spies the leather-covered blackjack. She screams and leaps from the roadster.
Harden spins toward her and realizes, too late, his mistake. The descending blow of that heavy blackjack knocks him out cold. Harden crumples to the pavement, a motionless lump of flesh.
Ashley doesn't notice another figure furtively emerge silently from that black sedan and doesn't sense any danger until powerful arms encompass her from behind. She attempts to call out. A rough hand jams over her mouth and smothers the cry.
Crushing arms encircle her body and mash her firm breasts. She feels her compact body forcefully lifted and carried to the black sedan. She feels ropes tightly binding her ankles and wrists, feels a gag stuffed roughly into her mouth, and tied there as he tosses her callously into the sedan.
Ashley's captor crawls into the front seat and slides under the steering wheel. The engine roars to life. Ashley observes another man leap into the sedan, the man who'd struck Harden, and just as the sedan quickly lurches forward, her consciousness fades to blackness.
When she opens her eyes, Ashley lies in a dimly lit room. With gag and bindings removed, she struggles upright on the chesterfield. A masked man sits in a chair nearby. The mask obscures most of his features, but his hair is the color of Harden's and he's just about the same size.
Ashley studies her captor. She notices his right hand. It wears a ring. A gold ring set with onyx, and in the center, a small diamond. It's Dick Harden! He's changed his suit, but he's forgotten about his ring.
Abruptly, Ashley's stung with a sharp pang of disappointment. She understands the whole thing now. He'd fooled her with his talk of love and marriage. He was interested only in that bet.
Tonight is his last chance. Since he hadn't been able to storm Ashley's barriers any other way, he'd finally resorted to force! Evidently, Dick convinced a couple of his cronies to stage the fake holdup in Fairmount Park and pretended to be incapacitated while she was abducted.
Angry flames flash in Ashley's green eyes. Her pink lips curl contemptuously. So that's the kind of worm he is! To think she'd genuinely fallen for him!
She reviews events of the past month. Recalls how she had teased him, tortured him unmercifully, permitted him every liberty except the ultimate one... then made him stop, left him frantic with frustration.
That had been her repayment of his wager. Of course, during the process, she'd incidentally fallen in love with him, but that was over now. Although she despised him, she could still play the teasing game. She could still make him squirm.
A devious plan flashes through her angry mind. If Harden thought he could fool her... Well, two could play at that game. Ashley grins to herself, mischievously. She'll give a little performance of her own!
Ashley edges forward on that dark leather sofa and speaks calmly.
"Well! Here we are!"
The masked guard stares at her and grunts.
"Shut up!"
Ashley smiles politely.
"Is that any way for a gentleman to talk to a lady?"
"How do you know I'm a gentleman? For that matter, how do I know you're a lady?"
The masked man retorts.
"You might try to find out if I'm a lady."
Ashley suggests. He eyes her suspiciously.
"What do you mean, sister?"
"What do you think?"
Ashley challenges him with her sparkling green eyes.
He shrugs.
"I don't give a damn what you mean, kiddo. All I know is, you've had the snatch put on you."
Ashley laughs.
"Maybe you'll let me get away... if I'm nice to you."
"Not a chance, doll. The guy I work for don't stand for no double-cross. I'd wind up in a ditch somewhere with the top of my skull blasted off."
He turns away from her.
Ashley stares at his broad back. Harden is a better actor than she would have guessed. Even his voice sounds different. Ashley grins and unfastens the top button at the neck of her shirt. After a hesitant instant, she unfastens the second button as she leans suggestively forward.
"You might at least give me a cigarette."
He turns toward her, fishes in his pocket, withdraws a crumpled pack, and hands her a smoke. He strikes a match and holds it for her. She feels his fierce gaze burning her bare flesh, drinking in the revealed glory of her tempting breasts as she leans. The neck of her blouse bulges open.
She gazes at him boldly.
"Like what you see?"
He grins despite himself but answers indifferently.
"You'll do."
She slides back on that chesterfield and lifts her arms above her head. The movement pulls her breasts taut and they thrust forward thrillingly, temptingly, through that sheer silk fabric. She crosses her knee, making certain that tight-fitting skirt slips up to reveal a flash of exposed thigh.
Ashley purrs a seductively salacious invitation.
"Why don't you sit closer and be sociable?"
"It won't do no good, sister. I'm vamp-proof."
"Sit down anyhow. I like vamp-proof men."
He ensconces himself beside her. She wiggles closer and softly whispers.
"My offer still stands."
"What offer?"
"I'll be nice to you... If you let me escape."
He laughs shortly.
"No dice, sister."
"Why not? Don't you think I'm... attractive?"
His eyes survey her petite, compact, and lithe feminine form.
"Sure. Plenty. In fact, you're drivin' me nutty right now."
"That's what I intended."
She draws those long shapely legs beneath her and leans back against him. Her arms lift and lock around his neck.
He grunts.
"Damn you! Lay off before I forget myself!"
She grins at him daringly.
"Go ahead. Forget yourself... if you want to."
She blew a smoke-ring.
"I don't mind."
He groans.
"You little devil!"
Hands flash down and grab at her. He tears the remaining buttons from that flimsy shirt. Ashley's breasts stand forth proudly, boldly. He touches her. His lips descend on her waiting mouth and clamp over it. Her hand slips inside his coat, caressing the muscles of his shoulders and broad chest.
With an increasing urgency, he crushes her against him savagely. His hands explore her body, her thighs, her legs. He snarls at her hotly.
"You asked for it. Now you're gonna get it!"
She laughs in his face as her fingers dart to his mask and yanks it roughly. She voices a triumphantly taunting exclamation.
"All right, Mr. Dick Harden. You've gone far enough!"
Ashley's features suddenly pale. The unmasked man is not Dick Harden! He's a stranger, a man she'd never seen before!
Ashley's heart leaps into her throat. The enormous danger of this situation crashes instantly into her consciousness. She really has been abducted! That confrontation in Fairmount Park had not been a fake!
The unmasked man grins at her.
"Who the hell is Dick Harden?"
Ashley gasps.
"He's... I thought you were..."
The words strangle and die in her throat.
"Yeah? Well, whoever he is, I ain't him, baby. Now let's get back to what we were doin'!"
He grabs her again. His lips bruise hers. He kisses her neck, her shoulders, her arms.
She feels his hot mouth against her and attempts to beat him away, but it's impossible. He forces her back relentlessly, savagely. His hand snakes to the hem of her skirt and tugs violently. The side seam splits up to the waistband.
Suddenly, heavy footsteps pound rapidly in the hallway outside this room. Ashley's attacker tenses and leaps to his feet. His hand flashes to his pocket just as the door splinters. Harden bursts into the room and trains that trusty PPK on the desperado before he could draw his own weapon.
Harden dashes forward and pounces to Ashley's side.
"Darling, you're safe now!"
She stares at him, at the purple mark on his temple where he'd been bruised, stares into the wildness of his eyes. She sways toward him and collapses into his arms.
She whispers breathlessly.
"You got here... just in time..."
When the police depart with their prisoner, when they're alone, Harden's arms wrap around Ashley's waist, holding her tightly.
"A copper found me lying in the road. Fortunately, I caught the license number on that black sedan. We traced it here."
He grits his teeth.
"If I'd been five minutes later..."
"Thank heavens you weren't five minutes later!"
Ashley shivers and glances at Harden's left hand. His ring is missing.
"Dick, your ring... where is it?"
He grins wryly.
"Guess they stole it."
"That man who was in here with me... he has it! I saw him wearing it!"
Harden shrugs.
"I'll get it back tomorrow."
He caresses her shoulders. His hand strays down to where her blouse had been ripped open and over those alluringly exposed breasts.
"Darling?"
He whispers.
"Yes?"
"It's midnight. My thirty-day probation is over."
She peers into his eyes and blushes.
"We couldn't possibly find anybody to marry us at this hour of the night."
He lifts her into his arms and carries her to that sleek silver roadster. He smiles gently and reassuringly.
"What's the difference? Morning will come soon enough. Too soon."
"Too soon?"
"Yes, because we're going to wait for it in my apartment."
Ashley smiles and a thrill ripples through her body, the thrill of anticipation.
"Your apartment or your bedroom?"
- TERMINUS LIBRI -
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