Naked Came the Stranger - By Penelope Ashe Page 0,59

laid her dress, smoothing it out full length. She put the bra on top of the dress. And then the half slip. She was standing nude when she picked up the twin pictures in the single frame.

"This is the Baron," she said, "and your wife?"

'Yes," Taylor said. "Yes."

Gillian put the pictures back on the desk, placing them at an angle that left the Baron and Taylor's wife looking out across the room. Looking out at Gillian and Taylor.

"Taylor," she said, "do you love your wife?"

"Good God, Gillian, how do I know?"

He was undressed now. And he was moving across the room to her, sucking in his stomach and wishing he still had the old suntan. Gillian wasn't even looking at him.

"And this is the Baron's… what did you call it?… business wheelchair? The fast one?" Naked, she stood as easily as if she were in Lord and Taylor's at 11:30 in the morning, trying on a new dress. She picked her bra from the desk and hung it across the left shoulder of the Baron's fast wheelchair. "Wear it with honor," she said.

"Don't forget that goddam thing," Taylor said, "and leave it hanging there."

"Taylor, are you afraid of the Baron?"

"Ah, hell, Gillian, just remember to get the thing. I've got to be back here in the morning to explain something the Baron'll be madder'n hell about, and it's going to be bad enough without a goddam brassiere hanging on his fast wheelchair."

Gillian picked her panties from the desk and hung them on the right shoulder of the wheelchair. Taylor caught her from the side and pulled her around, feeling her body against his. Walking her backward, he moved her in front of him. "If you're so interested in the Baron's chair, Gillian, I'll show you something else." With three steps, he maneuvered her and then pressed her over and came down on top of her, feeling her legs come up.

"This is the Baron's vibrating chair," he said. "When he's not sitting in that goddam fast wheelchair, he sits in this one and… vibrates."

It was also a reclining chair, tufted brown, with a footrest, and Taylor dug at Gillian's breasts with his face and mouth.

"Start it up," Gillian said.

"Godawmighty," Taylor said. "Are you talking about the chair?"

"If it vibrates, then start it," she said. "Or do you want me to get up and do it?"

Taylor leaned over the side, feeling for the buttons and gears. With his right hand, he pushed a lever and he felt them start, he and Gillian and the tiny wire-nerves in the chair that made it vibrate. And he was inside of Gillian, too, now, warm. And it was Gillian and he and the tiny wire-nerves and he and Gillian and Gillian and the tiny wire nerves and he and Gillian and he and he and he and Gillian and He and He and GILLIAN and HE and GILLIAN and HE… and HE… and he and he and Gillian… and gillian. And gillian.

The chair, its fabric crinkly against Taylor's side as he rolled over, was still vibrating. He reached over, feeling for the lever.

"Leave it alone," Gillian said quietly. "It feels good."

As they lay there, with the left side of Taylor's body against Gillian, he could feel the vibrations of the tiny wire-nerves. On his right side, the vibrations were direct. On his left, coming first through Gillian, they were soft.

"You're good, Taylor," she said. Gillian realized, with a start, that it was the first sincere compliment she had paid a man since the beginning. She was quiet, reflective, the lines on her face easy. "Did you like me?"

"Damn knows," Taylor said. "You're something else, Gillian. How do I tell you? How do you describe it?" Unconsciously, his hand went toward his chest for a cigarette and then over the arm of the chair, as if he were reaching out toward the lamp table at home, the lamp table that separated Sarah's bed from his own.

"Why do men want to smoke afterward?" Gillian said.

"I don't know," Taylor said. "But you sure to God do. I guess if you didn't smoke, you wouldn't want to. But if you smoke, you sure to God want to."

Taylor got up, going across to his coat to get a cigarette, and wondering how he looked to her from the back, naked. He brought her a cigarette, too, and they lay there together in the vibrating chair, smoking and not talking.

Lightly, Gillian kissed Taylor on the neck and then on his chest.

"You're