“Yes,” agreed Anthony. “It’s a dead giveaway. So of course we began to talk about it and I made no secret of my interest. Then he showed me his own magazine, which I’d never heard of before but absolutely loved. So in one day I became a customer, a friend and a fan.”
“And patron,” Amanda said, with gratitude, for she knew how many generous acts Newton had performed for his scene friends.
“Get to the part about me,” said Susan, helping herself to Dennis’ array of pretty, wholesome dishes.
“Oh yes, how could I forget,” said Newton, “Hugo gave me Susan. It took a while for me to get disentangled from all of my various wives and become free to actually date a girl in the scene. As soon as that happened, Hugo said he’d like to introduce me to a cute, little submissive so I could really start living my fantasies.”
“How many wives were there?”
“Five,” Newton sighed.
“Didn’t you play with any of them?”
“Not in that same satisfying way you can with a girl who’s really into it,” Anthony replied. “So he sent Susan over to me and I don’t know about her, but for me, it was love at first sight.”
Susan started, looking at Anthony in surprise, as he had never uttered any phrase as blatantly, sentimentally romantic in her hearing since they had met.
“So, we started seeing each other right away,” he continued, “even though I was busy as hell and she was in college. Somehow it worked out okay. Then she stuck with me through design school in New York and then she started working at Chipper Knight about two years ago and we’re still together.”
“He says that like I’m doing him some favor,” said Susan, her heart swelling with affection for her lover, who obviously still valued her so highly. “The truth is he’s been spoiling me, my sister and half my friends rotten for years.”
“You’re a very good girl,” Newton assured her. “You make me smile.”
“Anthony made it so comfortable for my sister Laura after her settlementless divorce, that she was able to keep Hugo at bay for years,” Susan reported. “Hugo will confirm that.”
Anthony smiled and told Amanda, “I love how Laura draws. Of course I’ve been happy to patronize her. I’d probably do it even if she wasn’t Susan’s sister.”
“I need to get to know Laura,” said Amanda, thoughtfully. “But I don’t think she likes being around me.”
“Give her time,” said Susan. “It was a shock suddenly having to share Hugo’s attention with another girl. And then your appearance triggered his trip out west to see your mother for the first time in nineteen years, during which visit they played and made love. And on top of that, you introduced that crazy slut Thalia into our group and she wasn’t happy until she scored with Hugo. Laura intercepted one of Thalia’s emails to me and found out.”
“I didn’t know that,” said Amanda, shocked and blushing with embarrassment. “I don’t think Thalia does either.”
“No,” Susan said, “Hugo probably didn’t think it was worth making Thalia feel guilty about once the damage was done. He knows girls kiss and tell. The end result was him finally insisting that Laura marry him, if only to prove that he had no intention of chasing after nineteen-year-olds for the rest of his life.”
“Laura probably blames me for both the incident with my mother and with Thalia,” Amanda mused with a troubled expression.
“Well, if you hadn’t popped up all of a sudden, this far distant part of Hugo’s past would never have become an issue. But here you are, an extraordinary creature of the scene, with this still hot hippy chick of a mom hanging out casually on the opposite coast and slightly sexually frustrated from not getting any BDSM love in twenty years, not to mention any number of bouncy young girlfriends ready to be intrigued by your newly discovered and singularly dashing father.”
“I’m horrible,” said Amanda with conviction.
“Never think that,” Susan reassured her friend; “What’s happened since you’ve come into Hugo’s life has simply taught my sister to take nothing for granted.”
Several days later, Amanda accepted Anthony’s invitation to come and swim again, but this time Susan was away from home. It was after six in the evening but still quite light and Amanda had just come from the shop. She donned a white two-piece swimsuit with blue anchor accents and white Lycra swim cap in the cabana and dove in at the deep end. The water seemed colder than on her previous visit and Amanda shivered at the end of the lap. A lean, young Latino gardener in low rider jeans and a sleeveless white ribbed undershirt that set off his tanned, muscular torso to advantage, looked up from his Birds of Paradise and smiled.
“Is it too cold?” he asked.
“A little.”
“Go in the hot tub for a few minutes and I’ll turn up the pool,” he suggested.
Amanda warmed up nicely in the Jacuzzi beside the Aphrodite fountain for several minutes, then dove back into the pool and began swimming laps. After a few laps she floated on her back, looking up at the cloud dotted deep blue sky through the clear dome of the greenhouse. The water was perfectly warm and Amanda felt suddenly restless. It had been a week since Colby had gone back to California. She’d spent every night alone in Hugo’s house, in the guest room that looked out on the woods, a charming room, but it felt very empty without Colby there.
Amanda rolled over and over in the water, arching up her bosom and stretching out her long legs. She began stretching and twisting her lithe, small waisted form around and about in the water, staring up at the flowers and vines that intersected in a fragrant bower above the pool where she floated and dipped.
Then, the Latin boy came back into view, pushing a cart of soil and pretending not to look at Amanda. Amanda halted her shadow flirting display at once and felt herself flushing pink at having been seen behaving in such a manner by the good looking gardener. Then she swam a lap or two and covertly looked for him over her shoulder. He was pretending not to notice her but she could tell he was tracking her every stroke.
“I was just missing my boyfriend,” Amanda explained, swimming up to Jaime.
“Lucky boyfriend,” he said, with no trace of an accent.
“Thank you,” Amanda replied.
“Well, have a good swim,” he said, reluctantly attempting to avert his eyes from her lissome form in the well-behaved and thus completely obscene nautical two-piece.
“Aren’t you hot? Don’t you want to cool off in the water?” she asked absurdly, but so there could be no mistake. She patted the water with a graceful hand and pulled off her swim cap, allowing her long, blonde hair to tumble down in a single braid. She tossed the cap up on the deck and smiled at him. A second later he was in the water and she was in his arms. They clasped each other tightly, looked into each other’s eyes and kissed. He cradled the back of her head in his hand and devoured her ears and throat with his lips, his hands going from her waist to her bosom, then down to her bottom and inner thighs. There was no part of her he didn’t want to handle.
“So, are you a nice girl or a crazy bitch?” Jaime asked her.
“Nice and crazy but not a bitch. Oh please, just slip it in me for a minute, right here,” she insisted, her hand sliding across the bar of iron that had emerged to