Dutch chocolate 9, p.26
Dutch Chocolate 9, page 26
Forty minutes later, Vita said her goodbyes to G-Ma, Viola, Dutch, DC Dodge and Lottie. She stepped on the bus that would take her back to the city. When the bus drove off, she waved goodbye to the small group of women she regarded as her friends now.
“May, I’m surprised you and G-Ma let her go without a fight,” Dutch remarked, eyeing G-Ma and May Dodge, a woman she admired a great deal.
Maybelline watched the bus disappear into the horizon before answering. “My daughter is as stubborn as I am. Sometimes, she can be a bit dense as well. I will work on her.” She glanced at the four women. “I expect we all will work on them. In other words, Dutch, I am not letting her go without a fight. I’m just adjusting my tactics a bit. I, too, will be leaving in a day or so. My daughter is in good hands up here. I think she should stay here and recuperate with her doggy.” She sighed. “I’m far more worried about your cousin, Lottie. Back in the city, I suspect Vita has nobody to support her as she does here.”
Lottie nodded. “That’s right.” She studied DC Dodge. “And you plan to be that supportive friend, don’t you?”
“If she allows it, yes. I will. I’ll have figure out how to do that without the connection to my daughter.” Maybelline eyed each woman. “Do we all agree? Vita is a perfect match for Tanya and Tanya is perfect match for Vita?” The four women nodded. “In that case, I’m open to suggestions.”
Viola giggled, rubbed her hands together and grinned. “I love it, May. It’s been months since I played matchmaker.”
G-Ma nodded. “Thinking hard. Something work.”
Lottie sighed. “May, Vita and Tanya are so stubborn and foolish about this entire love thing. We need to do something to help them see the light.”
Dutch nodded. “First off, we need to put a cork on this Hillary person. Get her out of the picture and make her stay away too.” She remembered how irritating and annoying Linda’s first wife was. The Rat woman seemed to pop up at the worst times, almost as if she knew Linda’s weakest moments.
“I agree. I’ll check with Sharpie about her next assignment. Hopefully, it’s here and not in the city,” Maybelline promised.
“Speaking of love thangs, did I mention Sharpie’s administrative assistant, Alice Brewster, said yes to my executive assistant Natalie Mitchell’s marriage proposal?” Viola asked.
Dutch grinned. “That’s great. I approve.”
“Hold on a minute, Dutch. I’m not done yet,” Viola warned.
Dutch rolled her eyes. “Are lawyers ever done speaking?”
“They need a wedding revenue.” Viola studied Dutch and then Lottie. “I remembered how wonderful our land looked for my marriage to Dora. When they said money was a problem, I spoke with Sharpie. She said yes, but that I should ask all of you. What would you all say to another wedding celebration at the farm?”
Lottie grinned broadly. “I’d love to help with that, Vi! Dutch, how about it?”
Dutch smiled at Viola and Lottie. “Tell me what you need me and the guys to do and we’ll do it. If you need us to build anything, let us know now so we can start planning.”
“I have some ideas. Nothing concrete yet,” Viola remarked.
Lottie nodded. “Me too. We’ll ask Sharpie too. Why don’t we meet this evening?”
“Sounds good to me.”
“May, you’re invited too. We want you at the wedding too.”
Maybelline nodded. “Hmm, I’m thinking. This might be the way to get them back together.”
“Hullo.”
Hillary cleared her throat. “I woke you, didn’t I?”
“What did you expect at one in the morning?” Vita yawned. “Where are you anyway? Still working in the corrections system, right?”
“Come to your door and see!” Hillary invited.
Vita groaned. She slipped into her robe but forgot her slippers. She tippy-toed to the door and used the peephole. All she could see were a bunch of crimson and white roses. “This better be you behind those flowers, Hillary Jones!” She slipped her cellphone into her pocket then opened the door. Hillary’s intense eyes sparkled at her. Why didn’t she notice the wonderful sparkle of them before? Or the brown crewcut with touches of grey at the temples.
Hillary studied her until she grew uncomfortable enough to pull her robe around her and tied it tightly.
“Leave it loose,” Hillary ordered. “It’s coming off anyway.”
“Oh, is it? Are you a fortuneteller or something?” Vita snapped. Hillary pissed her off with her casual, super-duper confidence. How could she know I needed to see her … feel her inside me tonight?
Hillary winked at her. “These are for you. A beauty for a beauty.”
“No shit, Sherlock.” Vita snapped at Hillary again. Soon as she took the flowers, Hillary kicked the front door shut then lifted her.
“Which way to the bedroom?”
“Figure it out yourself.” Vita sighed then cuddled into Hillary’s broad chest. “I didn’t think that I’d see you again.” She inhaled Hillary’s scent, enjoying the heavy spiciness of it. Before she could fuss again, Hillary stripped off everything but silky boxers.
Hillary offered her crotch to Vita. “I saved the best part of me for you to do with as you wish.”
Vita scooted up the bed to the headboard. Then she opened her legs and wagged a finger at Hillary. “Take it out and come closer. Really closer so close I can …”
Hillary interrupted her words to rub against her vagina. “You’re dripping wet.” She squeezed her eyes closed. “Don’t you move a wonderful inch of your sexy body. “I don’t wanna climax too soon, Pretty Baby,” she whispered in a hoarse, strained voice. She leaned down to suck a maple breast with a dark, espresso-colored nipple. She kept licking and sucking, praying that would distract her body from climaxing. It didn’t help.
Her pelvis flew against Vita’s warm thighs. Her clitty dipped deeper and deeper into Vita’s vagina. She grabbed Vita’s hair, pulling it to move Vita’s face closer. She thrust her tongue into Vita’s waiting mouth. She fucked her mouth the same way she fucked her vagina: intense, rough, hard, and desperate. She howled out her climax when Vita’s vaginal muscles rippled along her clit, giving her best hand job she’d ever felt from a vagina. She collapsed on top of Vita, nearly smothering her with her solid weight.
Vita tried shoving Hillary from her suffocating body. She caught a strong hint of alcohol on Hillary’s breath. She couldn’t tell whether Hillary had passed out or not. She just knew she was having difficulty breathing. She wondered how long it would be before she blacked out from lack of air. She reached between their bodies, pinching and squeezing whatever body part of Hillary’s she could reach.
Hillary’s body followed her hand movements like an obedient puppy until she was able shove Hillary onto her back. She drew deep, much needed breaths. Something caught her eye. She studied Hillary’s clit standing straight up in the air. When it wiggled and shimmered, she grew curious and touched it then poked at it with a finger. She gazed at Hillary for a reaction.
Hillary moaned in her drunken state but didn’t awaken, not even when Vita shook her hard. Vita sighed. Much as she wanted to climb aboard Hillary’s sturdy body and screw her until sunlight hit the curtain in her bedroom, she decided not to. It seemed unfair to have sex with a clearly drunken woman. She lay staring at Hillary, who began to snore in a loud, annoying way. Impatient, she finally rolled Hillary onto her side, covered her with bedlinen and fell asleep.
Thirty: What’s going on with Vita Kane, Hillary Jones, & Tanya Dodge?
When the sun rose the next morning, coloring Vita’s curtains a bright gold, she looked around the room. Her bed was empty. She wondered if she’d dreamed Hillary Jones was in her bed because she was lonely and needy. Then she spotted the glorious red and white roses filling one of her vases as it sat on her dresser. There was also a note next her pillow that she didn’t see at first glance. When she opened the note, it read:
I enjoyed last night. I needed it as much as I enjoyed it. Can we do it again? H.J.
“You certainly don’t beat around the bush, Hilly Jones,” Vita remarked. “You do beat my bush, but in a nice way … a nice very, sexy way.” She laughed at her own joke. She went into the bathroom to shower and start another day of work. Her phone rang as she stepped out of the shower. “I’m dripping wet. Kind of like I was last night. Before you ask. Yes, I got your note. Yes, we can do it again.”
DC Maybelline Dodge cleared her throat. “I called to see what you’d like for this Friday’s dinner menu. Or would you rather go out for dinner?”
Vita groaned. “I’m sorry about that, Miss May. I thought you were somebody else.”
“Would that somebody else be Hillary Jones?”
Vita didn’t answer right away. She debated what to say. “Yes, Ma’am. We had a date yesterday.”
It was more like a booty call, Maybelline was dying to say but held her tongue. “I didn’t know she was in town. Is she on assignment here in the city?”
“When I asked her, she said she couldn’t get into it,” Vita lied through her teeth. “I guess that’s all a part of the undercover world, right?”
Maybelline sighed. “Unfortunately, it doesn’t bode well for long-term relationships. It’s too bad, because stable, steady, long-term relationships are exactly what folks like Hillary need to come home to when the job is over. It’s even better if they’re already in one before they start their assignments.”
“Why is that?”
Maybelline sighed. “It’s been my experience the relationships they have during their assignments end when the assignment does. It’s my belief that they have difficulty adjusting to trusting folks again. Undercover life requires them to lie so much and be somebody they aren’t, it’s difficult to turn that off and be normal again.”
“Are you telling me in a nice way to stay away from Hillary Jones?”
“No. I’d never do that, Vita. You are exactly the kind of woman she needs … a faithful, steady woman with a stable job. A woman who has her own money and has her own thoughts and feelings. An independent woman.”
Vita wrapped herself in one of her jumbo towels. “I can feel the ‘but.’ There’s a ‘but’ in there somewhere, Miss May.”
“While you might be better than good for her, the real question is whether she’s good for you?”
“And you don’t think she’s … good for me.”
“I think you have to make that decision yourself, Vita.” Maybelline wanted to thrust her daughter into the picture. She realized she couldn’t do that now or ever. Both women had to decide things for themselves. “Vita, Honey, if you’re busy this weekend, we can have dinner another time. Lord knows, I have plenty of time on my hands.”
“Let’s reschedule dinner for next Friday.”
“Heard and done!” Maybelline remarked more enthusiastically than she felt. “Get back to me on your dinner desires later in the week.”
“I will, Miss May. Bye now,” Vita remarked and then hung up. She dressed quickly. She loved getting to work earlier than the troops. Especially when she had some snooping to do.
Vita smiled when MB Collins walked over to her office without prompting. She must have received her email. “Well?” She noticed how good MB looked in the new woolen olive-green tweedy patterned suit. The peach blouse and striped peach, olive-green, silver and navy tie, gave just the right professional look for the tall, solid detective.
MB Collins rolled her eyes heavenward then jammed her hands into the pockets of her new suit. “Why did she call me for your number and address, Vee?”
Vita studied MB. “Why do you think she did?”
MB pulled up a chair and sat next to Vita at her desk. “We’re friends, right?”
“Yes. Why do you ask?”
“Take a word of advice, Vee. She’s changed since I knew her.” MB sighed. “Honestly, she sounded drunk when she called me for your number and address.”
“And yet you gave it to her anyway.”
“Hilly would never hurt you, Vee.” MB inhaled and then exhaled. “She sounded lost and needy too. She told me about the shit in Hudson County Corrections upstate. She helped prevent your demise up there. I figured if you didn’t want her at your place, you knew how to kick the woman out.” She stared at Vita for a moment without saying anything and suddenly found something interesting on the tiled floor to study.
Vita grabbed MB’s chin and jerked it upright to stare into her eyes. “Tell me about that look you just gave me.”
MB rubbed the knee of her new suit. “I have a couple of FBI contacts.”
“And?”
“It’s not good.”
“Meaning, what?”
“Hillary is on leave until she signs up for a treatment program.” MB sighed. “I don’t know what she did exactly. I heard she came to work too drunk to do her job. She did something to blow the deal. Her boss stepped in to save her job by offering the treatment program.”
Vita sighed. “I like her, MB. I really like her a lot.”
MB groaned. “You know what I think. You should give the rookie another chance. She travelled all the way to the boonies to find you. Hell, she almost died trying to find you, Vee. What happened with that?”
“Hillary and I did the wild thing in the bathroom. Tanya heard us. I lied and said it was her meds giving her hallucinations.”
“Geeze Louise, is she that good, Vee?”
“Which one?”
MB started laughing.
“What? They both are.”
“Girlfriend, you’d better figure out what you want. Once you do, better tell the other one.” MB stared at Vita. “Are you still sharing dinner on Fridays with the rookie’s mom?”
Vita smiled. “Yes. I never thought I’d like her, MB. I’m discovering she’s her own woman. I thought she’d pressure me into dating her daughter. She hasn’t. We talk about what I want besides working for the lieutenant. She thinks I should apply for IT work once I finish the online refresher course. We talk about my work in PAL. She does volunteer work in a homeless shelter downtown somewhere. She sits on a board that supports battered women, helping them get training and jobs once they leave their batterers.”
“Drop one of them, Vee. I don’t think DC Dodge will hold it against you if it’s her daughter. She sounds like she sees you as somebody to mentor, with or without the rookie.”
“Are you saying I’m too much for the rookie … too old, too experienced, too much?”
“Nope. I’m saying decide and stick with it.”
“Oh.”
They both watched the lieutenant march into the front of the room.
“I gotta go before he starts asking me for updates on cases me and Ross don’t have yet.” MB squeezed Vita’s shoulder. “We’ll talk some more.”
Back on the farmland, Tanya was still recuperating. Lottie, Dutch Bonita and Dora were on the wraparound porch. They watched Tanya walking Billy Boy in the clearing. It looked like they were heading in the woods again today. Walking Billy Boy wasn’t quite the most accurate description. Strong as Tanya was becoming, it was still a contest between a two-legged human and a four-legged behemoth determined to chase rabbits, squirrels and foxes.
“Damn it, Billy Boy. Stop running, would you?” Tanya hollered, yanking on his leash with both hands as she tried to reel him in.
Today wasn’t different than any other day to the huge dog. Soon as he caught the scent of one of his favorite wild things, he was off like a huge rocket. That meant dragging his handler with him into the woods. It was why nobody else wanted to walk the loveable dog anywhere near the woods.
“I’m betting on the dog.” Dutch remarked, pulling out a ten-dollar bill out of a pocket and smacking it on the banister.
Bonita pulled out a ten-dollar bill. “You always bet on the dog. I’m going for the human.”
“You two are terrible,” Lottie remarked. With a look of disgust directed at the two cousins, she went inside.
Dora chuckled then pulled out a ten-dollar bill and slapped it on top of the two other bills. “On my patient, of course.”
They watched as Tanya finally took control of Billy Boy’s leash. She yanked him backward then unfastened the leash and let him take off running. Then she decided to take off running too.
“Do we need to worry about them, Dee?” Bonita asked.
Dora sighed. “You always ask the same damned question. We always do the same thing. We send in Ozzie’s drones and turn on his woods cameras to check on them.”
Dutch shrugged. “Send in the clowns. Let’s go fly the drones and turn on the cameras.”
They watched Tanya catch up with her dog. Then they raced down one of the various narrow dirt paths in the woods. The one they chose was an up and down dirt path wide enough for two people. The pathway went up a sometimes slippery, steep embankment. Today, the ground was cold and dry, having not snowed or rained this week. She and Billy Boy ran up the dirt and stone embankment leaping over the overturned stumps and tree roots damaged from previous floods and lightning strikes. They made it up to the top of the hill without stopping.
At the top, woman and dog stopped to look down at where they’d come from. Tanya was wiping the sweat from her brow. Then she grabbed her knees, bending down to catch her breath. Billy Boy decided to lick his mistress’ face, making her frown and spit.
“Stop that shit, Billy!” Tanya fussed. “You know how much I hate tongue baths from you. You lick your balls then you want to lick my face. Eck, pew! Nasty.” Her actions belied her words. She reached down to fluff his face and pet his thick coat. “Come on, boy. Let’s find us a new path home.”
She and Billy Boy ran along the top of the embankment, then it curved downward to an eroded creek bed with shallow water in it. She and her puppy doggy leaped across the water and jogged back to the farmland the long way.
“How does she find all those new paths, Dutch? Some of them I didn’t know about,” Bonita admitted as they watched Tanya running with her dog. “I thought I knew the lay of the land ... everything about the place. I stand corrected. She just showed me that I don’t.”
