A Sense of Duty

By Jon von Műnchen

In 1987, the KGB launched an ambitious plan to kidnap an American Airman with access to nuclear weapons storage at a Strategic Air Command base. In 1988, two female Air Force Munitions Officers were taken from an apartment in Fort Worth, TX. One of them was Brad Waverly's wife. When the government failed to mount an effort to rescue her, his Sense of Duty forced him to take on the mission himself - despite evidence that she was unfaithful. The trail lead to Honduras where the girls were being interrogated by the KGB, using all the physical and chemical methods they had pioneered. Protected by a Honduran drug lord in the depths of the jungle, Waverly had just one chance and that a slim one. Little did he suspect that his efforts would be rewarded animosity and not appreciation. This is a fast-paced adventure that examines love, hate, Soviet torture, and human duplicity.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Oct 6, 2014
• ISBN: 9781312552715

Book preview

A Sense of Duty

A Sense of Duty

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Warning: the following material is for mature adults only. It contains adult situations, language, graphic and aberrant sexual material, violence, and certain characters reflect attitudes that will be offensive to some people. In other words, it is fiction about real life.

A Sense of Duty

by

Jon von Műnchen

Brandt Media

2014

Copyright © 2014 by James B Brandt

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review or scholarly journal.

First Printing: 2014

ISBN: 978-1-312-55271-5

Brandt Media

Phoenix, AZ 85017

www.http://brandtmedia.wix.com/james-b-brandt

Contents

Day One: Friday, March 18, 1988

Day Two: Saturday, March 19, 1988

Day Three: Sunday, March 20, 1988

Day Four: Monday, March 21, 1988

Day Five: Tuesday, March 22, 1988

Day Six: Wednesday, March 23, 1988

Day Seven: Thursday, March 24, 1988

The wise men thought so hard

For a night and day

Found these words to say on

Every occasion

These things too shall pass away

Illusions, always changing

Like the wind and the rain

Illusions, always changing

Like the wind and the rain

Tom Rapp

these things too

Day One: Friday, March 18, 1988

all at once

i was alone

but only when you were there

how could the universal song

be coming out so wrong

but then i knew it by your eyes

love last forever until it dies

Tom Rapp

if you don't want to (i don't mind)

She stood still, the phone pressed tight to her ear. Her blue-grey eyes, hard as gunmetal, flashed with anger as she impatiently listened to the voice on the other end. She was furious and every line of her body spoke that fury, from the ridged spine to the thinly drawn line of her mouth to the left arm folded fiercely across her chest, her hand clasped in a fist. She waited for her husband to finish what he was saying and then let the silence slowly drag out as she tried to formulate her reply.

Look, I'm sorry, she said finally, ice dripping from her words as surely as venom form a rattler's fang. "I told you that I might have to work late. I have a job, remember? There's an inspection due and I have a lot of unfinished work. I am trying to leave now and I will be home as soon as I can."

You're not the only one who works, he said, pride wounded by her attitude. I've been freezing my butt off all day photographing screaming kids and then I come home to fix dinner and to clean up a little. That's not to mention taking care of our kid, too. The least you can do is call if you're not going to be reasonable about coming home.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw Linda watching her. This had happened entirely too often; the fights, the phone calls, the thinly veiled accusations. She admitted that it was probably her fault as much as his. She knew Brad loved her with an almost addictive dependency and she had not been fair. She seriously suspected that she no longer loved him and knew in her own heart that she was deliberately causing him pain. But she would not allow herself to examine her own duplicity too closely and could, indeed, was, not sure if she could or even wanted to stop her viciousness. No more than he could help striking back or reaching out in sarcasm. Hell, she even had a degree in family counseling and still couldn't find the words to express her heart. Or her pain.

But Linda was watching and Karen was acutely aware of her rank. She had worked hard to get her commission in the Air Force and Captain's bars were not that far away. Linda was new to the section, a fresh Second Lieutenant right out of OTS, that 90-day wonder program in San Antonio that had changed Karen from a sweet young thing into an over-confident, dissatisfied, restless career ladder-climber. Eight years younger, Linda watched every move her section commander made, just a little bit in awe of the former-enlisted-admin-clerk turned-executive-officer.

This will never due, Karen thought, I have an image to uphold and I can't have a petulant husband calling every time I decide to work late.

Look, I'll be there when I get there, so you two eat and I'll see you whenever.

You promised Michael you would go to the show with us tonight.

I can't and I'm not going to even if I can get free. Good-bye! The receiver hit the cradle before he could say anything else. For several long seconds, Karen glared at the phone, daring it to ring again. She was also acutely aware that Linda was once more watching her.

Your husband again? Linda asked, giving Karen a sideways glance from across the room.

Naturally.

Why do you put up with it?

Karen hesitated slightly and sat on the corner of the desk. It was too late to pretend that nothing had happened, as she had so many times before. Even though she would like to blame Brad for their all problems, Karen knew that was just taking the easy way out. Damn those psychology classes! They made it harder to hide from herself. She knew all the things he liked and never did them. She knew he was starving for affection and she pushed him away. She also knew all the phrases, the tones, the words, the looks which would irritate and she couldn't keep herself from setting him off. That way it was always his fault for starting the arguments even if she was the one lighting the fuse.

I don't really know, she said. I guess because I'm partly to blame. Things have been difficult since I was commissioned and he's just too pigheaded to see that things are different now that I am an officer.

Linda rose from her desk and reached for her coat while shutting the folder that had held her attention.

Have you tried talking to him about it? Linda asked quietly.

We've talked, but I don't think he listens. But then, I haven't pushed it, Karen responded. She shook her head and sighed. We get along all right and I never thought it was worth a fight. Now all I want is out. I suppose I'll have to tell him...

Well, it can wait until after the inspection. Come on, there's not much more we can do here until after the Command Base Operations inspection starts on Monday. Let's go and I'll buy you a drink at the O-Club.

Karen shrugged and stepped over to the coat rack.

Might as well. Dinner's going to be spoiled. I don't feel like going home right now, anyway. He's right. I should have called. I could have called. I hate it when he's right.

Karen checked the lights and locked the door before joining Linda in the hall. The two walked slowly down the stairs into the now-empty hanger, their footsteps echoing off the rafters in the silence. Karen shrugged on her coat and looked with more than a little envy at the slim blonde walking beside her. Linda has the perfect body, Karen thought, small in all the right places. Karen's hips had never properly shrunk after giving birth and, after seven years, she despaired of ever losing the flab on her thighs and around her tummy. How Brad could even stand to look at her was sometimes an amazement.

Linda, on the other hand, had fine, shapely legs with firm muscles all the way up, as Karen had noted in the gym during the base-wide intramural volleyball games. She had breasts, too. Not that Karen didn't, but Linda's looked more like firm grapefruit while Karen likened hers to poached eggs. Brad had always complemented her tits, but after fourteen years of marriage she longed for some of the same looks the men gave Linda. Recently, she had been dabbling in playing around, just to find out what another man might be like. The pick-up was exciting, but the sex was just as dull and unexciting as she found it with Brad. God knew he tried, she had to give him that, but Karen was just no longer interested. Or maybe she never had been. Whatever.

They stepped over the hanger door's runners and into the biting cold of late winter. Ice patches shown dully in the light from the overhead lamps and they both hurried in little, short, choppy steps through the security gate and into the parking lot.

Oh, shit! Karen exclaimed, freezing in her tracks.

What...

It's a damned flat tire, Karen spit out, cutting off Linda's question.

The young blond turned and eyed the problem. Sure enough, the dark blue Thunderbird parked in the Executive Officer's spot had a tire as flat as yesterday's beer. She turned back to her boss with a raised eyebrow that, at any other time, Karen would have found cute.

I suppose I'll have to have Brad come and get me. Maybe we can get it fixed or replaced tomorrow.

He's not going to like that. It was a statement, not a question.

Not in this weather and not with Michael crying about me missing the show. Again. I could probably call a cab but...

Hey, I can take you home.

I wouldn't want to put you out, Karen replied without conviction.

No problem at all. I just have to pick up a few things at the Shopette and we can drop them off at my place on the way.

If it's not a problem...

No, I'd love too. Linda gave Karen her best Sally Fields smile. I don't think the frozen goods will melt in this weather so I could take you right home. Or you can have that drink at my place while I throw the groceries in the freezer and still be home in time to beat your hubby back from the show.

Karen thought a second, then nodded her accord and the two moved around to Linda's '73 MG. It was a tight squeeze getting in. Karen had not been in a small car since she had made Brad sell the Fiat ten years before and a cold blast of air slid sharply up her skirt when she swung her legs into the two-passenger sports car, sending goose bumps all over her body.

The nice thing about small cars, Linda was saying, is that they heat up quickly.

Karen nodded her agreement and huddled deeper into her field jacket. She had pulled the lining out a week earlier when it had looked like spring had arrived, but North Texas weather was known for its capriciousness and she should not have been fooled after three years at Carswell, the major Air Force Base just outside Fort Worth, Texas.

The MG sputtered to life and Linda jerked it into reverse and out of the parking space. She spun the tires in the gravel and fishtailed out onto the street, mumbling a little ooops when she remembered that it was her reporting officer sitting next to her. Karen gave her a small smile and her companion relaxed. Karen intrigued her. The incident on the phone had been the first time she had ever seen her boss lose her cool, although how she kept it together when the Commander was on the warpath was a mystery to the entire office. The enlisted personnel had nicknamed her Iceberg since nothing appeared to warm her blood.

It would be fun to see what happened after a few drinks, when Karen lost some of that tight control. She had only seen the long haired brunette tipsy once, at the Christmas party, and Brad had been there to keep things from getting carried away. Too bad. There had been a lot of interesting happenings that night in the hanger after the children had been taken home. She still wondered who the airman was who performed the striptease on top of the refrigerator. She thought Karen might know, but Karen had been very busy with that B-52 navigator between the time her husband had left to take their son home and when he came back two hours later to pick her up.

What had she been doing during that time anyway? She had vanished but had returned right before midnight with a cat-caught-the-canary smile. That other officer – what was his name?  – he had looked more than satisfied. Did Karen have a secret life? There was a lot that might come to light if she could pour a few drinks down the brunette's throat in a private place.

The Shopette was on the way off base. The government version of a 7-11 was near empty since it was dinner time and most of the airmen were at pursuits more suited for the weather than riding around in a drafty cloth-top foreign car. Karen climbed out and welcomed the warmth of the small convenience store with enthusiasm. She only hoped Linda's heater worked better on the way to her apartment than it had on the way across the base. Karen's thin, Alabama blood never seemed to keep her warm once the temperature dropped below seventy-eight degrees.

Karen flipped through the checkout stand magazine displays while Linda picked up the few things she needed. It seemed that every article from the tabloids to Cosmo to Seventeen to People was full of nothing but sex and how to solve the problems that couples had getting it together. She knew her problems (and she suspected that it might just be attitude), but if she had stopped loving Brad then there was nothing else to it.

With a sigh of disgust, she placed the magazine she had been flipping through back in the rack. How Sally Jessie Raphael juggled her sex life around a career wasn't going to help her and Brad. She still hadn't told him she had volunteered for a remote, unaccompanied, assignment with only a sixty day lead time. Maybe a year in Korea would help her get her perspectives straight. At least she wouldn't have to pretend to be asleep every time Brad reached for her in the night.

She looked up as Linda set her basket down on the counter and held up a huge bottle of Karen's favorite wine cooler.

It's on special. We can get real giggly with this.

Karen smiled and made a half-hearted attempt to pay for the wine, but Linda was insistent and soon they were both huddled in the MG and nudging into the late rush hour traffic on Highway 183. Linda handled the MG like a toy, whipping around other cars and catching the tail end of a yellow light in front of the mall. Compared with Brad's driving, this was hell-raising stuff, especially with the light, misty rain that was starting to freeze up. But Karen kept quiet and the pair made the fifteen minute drive with the soft sounds of the windshield wipers and Kenny G's light jazz soothing Karen’s frazzled nerves. Linda popped onto the freeway and revved the car up to eighty in the two miles to her exit. The apartment complex was just off the freeway and they snaked quickly into an open space in the Bent Wood lot right by Linda's unit.

Karen worked her legs out of the car, careful not to get a run in her last pair of nylons. The MG was a little cramped for Karen's five-eight but it did not bother Linda's five-five frame. She was out and jogging toward the shelter of the apartment through the quickening rain before Karen had both feet on the ground. Laughing at her own distress, Karen grabbed a plastic food bag from the floor of the car and followed Linda into the welcoming shelter of the ground floor apartment's foyer.

Just set the bag in the kitchen, Linda shouted as she walked to the bedroom, setting the bag she carried in the middle of the living room floor and stripping off her field jacket as she went. I'm going to do a quick change and I'll be right out.

Karen carried both bags into the kitchen and absently began to pile their contents on the counter top after meticulously hanging her coat on a rack by the door. From her vantage point, she could see Linda in the bedroom, changing clothes. With a touch of guilty voyeurism, she watched as Linda peeled off her slacks and hose, managing a 360 degree view by watching Linda’s reflection in a full-length mirror free-standing by the closet. In just her blouse and panties she looked like a little girl in her daddy's shirt, but that illusion was destroyed when the blouse and bra dropped into a careless heap on the floor.

She really is pretty, Karen thought, looking enviously at the reflection in the bedroom's full-length mirror. Linda had the muscles and suppleness of an athlete and her breasts were large without being so big that they sagged. She looked smooth and somehow soft and hard all at the same time.

Linda rummaged through her closet and pulled out a pair of sweat pants and a large cotton shirt. As she turned to put them on, she caught Karen staring at her in the mirror and flashed a wide, uninhibited smile. Karen flushed a deep crimson and went into the kitchen. She began putting the cold items in the refrigerator and freezer as Linda slipped into the shirt, but, almost as an afterthought, substituted the sweatpants for a pair of skimpy gym shorts. By the time the blond had dressed and combed her shoulder length hair out of its prescribed military bun, Karen had the glasses filled and had moved to the living room. She sat in one corner of the large, over-stuffed sofa and let out a long sigh, kicking off her tight military pumps.

You like movies, don't you? Linda asked as she came out of the bedroom and accepted the glass Karen offered.

Sure, but Brad's the movie buff in the family.

What do you like?

"Romances, mostly. Light adventures. Like Dirty Dancing or Romancing the Stone.  Nothing heavy. But I am beginning to hate that science fiction stuff that Brad thrives on."

I've got a few tapes if you'd like to see something a little more off-beat.

Maybe some other time. I really shouldn't stay that long. I'd like to come by another time though.

OK. That'd be fun. Linda moved over to the stereo center and switched the jazz station on low, then moved to sit in the opposite corner of the sofa, across from Karen. Do you want to talk? It's OK.

Karen was silent for a long moment, a riotous debate running through her head. She wanted to talk. She needed to talk, but she was not sure she could. She had never even discussed this with Brad and Linda worked for her, right there in the same office, and if she talked there would be trouble and how could she face her at work if she exposed her soul and what about Brad and... and… and… A tear wormed its way down her cheek.

Hey, it's OK. You don't have to talk. Linda set her glass down and scooted over to pat her supervisor on the hand. Karen glanced up, tear moistened eyes giving Linda such a hang-dog look that the petite blond, on a sudden impulse, pulled the older girl close. After a brief resistance, Karen leaned over, put her head on Linda's chest and then the tears began to flow in earnest. Karen let lose like she was a child. The sobs racked her shoulders, the tears slid down like the rain outside to darken the front of Linda's shirt with damp and mascara.

How long they sat like that, Karen could never remember. But the rain had turned to sleet and the room was lit only by the small light Linda had left on in the bedroom and the light from the stereo dials. After an eternity, the shudders finally subsided. In the haze of a dream, Karen felt a slight pressure on her chin. Linda gently pushed up Karen's head until she was looking in her eyes, then slowly bent down and kissed her, full on the lips.

At first, Karen resisted, and then tentatively parted her lips for Linda's questioning tongue. Linda took the cue and slid her tongue full into the now-willing girl's open mouth. Though still unsure at first, Karen quickly responded with a shy probe of her own. Then her inhibitions dissolved and she kissed back with a passion she had forgotten existed.

The embrace was long and drawn out, comfortable. After a while they parted and Karen lifted her eyes to the younger girl with an ache and yearning that was impossible to misread. Almost too afraid of rejection, Karen moved her head toward Linda, asking with half-closed eyes and the innocence of a twelve year old in her first encounter. Linda smiled and their lips met again. This time there was no hesitancy and they kissed with mutual enjoyment.

Somewhere, as if in a dream, Karen felt Linda working on the buttons of her blouse. She drew back a little but did not break contact. She remembered the first time Brad had tried to unbutton her blouse. So long ago; so many lonely nights since then. Lonely, because she preferred to keep Brad at a distance, but lonely nonetheless. A portion of her mind was screaming to stop, to back-off, to slow down. But that was a small voice in the great void of her need, easily ignored, quickly silenced by the physical expectations her body was generating.

Almost without conscious will or acknowledgment, her body responded to Linda's renewed efforts to touch the tender flesh protected by the starched blouse. A sudden need  –  almost an ache  –  welled up in her breast. Gently, she reached up and took Linda's hand and pressed it against her breast and leaned back into the kiss. What the hell, this had to be a dream. And she was not even drunk. It was as if a switch had flicked off her culturally imposed inhibitions, allowing her to sink into the sensations brought on by her growing sexual excitement.

Linda squeezed Karen's breast and rubbed it gently as the kiss lingered, then went back to the buttons. It took just a minute to get the blouse undone and she pushed the material aside to reveal Karen's right breast. Tenderly, she pushed up the bra to expose the erect nipple. Almost reluctantly, she broke from Karen's embrace and leaned down to wrap her lips around the soft mound of flesh. She tickled the nipple with her tongue and Karen let out a little gasp, shutting her eyes and clinching her fist as fantastic images rushed through her head and chills raced across her body.

Encouraged by Karen's response, Linda sucked gently on Karen's tit, reaching behind her to release the clasp of her bra. Karen arched her back, unconsciously pushing her breast into Linda, accidentally forcing her to nip the tip of Karen’s nipple. Karen let out a small cry of pleasure and felt chills once more run over her body. Still not sure what she was doing  –  or why  –  Karen shrugged out of her blouse and bra, and then leaned back on the arm of the sofa, pulling the younger girl with her.

Linda rolled the nipple of Karen's left breast between her fingers as she continued to use her mouth on the right nipple. Karen felt herself losing control as she sank into a blissful fog of sexual desire. She thought about resistance, a mad race of negatives rushing through her mind, only to sink beneath a chorus of what-the-hells and let it happen, you deserve this.

With her eyes closed and her mind a blank, Karen allowed Linda to fondle her breast in a gently pleasing way that she had never experienced before with Brad. Although she was sure that Linda was doing nothing new or innovative or different from what Brad attempted in foreplay or the one-night stands she pretended accidentally happened with fighter jocks. Hell, pilots didn’t know anything at all about foreplay, just make the score before the girl sobered up and had second thoughts.

There was an emotional excitement with Linda that she had never felt with her husband. It was a thrill new to her, a total release of hang-ups she had never thought to feel. On a vaguely rational level, Karen knew her body was reacting to Linda's attentions. Her crouch was moist, her nipples so hard they hurt.

Pulling herself out of her dream state, Karen reached a questing hand out to Linda. Softly, fearfully, she ran her fingers down the blonde's chest, thrilling in the feel of the soft curve of a breast not her own. Abruptly embarrassed by her daring, Karen let her hand drop. But Linda had begun to feel a need of her own. Still concentrating on rousing Karen to a greater height, she reached up and unbuttoned her own shirt, letting it fall open. She raise up her head and looked Karen in the eye, then slowly lowered herself, rubbing her chest up the other's body, then she stretched full on Karen and they kissed in a slow way, mouths open, tongue questing, bare skin against bare skin.

Linda reached for Karen's hand, guiding it slowly to her own breast, gently forcing Karen to take the younger girl's tit full in her palm. Nervous, Karen pulled her hand back as soon as Linda released her wrist, then reached up again to feel the full roundness pressing with a small hard point into her palm. In a rush, Karen realized that she had been waiting all her life for this sensation while making love. And love is what she knew she was making; something she had never felt with Brad, no matter how often she had told him otherwise.

Their passion lasted for an interminable time before Linda finally pulled away.

Come on.  It's time we stopped this playing around.

What? Karen replied in a sleepy voice, not wanting to break out of the spell Linda had cast.

Don't talk, just come.

Obediently, Karen accepted Linda's offered hand, only half afraid to follow the petite blond into the dim confines of the bedroom. But something overcame her fear and she stood passively, expectantly, as Linda removed her skirt and peeled off Karen’s panty-hose. With a mischievous grin, Linda pushed Karen into a sitting position on the bed.

Wait.

Karen nodded. Then laid back on the bed and dreamily ran her hands down her sides and across her thighs. One part of her was demanding to know what she was doing in Linda's bedroom and what it was she planned on doing next, but the vast majority of her just wanted to accept whatever came without reservation or regret. She reached up and pulled her hair out of its bun, symbolically allowing her objections to fall away with the cascading locks. She sat up and shook her hair, unaware she was letting the long tresses fall over her breasts in the way that Brad had always found so exciting and alluring. She did not realize that, even now, her actions were dictated by the man she had stopped loving a decade ago. Perhaps her lost love was in her head, not her heart.

Linda stepped out of the bathroom with a small bottle of oil and walked over to Linda. Smiling slightly, her eyes alight in anticipated delight, Linda bent down and kissed Karen without the previous passion, teasing. She slowly drew a line of caresses down Karen's body, past the ear, along the side of the neck, over both breasts, lingering on the soft round of Karen's stomach. Linda poured a little oil on her hands and rubbed it over Karen's breasts, making them slippery, smooth, sensual. The smell of musk permeated the bedroom and Karen's breathing became once again rapid, her vaginal juices flowing.

Linda reached over and moved one of Karen's hands to the brunette’s own boob, pressing Karen's hand against her own nipple, forcing Karen to involve herself in the her own stimulation, adding a touch of masturbation to her aroused sensations, allowing Linda to concentrate her efforts farther down. Karen began rolling her oiled nipples between her fingers, finding new excitement in touching her own chest though she had done this many times before. Once Linda was sure that Karen was fully into the experience, she slipped off the bed, spreading Karen's legs apart with her nude body.

The smell of Karen's juices was cloying and Linda breathed it in deep. This was not her first session with another woman, but it was not a frequent happening. There was something special, too, about having her commander spread before her, lost in sensation and dreams. Don’t ask, don’t tell, she thought, knowing that the don’t tell would not be easy. She felt the rush of power as her own juices began to flow and leaned in to kiss the insides of Karen's thighs, moving her tongue up until she met the soft cotton of Karen's panties. Her excitement grew even more as Karen cried out at the contact.

Linda slid the moist cotton over Karen’s hips and tossed them across the room. She kept her eyes on Karen's vagina as she brought her hand down and fingered open the skin to reveal the moist richness of Karen's love nest. With her thumb, she began rotating Karen's clit, drawing a series of gasps out of the older woman, working her higher and closer to a climax that Brad had only been able to draw occasionally. Brad's failure to bring Karen to frequent climax was a source of depression for both of them, since, before Karen, Brad had never had problems pleasing women. Brad claimed it was because Karen always held back. With Linda pushing her ever higher, the analytical part of her mind finally acknowledged the truth in his claim. For the first time ever, she was letting herself go completely. Though part of her wanted to investigate this new phenomenon, the rest of her rapidly overpowered her last mental holdout and Karen sank into total sensual pleasure well beyond her cognizant level.

As Karen's adore grew, Linda's matched pace. She moved her head closer into the moist haven of Karen's bush, Linda’s tongue sliding over Karen’s swollen clit. Linda began stimulating herself, shoving her fingers in deep, driving herself to climax as surely as she was driving Karen with her sucking mouth and gently pinching teeth.

Fingers squeezing her breasts in rhythm to the thrusts of Linda's tongue, Karen lost herself in the oblivion of sexual pleasure, gasping now as Linda's efforts made her body tremble with the excitement of physical delight mixed with forbidden fruits. Her mind was blank, her excitement building on the awareness that Linda, too, was approaching climax. The younger girl thrust deeper into her partner, panting into Karen's love opening with desperation of her own, feeding off Karen just as Karen was feeding off of her.

In a blinding moment of desire, Karen reached down and wrapped her fingers in Linda's hair, pulling the girl as tight against her as she could. In that moment, both girls climaxed in a wild chorus of screams and gasps. Karen, for the first time ever, felt the wet rush of juices roll down her legs as Linda pulled herself onto the bed to lie wrapped in Karen's arms, legs intertwined, her juices mixing with Karen's on the bed covers.

They lay together, catching their breath, their bodies pressed close together in a sharing beyond love. Karen remembered the early days in her marriage with Brad and wondered where that feeling had gone. While the physical had never satisfied, there had once been something warm and deep between them. Karen did not know why she had let that slip out of her life without making an effort to save what they had once had. Then she became angry. Angry at Brad for forcing her own guilt to the surface at a time that should be warm and caring, not shattered by the coldness she had been feeling in her marriage. She had tried to show him that it was over, but he had never noticed anything but the decreasing number of sexually active evenings and the walls she had built whenever he had tried to touch her. He had never understood. It was not him, it was her. She did not want him around. But, since she never had the decency to tell him, he refused to listen to his heart, reasoning away the feelings of rejection, internalizing the blame. She knew that if she had tried to talk to him, he would have done anything she had asked to save the marriage, to save their love. She had just never talked. She had never asked. Now it was too late. In another month she would be gone and she could do all the cold, calculating things guarantee to hurt, guarantee to cause pain.

She was thinking these thoughts and questioning why she could not cry, could not care about the man who she knew loved her more than life itself, how she could be so callous about the love of her child, these thoughts filled her as she drifted off to sleep cradled in Linda's arms. Her dreams were centered on herself, leaving no room for others.

#      #      #

Linda woke looking at the clock. Almost eleven. Karen was still asleep, emotionally and physically fulfilled, a slight smile on her face. Carefully, so as not to wake Karen, Linda slipped out of their embrace and wrapped the bedspread over Karen's huddled form. Jerry was due soon and she didn't want him destroying Karen's mood by barging in on the two of them.

She threw back on her shirt and walked into the living room, pulling the door closed behind her. She refreshed her drink, flopped down on the sofa, keying on MTV with the remote. Her favorite video, Heart's These Dreams, had just begun playing and she snuggled in with the drink to enjoy it.

There was a lot to think about. Karen was going to be up-tight about what had happened. Anyone with as many deep-seated, Southern Baptist hang-ups would, but Karen was her boss. Linda had enjoyed the encounter, but was practical enough to know how much even an average work performance report could hurt her chances for promotion. Somehow, she had to help Karen realize that sex was alright and that what had happened was nothing to generate guilt.

She even hoped that, in its way, it would help Karen get back with Brad. She had met him a couple of times. He had obviously felt very out-of-place at many of the parties, though he tried to fit in. He was a little over-weight, bearded and into movies and music and things that the normal military mind thought wimpish. He was especially concerned about his image as a freelancer since he was often not working. Not that he totally failed to contribute to the family. He appeared to be a damned good father and it was obvious to anyone but Karen that he loved his wife with a devotion that ran very deep.

Linda knew that Karen had been making life rough for him since she had given up her stripes for brass. He no longer fit the proper image. But, after the episode earlier, she suspected that it went much deeper than that. Karen had said that their sex life was lacking. Linda believed that it was all in Karen's attitude, though she was half tempted to slip out and see if Brad was that bad. It might help soothe her own uncertainty over what had just happened.

Heart went off, replaced by a rap group. Too much rap and not enough rock on both MTV and VH-1 these days, according to Jerry, and from what Linda had seen lately, that was about true. She drank a little more wine cooler and thought a little more about rap and rock and Karen and Brad and Linda and Jerry, Linda's current lover. Then she thought about Karen and Jerry and the thought of breaking down a few more social barriers suddenly became appealing. That was what made her eyes sparkle when Jerry showed up a few minutes later.

Woah! Look at you. Too lazy to get dressed these days? Jerry asked as he entered, shutting the door behind him.

Shhhhhhh! Linda replied moving sensually up to her six-two dark-haired lover. I have company and I'm not ready for you to wake her up.

Oh, who?

Someone from the base. You don't know her, but she's a good friend and she's got a real problem.

Boyfriend beat her up or something? Hey, she's not staying here, is she?

"No to the second part. Well,