The Whore-for-a-Day Game

by Ashley B. D. Zacharias

“Let me be blunt,” Alex said. “We've been married for more than a year and a half and it's not as good as it should be. I'm willing to do whatever it takes to have a better marriage. I just don't know what I should do.”

“I think everything's fine,” Leslie said, but there was no conviction in her voice.

Alex waited for a long time, hoping that she would elaborate, but she remained mute. Eventually he asked, “Are you happy?”

“Yes. Are you?”

“Not especially. Not as happy as I thought that I'd be when we first got married.”

“Well, I guess life isn't a bowl of cherries after all, is it?”

“I'm not sure that it should be this sour.”

She looked at him with shock. “You think that our marriage is sour?”

“It's not sweet. You can be pretty sarcastic sometimes, you know.”

“Is that it? You want me to act sweeter. You don't want me to be so sarcastic? I can try to change that if you want.”

It was his turn to look at her for a while, trying to figure her out. “I don't think that's it,” he said, finally. “I don't mind your being sarcastic. I just think that we're stuck in a rut. We don't have as much fun as we should.”

“You think we should have more fun? Like what? I'll do whatever you want to do for fun. Go dancing? Go to more movies? Whatever.”

“It's not that simple. It's... I don't know. It's something more important than that.”

She looked at him through narrowed lids. “Okay. Let's do it this way. I think that our marriage is fine. You don't. You said that you wanted to be blunt, so do it. Be blunt. Tell me exactly what you want that you're not getting.”

He blushed, then said, “Okay. Let's start with sex. I think that we should have more sex.”

“You think that we should have more sex or you want more sex for yourself. This is important, so let's be absolutely clear about this.”

“I want more sex. I love making love to you. There's nothing in the world that I'd rather be doing than making love to you. Nothing.”

“And doing it whenever we feel like it isn't enough?”

“Three times last month? That's not much sex, you know.”

It was her turn to blush. “You're keeping count?”

“It's not like it's hard for me to count to such a big number.”

“And you call me sarcastic. So what do you think would be a good number? Twice a week? Three times?”

“That would certainly be a better number.”

“Even if I don't feel in the mood? Even if I can't enjoy it?”

“No. I want you to enjoy it as much as I do. I don't want to make love to you if you're not having any fun.”

“So that puts us right back where we started. I'm happy, you're not. And if I'm not happy, then you're still not. I'd say that it sounds like you have the problem, not me.”

He sighed. “I don't think that you're being honest with me. I don't think that you're really as happy with the status quo as you claim.”

“What makes you say that?”

“The way you act with me. You don't act happy.”

“Maybe I don't want to be happy. Maybe I'm happy not being happy. Did you ever think about that?”

“Now you're being sarcastic with me again.”

She paused. Then she said something strange. “No. I'm not. I'm being literal. You're going to think that I'm all screwed up in the head, but sometimes I need to be unhappy. Sometimes a little dose of misery is exactly what I need.” She paused and he saw that her hands were trembling. “I... God, this isn't easy for me. I...” She stopped and looked at him. There was a glint of desperation in her eyes.

“Have you had an affair?” he asked softly.

“No! God, no! I haven't slept with anyone but you since before I met you.”

“Do you want to have an affair?”

“No! Never! How can you even ask that? How can you even think that?”

“The way you were talking about feeling miserable, I thought maybe that you were hinting that you were feeling guilty about having an affair.”

“No. It's not that. Not at all. I...” She paused again, searching for the right words, then slumped in her chair in defeat.

“Okay, babe. Okay. There's something else then. I promised myself that I'd never raise the subject again, but maybe I have to. You can tell me if I'm out of line, and I'll stop talking and never mention it again but maybe we need to get this out in the open. Back when we first started dating, there was a time, once, when you asked me to use you sexually without considering your feelings. In fact, I believe you urged me to treat you like a piece of meat. I tried to do what you wanted. You made it clear, though, that you didn't want to be treated like that normally, that it was a rare thing. Like a one-time thing. Is that what you're talking about? If it's not, just let me know and I'll never mention it again. But now you're making me think that you need something like that again and I've been too dense to realize it and do it to you.”

Leslie couldn't meet his eyes when she said, “No. You're right. I have needs. Strange needs that I don't like to talk about. Sometimes I need to be treated badly. Sometimes I need to feel miserable to be happy. I've been afraid to tell you because I know that isn't normal and I don't want you to think that I'm weird. Worse, I'm afraid that, now that I'm telling you, then you're going to think that you should treat me badly all the time and that'll ruin things for sure. Those things are too intense to do more than on rare occasions. You saw me once on one of those rare occasions. I think that I'm past due for another session.”

“Okay. Tell me what to do and I'll do it.”

“Okay. I'll think of something and let you know. Now, can we just go to bed and make love like normal people and pretend that we have a happy marriage?”

“If that's what you want.”

“That's what I need today. Soon – maybe tomorrow, maybe next week – I'm going to need something different.”

“Let me know.”

“Count on it.”

* * *

On Monday morning, Alex found an envelop on the table next to his breakfast. That was the third surprise of the morning.

The first surprise had been that breakfast was waiting for him. Leslie never ate breakfast so Alex normally had to microwave a bowl of instant oatmeal for himself.

The second surprise was that Leslie had gone to work before him. She'd waved at him as he was coming down the stairs and said that she was going to go to work early today, then left. It was clear, now, that she'd cooked his oatmeal while he was getting dressed and had waited for him at the bottom of the stairs so that she could say goodbye before running out.

The contents of the envelop was the fourth, and biggest surprise, not just of the morning, but of his marriage. The letter inside read:

Dear Alex:

You say that you want more sex. Next Saturday, I'm going to give you all the sex that you want and more. I love to play games so I've made up a new one. We're going to play the “Whore-for-a-Day Game.” For twenty-four hours, I'm going to be The Whore who has only one client: you. You're going to be two people. At eight o'clock on Saturday morning, you're going to be “Leroy the Pimp” for a few minutes and turn me out to be your whore. Then, for the next twenty-four hours, you're going to be “John the John”, my one and only client. Finally, starting at eight o'clock on Sunday morning, you're going to be “Leroy the pimp” again.

Like any game, the Whore-for-a-Day Game has rules. The most important rule is that The Whore has a quota to fill. To make Leroy, her pimp, happy, she has to earn a certain amount of money. But, to make the game interesting, neither The Whore nor Leroy/John knows what the quota is. The Whore and Leroy are going to roll a single die but they're going to leave the dice cup turned over top of it. Maybe they rolled a one, maybe a six; they won't know until the cup is lifted on Sunday morning.

For twenty-four hours, The Whore is going to have to make John have as many orgasms as she can. That's what whores do – they do whatever it takes to convince men to have sex with them as often as possible. Every time John has an orgasm, he's going to pay The Whore $100. That's what johns do – they pay for it. John better make sure that he starts with $600 in cash in his pocket because The Whore is going to try to earn every penny of it.

It's going to be pretty easy for The Whore to earn at least a hundred dollars because you're prohibited from jerking off between now and Saturday morning and I'm sure as hell not going to have sex with you before then. If you have even one orgasm between now and Saturday morning, then you are honor-bound to tell me so that I can cancel the game. I advise you to spend the next few days trying not to think about sex.

On the other hand, it's going to be damned hard for The Whore to earn all six hundred dollars because that's a lot of orgasms for one man to have in twenty-four hours, even a man who hasn't had sex for five days.

Let me be perfectly clear. John does not have to please The Whore in any way. He does not have any obligations but to please himself. In particular, he does not have to have sex with her if he's not in the mood. It is totally up to The Whore to put him in the mood and bring him to orgasm as often as she can. John's frequent satisfaction is her job, not his.

She will want to do a good job.

You see, The Whore has that damned quota on that hidden die to worry about. Every whore needs an incentive to work hard. On Sunday morning when The Whore reports back to Leroy with her hard-earned cash, they're going to look at that die together. Every spot on the die is worth a hundred dollars. If she has earned her quota, then she keeps the money and Leroy takes her shopping so that she can spend it on a nice gift for herself. But if she fails to make the quota, then Leroy's going to be angry. He's going to take all the money away from her and then he's going to punish her from eight o'clock Sunday morning until noon. He's going to tie her up and beat her and abuse her terribly. There will be another envelop with suggestions for ways that Leroy can punish his Whore if she turns out to be lazy and useless. Leroy will make The Whore suffer in misery for every minute of four long, long hours.

Love, Leslie

Alex pushed his porridge aside. His appetite was gone. Completely forgotten. He read the letter again, and then a third time. Common sense was telling him that this was insane but his dick was singing a different tune; it was as hard as a rock. He wanted nothing more than to run upstairs and jerk himself into ecstasy. But that would be cheating. The letter was as clear as can be about that. From now until Saturday morning, he was not permitted a single orgasm.

If he played by her rules, he was facing five days of severe frustration. She had written a letter that was guaranteed to set him on fire at the same time that it denied him any relief. Had Leslie planned it that way? Was this her way of punishing him for complaining about not getting enough sex? She was a smart girl. And she loved her games. Surely she knew what she was doing when she put Alex in this predicament. It was no accident.

He read the letter for the fourth time. She was facing the possibility of spending four hours in hell, he was facing the certainty of spending five days there. What was fair about that? For a brief moment, he thought about cheating. If he jerked off three times a day every day until Saturday, John would be exhausted. The Whore wouldn't be able to earn even a hundred dollars.

He dismissed the idea as soon as he thought about it. She would be watching he and, if she caught him, the game was off. He dearly wanted to see how the game turned out. And even if she didn't catch him, what would be the fun in living through a predetermined outcome. He dearly wanted to see how the game turned out when it was played fairly. Making him come six times in twenty-four hours would be a hell of a challenge. How many wives would accept that challenge? He would be thrilled to know that he had married a woman who would suggest such a thing. And if she succeeded? Her accomplishment would be legendary.

He took his pen from his pocket and scrawled, “You're on. We start playing at eight on Saturday morning. Good luck.” He left it on the table for her so see when she came home from work tonight.

He was going to have to throw himself into his own work whole heartedly for the next few days to to try to distract himself from thinking about the Whore-for-a-Day game. Yeah. Like that was going to work. He knew that he would be unable to think about anything else. For five days, he would think about nothing but sex with his wife and would have to master his desperate desire by sheer force of will.

If he had known his own wife better, Alex would have known that Leslie thought of herself as a masochist without realizing that she was a sadist underneath. Her masochism was merely the inevitable consequence of her preference for directing her sadism toward herself, the better to appreciate her cruel fantasies firsthand.

* * *

On Saturday morning, the alarm rang at seven o'clock, the same as on weekdays, because Leslie had kept it set. She rose first and took her shower, expecting Alex to roll over for another fifteen minutes sleep as he did every working morning.

Today was different, though. Alex was already awake, had been awake long before the alarm rang and had lain in bed, waiting impatiently for the Whore-for-a-Day Game to begin. For most of the night, he had been sporting a huge erection. He dared not touch himself for fear of releasing an earthshaking orgasm that would drench the bed and cancel the game. He kept telling himself to be strong. Wait and there would be orgasms aplenty a coming. Much better orgasms than he could give himself.

Another difference was that today, Leslie had shaken him to make sure that he was awake and told him that he could get up and shower right away. She was going to use the main bathroom and leave the en suite to him.

Showering without stimulating himself was just one more ordeal capping a week of the same. As on the previous five mornings, he managed to stay strong. And erect. It took a further effort to get his jeans zipped up without creaming them. Eight o'clock couldn't come soon enough for him. The Whore could earn her first hundred dollars just by brushing her fingertips across the outside of his pants.

The second hundred dollars might be a little more difficult for her.

When he came downstairs, he found Leslie in the kitchen, cooking bacon and eggs. To his amazement, she was dressed like a housewife from fifty years ago. She wore low black pumps, a calf-length black skirt and modest white cotton blouse. To top it off, she was wearing a red and white checked apron and a double string of pearls. Pearls. While she cooked breakfast. He caught a glimpse of matching pearl earrings when she flipped one side of her long brown hair off her left shoulder. The outfit should have been demure, but something in the way her full breasts filled the blouse and her cherry red lips parted in a teasing smile almost made him come in the middle of the kitchen. She was the sexiest housewife he had ever seen. And she was his sexy wife. For a brief, mad instant, he thought that he should tell her to forget the game and get back to bed for some regular, married, perfect, Saturday-morning sex.

Instead, he sat down and waited for her to serve breakfast.

They spoke little as they ate. When Leslie finished, she rose and said, “I better get the dishes done. I've got an appointment with a man named Leroy. Apparently he has some kind of business proposition for me. He should be arriving at eight. I'll be waiting for him in the living room. Please send him in when he arrives.”

“I'll make sure that he knows where you are.”

Ten minutes later, at exactly eight o'clock, Alex found Leslie sitting primly on the living room sofa, waiting patiently. When he sat in the easy chair across from her, she said, “I have been told that you have a business proposition for me, Mr. Leroy.”

“That's right,” Alex replied. “I believe that you could have a lucrative career in sales.”

“In sales? That sounds like it might be interesting. I could meet lots of people that way.”

“Yes, you certainly could.”

“What would I be selling?”

“Why, yourself, my dear. It's been said that every salesman ultimately sells himself. You would be doing that quite literally.”

She frowned. “I don't think I follow your meaning.”

“I propose to employ you as an escort.”

She looked shocked and raised her fingertips to her mouth. “An escort, sir? Do I understand that you mean to make me a whore?”

“Yes, dear.” He gestured at the generous breasts that were pressing against the too-tight blouse. “You appear to be naturally suited for the profession. If you apply yourself, you will find my proposition to be quite lucrative.”

“Indeed? How much do you think a man would pay for my services?”

“I recommend that you charge a flat rate of one hundred dollars.”

“My, that is a lot of money. What would I have to do for a hundred dollars?”

“Whatever it takes to satisfy your client.”

“In my new profession, my clients are called johns, are they not?”

“That they are, dear.”

“How many of these johns would I have to service in a night?”

“As many as possible.”

“How many would that be?”

Alex – Leroy – raised an eyebrow. “That's up to you.”

“I guess that I'll just have to do the best that I can, then.”

“That's all I ask.”

Leslie – now The Whore – opened a small chest that was sitting on the coffee table and removed two small padlocks, a large white die, and a dice cup. “I guess I'll just have to trust to chance that I'll be good enough, won't I?”

“Try your luck, dear.”

She shook the cup, rattling the die for a long time. Her breathing was fluttery and Alex could see a lovely dew of nervous sweat on her upper lip. Then she dumped the cup upside-down in the chest, trapping the die inside. She did not remove the cup so that the die remained covered; neither one of them had any idea what she had rolled. She closed the chest gently. It had two hasps on it. She snapped a padlock through each hasp and held one key out to her new pimp. “You'll want to put that key in a safe place until you need it tomorrow morning.” She kept the other key for herself. As long as each held their own key, neither of them could open the chest to inspect or alter the die alone.

“Now, if you'll excuse me, Mr. Leroy,  I would like to find my first john and get to work as soon as possible.”

She left Alex sitting in the easy chair, stunned that the game had actually begun. He was going to have as many orgasms as he could manage in the next twenty-four hours. But right now, he only cared about getting the first one as soon as possible. He was about to explode in his pants. But now that the game had begun, that would count as one score for The Whore. She could legitimately demand a C-note even if she was not in the room. After all, she would be correct in claiming responsibility for his excited state.

Before he could finish the thought, The Whore was back. She was still wearing her housewife outfit, from pearls to shoes. “Why Mister,” she said, “you look awfully stressed. Hasn't your wife been treating you properly the last few days?”

“No, I can't say that she has.”

“Well, for a hundred dollars, I can do something for you what she won't. What do you say?”

“I've got a hundred dollars right here, Miss.” He pulled a hundred dollar bill from his wallet. He had gone to the bank days ago and withdrawn six of them. They had been burning a hole in his wallet all week.

“Okay, then.” She knelt in front of where he was sitting and said, “There are some things that a man likes a lot that their wives are just too prudish to do for him. How would you like a nice sloppy blow job?” She smiled up at him and added, “I swallow.” She caressed him lightly through his pants with her right hand while she held her left hand above her head. When he put the money in it, he noticed that one thing had changed after she had gone upstairs. She was no longer wearing her wedding ring. That vacant spot on her ring finger was a visible promise that Leslie was not going to act like his wife for the next twenty-four hours. Seeing that naked finger in this circumstance was more erotic than seeing an entire naked female body.

As soon as she had tucked her fee into her bra cup, she unbuckled his belt, unbuttoned his waist band and pulled his zipper down. “Let's see what we have here.” He raised his hips so she could pull his pants and underwear down over his hips. His erection sprang free.

“My, my. You do have a big cock. I've never seen a bigger one.” She giggled girlishly. “I'm going to have to work to get all that into my mouth.”

Without further ado, she began licking around the head, paying special attention to the joint between the head and shaft. While she licked and sucked, she began pumping his shaft by the base with both hands. He watched her head bobbing and her hair swishing back and forth and was transported by the beauty of his wife, who had, of her own free will, become his private whore. With that thought, he could contain himself no longer and began pumping into her mouth. She kept sucking and swallowing until he was empty. Then she raised her face to look at him, licked her tongue around her ruby red lips and said, “You are delicious.” She sounded like she meant it. “I want to taste you again, real soon.”

“Okay,” he said in a voice that sounded thin and weak. “Okay.”

“I'm going to hold you to that promise,” she said with a grin, then rose elegantly and strode out of the room.

One hundred dollars down; five hundred to go.

He was still sitting on the easy chair with his pants around his knees when she came back into the room, this time wearing her coat. “I'm going out for a while, dear. I'll be back soon. You be good, okay?”

“Okay.”

* * *

Alex felt good. He felt relaxed for the first time since she had proposed the Whore-for-a-Day Game. Damn, he had had a hard week. Pun intended. After a while, he got up and refastened his pants. He thought about going upstairs and cleaning himself up, but there was no need. The Whore – he was consciously trying to think of Leslie as The Whore because that was what he was supposed to do – had already licked him as clean as a whistle. She had certainly earned her hundred dollars. As he puttered around, cleaning up the kitchen, making the bed, performing various other little domestic chores, he began to wonder what she would do to earn her next hundred. Another five perfect blow jobs sounded like a great idea to him, but he suspected that she was going to try something different next time. Leslie – oops, The Whore – would have a strategy that was more likely to win the game than trying to repeat the same act over and over and risk boring him.

After two hours had passed, he was getting impatient. Didn't she know that the clock was ticking? She had only twenty-two hours left and he expected to spend the last eight of those sleeping. That meant that she only had fourteen waking hours to work with and he was going to require more time to recuperate between visits from The Whore as the day wore on.

He tried reading but that was useless. He was obsessing so much about when he would get into a little more whore that he read whole pages without understanding a single word. In the end, he turned on the television and sat staring at whatever happened to be playing while he waited for The Whore to return.

At ten thirty, the phone rang. He raced to answer it. “Hello.”

“Hello,” The Whore's voice replied. “A friend gave me your name. She said that you might be interested in a party at your house. A house party, so to speak. Are you up for it?”

He was. Literally. “I'd like that.”

“Okay. What did you have in mind?”

“Sex.”

“Of course, honey. I mean what kind of sex would you like? Just whisper it in my ear.”

“I'd like... I'd like to come in your pussy.”

“I think I'd like that too.”

“Or your mouth,” he added. “Whichever you'd like.”

“No, sir. Whichever you'd like.”

“Okay. Pussy.”

“Do you want to be a beast? Do you want me to bend over so that you can take me from behind?”

“Okay.” Leslie had never offered to do it doggie style before.

“You think about that. You think if that's what you'd most like to do and, if that is it, then that's what we'll do.”

“Okay.”

“Where do you live?”

He recited his address to her, and she pretended that she didn't already know it, asking him to repeat the number and spell the street.

“I'll be over as soon as I can. I'm looking forward to this. We're going to have some fun.”

“Okay.”

She hung up and he resumed his wait. It was easier now because he had something concrete to fantasize about.

He seemed to be waiting for only a few minutes before the doorbell rang. He shut the TV off and practically ran to the door.

The Whore was wearing high, high heels; fire-engine red with straps around the ankles and open toes. Red stockings clung to her lovely long legs all the way up to the hem of a red skirt that fell half-way down her thigh. The skirt was cinched with a wide red belt that matched her shoes. A plain white cotton blouse was unbuttoned far enough to give him a glimpse of a red lace bra at her cleavage. The topper, though, was a fall of long red hair that tumbled to her shoulders in waves of luscious curls. Surely it was a wig; she would not have spent the morning getting her hair dyed and permed. Surely.

“Come in,” he said.

“You must be John,” she replied. “You're even more handsome than my friend said.” She walked through the door and he saw that her red stockings had a seam running up the back. Her ass wriggled as she walked. Leslie's ass never wriggled, but The Whore worked her ass like a pro. Maybe it was the heels that gave her an extra sway.

She held her hand back over her shoulder without looking at him and said, “Business before pleasure, my handsome man. My special rate for a good-looking guy like you is an even hundred.”

When he handed her the bill, she tucked it into a little clutch purse, fire-engine red, of course, and said, “Where would you prefer to have our date? Living room? Bedroom? Kitchen?”

“Living room?”

“I presume that's the room that I see through here.”

He followed her swaying, pulsing, rolling ass into the living room.

“Do you want to close the curtains or would you like to give the neighbors something interesting to gossip about? Either way is fine with me.”

She sounded like she meant it.

He wondered if she were so far into her character that she had forgotten that she would be Leslie again and still living here tomorrow. He leaped to draw the curtains.

She laughed in delight.

When he came back to her, she took him by the hand and said, “Now, if you're still happy with taking me like a bitch in heat, let me show you what a bitch in heat looks like.” She squatted so that her breasts were level with his navel, pressed them against his abdomen and slowly rubbed her body against his all the way up, moaning softly while holding his waist lightly with her hands. “You feel so good that I have to keep myself on a short leash.” She nuzzled his neck softly with her hair while she unbuttoned his shirt. It seemed to take a long time. She was in no hurry. After she pushed his shirt off his shoulders and pulled his arms free of the sleeves, she stepped back and began unbuttoning her white blouse. Slowly, one button at a time, revealing a bit more of her red lace bra at every step. Her back was arched, her lace-covered breasts were straining against the light fabric as though desperate to pounce on him. He loved his wife's breasts but marvelled at how much more erotic The Whore's tits were. When the fabric parted enough to reveal her nipples, he saw that they were dark and erect beneath the red lace. His wife's nipples had never been this dark. Was this the same woman or was The Whore an imposter who merely resembled his wife?

When she finally discarded her blouse, she grabbed his head by the hair with both hands and began working her tits against his chest. “You feel so good, I can't believe it,” she said. “I bet you're as strong as a bull.”

She sank to a deep squat and began unbuckling his belt. This time, she pulled his pants all the way off. His underwear followed in short order, revealing his erection.

“Look,” she purred, “You're hung like a bull, too.” She caressed his cock lightly. He was as hard now as he had been this morning. “I want to feel all of this inside me.”

When she rose to her feet again, she turned so that her back was facing him. She arched her back to thrust her ass out as far as possible and began to bend her knees in alternation to work her hips, moving her ass in circles underneath her short red skirt. “Why don't you let your cock feel what this ass is like?” she asked and worked her way back until she was grinding her fabric-covered butt against his cock.

It felt damn good.

“You know what kind of panties a bitch in heat wears?” she asked and reached down to begin working the hem of her miniskirt up her thighs. “You want to guess?”

“A thong,” he hazarded as he saw the tops of her stockings revealed. She wasn't wearing pantyhose. These were real stockings held up by a red garter belt.

“Mmm. I don't think so,” she replied. “Want to guess again?”

She stepped forward so that she was no longer in contact with his cock but was still working her ass for all it was worth. “Come on try again.”

“Red lace?” he guessed.

“No, silly. A real bitch doesn't wear any panties.” She pulled the skirt up over her hips to prove that she was a real bitch. “See? She keeps her cunt ready for a real man.”

She backed toward him again. “I want you real bad. I'm dripping for you, so why don't you grab my waist and put it to me. This bitch needs to feel you in–”

He had heard enough talk. He interrupted her spiel with action. She was as wet as could be and he slid right home on the first thrust. She kept working her ass and he felt her cheeks flexing against his abdomen as he began pumping in earnest. God, all that motion around his cock felt good.

It felt good to The Whore, too. She was talking constantly, “Oh, God! Yes! God, you feel good. Do me. Do me as deep as you can. God, yes. I can't believe how deep you're getting into me. Oh, God. Hang on tight. God, that feels good. Ram it home, stud. Nobody has even done me this deep before. God damn it, fuck me like there's no tomorrow. I'm begging you. Fuck me hard. God, you feel good inside me. Pump me. God yes. Pump me. Come on! Do me!”

He did her. She didn't stop working and grinding until she felt him come deep inside her. Then, when he was finally finished, she stopped and hung there, bent at the waist, arms hanging down, limp as a rag doll.

When he stepped away from her, she scooped up her blouse, stood straight and pulled her skirt back down to cover her garter belt and stocking tops.

She caressed his face, said, “Honey, you were terrific. I look forward to seeing you again real soon. Okay?”

“Okay,” he gasped.

She left the house.

He sank down on the couch, still naked and said, aloud to the empty house, “I love the Whore-for-a-Day Game.”

* * *

Alex had not heard from The Whore by noon, so he fixed himself a light lunch. Another hour passed and he was getting bored. He had not considered that the game would have such long intervals between the sexual interludes. Then he laughed at himself. He seldom waited for less than three days for a sex with his wife and usually waited much longer. Now he was complaining about having to wait more than a couple of hours for his third sexual adventure since he got up this morning. But he was ready for it. He wasn't walking around with a stiffie, not after getting off twice today, but he thought that he could get it up easily enough if called to duty. Especially if the call came in the form of The Whore's ivory smooth ass framed in scarlet and pulsing like it had a mind of it's own.

He decided to take a quick nap to recharge his batteries. Predictably, he had just closed his eyes when the phone rang and woke him up. “Hello,” he said, groggily, as he peered at the clock. It said one thirty and he realized that he had been napping for a full hour.

He recognized The Whore's voice, “I saw your ad on the Cheating Wives website and I was intrigued by it. I was wondering if we could meet and talk about it.”

“What? What ad? Cheating wives? I don't know what you're talking about.”

“Sure you do, John. That's your name, right, like you said in your ad. You said that you're Long John Silver and you said that you wanted to shiver the timbers of any bored and lonely housewife who wanted an adventure. Well, I'm calling your number because I'm a bored and horny housewife and I want to get my timbers shivered something awful.”

At last, Alex was waking up enough to understand what was going on. “Oh. Yeah. Right. My ad on the Internet. Yeah. Sorry. I just woke up and I'm not thinking clearly yet. Yeah, right. The ad. Wow. I never thought that anyone would call my number. I just put the ad up there as a lark. Wow. You're really calling. You want to have an affair with me.”

She tittered. “That's rather blunt, but absolutely right. My husband isn't satisfying me any more and I need a man who'll give me some relief, if you know what I mean. I just want a quicky. I need it real bad. No commitments. No names. Just a joyful physical coupling. You hear what I'm saying?”

“I sure am.”

“My husband can't find out. You can be discrete, can't you? Real discrete?”

“Sure. I'll never tell a soul.”

“That's terrific. Like I said, I'm a real desperate housewife. I'm not fat or old or anything. I'm twenty-nine years old and my friends say that I'm pretty. It's not that I couldn't find a man on my own, but I think that answering your ad is better. It's more anonymous. If I tried to have an affair with someone an acquaintance or someone from work, then my husband would find out. But this way, there's less chance of complications. Right?”

“Right.”

“Good. I don't want any complications.” There was a pause, then The Whore said, “So what about you? Are you real old or extra heavy or something?”

“No. No. I'm just like you. I've got a wife, but she's not very forthcoming when it comes to physical love and I need a little variety. I'm thinking that if I have a quick, simple affair with another woman, then I won't think about divorcing my own wife so much.”

“You sound like just the man for me. Like I said, I'm so horny that I'm almost coming just talking to you. Does it shock you when I talk like that?”

“No.”

“Good. I don't usually speak so crudely but you sound so understanding, I think that I could tell you almost anything.”

“I'm listening.”

“I'd rather not talk so much on the phone. Do you think we could get together real soon? Like now? My husband's gone for sure this afternoon, so I'm hoping that you're available right now. Do you think that you could meet me in half an hour?”

“I could do that. Are you going to come here?”

“Oh, no. I couldn't do that. And I can't let you come over to my house. I'm sure you understand. Do you know the A&W burger place over on Highway Ten just off the Anderson Road exit?”

“I think so. You mean the one next to the Day's Inn?”

“That's the one. Can you meet me in the A&W at two o'clock?”

“I'll be there.”

“You'll recognize me because I'll be wearing a green sweater with a yellow dress.”

“Okay.”

“How'll I recognize you?”

“I'll wear a white tee shirt and blue jeans.”

“Okay. Great. I'm sure that there won't be any other men there dressed like that.” Alex winced at the familiar sarcasm in her voice. “I'll see you at two.”

The phone clicked in his ear. He looked at the bedside clock. Twenty minutes until two. He was going to have to hurry or he'd be late.

In fact, he was more than ten minutes late. When he entered the A&W, he scanned the tables for The Whore. When he didn't see her, he feared that she might have left already. Then he chided himself. It was her who needed him to come, not the other way around. Suddenly, he felt a soft touch on his arm and swivelled his head to look into The Whore's misty eyes.

“You must be my John,” she said with a smile. “You didn't lie. You're even younger and more handsome than you claimed in your ad. I think that we're going to have a lot of fun this afternoon.”

The Whore had traded her cascades of red curls for a dark blonde ponytail. She looked like a bobbysoxer who had grown up to become a soccer mom. She had a pale green sweater tied loosely about her neck over a light yellow sundress that reached her knees. Her calves were bare and her feet clad in white ankle socks and tennis shoes.

She looked wholesome.

She looked like she wanted to be despoiled.

“When we were speaking on the phone, I thought that we might want to sit for a while with some root beer and talk, but now that I see you in person, I just want to be alone with you. You look like a man from my fantasies. Do you want me to get us a room at the inn next door?”

He nodded. “I think that I'd like that very much.”

“We can't be seen getting a room together. We don't want your wife to find out how you spent your afternoon, do we?”

He shook his head.

“I'll tell you what. You move your car over to the parking lot next door and wait until you see me come out of the lobby. Then you follow me and see what room I go to. I'll be watching and let you in as soon as you get to the door. Is that all right?”

“That sounds about right.”

“Of course, a gentleman like you'll want to reimburse me for the room. My husband is an awful man. He makes me account for every penny that I spend. If a hundred dollars is missing from my household expenses, then I'd never hear the end of it. Do you have a hundred dollars on you?”

“Sure.”

“I was sure that a successful man like yourself wouldn't have a problem with a few dollars. You don't have to give it to me now. I trust you. You can give it to me when you come up to our room. Okay?”

“Okay.”

As Alex waited in his car in the parking lot, he wondered how many personal ads for “horny, cheating wives” on the Internet were placed their by professional women who expected to be compensated well for their time. Probably a lot.

He did not have to wait long before The Whore came out of the motel lobby. With a start, he realized that she had not had time to check in and register; she must have had the room rented already. Undoubtedly this was her base of operations for the day. He thought about the economics. If a whore turned a single trick in the room, then she'd break even, but if she serviced a half dozen men in a day, she'd make out fine.

This one, The Whore, had only one client, him, but, as long as she got her hundred dollars, the rules of the game allowed her to consider the price of the room, or any other expenses, a sunk cost.

Leslie must have been planning The Whore's strategy all week. God, he was a lucky man to have a woman who would go to this much work for his pleasure.

The entrances to the rooms were outside so it was easy for him to follow her up a single flight of stairs and down the corridor to the room. He was not close enough to see which room she had entered, but that was not a problem. He walked slowly passed the doors until one opened and The Whore beckoned him inside.

She blushed when she said, “I hate to have to ask you for the money, but, like I said, I can't let my husband catch me short by a hundred dollars.”

As he handed her the money, he noticed that she was still not wearing their wedding ring. The Whore did not bother playing the horny housewife role in every detail. Broad brush strokes were enough for a horny john. Or maybe leaving her wedding ring behind was exactly what a real cheating, horny housewife would do when she went out for an affair.

The Whore tucked the money into a pocket in her sundress and then kissed him on the cheek. “Let's have some fun, darling,” she whispered into his ear. “You have no idea how much I'm looking forward to this.”

She kicked off her shoes and pulled off her socks, then walked barefoot to the king-sized bed and yanked the covers off.

He followed her lead, kicking his own shoes off.

When he approached her, she pulled the sweater off her shoulders and tossed it over a chair. The only clothing that he could see was the yellow sundress. The square front was almost low enough to show her cleavage, but not quite. Did it conceal a bra? Was she wearing panties? Or was she naked underneath that single layer of thin fabric? He could not tell. She pushed her hands underneath his teeshirt and pushed it up, running her fingers across his chest. “I haven't felt a real man in so long.” She kept pushing upward and he raised his hands to let her slide the shirt passed his shoulders and over his head. When he was bare to the waist, she bent over and began kissing his chest, licking and sucking on his nipples.

He didn't have to wonder if he had a third erection in him, he was painfully hard inside his jeans and boxers. He began undoing his belt and pants to give himself a little relief.

“Ohh, let me do that.” She lowered her hands to slide his pants over his hips, leaving his boxers in place. After he stepped out of his jeans, she hugged him tight and pressed her crotch against his raging hard-on. She rubbed up and down and said, “My, I think you want this as badly as I do. Why don't you take my dress off? The buttons run down the back.”

He had to concentrate to reach around and undo her buttons, her action against his crotch was terribly distracting. She pressed a leg in between his and began caressing his inner thighs with it, dialling up the distraction another notch.

By the time he freed the last button just above the curve of her ass, he was panting like a long distance runner.

So was she.

She was holding him around his lower back, the better to press her crotch against his, so it was easy for him to slide the broad yellow straps over her shoulders and let the dress fall to her hips. Her breasts were unfettered. His first question was answered: she was not wearing a bra. He pulled his crotch away from hers so that he could push her dress passed her hips. She was wearing panties. Cotton briefs appropriate for a soccer mom. He pushed his hand into her crotch. The cotton between her legs was wet. She was ready for him.

“Put me on the bed and take me now,” she whispered as she pushed his boxers down to his knees.

He pushed her gently down on the bed and pulled her panties off, revealing her downy hair.

As soon as she was naked, she threw her arms apart and spread her legs wide, giving him an unrestricted view of her engorged pussy lips.

There was no need for any further foreplay. He climbed between her legs and wasted no time before working his cock into her.

She moaned and squealed and then grabbed his shoulders and pulled him down on top of her, taking his full weight. “Fuck me hard, John. I'm so horny. I want to be fucked like no woman has ever been fucked before.”

He obliged.

It took a while. His third orgasm in less than seven hours did not come as easily as the first two. Toward the end, he felt like he had to force himself a little. Not too much, but enough to be noticeable.

She helped by rocking against him, pressing and grinding, while her own passion rose to a towering crescendo of ecstasy. She came at the same time as him, screaming wordlessly while her whole body convulsed with pleasure beneath his.

It was his most enjoyable orgasm of the day so far.

After he rolled off her and their breathing slowly returned to normal, she rubbed her hand across his chest and said, “Thank you. I needed that so bad. You've made me feel like a real woman again.”

“The pleasure was all mine,” he replied. His words were truer than he knew.

After resting for another ten minutes, she said, “I'm going to have to get back now. I can't risk letting my husband getting home early and find me missing in action. He'd spend the rest of the week grilling me about where I was and what I was doing.” She laughed gaily. “He should ask who I was doing. Then I could tell him that I did Long John Silver, the Internet buccaneer.”

She rolled out of bed and picked his boxers off the floor. When she handed them to him, she said, “Do you think that we might do this again some time?”

“I think we might,” he answered.

“I'd like that. You get dressed and I'll give you my cell phone number. I keep it on vibrate so you can call me and leave a message any time you like. I'm sure that I'll be able to arrange a time and place to get together again. I need loving on a regular basis and you're a terrific lover.”

While he was dressing, she went to the desk and wrote a number on the motel pad.

Then she slipped her panties and sun dress back on. It was quicker for her to dress than him, but for the buttons up the back. She turned her back to him and said, “Would you mind buttoning me up?”

Alex was taken aback. Re-buttoning The Whore's dress for her was a shockingly domestic act after their mad, wild sex. The Whore who had been the hot, horny housewife a few minutes ago had already transformed herself into the average soccer mom, ready for the next patron of the cheating wives web site.

As he walked across the asphalt to his car, he wondered what kind of woman The Whore would be the next time he saw her.

She was half-way to her maximum quota now. Even if she could not bring him to orgasm again before tomorrow morning, there was a fifty per cent chance that she had already satisfied the hidden outcome of this morning's roll of the die and escaped punishment.

That was good because he felt sated. He hoped that he had at least one more orgasm in him, but he would not be willing to bet on it. He remembered the rules of the game and shook his head. There was no way that he would be willing to risk a beating on his ability to perform again. The Whore was a brave and foolish woman to have made her bet.

But he was eager to see her perform again. She had surprised him three times so far and undoubtedly had more tricks up her sleeve.

* * *

When he got home, he found a message waiting for him. The recording of The Whore's voice said, “I think you'd enjoy a drink before dinner. I recommend taking advantage of the Happy Hour at the Chocolate Lounge. I expect that you'll be thirsty at six o'clock.”

He deleted the message. A bar? Kind of a cliché, wasn't it? A hooker picking up a john in a bar. Not nearly as imaginative as the fake horny Internet soccer mom scenario. What if he didn't feel like hanging around a sleazy bar? He could stay home. Alex thought about the rules outlined in her letter. They were explicit and unambiguous. It was The Whore's job to find the John and make him want her. The John did not have to do anything special.

Alex didn't particularly want to go out to a bar alone. Hanging around bars had never been his thing. He resolved to stay home. By six-thirty, she would know that he wasn't going to show and that would give her plenty of time her her to come here and offer her services. It wasn't like he was making her lose the game. According to her rules, this was the game.

By five, he was feeling rather bored. He began to watch the clock. If he didn't go to the Chocolate Lounge, the soonest that he could expect The Whore to get in touch with him was seven. Two hours. He could spend the time cooking supper for himself, but he didn't feel particularly hungry.

By five-thirty, he was watching the clock almost constantly, trying to make the time pass by sheer force of will. The harder he tried, the more slowly the clock seemed to move.

By five-forty-five, he was deep into speculations about what The Whore was wearing right now that would help her pick up a man in a bar. Miniskirt? Fishnet stockings? He had never gone to a bar looking for hookers so he had no idea what they looked like. For all he knew, they might wear business suits. If they looked too obvious, they'd get kicked out, wouldn't they? It probably depended on the kind of bar.

He wondered what kind of bar The Whore had recommended. Was it a swanky joint or a sleazy dive? Out of idle curiosity, he typed “Chocolate Lounge” into Google. Most bars and restaurants had their own web pages and the Chocolate Lounge was no exception. It was a bar in the Marriott hotel downtown. How sleazy could it be if it was in a Marriott? It wouldn't be so bad to be a single man having a drink in a nice hotel bar. He would just be another business traveller, relaxing after a day of sales meetings.

It was a quarter after six when he entered the bar. The room was not empty, but not busy, either.  Maybe there were a dozen men scattered about, a couple of small groups at tables and a few sitting at the counter. The Whore was already there. She was dressed in a long, skintight black sheath dress with black medium heeled sandals. Her hair was black and straight, cut square halfway down her neck at the back and sides and square across her forehead. The dress was backless; in the front, it plunged halfway down her cleavage. There was no way that she was wearing a bra underneath it.

What really caught Alex's attention, though, was that The Whore was sitting on a stool right next to another man, a fiftyish, fellow in a well-tailored business suit who looked handsome in a slick-salesman kind of way. There was a half-finished martini in front of her but she was ignoring it and devoting her entire attention to the man. She was turned on her stool to face him and was lightly stroking his hand with her fingertips. She had an enigmatic smile on her face. The man had his back to Alex, but he looked like he was laughing at something she had said.

Alex was appalled. What did she think she was doing? He was John. The John. The Whore's only client. What was he supposed to do now? He sat down at the corner of the bar so that he was facing The Whore and the stranger and stared daggers at her.

The Whore was looking in his direction but ignored him. He waited for a flicker of acknowledgement, a smile in his direction or at least a glance and a twitch of an eyebrow, but he could find nothing in her face. She could not avoid seeing him so she must be deliberately pretending that he wasn't there.

Was this to punish him for being fifteen minutes late? Was she angry that he had almost stood her up?

She didn't look angry. She looked cool and detached. Interested in whatever the stranger was saying, but not fawning over him.

The bartender asked Alex what he wanted. He was going to order a beer, but decided on Canadian Club, neat. He didn't want to be burdened with a whole beer if he had to finish it fast.

When the CC came, he said that he didn't want to run a tab and paid for it.

He drank half the shot in one gulp.

The Whore leaned over and put her lips to the stranger's ear. Alex couldn't tell if she was whispering something to him or kissing him.

What in hell did she think she was doing?

Maybe she was thanking the man for the drink and telling him that her husband had arrived at last. Surely that was it. The stranger slipped off the bar stool and offered his hand to her. She held it gently while she slipped off her own stool.

Alex waited for her to bid the stranger goodbye and then come and ask him if he wanted to party. Instead, The Whore let the stranger escorted her out of the bar.

Alex sat on the stool like a lump and watched in disbelief as she walked away with a strange man. Through the glass doors, he could see her clutch the stranger's arm and lean her head against his shoulder as they got near the elevators.

He downed his drink and rushed out of the bar. He made it only halfway down the hallway when the elevator doors closed on The Whore and the stranger.

She was gone.

He didn't know what to do. His gut was tied in a knot. Was he supposed to go home now? Wait by the elevators for her to return? Stay in the bar?

He needed another drink.

He returned to his seat in the bar and ordered another whisky. When the bartender set it down, he leaned toward Alex and said, softly, “Don't worry. She'll be back in fifteen minutes and then you'll get your shot. She's been doing this all evening. She always comes back in fifteen minutes. You could set your watch by her.”

Alex looked at the bartender in shock. All evening? Every fifteen minutes? That would be – what? – a half-dozen men? More? But before he could ask any questions, the bartender winked and turned back to his business.

What was The Whore up to? This was just a game. The rules said that she had only one client. She couldn't meet her quota by earning money from other men, could she? Alex struggled to remember the exact wording of the letter but wasn't sure if it said that she had to earn six hundred dollars from him or just pay six hundred dollars earned by selling her services. But it definitely said that he was her only client. Didn't it?

What was she doing right now? Did she have her lips wrapped around the stranger's cock? Was she bent over a chair with her dress hiked up to her waist and her panties hanging around her knees? Was she flat on her back with her legs spread akimbo, urging the stranger to fuck her deep and hard?

It was six-thirty before The Whore came back to the bar. She looked as cool and elegant as before. There was not a wrinkle in her dress or a bead of sweat on her brow.

Was there strange cum swirling around in her cunt? Slick salesman jism coating the back of her throat?

All evening? Was she dripping with the semen of half the men in this bar?

One of the men rose from his chair at the tables and looked in her direction when she sat down at the bar.

God, no! Not again!

Alex bounced from his seat and strode over to The Whore. “Can I buy you a drink?” he asked. He noticed that the man who had stood up was sitting down again, a disappointed look on his face.

“A martini. Gin, not vodka. Not dry and not shaken. Make it a gibson.”

Since when did she know how to order a martini? She was strictly a red wine drinker. The bartender was standing right there. Alex nodded at him. “Like the lady wants.”

“Yes, sir.”

“So, tell me about yourself,” The Whore said with a voice as smooth as satin.

“Nothing much to tell. I'm just an ordinary guy,” he replied, thinking that his answer sounded lame.

She smiled delicately. “Not so ordinary, I think. I bet you have some stories about yourself that would startle me.”

“I doubt that. I went to university. After I graduated, I got a lower management job. I've worked my way up to middle management.  My career looks bright. There's nothing interesting in that.”

“The quietest men have the deepest secrets. Tell me a secret.”

“What kind of secret?”

“A deep one.”

“I don't have any deep secrets.”

“Liar.” She laughed. “Tell me who you were fantasizing about the last time you made love to your wife?”

“What?” Alex felt his face blush.

“Remember the last time you made love to your wife?” The Whore nodded at the ring on his finger.

“Sure. I remember.”

“Who were you thinking about when you came? A movie star? Your secretary? A lingerie model? The woman next door? A whore? Which fantasy gave you that push over the edge?”

“I was thinking about my wife.”

“Liar.” The Whore laughed. “Keep your secret if you must. But I can tell you one true thing.”

“What's that?”

“When you make love to me, you're going to be thinking about me and nobody else. When you come in me, you won't be pretending that I'm someone else.”

“Maybe I'll be thinking about my wife.”

“Why don't we go up to your room and find out?”

“I don't have a room here.”

“Then you better get one quick because, if you're not back by the time I finish my martini, I'm going to find another man who does have a room here.”

Alex was angry that he was being jerked around so blatantly. But he didn't want to see The Whore disappear with another man. Last time she must have been pretending. The next time she might do it for real.

When Alex returned ten minutes later, plastic keycard in his wallet, The Whore was still alone at the bar. Every man in the place was eyeing her, many of them not so surreptitiously. They all wanted her but she had waited for him. He was relieved. And a little flattered.

As soon as he let her into the room, she said, “You can leave a hundred dollars on the desk for me.”

He obliged without comment.

She led him to the window and turned him so that he was looking out over the city. Standing behind him, she asked, softly, “What would you like me to do for you? For what you paid, you can have any service that you wish. I want to do something special for you. Something that you did once before and liked so much that you have always wanted to do it again. Or something that you hinted to your wife that you would like to try and she ignored your need. Or something that you read about but never even dared mention out loud. You can use any part of me. Ask me to assume any position. As long as you don't injure me, anything is yours for the asking. You have never had a woman who is as available to you as I am right now. Whatever your fantasy, it can be reality tonight. I know how much variation men want and I'm ready to give you whatever interests you the most.”

Her speech made him hard. He didn't know if he had it in him to get it up again today, but The Whore was a miracle worker. And the biggest miracle of all was that he didn't know why. He wasn't imagining any particular act. There wasn't a single fantasy that dominated over all others. The whole day was more than he had ever fantasized about. But the idea that this woman, this perfect whore, was prepared to do anything, follow any instruction, made him hard. When she held him from behind and caressed his manhood through his pants, he believed with all his heart that she had fucked a thousand men and had experienced every imaginable perversion. Anything that he might suggest would seem normal to her, compared to the outrageous things that she had done with other men.

Finally, he spoke. “I don't know. You're the expert. What do you suggest?”

She whispered in his ear, “I'm going to lay you on that bed and blindfold you so that you can concentrate on nothing but what you are feeling. I'm going to suck you until you are as hard as a rock. Then I'm going to straddle you and slide my cunt down over your cock. When I start to fuck you in earnest, I'm going to slide two fingers as far into your asshole as I can and I'm going to massage your internal male gland until you come like you've never come before. You have never had an experience as exquisite as that, have you?”

He shook his head.

“Do you want to know what it feels like tonight?”

He nodded his head.

“Take your clothes off and lie down on that bed on your back.”

While he was undressing, she pulled the covers off the bed and slipped her dress over her head. Her only underwear was a pair of black pantyhose with no crotch in them. The crotch was not cut out, the pantyhose had been manufactured that way. Where could a woman buy underwear like that?

She pushed him back on the bed and pulled a black cloth from her black clutch. Gently, she tied it around his eyes. It was not a particularly effective blindfold, he could see light coming in around his nose and make out shapes if he squinted, but he decided to close his eyes and go along with the experience that she had described.

“Feel my tits caress your cock. Doesn't that fell nice and soft?” He felt her soft, warm, smooth pillowy breasts rub gently against his cock. It was not completely erect, he had lost a little wood during her preparations, and the gentle caresses were not stimulating enough to bring him back completely. He wanted to feel her lips and tongue on his manhood.

Because he kept his eyes closed under his blindfold, he did not see The Whore's practical reason for massaging his cock with her breasts. While she was doing leaning over, rubbing against him, she was unpacking two more items from her purse – a latex condom and a small tube of lubricant. She tore the little foil envelop open and removed the condom. Then she unrolled the condom over the index and middle finger of her right hand and squeezed a generous dollop of lubricant on the end. She reached between her legs and smeared the lube over her cunt. She squeezed a second dollop of lube on her condom covered fingers as she moved her head down to start licking his cock. Putting the lube aside and holding her right hand with the condom-covered fingers out of the way, she used her left hand to squeeze and pump the man's shaft until it was fully erect. His hard on seemed a little iffy to her, so she straddled him and impaled her cunt with it as soon as she could. She began grinding up and down slowly while squeezing his cock with her cunt as hard as she could. She knew the value of Keegle exercises for strengthening the peritoneal muscles and had been using them sporadically for years. She was not as strong as she should be, but she was stronger than most women and could give her man that little bit extra stimulation that he needed in a pinch.

Once she had established a rhythm, she stretched back and slid her lubricated, condom-covered fingers down his ass crack, feeling for his anus. It took a bit of feeling around before she found it, but once she was sure of it's location, she rubbed the lube into it and then began pushing slowly and inexorably into him. He groaned loudly. She took that as a sign that she was doing the right thing. She felt rings of muscle tighten around her fingers but she did not relent. She kept working her fingers around, bending and straightening them slightly, massaging the muscles that were working to constrict her. The man beneath her kept groaning more and more loudly. She told herself that she was hearing passion in his groans and kept working her fingers deeper. She felt when the sphincter muscles finally relented and her fingers slid all the way without further resistance. From her study of the diagrams in the sex manuals, she knew that the prostate gland was on the wall closest to his testicles so she bent her fingers up and felt for the bulge.

The prostate gland is where the fluid part of the semen is produced. The nerves to the penis run around it. She had read that the sensation for a man of having his prostate massaged during sex was exquisite. She hoped that was true. She didn't want to press too hard for fear of damaging something, so she kept giving him a constant gentle massage. Even if it wasn't doing to much good directly, she was stretching his sphincter muscles and that had it's own erotic component. And there was always the good old placebo effect. If the man believed that he was receiving special erotic treatment, then he was.

Her fingers were growing tired when he finally came. He screamed in ecstasy. She had never heard him scream before; obviously she had done something right.

She did not bother simulating an orgasm herself. This was an act performed purely for his pleasure. Instead she gently withdrew her fingers from him and pulled the condom off, turning it inside out. Before dismounting, she said, “I love making a man come hard like that. Did you like it as much as I did?”

He mumbled something incoherent, but she understood that he was affirming that he had liked what he had experienced.

Less than a minute later, as she was walking out the door, she said, “I'm glad you came. I'll see you around.”

He was still lying on the bed, naked, moaning with pleasure as she shut the door on him.

Four hundred dollars earned so far. This was probably enough to satisfy the quota but it would only take two hundred more to make her absolutely safe. She wanted that safety because the punishment that awaited failure would be too severe to leave to even a one-in-six chance.

This time John's erection had definitely been questionable and the orgasm had taken a long time and a considerable effort from both of them. The next one would be a definite challenge.

This game was going to get a lot more interesting before it was over.

* * *

The Whore felt a chill when she got out of her car. It was almost eleven and the temperature had fallen considerably. Her fishnet stockings provided little insulation for her calves and lower thighs; the gap of naked flesh that was exposed between the tops of the stay-ups and the hem of the micro-miniskirt had no insulation at all; and neither did her bare midriff or naked shoulders below and above the hot pink, too-tight tube top. The wind that blew up her tiny skirt felt like it was raising gooseflesh on her naked pussy. The only part of her that felt warm was her head because it was well protected by the blond big-hair wig. Her eyelids felt heavy; the upper lids were spackled with bright purple eyeshadow and burdened with thick false eyelashes that were weighed down with a bountiful application of mascara. Her lips sticky with multiple layers of bright red lipstick.

Walking down the street, looking at her reflection in the dark vitrines, she barely recognized the streetwalker's hardened face staring back at her.

She had thought long and hard about how to stage this scenario. The streetwalker was at greater risk than other whores. There were many things that could go wrong if she was out alone on the street for even half an hour. Mostly, she had to worry about the three P's: pimps, police, and perverts.

At first she had planned to send John to a deserted part of town, a well-lighted street corner in a residential neighborhood. The problem with that was police and perverts. The residents were likely to call the police if they saw an obvious hooker loitering outside their house. Worse, in a place with no other people on the street, she was likely to be hassled, maybe even violently assaulted by passing perverts who would see her as an immoral woman who was vulnerable and deserved punishment.

After looking for a more suitable venue, she finally decided to bite the bullet and head straight to Broadway where all the rest of the streetwalkers hung out. She would explain her circumstance and come to an understanding with them.

Instead of avoiding the girls standing around, waiting for customers, she walked directly to the two nearest, youngest, hardest-looking hookers and introduced herself.

“Hi.”

“What you doing here, ho? You one of Leon's new girls?” The woman who asked was a short, busty latina wearing boots, a miniskirt, a fur bomber jacket, and a lot less makeup than The Whore. The fur jacket was sensible; she didn't look like she was freezing half to death.

“No. I'm here on a private gig. Don't worry. I'm not going to take any business away from you. The only man that I'm going to go with is my husband. He should be along in a few minutes. I'll get right in his car and then you won't see me again. And if he doesn't show, then I'll be on my way alone. I won't be talking to any men that you'd be interested in.”

“Yeah? Maybe we'd be interested in your husband. Maybe, he'd be interested in us.” This time it was the other woman, a brunette with bad acne scars. She couldn't be more than twenty years old.

“He won't be interested in you when I'm standing right here.”

“Then maybe you should get lost and we'll find out what interests him when he comes around.”

“He wouldn't chance it, knowing that I'm supposed to be somewhere around here.” The Whore smiled. “But maybe if he sees you with me, he'll decide to come back some other night when I'm busy at work and do business with you. I think he's faithful, but you might find out otherwise.”

“Maybe,” the latina said. “But maybe we'd be better off finding out for ourselves tonight.”

“The bottom line is that we got business to conduct and you're in our way. You aren't welcome here so you can get lost now, not later,” the brunette said.

“I'll give you each twenty bucks to let me stand here and not hassle me until my husband comes around. That's pure profit. You don't have to do a thing for it and, like I said, I'm not going to cost you a cent in other business.”

“Forty bucks each,” the brunette replied.

“That's eighty bucks. I bet I could hire you for a quarter hour for that much.”

“That's what you're doing, ho. You're hiring us to not screw you over,” the latina said with a grin.

The Whore sighed. “Okay. Forty each, but you gotta make sure that the other girls around here don't hassle me, either. I can't afford to pay every girl on the street what I'm paying you.”

“Don't worry about that, ho. This our corner. What happens on our corner is our business.”

“Your corner and Leon's,” The Whore replied as she handed two twenties to each of the other women.

“Yeah, well, Leon's another thing. He's not going to be happy if he sees you here. You gonna pay a heavy tax if Leon finds you on our corner. I don't think he's going to buy your slumming housewife shit.”

“Shit, we got a hot one. It your turn, Angel.”

The latina walked to the car that stopped by the curb and waited until the window rolled down. There was a brief conversation, then Angel returned.

“No deal?” the brunette asked.

“Guy had vice cop written all over his face,” the other replied. “I think I recognized him from the twenty-fourth.”

“He would have arrested you?” The Whore asked, wide-eyed.

“Not likely,” the latina replied. “He was so horny was has almost creaming his pants. I woulda been sucking him off for free for half the night. Leon gets unhappy it when that happens and when he's unhappy, he makes me unhappy.”

“Does he beat you?” The Whore asked.

The other two girls laughed. “No, ho. He don't need us to get marked up. That's bad for business. He bogarts our candy is what he does. I can't be happy when I don't get my candy. It's my candy makes me mellow,” the latina replied.

“Oh.” The Whore didn't think that the latina seemed particularly mellow. But before she could reply, she saw John's gold Accord rolling slowly down the street. Showtime. “This one's my husband,” she told the other women. “I'll be out of your hair in a few minutes.”

“Can't be too soon for us,” the brunette said seriously, but The Whore didn't hear her; she was already halfway to the curb.

“Looking for a party,” she asked when the John rolled down his passenger window.

“I don't know,” John replied. “What do you charge?”

“A hundred bucks.”

“What do I get for that much?”

“I can–” The Whore started to say but she was interrupted.

“This ho's the best cocksucker on the street, mister,” the brunette said. “She can suck the chrome off a trailer hitch. No shit.”

The Whore looked around in shock. Her two new friends had followed her to the car and were now standing on either side of her.

“That's not worth a hundred bucks, though,” the latina said. “A blow job's only worth thirty or forty. I'll tell you what a hundred bucks will buy you. It'll buy this ho's asshole for you. That's what you really want. You want to fuck this ho up the ass.”

“Yeah,” the other woman said before The Whore could speak. “That's this ho's specialty. She's brilliant at taking cock up the ass. You can pound her deep and hard and she's so hot and tight, you'll think your dick done died and gone to heaven. Ain't that right, ho?” The woman grabbed The Whore's ass and squeezed hard enough to hurt.

“That's right,” The Whore answered, appalled to see a feral gleam in the John's eye.

“What's right?” the latina asked?

There was a long pause, then The Whore had to say, “You can fuck me in the ass for a hundred dollars.”

“I think I'd like that,” John replied.

The Whore was not an anal virgin. Once before in her life, she had been penetrated anally. She had not liked the experience and did not care to repeat it. But she had made the offer and was trapped now. She couldn't disappoint the john. Failing to make her quota would be a lot worse than getting a vigorous ass fucking.

“I tell you what you do with this ho,” the latina said. “You take her to Jack's down around the corner and you rent a room for a couple of hours. Don't let him charge you more than fifty bucks for two hours. And you take this ho up to that room and you bend her over the chair. Jack's a shitty hole but he's got nice solid beds and chairs because they gotta take a lotta abuse. You bend her over the back of that chair and you flip her little skirt up out of the way and then you drive into her pretty little asshole like a pile driver and you pound her til you feel like you done gone to heaven.”

“You think you'd like doing that?” the brunette asked him.

“Yes. I think I would,” the john said happily.

“Sure you would,” the latina said. “You're going to love it. Really love it.” She took a foil-wrapped condom out of her purse and tossed it on the seat beside the john. “Use this. It's already lubricated. That'll be all that you need to get into her tight little asshole. I know. I been there myself. More than once.”

“Yeah,” the brunette said. “And if she yells a little bit, that just shows how much she's loving it. This ho, here, she lives for servicing men like you. She gets off on ass fucking, don't you, ho?”

“Yes,” The Whore said, trying not to sound as dismayed as she felt. “I'm going to love every minute of it so much that I may scream about it.”

“Okay,” the john said. “I've got my hundred dollars ready. Hop in.”

The latina opened the door for The Whore and the brunette helped her into the car.

As they drove away, the latina said, “Maybe that'll teach the snotty bitch to come down here and mock us.”

“Yeah,” the brunette laughed. “And she thought that her husband was going to be thrilled just to get a quicky blow job. She'll learn different now. He's going to get a real thrill tonight.”

When they entered the room in the dirty little dive, Alex handed The Whore a hundred dollars and said, “You don't have to do what they say, you know.”

“I know my job. We have an agreement. My job is to give you what you are paying for.” She bent over the back of the chair, spread her legs, and flipped her micro skirt up to her waist. She was wearing no panties. She reached back and pulled her cheeks apart. “Put that rubber on and then come and get it.”

The sight of her puckered little naked asshole, begging to be fucked was enough to get him hard one more time.

A lubricated condom does not have enough lubrication by itself to make anal penetration easy. He didn't tear The Whore but she couldn't completely stifle her scream as he slid home.

The hookers were right. Her asshole was so tight and hot, his dick felt like it had found heaven. It took him a long time to reach orgasm. For The Whore, it felt like forever.

After he was finished, The Whore asked him to drive her back to her car.

He was happy to do that small favor for her, noticing that she was walking ever so gingerly, taking small steps with her legs held apart, as they left the room.

In Jack's lobby, they passed the latina who happened to be bringing her own john in. The young woman smiled with satisfaction when she saw The Whore dancing the slow fucked-in-the-ass-shuffle across the lobby.

The Whore-for-a-Day Game was fun for almost everyone.

* * *

Alex was alone in his own bed when he fell sleep. He didn't know where The Whore had gone when he dropped her off by her car. But he was awakened at seven by a naked Whore who was massaging his cock. “What?” he asked.

“Please, mister. I need a hundred dollars,” The Whore whined. “I need to pay off my dealer and buy some more crack. Just a hundred bucks. I'll do anything for it. Anything. Suck you. Take you in my ass. You can fuck my pussy any way you want. Anything. Please. Just give me a hundred bucks and I'll let you do anything. Anything at all. You want to spank me first? Go ahead. My ass is yours. What do you say?”

Wow. He had a desperate crack whore in his bed. The Whore had hit rock bottom. She had already earned five hundred dollars but she was so desperate to earn one more hundred that she was willing to do anything.

While he was thinking about what he might want to do, The Whore was bent over his crotch, sucking him like there was no tomorrow. But he had no erection for her. She had got him off five times in eighteen hours yesterday and he had nothing left to give.

He put his hands behind his head and said, “Go ahead. Do whatever you can. I don't think it's going to work. We had a big day yesterday, but I don't mind if you keep trying.”

And try she did. She pulled and sucked and pressed her tits and ass against him for a full hour. She didn't stop until the clock said eight.

He pulled her head away from his crotch and stroked her head softly. “I'm sure it's going to be enough. You worked so hard. You were wonderful. I never would have thought of all the things you did. You were amazing. Truly amazing. I'll never forget all the things that you did for me. Never.”

She stood up, woodenly and said, “Thanks, John, but we'll have to see what Leroy says. I'll meet him in the living room in five minutes.”

Five minutes later, Alex went down to the living room and found The Whore, still naked, sitting and staring at the locked chest on the coffee table. Her arms were folded across her breasts and her legs  were pressed together. Five one hundred dollar bills were clutched in her hand. She looked afraid.

When he sat down, she offered him the money. “I earned five hundred dollars. Is that enough?”

“Let's find out.” He unlocked his padlock with his key and pulled it from the hasp.

Her hand was trembling when she unlocked the other lock and pulled it from the other hasp.

“You open it,” she said. Her fingers were trembling too much to open it herself.

He opened the chest and, without ado, lifted the cup from over the die.

The Whore wailed piteously.

The die said six. Five hundred dollars was not enough to satisfy her quota.

The Whore curled into a foetal position on the end of the couch and began moaning in terror.

“How do you think I'm going to punish you? What makes you think I will?” Alex snapped in annoyance.

The whore said something.

“What?”

She forced herself to enunciate clearly. “The envelop in the bottom of the chest.”

Alex looked into the chest again. The die with the six on the upper face was lying on a letter-sized manila envelop. He had not noticed it before. There was writing on it. “How to Punish a Lazy Whore.”

“You're not lazy,” Alex said.

“Read it,” she said.

The letter read:

Dear Leroy:

If you're reading this, then The Whore lost the game. Now Leroy has to punish her. Please do not argue about it and please do not shirk your duty. It doesn't matter how good The Whore made you feel, how hard she tried, or what bad luck happened to befall her. If you do not administer a proper punishment, then the game is a farce. Punish The Whore properly and we may play the Whore-for-a-Day Game again some day. Shirk your duty and I guarantee that we will not.

As The Whore, I probably did some things that I might have preferred not to do, now you may have to do some things as Leroy that you might prefer not to do. That's the breaks. Of course, you may enjoy causing me pain and misery. That, too, is okay because I know that you are not like that in the rest of our marriage.

First, you should establish your authority as The Whore's pimp. Whores are afraid of wire coat hangers because pimps use them as steel whips, called “pimp sticks”. You will find wire hangers in every closet in this house. Unbend them and then use them a single flails, fold them over one or more times to make double or multiple flails, or twist two together to make a heavy flail. You can also use them as bindings, bending them around my wrists and ankles. You may fasten me to furniture this way. Spend some time experimenting with different uses of your pimp sticks. It will be a learning experience for both of us. Make sure that your lazy whore admits her shortcomings and will want to do much better next time.

Pimps do not go far to find the tools of their trade. Belts and electrical cords also serve as easily available whips. You will find a few electrical cords hanging in the bedroom closet next to the wire hangers.

When you grow tired of beating me, you can rape me. Rape is not love. Be hard, be brutal. If you do not feel like soiling yourself, use something else. There are cucumbers in the fridge. For a special treat, rape me with a real hot cock. Peel a jalapeno pepper and fuck me with it. It may be small, but it's going to make me scream like you've never heard a woman scream before. You should probably gag me with duct tape first or the neighbors will be calling the police. You'll find a few rolls of duct tape in the bedroom closet next to the electrical cords.

Finally, you can show me that you don't need me as badly as I need you. Throw me in the trunk of the car and drive me out of town. Leave me beside the road and make me walk back home to you, wearing whatever you choose. Barefoot, probably. No underwear, of course. Naked? Not unless you want to bail me out from the police station, but that's your choice, not mine.

The rules of the Whore-for-a-Day Game specified that I was to be punished from eight until noon, but that's not carved in stone. If it takes you longer than that to make sure that I've learned my lesson, then so be it.

I'm ready to be punished. Make me suffer and I will be proud of your strength.

Your Lazy Whore

When Alex looked up from the letter, he saw The Whore still curled into a ball at the end of the couch, naked, clutching her self, whimpering. She knew what the letter said – she had written it – and she expected her punishment to be bad. He could not deny her the punishment that she demanded. He would make it bad.

He scooped the five hundred dollars from the table. She had failed to make her quota, so she did not get to keep the money. A whore who failed didn't deserve any shopping trips for nice gifts.

Then he reached over and patted her shoulder tenderly. She cringed at his touch. “It's going to be all right,” he said softly. “You're going to survive this.”

He walked to the foyer and opened the front closet. As promised, there were a dozen wire hangers on the rod, no coats on them. He took all of them in his hand and walked back to The Whore.

When she saw them, she wailed, piteously.

She watched with wide eyes as he unbent one of them and straightened it as best as he could. They were quality hangers made from a heavy gauge wire. Holding it in his hand, he realized that it was an unstable whip that would be difficult to control with any precision. He dared not begin flailing at her as she was for fear that the hanger would twist in his hand and put out an eye.

He grabbed the hangers in his right hand and twisted his left hand in her hair. “Come on,” he growled and pulled her into the kitchen. “Get up there.” He dragged her head onto the kitchen table. She scrambled to make her body follow. Her whimpering never stopped.

As soon as she was on the table, he wrapped one end of the straightened hanger around her right wrist. The stiff wire did not bend easily and bruised her flesh as he forced it around her limb. He stretched her arm to the corner of the table, bent the other end of the hanger over the edge and wrapped it around the table leg. She jerked her arm weakly, but the heavy wire did not relent. If she pulled her arm too hard, it would bruise her wrist more severely.

He unbent a second hanger, grabbed her other wrist and stretched her face down across the table, and then used the hanger to secure her wrist to the other table leg.

Next, he secured her ankles to the two table legs at the other end so that she was held spread-eagled, face-down across the table – open, vulnerable, and helpless.

She continued to mewl, softly and rhythmically, like a frightened, abandoned kitten.

He unbent a fifth hanger, folded one end twice to make a handle, then raised it and brought it down hard on The Whore's ass. She jerked against her bonds and wailed. He thrashed her ass a few more times, laying hard stripes on her in a random pattern. The pimp stick was hard to control.

The Whore was shrieking and writhing against her bonds with every stroke. He doubted that she was loud enough for the neighbors to hear but if they did, he expected that they would think that she was enjoying a Sunday morning loving from her devoted husband. She was. In a perverse way.

To try to get better control, he folded the wire in half and tucked the free end into the improvised handle. Now it it was about a foot and a half of doubled wire that was much easier to manage. He began working his way down the back of her left thigh, leaving a close lattice of bright red welts.

She began begging for mercy. Pleading with him to stop and promising him that she had learned her lesson. She would never be lazy again. Never. She would be a good earner for him every night.

The one thing that she did not say was that the game was over. If she said that she didn't want to play the game any more, he would have stopped and released her immediately. But as long as she stayed in her role, he was determined to stay in his.

He moved to her right thigh and whaled into her with vigor.

She wailed with equal vigor.

When he was finished, the double pimp stick was bent into a sharp curve where it had been molded by repeated strikes against her flesh.

Her legs were quivering and twitching involuntarily from the abuse that they had suffered.

He laid the wire whip on the table in front of her tear-stained face so that she could contemplate the instrument of her torture while he was out of the room.

A couple of minutes later, he returned from the bedroom carrying an electrical cords and a roll of duct tape.

The beating would continue with a new flavor.

She howled in distress and struggled desperately against her implacable bonds.

He tore a strip of duct tape from the roll and said, “Shut your mouth, whore.”

She shut her mouth and he smoothed the tape over her lips and cheeks. She whimpered through her nose.

He raised a three-foot length of fourteen gauge insulated lamp cord and lashed her viciously across the shoulder blades. She arched her back, pulling her breasts clear of the table and screamed through her nose.

He struck her again and again with the lamp cord. It was far more flexible than the coat hanger and the end wrapped around to snap against her ribs. She howled. He struck again and again, walking the blows from her shoulders down to the small of her back in small steps. When he was finished, he circled the table and repeated the punishment from the other side of the table, thus ensuring that both sides of her ribs were well tenderized by the vicious flicks of the the cord.

When he was finished, he saw that she was having difficulty breathing. Her nose was clogging with mucus from her crying and she could not breath through the duct tape. He pulled it free and she gasped through her mouth for sweet air.

He couldn't leave her gagged for long when she was being tortured. And he certainly couldn't leave the room when she was gagged, even for a couple of minutes.

He pulled a kitchen chair close to her head and sat down. She watched him. After a minute, she sniffled, “I'm so sorry that I disappointed you. I tried to make the quota. I really did. You have to believe me.”

He tenderly stroked her hair and spoke gently. “I know you did. I know how hard you tried. But you disappointed me anyway. You know that. And you know that I can't spoil you by permitting failure. You're better than that. I'm going to show you what you could have done so you'll know better next time.”

He retrieved a cucumber from the refrigerator and laid it on the table next to the pimp stick so that she could see it. It was no skinny little english cucumber; this was a big, fat dark green field cucumber. “How much of this do you think is going to fit into your ass?”

She began to cry again.

“I think that you can take more of this than you realize. That's what I think. What do you think?”

She sobbed without answering.

He brought a bottle of olive oil from the cupboard and a soup bowl. “I'm going to show you how nice it feels to have the fattest cock you've ever seen sliding all the way into your shitter. When it's in there, you're going to think about how much better it would feel to have man after man using your little hole instead of this lucky vegetable.”

She continued to sob while he poured olive oil over the cucumber. Then he parted her cheeks and poured a generous amount of oil into her ass crack, soaking her anus.

Without further delay, he began working the cucumber into her asshole. He did not just shove it in, he didn't want to tear her, so he pushed and pulled, giving her time to accommodate it, stretching her sphincter muscles a little at a time, and pouring more oil on her as necessary.

When he got past the small tip and he began stretching her sphincter in earnest, she began screaming in earnest. His own anus twitched in sympathy with her. The cucumber was bigger than any erect cock that he had ever seen and he didn't know how much she could take without injury. He decided to stop and began easing the cucumber out again. When The Whore felt the pressure in her asshole attenuate, she moaned softly, “No. More.”

“What you say?”

“More. Do it. Do it all. I can take it all,” she said.

She screamed when he started pushing it into her again, but she was true to her word. She managed to accomodate two thirds of the damned vegetable. He dared not push it in any further for fear of losing it insider her. It would be too hard to explain what he had done if he had to take her to the emergency ward.

“Take a picture,” she sobbed.

“What?”

“I want to see. Take a picture.”

He got the digital camera and took a picture. In fact, he took a bunch of pictures. Her face was not visible in any of them, but the end of the dark green cucumber protruding from her well-striped ass was a keeper.

While she looked at the display on the camera, he said, softly, “Time to bring a little heat to your pussy, don't you think?”

“No,” she cried. She began to beg. “I took the cucumber. It hurt like hell but I took it. I deserved it. But that's enough. Please. I learned my lesson. Please don't hurt me any more. Please. I'm begging you. I'll do anything. Please don't do this. It's too much.”

He found a bag of jalapeno peppers in the crisper and selected the biggest one. It was not huge like the cucumber but it was large for a jalapeno. She must have looked searched the whole vegetable bin for it.

He used a peeler to slice the tough skin from it in strips. He held it close to her face while he peeled it so that she could smell the pungent capsicum oil and anticipate feeling it burn the delicate mucus membranes in her cunt like a red-hot branding iron. But, unlike a red-hot branding iron, it would not destroy the sensitive nerves. The pain would go on and on.

She sobbed and begged. If he had a heart, her pleas would have broken it. But Leroy did not have a heart.

When he finished, she made one last plea. “If you're going to do this to me, please gag me again.”

That wish he granted.

When he pushed the peeled pepper into her cunt, she shrieked like a banshee through the gag and every muscle in her body convulsed as though she were suffering a grand mal seizure. The pain must have been incredibly intense.

To make sure, he worked the pepper in and out of her cunt and rolled it around to ensure that it made contact with against every side.

When every part of her insides had come into contact with the burning fruit, he pulled it out and rubbed it through the folds in her inner and outer lips and then he took care to rub it all over her clit for a long time, pulling the delicate hood back to make certain that the most sensitive part of her female anatomy was well-coated with the terrible juice.

If The Whore had not been gagged, the neighbors would have summoned the police for sure. She sounded like she was being tortured to death. She felt like she was being tortured to death.

He set the used pepper on the table next to the bent pimp stick, then he drew the cucumber from her ass and set it beside the pepper. “You're lucky that I don't make a cucumber and pepper salad and make you eat it,” he said.

But she didn't hear him. She was lost in a sea of agony. The pepper was gone from her cunt, but its oily juice remained. Her cunt would keep on burning for a long, long time.

He unwrapped the wire from her ankles and she pressed her legs together and brought her knees to her chest. Then he unwrapped her wrists and she grabbed at her cunt with both hands and curled into a ball.

When he pulled the tape from her mouth, she said nothing; she continued to sob and sob without pause.

He left her on the table and went upstairs to look at her wardrobe.

When he returned to the kitchen a quarter hour later, she had not moved.

“Get up. We're going for a little ride,” he said gently.

She kept clutching her crotch as she struggled off the table. The burning in her cunt had barely diminished; the torture was not going to end.

He was afraid that she wouldn't be able to walk, her legs were twitching and convulsing so badly, but she managed to stay on her feet.

He escorted her to the garage. He had turned his car around and backed in. The trunk was open. He helped her climb inside. She curled into a ball. He closed the trunk lid gently, being careful that her hands and feet were clear.

It was hot and stuffy in the trunk and she could not keep from bouncing around, sliding forward and backward when he braked and cornered. Those were the least of her concerns. Her womanhood was burning like the fires of hell and she was naked. If he dumped her by the highway on a Sunday morning like this, she would be arrested for sure. And probably be raped first. But the man who stuck his dick into her capsicum-soaked pussy was going to be in for a hell of a surprise. As would the medical officer who did a chemical analysis of her rape kit.

When Leroy – it wasn't time for him to be Alex yet – finally stopped the car , he opened the trunk and told her to get out.

Though she was as naked as the day she was born, she obeyed.

They were on a country road. There were no other cars in sight.

“Home is that way.” He pointed to the east. “You can wear this.” He threw a scrap of cloth at her.

She shook out the cloth and saw that it was one of her summer dresses, a flower print shift that buttoned down the front. But when she covered herself with it, she saw that all the buttons had been removed – she would have to hold it closed all the way home – and the bottom had been chopped off, leaving a new ragged hem that fell at mid-thigh rather than at its original mid-calf length. Just as bad, much of the back had been chopped away, displaying her newly flogged body to all the world; and the neckline had been chopped low so that she had to reveal more cleavage than was modest.

Before driving off, Leroy said, “By the way, I expect you to earn that missing hundred dollars before you get home. If I see you back at my crib and you're still short, I'm gonna sell you to Leon. I hear he really knows how to make his slot machines work for him.”

As he sped off in his car, she began trudging down the shoulder of the road, clutching her butchered dress closed with both hands. Her feet were tender and the gravel was cutting them so she moved to the edge of the pavement. That was only a little better; the asphalt was sharp in places.

She had to hold the dress closed at her bust with one hand and closed at her hips with the other. As she limped along, stray gusts of wind caught the ragged hem of the lightweight fabric and blew it high around around her legs. She didn't think that she was actually flashing the occasional passing car, but she held it as close to the bottom as she could to minimize the risk of public obscenity. The front gaped open at her midriff but there was nothing that she could do about that.

She was keenly aware that her back and thighs were striped with welts from her beating and that the chopped up dress revealed her punishment all to anyone who looked closely enough.

Her cunt continued to burn like hell. She wondered when it would stop. How long would it take for her natural juices to wash the burning oil away? Hours? Days? She wondered if her nerves would grow numb from the assault before the oil was gone. Maybe she would feel all right tomorrow, but Alex would get a horrible shock if he tried to make love to her. The thought was almost enough to make her smile.

Today, she still had to earn her final hundred dollars and she wasn't going to be able to do it with her cunt. She'd have to take her john in her ass or suck him off. Her ass was aching from the assault with the cucumber, but it was stretched loose enough to take a man.

She thought about having to earn another hundred dollars today. As she originally conceived the rules, she would only have to earn money on her whore day, not during her punishment day. But the nature of her punishment was left to Leroy's discretion. She had giving him guidelines in her letter, but had made it clear that those were only suggestions; he was free to do whatever he liked, including ignoring her guidelines completely. If he wanted to force her to service another trick, or more than one, that would be a legitimate part of her punishment.

The more she thought about it, the more she liked the idea. She didn't like having to do it – she was not supposed to like the punishment – but she liked the concept. It was an appropriate consequence for losing the game.

She had been limping along the side of the road for more than an hour when she reached the outskirts of town. Her feet were bleeding and she was exhausted from her extended ordeal. She heard a car pull up beside her and looked to see Alex in his gold-colored Accord.

He rolled down the passenger window and she leaned in to talk to him. “Hello.”

“Hi, there. I'm John. You look like you need help. Can I offer you a ride somewhere.”

“I'd sure appreciate it.”

“Well, then, hop on in.”

She did.

Her beaten back, ass, and legs stung fiercely when they came into contact with the car seat, but she wasn't complaining. It was better than walking down the road in bare feet.

She released the front of the ruined dress and it fell open across her legs to reveal her belly and pussy. Though her cleavage now extended down to her ankles, the bodice stayed draped loosely over her breasts. If she didn't move too much, her tits would remain covered and she wouldn't shock passing motorists.

John looked across at her partial nudity and said, “Wow. You're sure a good looking woman. What do you do for a living?”

She laughed through her pain and humiliation. “Just what it looks like. I'm sure grateful for this ride. I'd like to show you my appreciation in a more substantial way.”

“Gosh, that'd be terrific.”

“It's just that I can't give it away. There's union rules. My daddy'd beat me to a pulp if I didn't ask you for compensation.”

“I'd hate to see you get hurt. I might be able to give you a few dollars. How much do you want?”

“Well, that depends. What would you want to do?”

“I don't know. Whatever you do best.”

“I'm a terrific cocksucker. I can give you the best blow job that you'll ever have in your life. Believe me, I'll put everything I've got into it. I can do that right here in your car. We won't have to get a room or anything. But if that's not what you want, I can let you fuck me in the ass. Some men find that special and I'm real good at that, too.”

“Gosh, I'd be happy to get serviced right here in my car. The blow job sounds fine.”

“You won't regret it, I promise. You have a hundred bucks?”

“That seems kind of expensive.”

“You won't think so after you've felt my lips working down your cock. If I don't give you the best blow job you have ever had, then I'll give you your money back. Not many whores offer a money-back guarantee.”

“I can't complain about that.”

“Then why don't you find a quiet place to park and let me get to work.” She licked her lips. “I can't wait to taste you.”

“I know somewhere special.”

“Where's that?”

“You'll see when we get there. It'll be especially exciting for you.”

The Whore's heart sank. She was in agony already. Leroy's idea of an especially exciting place for her to give a blow job had to involve more punishment. She forced a smile and said, as brightly as she could, “Okay. Let's go.”

He drove around a block and pointed the car back down the highway in the direction from which she had been walking. After a few minutes, they passed the place where Leroy had dumped her from the car an hour ago. Her heart sank even lower. If John kicked her out of the car after getting his blow job, she'd be walking even further than when she started. John kept driving away from the city.

He commented, “This had better be a terrific blow job.”

“It will. The best ever,” she promised, forcing herself to sound as positive as she could.

The car began to climb. John continued driving until they were far up into the hills that surrounded the city. He found an overlook and parked.

“Come on,” he said as he got out of the car.

“I thought that you wanted it in your car,” she replied as she got out.

“Nah. Changed my mind. Too crowded in there. I like to be breathing nice clean air when I get sucked off. Wouldn't you?”

“Sure.” She followed him across the road and into the bush on the other side. Sharp sticks, rocks, and thorns punished her feet even worse than the gravel beside the road. They climbed twenty feet above the road to a small outcropping of rock. From here, she could see the city spread out beneath the hills.

A light screen of trees and underbrush sheltered them from the road below. If anyone stopped at the viewpoint, they would not see her and John. Unless they decided to cross the road and climb a little. Then they would come across a private little sex show almost immediately.

John lowered his pants and underwear to his ankles and sat on the rock. His dick was only semi-hard. “Why don't you shuck that bitty little dress and show me what I'm buying for all that money?”

The Whore held out her hand and said, “You haven't bought me yet. Nothing happens until I have a hundred dollars in my hand. After that, it'll be wonderful.”

“Shucks, darling. I wouldn't cheat a whore. You'll get your money.”

The Whore was vividly aware that she was alone with this man, far from any help. And that she had no way of predicting what he would do. And that he was far stronger than her. Being raped and beaten could be the next part of her punishment. She hoped that John/Leroy would show a touch of human mercy for once today. “I just want to get the messy business part of our date out of the way first so that we can concentrate on the fun part without having to think about it again.”

He looked at her for a long minute, then shrugged and said, “Okay. I guess I understand that. Here, you go, darling.” He took a hundred dollar bill from his wallet and handed it to her.

It was probably one of the very same bills that she had earned yesterday and had to give to Leroy a few hours ago. It seemed so unfair to have to earn the same money all over again. But this was her game and her rules. Them's the breaks.

She didn't have any pockets so she shrugged her useless dress off her shoulders and folded it up, wrapping the precious bill in the middle of the resultant package.

Then she dropped to her knees on the dirt in front of her john, took his half-erect cock in her hand and began gently licking the head, swirling her tongue around and around. As it got stiffer, she lowered her head and began taking it into her mouth as deeply as she could, working on swallowing her gag reflex and getting her lips right down to his root.

She worked on his cock for a long time, trying to ignore the occasional automobile that passed on the road below. They sounded so close. There might be gaps in the brush that allowed those drivers glimpses of the naked whore performing fellatio on her john, but she couldn't look around and see. She didn't want to know; she didn't need any more humiliation. She put all her concentration into her work, outdoing herself to fulfil her promise to give the man the finest blow job of his life.

His moans grew in volume and tempo, attesting to her skill, until he finally gave a mighty groan and came in her mouth. Her recently-acquired oral sex expertise told her that the amount of his spunk was small and his ejaculation weak. That was no surprise. This was the sixth time this cock had been called to duty in less than twenty-eight hours. It must be drained about as dry as a man'c cock can be.

She swallowed what little he had to offer, licked him clean, and stood up. “Thank you,” she said, wondering if he was going to demand his money back. She would fight to defend her hard-earned fee. He would have to beat her unconscious to get it back.

He might just do that.

When he said, “No, ma'am. Thank you. I can't say for sure that it was the best blow job of my life, but it definitely ranked in the top three. You've earned your money, all right.”

Her relief was palpable. “It has been my pleasure to serve you, sir. A true pleasure.”

He pulled his boxers and pants back over his hips and began walking down the hill through the brush.

She pulled her dress back over her shoulders, being careful not to lose her precious money, and followed him. Her feet were further punished by the quickness of her pace, but she didn't dare lose him now.

When they got to the car, she opened the passenger door.

He was standing on her side of the car and slammed her door shut as soon as she opened it. “Where do you think you're going, ma'am?”

“I thought that you'd give me a ride back to the city. You were going that way when you picked me up.”

“I'm going that way, ma'am. But I don't need no passenger. You don't see a taxi sign on my car, do you?”

“Please, mister. You brought me all the way out here. I did my best for you. You can't leave me.” She felt tears welling up in her eyes. It would take all day and most of the night to walk all the way back to town from here. Her feet would be shredded like bloody hamburger before she got half way. She'd be walking on naked bone by the time she made it back. If she made it back. She'd more likely be gang raped and murdered out here in the wilderness.

The john's eyes gleamed. “I'll tell you what, ma'am. I could give you a taxi ride just this once.”

“Thank you,” she said with relief.

“But, of course, you'd have to pay the fare.”

“The fare?”

“Yes, ma'am. Like you said, there's union rules. I can't give you a ride for free. If I'm going to offer a taxi service, I got to collect a fare.”

“What kind of fare?”

“Well, ma'am, I'm not a regular taxi. No meter or anything. I'm more like a private limousine service. That's expensive. And it's a long dirve back to town, as you know. I can drop you right at your front door, but it'll cost you a hundred dollars. I'm pretty sure that you can afford that much, a nice professional lady like yourself has to have a hundred bucks on you.”

She looked at the bill clutched in her hand and began to cry. “I can't give you this. I owe it to someone else.”

“No, ma'am. If you want a ride back to town, you owe it to me. But, don't fret. You can keep your money and find another way to get back. It don't matter to me. But decide quick, because I gotta go now.” He walked around to the driver's door and slid into the seat.

When he started the engine, she threw the passenger door open and jumped into the car.

“Good choice, ma'am. Now, about that fare, it's pay in advance. We want to get the business part out of the way, don't we? So we can enjoy the ride.”

She was crying freely as she held the money out to him.

He took it and put it in his pocket. “Thank you, ma'am. Doing business with you a second time is a whole new pleasure.”

She wept all the way back to the house. What was she going to do now? Leroy had told her that she couldn't return unless she had a hundred dollars to give him. She didn't dare show up without it. She had been been punished terribly already. Her cunt was still burning like hell and her back was aching with bruises from shoulders to knees and her feet were throbbing. She couldn't go through that again.

When he parked in the driveway, she said, “Look, mister. I'd sure like to earn another hundred dollars. You know how good I am at sucking cock. But, like I told you before, I'm just as good when I'm taking it up the ass. That's a special treat that not every woman will do for a man. I bet your wife would never allow it. Why don't you treat yourself to the ultimate gourmet experience and fuck my ass like it's never been fucked before. You won't believe how hot and tight it is. In fact, I'll do something for you that no woman will ever do for you again. No woman. I'll let you fuck my ass without any lube at all. That'll make it tighter and more pleasurable than ever. Any woman who lets a man fuck her ass without lube is a fool because she's risking permanent damage but I'll let you do it anyway. I'm so good that I can handle it.” She was lying a little. She could still feel some of the olive oil in her crack. It wasn't much, but it might just be enough to make a dry ass fucking possible. Especially since she had been pre-loosened by that cucumber.

“Gosh. That sure sounds like a treat all right, but I don't think that I can manage that. You were so good at sucking cock that I'm as empty and relaxed as I can be. There just ain't no spunk left in me.”

He was probably right.

Then she had an inspiration. “Okay, then. I guess I am just too good for my own good. But I can offer you something else. Something even more exotic.”

“Yeah? Well, I don't think that there's anything that you can offer me that would be exotic enough to make me hard again. Not until tomorrow, anyway.”

“No. It's not that. There's some things that will give a man deep pleasure that don't require him to have an erection or an orgasm. They just feel good on their own. One of those things is a long, deep rim job?”

“Rim job?”

“That's when I lick your asshole clean. Not just the outside. I'll get my tongue so far into you that it'll feel like I'm licking the back of your balls. I know that your wife won't do that for you, but I'll do it for a hundred bucks. You'll feel so good when I'm finished that you won't care whether you come or not.”

The john smiled. “I think you've talked me into a rim job, little lady. You want to drive back up into the hills to do it?”

“No thanks. It'll feel much better for you if we do it right here in my house. I've got to have proper furniture give a man a proper rim job. Come on inside. Nobody is home but you and me.”

He followed her into the house.

“Now, you give me the money and we'll get started.”

“Okay.” He handed her the money, then said, “But this better be done right or I'm going to be angry with you. I don't let anyone cheat me.”

“Don't worry. I'll give you exactly what I promised.” She put the money in a drawer and then threw her dress off. She wouldn't have to wear it again.

For the seventh time since the previous morning, she helped the john get undressed. She only needed his ass bare but she took all his clothes off to make sure that she wouldn't have shirt tails getting in her way and that he'd be able to spread his knees far apart.

Then she draped him across the back of the easy chair in the living room and spread his legs apart as far as was comfortable. She knelt between his feet and began licking his ass crack from taint to tailbone, spreading his cheeks apart and working her way in deeper with every stroke. She tried not to taste what she was licking. When she was finished, he was going to as clean as any man had ever been.

When she finally got down to his puckered bud, he began groaning with pleasure.

She tried to imagine that she was licking a piece of steak to control her disgust as she worked her tongue into him. There was no joy in this act for her. She would rather have a cucumber shoved up her own ass any day. But she would rather do this than be abandoned in the hills, half naked and almost crippled.

She told herself that this was the final part of her punishment and licked him out for all she was worth. She kept at it until her tongue was exhausted and her jaw was aching. All the time, she was fighting to keep her gag reflex under control. She told herself that she loved this man so much that it was worth every lick.

He kept moaning and groaning throughout.

She could not avoid tasting what was inside his asshole, but she kept licking and swallowing until she could no longer taste anything but her own saliva. When she was sure that he was as clean as he was going to get, she withdrew her tongue, gave him a final, wet kiss on his anus, and said, “All done. I hope you enjoyed your rim job.”

He stood up and began re-dressing. “Yes, ma'am. I have to say that was the most pleasurable experience that I've had for some time. I look forward to repeating that experience some time in the near future.”

He must have liked it a lot. She smiled. “Maybe you can talk your wife into doing that for you.”

“Do you think?”

She shrugged noncommittally. To herself, she thought, Not a chance in hell, Alex. Not a chance in hell. Aloud, she said, “You better go. Someone is coming back soon. My business partner. And you don't want to be here when he arrives.”

“I understand.”

He left.

Five minutes later, Leroy was back. Funny thing, he was wearing exactly the same clothes as John and had exactly the same shit-eating grin on his face. Maybe that should be called a “shit-eaten grin” because that better described how the grin got there.

She held the hundred dollars out to him, silently.

Leroy took it and said, “That's my girl. Looks like you made your quota after all. I knew you could do it. Better late than never. Next time, do it when I say to do it and your life will be a lot easier.”

She nodded, too sore and tired to come back with an answer. She felt a stray tear trickle down her cheek.

Leroy nodded at the clock on the wall. “It's noon. I gotta get outta here. I'll see you around some time.”

She looked at the clock. Damn, he was right. The original game specified that he was to punish her from eight until noon and that was exactly what he did. It was noon and she felt wracked, mentally as well as physically.

Alex returned a minute later, wearing the same clothes as John and Leroy, but now adding a frown of concern to his ensemble. “Are you all right, dear?”

“I hurt pretty bad,” she replied. She was clutching her crotch that was still burning like a wildfire in a Santa Ana wind.

“We better do something about that. Come with me.”

“What can you do about it?”

“You'll see.” He led her upstairs and lowered her into the empty bathtub. It was cool against her abused flesh and didn't feel bad. “Wait there. I'll be right back.”

She thought about turning on the water but didn't have the energy.

He was back in a minute with a turkey baster, soup bowl, and a pint carton of heavy cream. “This is what the doctor ordered,” he said.

“What are you doing?”

“Trust me,” he replied, pouring the cream into the bowl and then sucking it up into the turkey baster. “Now lie back and spread your legs.”

Her punishment was supposed to be over, but she didn't have the strength to argue any more.

The cold heavy cream douche didn't feel bad at all. In fact, the burning in her vagina subsided immediately. He began running a slow stream of water into the tub and then a faster stream into the sink. He followed the cream douche with a warm water douche, then gave her another cream douche. This time, he also poured cream over her outer lips and clit, soothing them, too. Finally, he rinsed her out with two more water douches, rinsed it all down the drain, and began filling the tub. He poured in a generous measure of bubble bath and stayed in the room until the water had risen to the level of her chin.

“You soak there for a while. Call me when you're ready to get out.”

After fifteen minutes, the water was beginning to cool so she called him. Her voice was not loud, but he was waiting in the bedroom right outside the door and came in immediately. “Lay your head back and let me wash your hair, first.”

She let him lather her up and rinse all the shampoo back out. Then he pulled the plug and helped her from the tub.

“We should get you into bed,” he said.

“Give me a minute to brush my teeth and I'll be right out.” She not only brushed her teeth twice and flossed, she also swished mouthwash into every corner of her mouth. Her breath had never felt so minty fresh but her mouth still felt a little foul.

When she came out of the room, she gave Alex a long wet kiss.

There were clean sheets on the bed. She crawled into it naked and he tucked her in ever so gently. Her back was still aching from the brutal beating that Leroy had administered and her feet hurt terribly from walking on gravel for miles. It would take days to heal. Other than that, she felt all right. It was such a relief to finally get the burning out of her crotch that she was willing to forgive the bruising.

She was exhausted but not sleepy. “Why did the douche with the heavy cream work so well?” she asked.

“It's a molecular thing. The burning is caused by an oil. The cream contains fat that binds to the oil molecules and carries them away. Water alone won't do it because water and oil don't mix. If you eat a hot pepper, you should drink milk, not water. I simply applied the same logic to the jalapeno that we used on you.”

She smiled at his use of the plural pronoun. It was true that her letter suggested the pepper – and that she had stocked the fridge – but, as far as she was concerned, it was his decision to use it.

But he had been right. The rules specified punishment and the peeled pepper dildo had been an awful punishment. He deserved full credit for administering it to her and even more credit for knowing how to stop the pain when the punishment was over.

In retrospect, he had administered her punishment brilliantly. She had outlined a procedure in her letter but he had tweaked it to the peak of perfection. Deserting her outside the city in the hacked-up dress had been exactly the right thing to do, particularly when he returned to play the john again, this time making her as fearful as a hooker should be when she lets a bad client get her in a vulnerable position.

“Thank you,” she said softly.

“You rest,” he said. “I'm going to make a dinner that will amaze you. After you've had a chance to recover a little, you're going to be ravenous.”

She smiled to herself. He was right. All she had had to eat this morning was a small load of jism and a few licks of shit. Even a whore deserved a real meal sometimes.

* * *

After dinner, she raised the issue that had to be addressed. “We should talk about our marriage. A week ago, you said that you wanted more sex. I gave you more sex than you could handle this weekend, but we need a more realistic long-term solution. What do you expect from our marriage?”

He frowned. “I don't need you to make love to me six times a day, that's for sure. But two times a month simply isn't enough.”

“I understand that. I should have been more attentive to your needs. How about two times a week? Is that enough?”

“How about every night? That would be enough.”

“I think that would get a little tedious. How about three times a week?”

“Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday?”

“I can do you four times a week.” She nodded.

“You're going to make me the happiest man in the city.”

“I hope so,” she smiled, “but you're going to have to give me a few days to recover before I can start honoring our new agreement. I don't think that I'll be able to lie on my back on Tuesday.”

“I can get by until next weekend. I'm kind of worn out myself.” There was a pause, then he said, “There's another thing.”

“Yeah?”

“Variety. If I learned one thing this weekend, it's that you know how to have sex in a whole lot of different ways. You were amazing. How about if we have that same kind of variety in our married life?”

“That's a problem for me. I want to enjoy myself when I make love to you.”

“You didn't enjoy everything that you did on Saturday?” He looked genuinely surprised. “It sounded like you were having fun.”

It was her turn to look surprised, then she laughed. “I've got a news flash for you, Alex. When you're making love to me and I start convulsing underneath you and moaning, I'm experiencing genuine ecstasy. As your wife, I never put on an act. My husband deserves the real thing and I always give it to him. The Whore fakes it. She takes a certain cerebral enjoyment from manipulating her john, but she's never lost in the throes of passion when she's with him. If you think she is, then that's a tribute to her ability to tell a convincing lie. Do you want me to start treating you like a john and faking it?”

“No. No. Never. I want you to be a wife, not a whore.”

“Good answer. And I promise that I never will fake it with you. Not when I'm being your wife.”

“So, we're not going to have a lot of variety in bed.” He looked disappointed

“Sure. We can have more variety in the future than I've been giving you up to now. Not as much as when we're playing games, but I don't mind a little oral action once in a while. As long as it's not expected all the time. But you have to realize something.”

“What's that?”

“The Whore gives, she never receives. If you want variety with your wife, that's a two-way street. You better be ready to give as good as you get and you better learn how to do it right. Are you going to be an apt pupil?”

He nodded slowly. “Okay. You'll have to tell me what you want.”

She thought that he was losing a little of his enthusiasm for variety. Maybe he was seeing himself having to rim her. “Don't worry,” she said with a grin, “I won't be shy about telling you what to do.” She predicted that he wasn't going to want as much variety as he thought. Right about now, the missionary position was sounding pretty good to him.

“So, that's settled. Four times a week is enough for you. Not if one of us is sick or out of town, of course.”

“Of course.”

“And not if you're not in the mood. You're allowed to be tired or busy sometimes.”

“Like that's going to happen,” he laughed.

“It could. And I'll throw in the occasional blow job as a special treat.”

“I'd love that.”

“Good,” she replied. “And, to make sure that I keep my end of the bargain, this is for you. I expect that you'll never have to open it.”

She pulled a sealed envelop out of a pocket on her robe and handed him. On the outside, writing in her hand said, “How to Punish a Lazy Wife.”

He looked at her in shock. “You mean it?”

“I do love games. This is just another one. Call it the Wife-for-Life Game.”

“I hope that you're luckier with this one than with the Whore-for-a-Day Game.”

“This is a lot easier game. I won't lose it. But I almost won the Whore-for-a-Day Game, didn't I?”

“You played a hell of a game. A hell of a game. If that die hadn't been a six, you would have won, hands down.”

“Just my bad luck.”

“Yeah. You had terrible luck.”

But that night as he was trying to go to sleep, he began to think about her 'bad luck'. The die had been locked in the chest for twenty-four hours. They each had their own key to their own lock so that neither one of them could alter the die. But Leslie had supplied the locks and locks normally come with two keys, don't they? Even after she gave him a key, she must still have had the other key for his lock hidden somewhere. She wouldn't have gone back later and turned the die six up to give herself the maximum challenge would she? Surely not.

By the dim glow of the streetlight filtered through the bedroom curtains, he could see a small smile on his wife's sleeping face. A week ago she had confessed that sometimes she needed to be made miserable to be happy. Tonight, she looked happy.

Surely not.