Raymond Travis - The seductive sister-in-law

"I am a Geisha. I was born to please," Shirley said demurely and pulled out a chair for Kent at the kitchen table.

"And how the hell does Bob like working for Damon Construction?" Kent asked more out of a sense of politeness than through any real interest.

"Kent!" Shirley giggled. "Do I look like I know anything about computers?"

The pair laughed again and sat down at the table, and Betty stood over them, smiling again for a moment, before she began serving the breakfast she had prepared. Now that Kent so obviously liked Shirley, she felt relieved. He had made it clear to her what she should have known all along: the girl was a member of the family and her vacillating attitude towards her new sister-in-law was silly. It would be like having a new sister, or, at least, a friend.

"Hey, aren't you going to eat, honey?" Kent interrupted her thoughts as she stood over the table between their two chairs.

"No, I made this for the two of you. In fact, I've got to leave pronto for the dressmaker's."

"But you've got to eat some breakfast," Kent protested grandly.

Betty smiled at his unexpected good mood. "I've had some toast. Let me run or I'll be late. But I'll be back in three or four hours. You and Shirley have a nice talk."

"Well, I hate to see you go," he said and slapped her buttocks playfully as she left the room.

Betty went into the bedroom for her purse, then exited through the sunken family-room porch that jutted into the backyard off the living room. She walked past the pool and crossed the flagstone patio, stopping a moment. She scratched at the screen that covered the large window over the sink to say one last goodbye to Kent and Shirley in the kitchen. They were already arguing good-naturedly, like brother and sister, over a strip of bacon. Kent reached forward and Shirley swatted his hand, causing a fork to jump off the table and clink to the floor. Shirley bent over to pick it up, laughing gaily, and they waved happily to Betty who hurried down the patio and under the breezeway to the sudden damp coolness of the three-car garage. She nodded her head fondly at their antics as she opened the door to her station wagon and slid onto the smooth leather seat-covers. Backing out of the driveway, she glimpsed Dan Clark bent over his lawn mower. Dan bragged about making it big in the fertilizer business out West. But even if he had become partially suburbanized he was still a country-bumpkin in many ways, Betty smiled to herself.

"Nice Saturday," Betty smiled out the window at him as she turned the car into the street.

"That it is, Betty," he said metallically, looking up from his work. "And you got your hands full with them relatives, dontcha?"

She waved at him not answering back. Dan was always making odd cryptic comments, but he was quite harmless so she paid little attention to him. She drove calmly through busy Saturday morning traffic that congested the streets between her house and the suburban North Shore community of Potasset where Mrs. Fergusson lived. The day had started badly and she expected it to get even worse as Kent arose hung-over and grumpy, but it didn't. Now his unexpected good humor and the sudden clarity with which she had seen that she must accept Shirley had relieved her depressing confusion and fortified her for an afternoon with sour Mrs. Fergusson.

She parked the car so she wouldn't block the driveway on the small shady street in front of the widow's modest bungalow. She was careful to walk up the front sidewalk rather than set foot on the grass. But, fortunately, the acid-tongued seamstress was not looking out the window as usual.

Betty stripped to her bra and panties while Mrs. Fergusson brought the elegant dress from the back room, muttering her usual complaints about Mr. Fergusson whose final act of discourtesy seemed to be dying five years ago. Betty caught the reflection of her half-nakedness in the mirror and thought it would be an advantage to a dressmaker not to have a man wandering about. She felt odd enough with Mrs. Fergusson's plump hands fluttering like small birds over her firmly curving abdomen and waist. The woman slid the strapless gown over her head and she shivered as the plump widow abruptly undid her bra before Betty could lift the front of her dress to cover herself. Her large, melon-like breasts swayed out and reflected back in the old fashioned mirror, their tiny bud-like nipples in the center of the wide pink aureoles stiffening from the sudden naked contact with the air. The widow's eyes gleamed peculiarly and a tremor quivered through Betty's belly. God, she wished the woman would hurry up with her fitting, as she made her nervous, even though she was aware that the seamstress was merely suffering the eccentricities of loneliness and the beginning of old age.

She broke off the fitting when the seamstress was almost finishing her work and changed hurriedly into her street clothes, explaining that she suddenly felt unwell and leaving the widow sputtering irritably through the pins in her mouth. For some reason, she didn't feel quite herself. Perhaps the tension of the last two days was catching up with her, but Mrs. Fergusson's reaction to her naked body – that after all might just as well have been a mannequin for the purposes of fitting – was quite odd, she shivered to herself.

She drove directly home. Her own sharp reaction to the incident a few moments before had been sparked by Bob and Shirley's actions the previous night that had diverted her momentarily into her disgusting self-abuse. But, despite the guilt, she had learned from that experience: she needed a man to bring her to what she considered complete satiation. She had repressed her needs for a long time but now that she had been awakened, the passion seemed to feed off itself and her desire increased rather than diminished. She swung the car audaciously up the driveway and came to a halt without bothering to park the car in the garage… Shirley could use it for the errand she planned to send her on.

A very long errand, she thought and grinned widely to herself as she entered the kitchen.

The room was a surprising disorder. Before she had left, Betty had washed the pots and pans she had used to make breakfast, but now the dirty plates and cups still sat around the kitchen table. The bacon, eggs, the orange juice – everything had been devoured, plus the cantaloupe she had been saving for dessert after dinner. There were no signs of Shirley and Kent there. She walled through the living room and stuck her head into the silence of the back porch, then recrossed the front room, turning towards the L-shaped hallway that ran to the bedrooms of the long modern ranch house.

The bathroom door was open and she looked in, noticing that someone had taken a bath. Apparently Kent, she frowned, seeing his shoes and clothing piled in a careless heap under the sink and wondering why he should take a bath there when he always used their bathroom off the master bedroom. Coming out of the bathroom, she progressed a few steps and noticed something queer in the center of the thick carpet: Shirley's sandals. Her step quickened as she followed the trail of Shirley's clothing now apparent down the long hallway. She stepped quickly over Shirley's dress, bra, and then her panties and found herself at the door of her own bedroom.

God, WHAT HAD HAPPENED? her hand curled reluctantly over the door knob to her own room. Had there been some crime, a murder perhaps, and she felt sickened at her own response that almost hoped it was true. WHAT HAD THEY DONE THE MOMENT HER BACK WAS TURNED? She wanted to scream and abruptly opened the door and then fell back against the door frame, wild sobs of relief spilling from her eyes. There was absolutely nothing. The sun streamed in the windows and the bed was unmade just as Kent had left it that morning. But then, the sounds started coming…