Eva Rutland - Almost A Wife

“Oh, my God!” The heartrending wail commanded his full attention.

What the hell!

He turned to see the woman crouching in terror, the wail escalating into a crescendo of uncontrollable sobs.

He bent toward her. “What…what is it?”

“We’re stuck. We’re stuck. Oh, my God! I knew it. I knew this would happen! Oh, God, oh God, oh God!”

Her hysteria was so unnerving, it was a moment before he realized she was right. The elevator had stopped somewhere between floors. He was about to sound the alarm, but she blocked his way.

“I shouldn’t have got in…I wish I hadn’t. I wish I hadn’t.”

He wished so, too. She was losing it. He tried to reassure her. “Hey, it’s okay. I’ll alert somebody.” Whoever’s in charge of the damn thing…if she’ll shut up!

He shook her gently, and tried to cut into the now incoherent babble. “Hush. It will be all right.”

The mass of black hair swung around her face as she violently shook her head. He couldn’t tell whether she was laughing or crying.

Clearly hysterical. He didn’t want to slap her. If he kissed her?

His mouth closed on hers, shutting off the screams. Or shocked her into silence. For…Good Lord! The kiss was more potent than a slap. Her soft yielding surprised him, evoking an exciting erotic spasm of…What on earth was he doing!

He tried to release her, but he couldn’t.

She clung to the feeling. His arms around her, secure and warm. Safe.

The pressure of his lips against hers…demanding, teasing, pleading. Her whole body responded, awakening to a strange exhilarating sensation of desire that pleased and held her.

Each time he tried to pull away, her grip tightened. Her head was buried on his shoulder and an alluring scent of fresh shampoo mixed with an exotic perfume wafted from the hair covering his chest. Her arms held him close. Too close. A hell of a time for the way she was making him feel!

With an effort, he took control. At least he had shut her up.

Over her shoulder he reached for the phone connected to the alarm.

She heard him on the phone. “Hello, hello…Is anybody there?”

Her head jerked up as the panic returned. She still held him tight, but she vehemently declared, “No! Nobody. They won’t come…Oh, God! Oh, God!”

Hell, she was off again and whoever was supposed to answer the alarm was out to lunch! “Shut up!” he shouted. He felt tears dampening his shirt and softened his tone, “I can’t hear if you’re not quiet. Just be patient. They’ll have us out of here in a jiffy.”

“They won’t. We were stuck for almost two hours!”

“Oh? It happened before?” This elevator must be a jinx. But it should have been fixed. “When?” he asked.

“Two years ago. At my old apartment. But there were only seven stories,” she said. “We were stuck halfway to third and we had to climb out.”

“Oh.” Her apartment. It wasn’t this elevator. The woman was the jinx. The thought made him laugh.

That seemed to make her mad. Not mad enough to turn him loose, but she flared up at him. “Why are you laughing? It’s not funny. Do you realize we’re stuck between no telling how many stories of solid wall? This elevator doesn’t stop until the twenty-first floor. No way to climb out like we did…That is, if something doesn’t break loose and we go crashing to the ground. That time at my apartment, we decided that if that happened, we would jump up and down so when it hit, we—”

“Hey! That’s enough.” Hysteria was better than her crazy predictions. She was making him nervous. Still…best to keep her talking.. “You may be an old hand at this, but you’re not an expert. Elevators have springs on the bottom, so if they hit bottom, it’s not with a crash.”

“Oh?” She looked up at him, eyes wide. “Is that true?”

He nodded, though he wasn’t sure. He also wondered about all that solid wall between openings. He pushed the alarm, and spoke again into the phone. “Hello. Anybody there?”

“They weren’t when we called,” she said. “We’d probably have been there all night if it hadn’t been for the pizza.”

“Pizza?”

“A girl on the elevator was delivering a pizza, and this guy on four came to see why she hadn’t gotten there, and found out the elevator was stuck. If he hadn’t, we might have been…” She stopped, struck by another alarming thought. “Maybe it’s an earthquake.”

“Earthquake?”

“They told us never to use the elevator during an earthquake. They cut off the electricity you know, and—”

“If there was an earthquake, you’d damn well feel it,” he snapped. “And if the electricity was off this phone wouldn’t be—” A voice on the other end stopped him. A reassuring voice. He smiled. “Oh. Sure. Okay.” He looked down at her. “It’s okay. Be calm. Help is on the way.”

She didn’t release him until the elevator started its ascent. Then she moved, turning away from him, mopping at her tear stained face.

“Sorry I was such a nuisance. Thank you,” she said, and bolted as soon as the elevator came to a smooth stop at the thirty-fourth floor.

He was straightening his tie, and only nodded. When he stepped out of the elevator, she had disappeared.

“SO YOU got stuck in the elevator!” Mike said.

“It’s not funny,” Lisa scolded, but she laughed with him. At least he didn’t know she had acted like an idiot.

“Well, you’re only a little late,” he said, and pushed open the door of the conference room.

Lisa gasped. Looking at all the gang, waiting to say goodbye, at the table laden with goodies and gifts, made her all teary. She didn’t want that.

“What’s this! You’re celebrating my getting canned?”

“Sure thing.” Mike grinned. “I warned you. Squash my creative talents one more time and you were out of here!”

“Stingy with the supplies, too. Slow,” Jim said. “Took me all of two days to get those bytes I needed.”

Others joined in the bashing, and the laughter made it easier. Not much easier. She really hated leaving…right in the midst of everything it seemed. Things changed fast in softwear, and you had to be on the ball to get there first. And they were getting there, for instance what Mike was developing with—

“Stop it, you guys! Come on, Lisa.” Pam, who was fashioning a special keyboard that was bound to be a major success, led her to the table. “Help yourself. Coffee?”

Lisa nodded and smiled at the Japanese girl she had hired only a few short months before. One of the three new people she had hired after convincing the head office that if they were to capture the international market, they had to offer a keyboard and program compatible with the nuances of the different languages. But now that she was leaving…

Egotist! You think you’re the whole kit and caboodle, that the wheels of progress stop with your departure? These are the scientists and technicians. You were just one spoke in the wheel.

An important spoke, she told herself with a touch of bitterness. I dealt with the idiosyncracies of this talented crew, I was the mediator between them and management, I fought for their ideas, got the supplies, monitored the deadlines, and—

“I brought champagne,” Mike said.

“And I baked the cake,” Linda said.

“I thank you both. My favorite drink, and my favorite cake,” she said, forcing a jocular mood. She sure wasn’t going to spoil the goodbye party they had planned. “You guys go easy on these goodies. What’s left goes home with me,”

“Stashing, huh?”

“Sure. No telling how long before another paycheck.” Lisa laughed with them. There was another job out there waiting for her, and she’d find it. She wasn’t worried, and the good mood held.