Gifted Grifter Ch. 10

Chapter 10: A Slight Change of Plans

It was our last day in Austin, and Julie and I were plotting a course through uncharted territory. I had come to Austin to attend a conference and have a rendezvous with Julie, since it wasn't far from her hometown of Oklahoma City—but there had been a slight change of plans. Our relationship had once been purely sexual, but somehow along the way we had fallen in love. Now, rather than each of us going back to our respective homes tomorrow, we were both headed for New York to start building a new life—together.

But before we could really get started on our new lives, we had a lot of old business to attend to: she had a condo to sell and an ex-boyfriend (although he didn't know it yet) to evict; we both had personal belongings to retrieve and get to New York; and we had to come up with at least another 30 grand in seed money for our day trading scheme. But the first order of business was to build Julie her own mindreading machine. So right after lunch I started putting together mindreading machine number four.

The mindreaders I had built into eyeglass frames proved to be the most versatile, so I had asked Julie to pick up a pair of plastic-framed sunglasses for herself. But as I started working with the electronics, it soon became apparent that any frames that were feminine enough for her to believably be wearing didn't leave enough space for all the electronics that needed to go inside them, even if I had been able to hollow them out without the kinds of tools I had access to when I worked for the Defense Department.

"Dammit," I said, "these women's frame styles are too small. I can't build a mindreader in this small amount of space."

"Does it have to be a pair of sunglasses? Can you build the mindreader into something else?" she asked.

"I can built it into a lot of things, but it has to be worn somewhere on your head, and it has to be something that won't seem odd when you're wearing it," I said. Looking up at her, I joked, "I would gladly build one into a tiara for you, by queen, but I think it would attract attention."

"Could you build a receiver in a Bluetooth headset?" she asked.

Fucking brilliant, and I told her so. Once again, the solution was a stroke of sheer genius—and once again it was hers, not mine.

She got a little pleased look on her face, like someone was finally recognizing something she knew she had but that no one else seemed to have noticed before. "Why are you the only person who appreciates my ideas?" she asked wistfully.

"Because everyone else is a fucking idiot! I want to hear every single idea you ever have. Ever." I told her.

She put both of her arms on my shoulders and kissed me lovingly. "There really is no one else like you in the whole world," she said.

I held her and said, "I can only hope you remain deluded like this forever, and thus never notice that you can do much better than a boring old man like me."

"You stop that," she said in mock anger, "no one puts down my knight in shining armor like that" and kissed me again.

This road was going to end up with us both in bed in about two minutes. Julie was wearing a bluish-teal halter top that ended a good six inches above the top of her low-cut, ultra-straight leg jeans, but had blue lacey material in the front that teasingly revealed only some of the smooth skin in-between. In other words, she was hot and gorgeous like usual—but we really needed to get some work done, so not without regret I changed the topic.

"The only problem with this Bluetooth idea," I said, "is that we don't have a Bluetooth headset to use. Would you want to go get one while I work on these electronics some more?"

She was disappointed that we weren't headed back to bed, but she knew that we had to get this done. "Okay, throw me out why don't you."

I grabbed her waist from behind as she was walking away in mock petulance, slipping my fingers under the lacy covering so that I touched only smooth, bare skin. "I will never, ever throw you out," I whispered in her ear, then nibbled on it gently. "I promise I'll make up to you later what we don't have time to do now."

She reached behind her with one hand to hold my head, turned over her shoulder for one more kiss, then pointed her high heels out the door and went in search of a device.

The Bluetooth mindreader turned out better than I could have hoped. There was plenty of spare room inside once I took out the unnecessary blue light circuitry—which also allowed her to be using it without the world knowing about it. It came pre-equipped with its own rechargeable battery, so unlike me she wouldn't have to be replacing watch batteries all the time. With battery life not a problem, it wouldn't have needed an on/off switch like my eyeglasses did, but since there already was one I left it there. I added two tiny additional buttons; one which allowed her to switch to phone function so that she could actually still use it as a Bluetooth headset—and one that would send an emergency distress signal to my Blackberry. Julie could bench-press almost as much as I and had a black belt, so she was probably better off defending herself if needed than relying on me to come to her aid, but it made me feel better that it was there.

I loaded up the software and we got ready to try it out. Julie clipped the headset to her ear and turned it on.

Is it working? Is it working? I was thinking.

"Yes, its working, its working," she laughed.

I love her laugh—its so delicate. Her laugh got me started thinking about how beautiful she was and how my love for her kept growing. Of course, she was reading these thoughts even as I had them. She smiled but looked away, saying "I feel funny eavesdropping on your thoughts. I mean, I like the thoughts I'm receiving, but it doesn't seem right to be stealing them like that. If we use these on each other, to be fair we should at least both have them on at the same time."

"See what I mean...now that's another great idea by you!" I said, pulling my glasses out of my pocket and turning them on.

She smiled even broader and turned to look at me.

Everything turned gray. It felt like there were pulses or something running through my head, like it was subject to a deluge of pressure waves. My temples instantly started to ache. If I could have concentrated on what my eyes were seeing, I would have seen Julie grab for her temples as well—but I couldn't concentrate on anything. Probably from the pain, Julie doubled over—and as soon as she did the feeling stopped. It took me a second to figure out what had just happened, but I quickly whipped off my glasses when I did.

Julie was slowly sitting up again; she probably had the same dull headache I now had. "What happened? Did I speak too soon?" She had taken off her headset.

"Feedback," I said. "Just like if you put a microphone in front of a loudspeaker. When the mindreaders were fixed on each other, it must have shuffled the same thought back and forth, with increasing intensity, blocking our ability to think anything else."

"We have to be careful never to do that again," she said.

"I'll say—if you hadn't instinctively bent over and broken the loop, we might have been frozen like that until...well, I don't want to find out," I said.

"I'm afraid to try it again," she said.

"I don't blame you, but unless the feedback blew a circuit—entirely possible I suppose—it should still work fine." I said. "Here, I'll be the guinea pig." She handed me the headset and I put it on, then looked at Julie.

Her thoughts were full of wonder at what this contraption was, and admiration of me for being able to create it. She was also almost embarrassingly grateful to me for loving and accepting her as a person, not just a bombshell, and loved me for it. But she was also now petrified of her mindreader.

I looked away. "Yes, I agree: we should not use these on each other unless we both agree to use them. And, obviously, we'll have to be sure not to have them turned on at the same time. Yours works," I said, pulling off the headpiece and putting on my glasses. I could immediately see she was still afraid of it "and so does mine which is how I know that you're still afraid of the thing."

She took the headset back but was holding it the way one might hold a dead mouse.

"Please, darling, you know I would never hurt you, right?" I said. "I just put it on, it's perfectly safe." She looked at me, torn—afraid of the device, but trusting of me, and further not wanting to have her fear of the device turn into an issue of mistrust between us. I hadn't meant it that way, but suddenly the device had become an ultimatum on a trust that was still taking root between us, so I quickly reversed field. "Tell you what; it's new, I guess I can't be certain something weird with the Bluetooth doesn't interfere with it. I'll wear it, and we'll go for a walk. If all goes well, I'll test the panic button, which uses the Bluetooth function itself. If it passes all those tests, will you try it again?"

She nodded in relief; she was afraid, but she was also quite reasonable, and recognized my suggestion as such. "Thank you," she said quietly, referring to my not making her choose between trusting me and fearing the device.

"Anything for you, my sweet," I replied and kissed her.

I put on the headset and we started walking up Congress, across the "bat bridge" and into downtown Austin. Julie's ass swayed naturally in her tight, straight-leg jeans as we walked the city; I couldn't see that of course since I was walking with her, but after my mindreader picked up the thought "check the ass on that chick" five or six times I got the message. In fact the thoughts of EVERY man—and a couple of the ladies too—turned sexual when they caught a glimpse of my dear Julie. She knew at some level that she looked good and that men in general liked the way she looked; after all, she'd relied on that to make a living for many years. Still, I'm sure she had no idea just how powerful an effect she had.

We found a nice restaurant in the warehouse district; I turned off the headset so I wasn't reading Julie's mind all through dinner. After a leisurely meal and a couple of drinks, we went back to the hotel. Once upstairs, I pushed the panic button. My Blackberry began to play "Need You Tonight," the ringtone I had specifically assigned to her panic button. Nothing had gone awry.

"So?" she asked.

"Everything in working order," I said, handing it to her "but it's a good thing that its got an on-off switch—you're probably not going to want to have it on when you're just out walking around. Apparently, my lovely," I added, holding her close to me, "you have an uncanny ability to generate sexual fantasies in the minds of bystanders."

Good thing she didn't have anything in her mouth, because she would have spit whatever it was all over the floor as she burst out laughing.

I elaborated "If you had really just given as many blowjobs as I just watched you give in the minds of strangers, you'd have a sore throat for a month."

She was now more incredulous now. "Really? You saw that many guys fantasize about me in that great of a detail?"

"You generating fantasies in men—no surprise. You generating those fantasies in every single man we saw on the street, plus more than one woman—somewhat of a surprise." I told her. "Guess I'm not the only one who constantly fantasizes about having sex with you."

She smiled and leaned close to my ear to whisper into it "Don't be so jealous. After all, YOU don't have to use your imagination." Then I felt a hand gently exploring my crotch. Oh yeah!

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Early the next morning Julie and I checked out and put our bags in the back of her ratty old Toyota pickup. We had about a 7-hour drive in front of us, which would give us plenty of time to talk and figure things out. We would take turns driving while the other made phone calls as we tried to take care of what seemed to be a million loose ends. Julie was dressed for driving; short shorts, flip-flops, and a tank top, but the colorful band of cloth around her neck belied the fact that she was wearing a bikini top under her tank instead of a bra. I love that bikini-under-tank look.

Julie and I had gone back out the night before to go dancing; even "leaving early" we didn't get to bed until two, and of course we had to have sex again before turning in. Since she was young and more resilient to sleep deprivation, she took the first turn behind the wheel.

We were both a little nervous about the many unknowns in the immediate future—just as we were both excited about the idea of being together long-term rather than just meeting for the occasional sex weekend. Eventually we would end up in New York and would use our mindreaders to pick up stock tips, allowing us to make a living as day traders. But we needed seed money, and the best place I could think of to make 30 grand was to play poker in Vegas. I was afraid, however, to take Julie back there since she had lived there for more than a year, working as a high-priced call girl. If it was going to cause my honey any pain, we would find some other way to make the cash. I should have known that my lovely Julie was too tough to let her past stand in our way.

"So where should we go to get our seed money?" I asked to open the conversation.

"I just assumed we were going to Vegas. That's the best place to make money gambling, right?" she replied.

"Absolutely...but I also imagine it would bring up a lot of memories for you," I said. "Vegas may be the best place, but it's not the only place. If it's going to be hard on you to return to the streets you used to work, then we're not going there. End of story."

She glanced at me and rested a hand on my knee momentarily. "I appreciate your thinking of me and worrying about me," she said. "But I think I'll be OK. When I was working I spent most of my time in the bars or high-end suites. If we stay away from them, I should be fine."

"Are there places where you've never been, or seldom been, on the strip?" I asked.

"I didn't go to the low-end properties much," she replied, "not too many five dollar players have three grand to invest in a rent-a-girl."

"What if we were to stay in Excalibur?" I asked, as it had been a place where I had stayed many times before the discovery of the mindreader changed my life.

"That's fine," she said, "I've only ever cut through that one on my way to somewhere else."

I called and booked us a room. They asked if I wanted a suite; I declined, thinking a regular room would be even less like places Julie had frequented when she was a working girl. The less similarity, the better.

That settled, I now called Erin, my real estate agent in Lake Country, as a first step towards selling Julie's condo. She couldn't help me directly, since she wasn't licensed in Oklahoma, but she gave me a number for her company's office in the city. She asked me whether I would be coming up that way soon.

"Gosh, I don't know Erin," I said, "Some new things have come up and I'm going to be away for a while. If I make it up that way again, you're the first person I'll call, OK?"

After I hung up, Julie commented that real estate agents don't usually ask when you're coming back.

"Well," I said, "she's not just a real estate agent; I slept with her a couple of times, too."

"Oh," she said, with slightly raised eyebrow, although obviously she had no leg to stand on when the topic of conversation was sleeping with other people. But I saw an opportunity to broach a topic I knew we had to eventually.

"Yeah," I said. "Look, I want you to know I'm no angel. I know a lot of the skeletons in your closet, but you haven't really seen much of mine." I paused; she was listening closely. "That's really what I've been doing with this mindreader thing up to now—picking up girls. I make enough money to be able to live a fancy lifestyle in order to impress girls. With my glasses on, I can see what girls want to hear and what they are looking for in a man. I do my best to pretend that that's what I am. In the last year, I've seduced dozens of girls under false pretenses. I'd still be doing it, if I hadn't fallen in love with you."

She was quiet, not knowing what to say. "I guessed you weren't a dedicated family man, or you wouldn't have picked me up in that bar. But..." she paused as she considered how to put what she was thinking..."I guess I can't help but wonder how much you've lied to me, too."

I turned in the seat so I could look more directly at her and put my hand on her knee. "That's the ironic thing, in a way—I've never had to lie to you. I have almost never used my glasses on you, either."

"I suppose you didn't need to use them on me," she observed, "you could just buy my affection."

"No," I replied, "I beg to differ. Yes, there was a time when I rented your body. But affection cannot be bought or sold, it can only be freely given." She didn't have any reply. "Besides, if you doubt me, you can find out for yourself—just use your mindreader on me."

She protested, but I could see that she really wanted to be able to confirm that I wasn't lying to her right now. "Here, you're headset is buried in your purse somewhere, use my sunglasses," I said, turning them on as I handed them, to her. Her fears go the better of her, and after a slight hesitation she accepted the glasses and read my mind. It took only a few seconds to confirm that I had virtually never lied to her, except for my initial false name of course. She took them off and handed them back, feeling somewhat ashamed that she hadn't trusted me.

"Look, I don't blame you—didn't I just tell you that I've spent a year lying to girls to get them into bed?" I said. "I wouldn't trust me, either...there's a lot of girls out there that I was not very trustworthy towards."

"Do you ever think I'm lying to you?" she asked. Actually, I hadn't.

"No," I said. "You seem so direct. I guess that since you've come right out and said a lot of things that most people would lie to hide, it hadn't crossed my mind that you would. You might choose to omit certain details at certain times, but frankly, there are times I am grateful for that."

"Well, you're right," she said, "after all the things I've done, there's no point in trying to lie about it—a series of lies would all come crashing down like a house of cards. But...I guess I wonder how much it bothers you that I used to be a sex worker."

"Well, I'd be lying if I said I wouldn't have it any other way," I said, "but it is what it is—and further, if you had not been out working the bars that day, I'd have never found you. So in a strange way, it's only because you were a sex worker that I'm with you now, and I definitely wouldn't trade being with you now for anything." She gave me glance of appreciation. "But because I love you and don't want to share you, I find it difficult to imagine you having sex with other men. So while I accept it as having been necessary that you were once a sex worker, I really don't want to hear any details about what it was like."

"That's good," she said, swallowing a lump in her throat. A stray tear rolled down her far cheek. "Because I really don't want to think about it."

"Oh, honey," I said, putting my arm on her shoulder but no daring hug her more or risk careening off the road. She pinched my hand between her shoulder and cheek in reciprocation.

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There was a rest area about 15 miles up the road. She got off to switch drivers; I gave her a big hug, but the tears had already ended. Back on the road, Julie started working the phone.

She called the real estate company number about putting the condo up for sale. She made an appointment to sign papers.

She called Ryder to arrange a cross-country rental of a small truck.