Rules of the Game

"Get out of here then."

"I only want to talk."

"You've talked enough," I growled. "You have nothing left to say."

He looked at me, uncertainly, then away. I closed my legs. I pulled the covers over myself again. I secured them in place. "What do you want?"

He took a moment to reply. "Is what Mike says true?"

"Go ask Mike," I said harshly.

"I'm asking you."

I found I was truly mad, breathing hard through my flared nostrils and clenched teeth. I hated this man; I hated his daughter. "Like father, like daughter?" I asked.

It didn't make sense, but it stung just the same. "I'm sorry if that's the truth," he said, wincing. "But I had no idea. How long has it been going on?"

"I don't know," I admitted.

"When did you find out?"

"This afternoon."

He looked up with a furrowed brow.

"Somebody sent me an email," I grumbled, surprised at the intense stab of pain to my heart. Tears filled my eyes again. I felt a helpless rage.

"Who?" he wanted to know.

"I don't know. His name was Ozone Breath, or something like that. An email address. There was no message with it. Only the attachments."

"Ozone Breath," he muttered.

"Something like that. He—or she—sent videos and pictures."

"What kind of videos?" he asked doubtfully.

"What kind do you think?"

He rubbed his forehead.

"Use your imagination," I said. "Tommy Lee and Pamela Anderson? Paris Hilton and her boyfriend? Do you know who Paris Hilton is?"

He scowled, deeply. "There's no call to be cynical, Lisa."

"Is that what I'm being?"

"Give it a rest. If this is true, I apologize for my daughter, and also my behavior tonight. I didn't know. I couldn't know. You didn't know until this afternoon yourself."

"Somebody knew," I pointed out. "Somebody cruel enough to send those videos to me."

He looked up, startled. "You don't think--?"

"Somebody sent them," I pointed out again. "You're closer to her than anyone else."

His face turned beet red. "Now, wait a minute, young lady!"

I waved it off. "It wasn't you. You wouldn't have been that way tonight if it was you."

He wasn't mollified. "How do you even know they're real? Pictures can be faked."

"Videos?"

He shrugged. "They could."

I shrugged at his belligerence. "You'd have to see them."

He nodded.

"I only looked at one."

He nodded again.

"It was shot here, and in a motel room."

He shrugged, disjointed, painfully.

Tears overwhelmed my eyes and flowed down my cheeks. I wiped them away with my hand. "There was no faking the fun they were having, or the way they enjoyed themselves. That was quite real. Would you like to see it?"

"I'm sorry," he muttered. "I didn't know."

"Somebody did."

He raised pained eyes. "You think someone here?"

"I don't know. You tell me."

"They'd have to have access to this place. To find the tapes and pictures. Unless they stashed them someplace else." He furrowed his brow again. "Pretty stupid to think they'd keep them here. Right under your nose."

"Not if they were in Chelsea's room," I said. "She's a very private person. I don't go in there unless I'm invited. And that's not all that often."

His forehead wrinkled again. "How long has she been this private?" he asked.

I thought about it a moment. "I see your point. A lot more in the last six months than she was before. Really, the last four months."

He nodded thoughtfully. "I think we can assume someone other than Chelsea or Matt sent that email." I didn't agree, but kept my peace. I felt Chelsea completely capable of sending the email. "If not them, then someone who had access to Chelsea's room."

"And knew what was going on," I said.

He nodded again. "It could be one of your friends."

"We don't party here," I said. I looked at the bedroom door, musing thoughtfully. "We don't entertain much at all. The only people in here with any regularity are you and your friends. I'd hate to think one of them did it." Especially Jim, I thought, whom I'd just slept with. "Mike?" I wondered aloud.

Steve nodded. "He knew what was going on."

"He's sharp, though," I pointed out. "It wouldn't take a lot to put two and two together for him. My attitude tonight, the uh, poker game--" Embarrass yourself, Lisa, why don't you. "--Matt and Chelsea being away for the weekend...?"

"None of the others did," he objected. "I didn't." He gave a squint, daring me to contradict him. I grinned.

"The point is, does it really matter? I--"

"It does if the object was to get me angry and vengeful and full of spite the same night as the poker game."

The idea made him wince. "I can't believe anyone here would do such a thing, Lisa."

"I can. And I don't believe its Mike."

He shook his head, scowling. "Gary's a lot of things, but he's--"

"It's not Gary," I interrupted. "Gary's been belligerently toward me all night long. And besides, I'm not sure I'm of much interest to Gary, anyway." I raised my eyebrows suggestively, and Steve blushed. "And that more or less leaves Robert out as well, wouldn't you say?"

"I guess," he grumbled unhappily.

"Which leaves Bill, or Nick or Richard."

"And Jim," he added.

"It's not Jim."

He examined my serene features and grumbled something under his breath, which I let it go.

"The question is," he said, scowling again. "What difference does it make? In the present context, I mean."

Reddening again, I answered: "You mean, my plan to fornicate the entire table?"

He nodded, abjectly.

"None. Except I want him to watch while everyone else and his brother takes me to bed tonight."

Disgusted, he shook his head and blew out a long breath. "Get even with three people, instead of two, by fucking everyone else. Great plan, Lisa."

"I admit, it has its flaws."

He laughed dejectedly and shook his head. He removed his cigar and picked a sliver of tobacco off his tongue. He reinserted the cigar.

"I can't talk you out of this?"

"No," I said, firmly shaking my head.

"Don't expect me to participate, Lisa."

"I can't force you," I admitted. "But it'd be nice." Under the covers, I reopened my legs as I had earlier. Even wider this time. He snorted and I giggled.

"You are some piece of work, girl."

"That sounds like a compliment, Steve." I tilted my head, my whole body, suggestively.

"Cut it out," he grunted. It was nice to see him smile, even grudgingly.

I said: "My best chance of revenge, as despicable an idea as it may seem to you, would be to fuck my interloper's father. You have to admit, that would be a coup-d-grace."

"She's my daughter," he reminded me gruffly. "I'm her father. I'm not giving aid and support to the enemy. So to speak."

"I'm not fucking her boyfriend," I reminded him.

"Nobody's proved that yet," he countered.

"Would you like to see the video?" A chill ran down my spine at the thought of seeing it again. "Its a key-click away."

"Seems I would have to, doesn't it?"

We stared at each other. Finally, wrapping myself in the bed sheets and steeling myself for the inevitable, I slipped off the bed, edged past Steve to my desk and opened the lid of my laptop. In a moment I was in the file labeled Kill These Bastards (my label) and hovering my key over the file. Bedroom and Motel Room—03-16-10. The weekend Matt and Chelsea had last been up north to see their parents. They had carpooled: How convenient.

"I can't watch it again," I said. My voice trembled and I had started to shake. The looks on her face; the looks on his; those big grins...I wanted to vomit.

"You don't have to. Go into the bathroom," Steve said. "Don't come out until I knock on the door."

I surrendered the touch-pad and fled without another word.

* * *

I cried. I couldn't help myself. I sat on the toilet wrapped in my bed sheets and bawled my eyes out. Using the same key he'd used to enter my bedroom, Steve came to where I sat, stopped down and scooped me up, carried me back into the bedroom. I clung to him like a little child. He made awkward comforting sounds and sat down on the edge of he mattress with me in his lap. I thought I had cried myself out before. I hadn't.

"Did you—did you see?" I bawled, hiccupping. In a sudden fury again, I wanted to tear over to desk and destroy the laptop with my fists. "In my bed! In my bed! How could they?" There was no expressing the outrage.

Steve said "Calm down, calm down. Calm down, Lisa."

"I don't want to calm down!" I cried. "I want to kill someone!" And then, incredibly, his hand was inside the bed sheets and holding my left breast. "Oh," I said, confused. I shivered violently, looked through my tears into his eyes. They were calm, resolved, forgiving. Without thinking I moved forward and joined my mouth to his. He stopped me, pulled away. "Please?" I begged.

He held my breast like he would a purse full of gold. Or a fragile work of art, I thought. I didn't think it possible to be touched so lovingly.

"They were wrong."

"They were," I agreed.

"They should not have done it here. Not in your bed."

I shook my head fervently no.

"I'm fucking you in her bed. To pay her back. Would you like that, Lisa?"

"Oh, my God, yes," I breathed, unbelieving in my good fortune. "I would like that so much, Steve."

"If she has condoms in there," he said, rising again with me in his arms, "we're gonna use every single one of them. If you'd like, I'll dress you in her lingerie and then rip it the fuck off you. I want that worthless bitch to know what she's done. I want her to feel it like you have tonight." He was shaking with his own, unspeakable outrage. "I can't believe—" He broke off, choked with emotion. He'd seen what I'd seen, Chelsea taunting the camera, asking how I liked the show they put on, why I didn't give it up like she did.

" "My asshole's so tight. It feels so good. I let Matt drill me in it all night long.' " And " 'Matt really likes it like this, Lisa. Long, slow, deliberate licks up the shaft.' " And " 'I can't believe you don't do him like this! What's the matter with you, Lisa? You don't like fun? Oh, God, Matt...so deep. That's it. Just like that, yeah.' "

Steve took me through the bathroom into Chelsea's bedroom on the other side. He held me even as he struggled to turn on the bedside lamp. I did it for him. Then he sat me down on the bed and kissed my upturned face, on my lips, the tip of my nose, my eyebrows, on my eyelids, and my forehead and then finally my temples.

"No one ever deserved that," he said disgustedly.

I agreed with him silently. I shivered as he removed the sheet from around my shoulders and let it fall on the bed.

"Did Jim use a condom?"

I nodded.

"Make sure all the others do, too. Especially Gary and Robert."

I looked at him questioningly.

"We're all in this together, Lisa. We'll take care of you tonight, every one of us. We'll make sure it's a night you'll never forget. The best night of your life. You can exact the sweetest revenge on her possible. With us. With me." He leaned down and found my mouth and made me forget everything but his tongue.

* * *

Forty-five minutes later, Steve opened Chelsea's bedroom door and ushered me outside. "Milady," he said playfully. I blushed, a hundred shades of red.

"Holy shit!" Mike exclaimed, turning around. The others, also agape and wide-eyed, gazed at me, at Steve, at Chelsea's open bedroom door, at my closed bedroom door, at the violently crimson hickeys on my neck, shoulders and torso. And the one just visible inside my left thigh, I thought. I clutched myself, thoroughly, extremely embarrassed.

"I take it you changed your mind?" Mike drawled.

"I changed my mind," Steve conceded to an outburst of laughter and hooting. Jim looked extremely displeased, Mike exultant, Nick delighted, Richard confused, Robert and Gary eye-rollingly bemused. Bill looked stunned, angry and betrayed-looking. I had my snitch, just as Steve had told me I would. It was Bill. Bill had sent the videos.

You fucking bastard, I thought. You will not have me tonight. Not ever!

"So, what made you change your mind?" Mike wanted to know. He looked so relieved, like a boy discovering there was a piece of pie left in the refrigerator after all. Apple pie, Alamode, I thought, grinning.

"She'll have to tell you herself." With a hand on my back, he guided me to my chair and then sat down himself. Every eye at the table sought out mine. I stared at the pot-in-progress, grinning foolishly.

"Those are some fucking wild hickeys," Nick pointed out.

I felt, rather than saw, Steve's eyes lock on those of Bill. Then he looked away, to Mike, and I felt a silent communication pass between them, like electricity flowing through the air. Peripherally, I saw Mike shift his gaze to Bill and his face set in stone.

"It won't take long to finish this round," Jim assured me. I noticed that he had transferred $70 in my absence: $20 for my panties, $50 for the privilege of taking them off. Among other things, I thought. I blushed anew, thinking of my forty-five minutes with Steve.

"I'm sorry," I said softly. I placed my hand atop his and squeezed it very gently, nearly as gently as Steve had squeezed my breast. I felt him shiver a bit. I knew, and felt badly about it, that Jim was feeling his own stab of betrayal. I whispered in his right ear: "I promise, no matter what else happens, whomever I'm with, if you still want me at the end of the night, I'm yours."

He smiled, bravely, a smile meant only for me. Despite what he feared—God, if there was just some way I could explain it to him—my forty-five minutes with Steve had not tarnished or diminished the twenty I'd spent with him. Or surpassed it. As good as Steve was—and my God, he was so good—he did not compare with Jim. Not even close. I explained this as best I could with my foot on his calf.

The current round ended and went to The River round. Much money was bet. Sidelined for now, I watched with attentive interest the interplay between the guys, the easy way they played with me out of the round. I grinned, sheepishly, catching continual looks at my bare breasts, my multitude of hickeys, and my obscured midsection. Midway through the round I excused myself to play barmaid. I stayed on my feet until I sensed every guy had gotten his fill of my pubic area and my rear end. I felt a true interest in my skinny butt, which both pleased and embarrassed me. I made it available and of course, Nick, Mike and Rich and Jim all got in a pinch, with Mike also giving me a proprietary and rather predatory pat. I blushed bright red, quite unconsciously. I wondered what he had planned for me.

The next hand went exceedingly fast. I lost $64 of the $70 and again had to offer something I didn't have.

"Hey!" Nick objected. "Wait a minute." He glared at Steve, who looked back at him in surprise.

"What? I didn't say anything."

"You also didn't pay anything," Nick pointed out.

Steve blushed bright red as everyone else jumped on his case. I, of course, turned bright red myself. Mike said: "You can't expect to mark your territory the way you did and not pay for it, honcho,"

"Oh, please," I begged. "Stop!"

They ignored me.

Mike: "You were in there an hour and a half, honcho. By my calculations--" His fingers flew over the keyboard of a small calculator. "You owe Lisa $225. Four and a half times the $50 Jim put in. Not counting the destroyed panties."

"Not to short the girl," Steve retorted, "but we weren't deal-making the entire hour and a half." He looked at me apologetically. "I don't want them thinking I monopolized you."

Could my face get any redder?

"So how much time, then?" Nick wanted to know.

Steve looked at me. I shrugged, and agreed with his assessment of forty-five minutes.

"Still $112.50," Mike calculated.

"Bullshit," Richard said.

All eyes went to him. "That's presupposing she charged Jim for screwing her. Sorry," he apologized to me. "But she didn't. If you remember right, what Jim paid for, was the privilege of removing her panties."

"Her name's Lisa," Mike reminded him.

"I know what her name is, fool. Anyway, Lisa rewarded Jim with sex. It wasn't paid for, remember? Which makes the sex Steve received from Lisa something entirely different."

"Stop!" I said. "I did not charge Steve for sex."

"Are you saying you didn't have it?" Nick asked, grinning hugely.

"You know I did, you bastard." Everyone hooted and hollered. "What happened between Steve and I was consensual and intimately private. No barter was intended, and none will be accepted. Not by me, anyway," I muttered, lowering my eyes. Steve had offered me two years, rent-free in the house. A hell of a lot more than $112.50, I can tell you. I had refused.

"So, then," Nick said calculatingly, "What you're telling us is that Jim and Steve both got sex rent free, and what you offer for sale is some intangible, that may, or may not result in further sex. Is that correct?"

I grinned, along with everyone else. Laughing, Mike punched Nick on the arm and told him how lucky he was that everyone loved him.

"I don't love him," Gary grumbled. I hadn't heard from him in a while.

"You don't count," Mike said. "Lisa? Would you like us to hold him while you kick the shit out of him?"

"I'd love that," I concurred. "But what I think Nick really wants is the chance to offer on my intangible, isn't that right, Nick?"

It was Nick's turn to turn red.

"Actually," Bill said, clearing his throat. I did my best not to look daggers at him. "You do have something of value left to barter with."

I frowned at him, confused. So did the others. He lifted his chin just high enough, and also his eyes, to convey his meaning.

"My hair?" I said, puzzled.

"You're beautiful, lovely blond hair, yes."

I was shocked. The others looked shocked also, but also somewhat thoughtful and calculating, the person dependent.

"Are you--?" I couldn't believe he was suggesting this. "I should sell my hair?"

"It's all you have left of a physical nature. And it's worth every bit of $200, I bet. Aren't wigs expensive?"

The expected protests came, though far less forcefully than I'd hoped for or expected. He was really advocating I sell my hair?

Lisa, hairless; billiard ball smooth, I thought. I think the idea intrigued the guys. And it had a certain charm, I must admit. Though presently, I find it hard to re-imagine the feeling.

"Human hair wigs, yes," I admitted. Mike laughed. Nick rolled his eyes. Robert examined my head as though already seeing the hairless scalp. Gary glowered.

"Okay," I agreed slowly. "I put my hair up for auction. Since you're to the left of Jim, you have the right of first refusal, Bill."

"Lawyer-talk," Mike observed wryly.

The truth was, I wanted no more to do with Bill than I did with an armadillo. But getting him alone might be the only chance I had to get at the truth, find who had sent the email. See what his reasoning was, discover his motives. If it was a he, I thought. Maybe I had been a little too fast, condemning Bill as Judas. Except for his withdrawn attitude all night, and his reaction to my hickeys, I had not a shred of evidence linking him to the crime. Lawyer-talk again, I realized. I smiled grimly.

To my surprise, Bill "checked." That threw the bidding over to Nick, and my chance to nail Bill out the window. "Well, all right," I said uncertainly. "Nick?"

"Oh, no," he said. "No way I'm being responsible for turning you into an 8-Ball, Lisa. No way. Somebody else."

Flustered, I looked at Mike, who shook his head.

"Fellas," I objected. "Come on!"

Mike shook his head again. This sent the turn to Richard, who sat nodding with a huge grin. He put his hands over two identical stacks of chips and held them in the air.