The Trail of Don Juan

I have had this story for some time, but have been hesitant to publish it. Some horror is disturbing, even to the writer. There are several scenes in this story that are that way to me. However, I decided to publish it and let the readers decide what they think. Feedback and constructive criticism are always welcome. Thanks to LadyCibelle for her editing work on this story. S.T.

* * * * *

It was my gift and my curse to so relish women, to be so completely obsessed with their scent, their skin, the flow and movement of their bodies that I forget myself and become more than I am. It was not always so for me, and now the long history of my life seems hazy and broken, but it still exists in my mind. It is the trail of Don Juan.

* * * * *

You hear about the people who are corporate drones working away in some cubicle or office locked away from color and sunlight, but you rarely recognize yourself as one. Well I knew I was one, and it made me miserable. To be locked away from life and love staring at a cheap flickering computer screen, answering endless lines of email, and waiting and begging for quitting time.

But like many people I had rationalized away my misery in favor of comfort. The good money I had made, the stock funds I owned, the expensive cars all were very good at keeping me coming back to that desk day after day. I believed myself successful, and indeed in the scope of our society I was. I had a beautiful house, expensive things to fill it, and two expensive cars parked out front.

Fortunately for me I believe I had found real wealth. I also had a beautiful fiancé. She was the one thing in my life that had broken through my armor and allowed a little bit of my soul to live again. I had met her in Spain on a vacation, and through constant email and letters, and trips across the pond I had finally won her heart.

She had come to live with me six months ago, and we had spent the time making love and planning our wedding for the fall. She was a full luscious woman, with soft hips and large breasts, and her dark eyes seemed to be windows to her soul. Whenever we went out to dine or dance all the men would look at her, and I would smile as I ran my hand down her back and across her womanly ass. I did not know at the time how completely obsessed I was with her.

* * * * *

The plane landed hard as was typical of jets flying into Denver's airport. The mountains caused the air to shift and move in ways that the planes seemed to dislike. Still, it was home, and she was waiting for me. I sat anxiously forward on my seat as the plane lumbered toward the gate, and my back protested the cramped seat and long disuse. The flight from New York had been long, and the business negotiations I had been sent on had been longer, but I was home now.

I watched the blue lights of the runway out the window, and the strange-lighted signs that must be clear as street signs to the pilots, who taxied our plane down the twists and turns of the runways. I could see the white domed peaking roof of the airport as we pulled toward the terminal, and people began to fidget in preparation for the mad wait the exiting of an aircraft always seemed to entail.

The plane coasted to a stop and jerked suddenly as the pilot pushed on the breaks to stop on some invisible line, prompted by the waving of a man with two orange batons. The large woman already standing in the isle next to me lurched forward into the other passengers giggling obscenely like some caged hyena. I tapped my hand impatiently as the line moved slowly forward and I could stand and join the throng moving like cattle down a slaughter chute. "Come on!" I shouted in my head, "She is waiting!"

When I burst from the enclosure of the crowd and past the groups of clinging and hugging couples I looked slowly around. She would not be here of course, she hated airports, but still every man when he leaves a plane has that moment when he stops and looks for a friendly face in the crowd.

I shouldered my bags and followed the flow of people towards the trains and the baggage claims. I had long ago mastered the art of carry-on luggage, even after 9-11, and would at least not have to wait on a bag with the others.

The train to the Terminal was crowed, and the elevator down to the parking garage was even more so. I rode down to the bottom level and walked into the cold fall air. Winter was fast approaching, and I shivered as I pulled the keys from my pocket and unlocked the car.

I wondered as I turned the key and the engine roared to life if she would be waiting in the red nightgown, with her hair down and a bottle of our favorite wine open. Or would she be waiting in a formal gown to take me to our favorite restaurant. I was smiling.

The drive across Denver and into the foothills to Boulder was long, and the traffic maddening. By the time I pulled into the drive high on the hill, the lights of Boulder were twinkling below, and my house sat dark and quiet. I smiled to myself again, wondering what plans she had in store for me. She had been so excited on the phone last week when she knew I was coming home tonight.

The cold mountain air was rich with the scents of fall as I walked up the steps to my home. The porch light was dark as I fumbled with the keys looking for the one to open the front door. At last, trembling slightly from the cold, I pushed open my door and walked into the dark entryway. The lights on the alarm pad flickered beeping out a warning, and I crossed to quickly punch in my code. That was strange I thought, she hardly ever set the alarm.

The house was quiet and dark, no music floated down the spiral stair from the second level, no candles burned on the entry table. The air inside was cold, and the house felt dead. I walked up the stairs in the dark, thinking she must be waiting in our room and not wanting to fill the house with light. At the stair top I turned and walked the hall into the large master bedroom. It too was dark.

A feeling of unease began to creep through me, and I skipped back down the stairs, snapping on the lights now as I went. The house was cluttered. In the living room a bottle of wine lay empty on its side on the glass coffee table. I rounded the corner in the kitchen snapping on the light, and was greeted by a pile of dishes, and half eaten food. I began to fear. She was a meticulous housekeeper, and she rarely ate at home when I was away.

I turned from the kitchen now running through the house, driving back the darkness in each room as I flipped on all the lights, calling her name. I took the stairs two at a time the stainless steel ringing under my feet like a chime. The office and the bathroom cluttered but empty, and at last back full circle to the bedroom.

I entered the room at almost at a run as I flipped on the light, and stood in the middle of the thick cream carpet. The covers on the king sized bed lay crumpled at its foot, and clothes were strewn about the floor. A bra here, and garters there. The bottom sheet of the bed rumpled and bunched, and there on the bedside table two tall wine glasses half full.

I moved slowly towards them, as if I suddenly doubted my footing, as if the rich carpet were the grass of a swamp that could swallow me up into a deadly bog. As if the floor of my own home was suddenly suspect, and there was no sure footing anywhere in the world.

On one glass the red smear of lipstick, and on the other nothing. My eyes strayed through the room again now slowly, and what had before been but random clutter, became a story, laid out piece by piece across the floor. Cloths scattered from door to bed as if in careless hurry. The bed sheets crumpled and stained. My gaze returned to the wine glasses, and I saw the pink paper beside them. It was a note in her hand, and hastily done. It left no room for question, and yet answered none.

"My Dear, I have found him. I must go with him. He has stolen my soul. I am sorry."

Revenge! It is a word we don't like to think of in terms of ourselves, but yet who else does it happen to besides ordinary people. Some part of my mind fled at that moment, some sane rational piece of me departed. I think I felt the only joy in my life slipping away, and rather then return to the monotony of my existence without her, I choose to turn from acknowledgment of it.

I would find them. I would find them both, and I would make her see her mistake, and he I would make pay. But how? How would I find these two lovers, one my life and love, and one a destroyer of my sanity, of my freedom? I walked out of the room and slowly down the stairs and some part of me began to calculate, to think on things logical and precise. It drove down my rising pain and panic, and added some focus to my slipping mind.

I began to search the house, meticulously from bottom to top for clues. From the dishes in the sink it would appear they had both been in my home for at least three days, and the leftover food was beginning to mold, so they had likely left some days before I returned. The suitcase in the downstairs closet was gone, and so she planned on not returning, or going far where it would not be easy to return for her things. Her makeup and other grooming things were gone from the master bath upstairs, and a good many of her clothes were missing in the closet. But still I had no idea where, where they had gone...

I began to rage. The early dawn light peaked over the horizon, and the sky grew pale in the east. All night I had searched and nothing! I walked across the bedroom and with one blow threw the wine glasses from the table, the line of my body forming an exclamation of anger and frustration. They flew to the floor, but did not break, bouncing in the soft cream colored carpet. They rolled in long arcs leaving long lines of red in the pale shag, like lines of blood pouring from an open wound.

In frustration I began to stomp on them, crushing them into shards of glass, and grinding it into the rich carpet with the blood colored wine, cursing at the top of my voice as I did so.

"The fool, I will kill him! How dare he come into my home and take her from me! The fuck, the lousy stinking motherfucker! I'll KILL HIM! I'LL KILL HIM!"

Over and over I shouted my new mantra as I stomped each grain of glass into oblivion. Then as suddenly as the rage had taken me it fled, and I stood trembling barely in control of my own mind.

Then I smiled, a cruel and terrible smile as the thought took me. "Her credit card." I thought. "Or should I say my credit card." I raced downstairs and the peg on which her purse hung was empty. I smiled again.

Up the stairs two at a time I ran to my office, and threw myself into the computer chair. I stilled, my tension held in check for the purpose of my action. I went to the web site of my credit card company, typing in my log-on and account information from memory. The screen flickered and each page flowed by too slow, too slow. I drummed my fingers on the desk, an insistent tapping in the dim morning light.

At last, I clicked the key, "Recent Purchases" and my fingers drummed, tippity tap, tippity tap... There is was, a large purchase, yesterday, looked like a restaurant or something. I cared not. The charge was in San Antonio Texas.

* * * * *

San Antonio was hot and bright when I landed the afternoon of the same day. I had my small carry-on I had packed for my business trip and my notebook bag as I walked down the curb to the waiting cabs at the airport. Everything seemed to hurt my eyes, and through the fog of my fatigue I knew I was not acting rationally. I knew I had precious few chances left to stop this madness, and to return to myself, but instead I walked up to the waiting cab climbing slowly into the back like an old man.

"Where to mister?" Came from the disinterested cabby, who eyed this disheveled looking businessman in his back seat.

"I think it is a restaurant, ever heard of Biga on the Banks?" My voice sounded hoarse and thin in my ears as I spoke, and the man watched me with narrowed eyes.

"Yes Sir, it is a restaurant, on the Riverwalk. Corner of Market and St Mary's. You wanna go there?"

I just nodded and looked out the window. The car lurched as it moved forward. The air down here was heavy, moist, and still hot even in the fall. The buildings that sped by as I hurtled through this strange city were not like my home, they were curved and brown, like her body I thought.

The cab dropped me in front of a building, and the glare of the sun made me squint as I departed. The restaurant looked nice, which I expected from the size of the bill I had seen on the card. I walked into the dark entrance, and the cool air of the restaurant was a relief to my throbbing head.

"Hello Seńor, welcome. Would you like a table inside or on the walk?"

"The walk." I said, following the man down through the dim restaurant. It was still afternoon, and the place was nearly empty. It was cool and dark, with southwestern art on the walls. The smell of spicy food lingered in the air, and my stomach rumbled. But I wouldn't eat here I thought, not where they had eaten.

The back of the restaurant opened onto a canal. The Riverwalk as it was known locally. I had spent the last hour reading about the romantic San Antonio Riverwalk as I flew down on the crowded plane. Large trees overhung the sidewalks on either side, and low gondola like motor boats traveled slowly up and down the river.

The back patio of the Biga on the Bank restaurant was hot in the afternoon heat, but I imagined that at night it would be very comfortable, and romantic. I took my seat at the small table, and watched the people pass by, always looking for one face.

I ordered a beer and half listened to the gossip of the staff as they waited for the busy evening rush. Well I was here now, but where was she? I drummed my fingers on the table and stared at the glare of sunlight off the river. My mind was hazy, and I was dreadfully tired, somewhere I began to wonder if this wasn't all just a mistake, if I shouldn't just go home, clean up the mess, and go on with my life. Then I heard it. Through the fog of my mind something the two waitresses said behind me cut through my sleep deprived brain. I could only hear one side of the conversation from the one with the slightly grating voice.

"..yes, I'm telling you she left with both of them, the beautiful woman and that man, and she has not been at work since....yes he was wasn't he......I know me too, I would have gone with him anywhere......she was beautiful though, and from Spain, did you hear her say that...."

"Excuse me." I said, startling myself with the loudness of my own voice.

"Yes Sir?" the waitress looked annoyed to have had her conversation interrupted. I felt the anger stirring in me again.

"Pardon me, I am investigating the disappearance of woman along the waterfront, and I overheard your conversation." I reached for my wallet, and opened it to her picture. "Is this one of the woman you were talking about?" I could see the recognition dawn on her face.

"Yes, yes that is her. The woman that was with that man." I nodded as if this explained everything.

"You said a friend of yours left with them, and you have not seen her since?" She nodded again. "I need to know that woman's name and address please, her life may be in danger." I tried to sound menacing and professional, and the woman's head bobbed up and down rapidly before she turned and grabbing a napkin off the bar and scribbled something on it and thrust it into my hand.

"Here, her name is Marina Gonzales, this is her address. Is she really in danger? Are you with the police?" I just looked at her seriously as I rose from my chair and nodded in a non-committal sort of way.

As I left the restaurant, the sun was dipping down behind the buildings to the west, and the entrance was in shadow. My head throbbed and the dimming light was a welcome relief. I hailed one of the many cabs driving by to drop off the young people heading to the Riverwalk for an evening of drinking.

As I crawled into the cab I showed the driver the napkin, he gave me an apprising sort of look and nodded his head. Without a word he slipped into traffic and headed through town. As the sun set the city was filled with an eerie mix of shadows and light as the sun broke through two buildings to illuminate a brilliant red flowering tree, and the neon lights came on like city stars in the shade of taller buildings, and the alleyways fell into darkness.

We drove out of the city proper into a surrounding suburb, and the houses and neighborhoods looked to be gradually getting worse and worse. A part of the city neglected, or maybe never even nice in the first place. She must live on the poor side of town, and that made sense for how much could a waitress make I thought?

We stopped in front of a rundown adobe house, and I paid the cabbie asking him to wait a few minutes and he nodded that he would. The walk was made of broken stones and weeds grew rank in the cracks between, and the house looked to be sagging under its own weight, as if it carried some great burden.

As I walked to the door I could hear low tantalizing music playing, and smell the scent of pot in the air. The front screen door creaked as I opened it, and the front door swung open as I tried to knock on it allowing both the music and the smells of the house to escape into the cooling evening air. The sounds of a slow Spanish guitar and drum beat in my brain.

"Hello" I called, but the music was loud now, and it hurt my throbbing head. I began to rub my temple as I stepped into the house and followed the sound of the music through the cluttered living room to a small bedroom in the back.

The room was lit with candles in red glass, and next to the bed stood a woman, nearly naked swaying in a wild dance of sexual display. She saw me immediately as I walked into the doorframe, but she did not scream or cry out, she simply smiled at me.

It was a look completely lacking of any sanity or reason. It was a lost and wanton look. She wore only stockings and a garter belt, and her large breasts swayed with the loud music that pounded in my head, and filled my mind with terible noise.

In one hand she held a huge dildo and as she twirled and slithered in the dance she rubbed it across her body, and down between her legs. I knew this was madness, that I should not be seeing this, that she should care that I was here but my head banged with the music and I stared.

She beckoned me to enter, and I walked trance-like into her room. I tried to yell over the music that I was looking for someone, and I reached for my wallet to show her the picture. But then she was right next to me, and her body rubbed against mine "No." I thought, "I must ask her, but god this music and my head hurts so bad." All my senses were overloaded, and I felt as if everything was obscured by the fog of pain in my head and the loud pounding of the music.

The stereo was beside me on the dresser and with great effort I reached and turned down the volume of the music, bringing with it some calm to my mind. As the fog cleared a little I nearly collapsed with the sudden pleasure I felt.

While I had fought my inner battle for clarity the woman had freed my cock from my pants and was sucking on it with wild abandon, her eyes looking up at me with no trace of sanity in them. Instead they held a pleading look, a look of such wild need that I nearly cried out in horror.

I wanted to stop her, to shout no, and to flee from the house, but as her head bobbed up and down the blood pounded in my brain. I was lost in indecision, and as I warred with myself, I felt my orgasm rise, and my cum flood into her mouth. I watched her as she sucked my seed down her throat, and then let my softening cock slide from her mouth with a soft pop. I felt the bile rise in my throat, and I choked it back, trying to stumble away from her.