By the time we had both completely released our tension the water had cooled so we got out, toweled off and headed for bed. Bruno was asleep in his doggy bed already as Braden and I snuggled in and fell asleep holding each other.
* * *
The sound of Braden’s cell phone on the bedside table woke us up the next morning. He reached over to pick it up as I groggily glanced at the clock. It was 9a.m. We had slept really late. It sounded like he was talking to either Adam or Mark.
“It’s on now? Okay, yeah. I’ll call you later.” He hung up and reached for the remote to the TV mounted on the wall. “Apparently an underground sex party got raided last night and a few notable local personalities were picked up.”
“A few?” Who had been there besides Cole, I wondered. Braden clicked on the news and we sat watching in shock as the full story unfolded.
Police say that the raid was the result of an ongoing investigation into the operation of illegal sex parties.
“Ongoing investigation my ass!” I said angrily. Braden shushed me.
Among those arrested were Pennsylvania State Representative Cole Stephenson. There was a shot of Cole with his head down walking to a car flanked by a couple of high-priced local defense attorneys. Socialite, Marla Benton…
“Marla was there! She must have been working the party!” It was a nice added bonus.
And society matron Veronica Mason, who may possibly have been the organizer of the party, known as Fanny Hill.
“Mrs. Mason! Holy shit! The whole gang was there!” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
“Well, it looks like you’ll get access to handwriting samples from all three of your suspects. I’m sure they wrote out some kind of statement. If not, though, I’ll get a subpoena. It shouldn’t be too hard now.”
“I’ll give Steve Flynn a call and see what the earliest he’ll be looking at them would be. I’m not expecting today, since it’s Sunday.”
I was wrong though. Steve was available later that afternoon if we could get something from the arrest the previous night. Braden got on the phone with his office and found out that all three had made brief written statements, so the samples were ours. We made arrangements to meet Steve at the Roundhouse, Philadelphia police headquarters at three.
“I can’t believe that nasty frigid woman was hosting sex parties,” Braden said, shaking his head.“I hope it doesn’t reflect badly on the foundation that she was a donor.”
“I doubt it, but it will give Alan something to keep him busy.” I remembered how stressed he had seemed when the journalists started questioning him about my dad and I felt kind of sorry for him. But then that was his job.
“What do you think will happen to them?”
“I think they’ll hire high-priced defense lawyers, who aren’t half as good as public defenders, but who will still manage to get them off with probation. Then I’m sure that all three will write books that will hit the New York Times bestseller list and they’ll do the talk show circuit. It’s probably the best thing that’s ever happened to them.”
“Poor Felicity.”
“Oh come on Gabrielle. She can’t stand her mother and this will probably make her the coolest Goth chick on the scene.”
“Maybe you’re right. Now that the letter writer is probably in custody, do you still want to get married?”
“For the final time, yes! Don’t you?”
“Yes, definitely. I love you and I’m sure that I want to be with you. I’m just still kind of shocked that it happened so fast.”
“I’m not. I knew from the first date too.”
“You did?”
“Yeah, do you want to hear about it from my perspective?”
“Actually I do. The male mind fascinates me. So tell me about our first date through your eyes.”
“The first thing I noticed, being male, was that you looked incredibly hot. You’re very attractive dressed for court, but with your hair down, dressed in a short skirt with bare legs, you look amazing.”
“I would have thought you would have noticed that my shirt kind of showed off my boobs.”
“That goes without saying. You know how I feel about those.” He glanced down happily for a moment and then continued, “I could feel the sexual tension between us and it was turning me on from the very beginning.”
“I could feel it too.”
“I probably would have been totally distracted by thoughts of nailing you, if it weren’t for the fact that you said that you liked walking in the city in the evening because you always felt like something exciting was about to happen. I just found that really cool and I couldn’t think of anybody else who would say something like that.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, and then when you told me later that you wanted to have hot sweaty monkey sex with me, that was it. I was done for and I knew it.”
“I’m sure lots of women have made you that offer.”
“Not that way.” He laughed. “And we talked for hours and found out that we had a lot in common. The biggest thing, though, was the places you took me. Anybody who could see true quality beyond superficial appearances was one classy chick in my opinion. And I could also see that you were a kind person without being condescending.”
“That’s so sweet. I knew you were a classy guy, and a good one, from how you acted in court.” “Last but not least, when I kissed you and you were so responsive, you almost drove me out of my mind. In another five minutes I probably would have begged you to invite me in. And speaking of inviting me in, my morning friend is visiting.” He gave me a slightly lecherous smile. Bruno didn’t even stir. He had become so accustomed to Mommy and Daddy having hot sweaty monkey sex that it didn’t even phase him anymore.
Later that day we sat across from Steve Flynn as he carefully examined the samples.
“What do you think?” I asked.
“Well, I can’t be one hundred percent certain, of course, but it’s my opinion this note was not written by any of these three people. I don’t have the original from New York for comparison yet, but what I see in the facsimile just confirms that. Your anonymous letter writer is likely a different individual.”
I was stunned. I was so sure that it was one of those three. All kinds of thoughts raced through my head. How had some other person even known we were together? What was their motive? How had they known where we were in New York? For a brief second Cam came to mind. He had confessed that he was still attracted to me but he had sounded completely sincere about being happy for us. No, it wasn’t Cam. My gut told me it wasn’t. So, who was it then?