“Oh, yes, Tom. Oh, yes. Rub there, darlin’. Right there.”
Tom Huff sat forward in his high-backed desk chair, rapture clouding his eyes, his right hand having wandered expertly up the skirt of his executive assistant, Daisy Ledet. This was a fairly typical day in the executive chambers at Big Tex since Daisy's arrival. Tom and Daisy had worked out a routine. It was a discreet though not totally secretive routine, thus mildly dangerous, too, assuming a person wished to avoid being caught by an extremely volatile wife (as Huff most certainly did). Still, he had come to grips with the fact that it was the risk—and possible rewards—that made the routine all the more alluring.
And Huff was certainly hoping to score big-time with Daisy—though here was the funny thing: he hadn't yet.
Oh, he'd gotten way past second base many, many times and was thrown out once trying to slide into third.
Still, this was a matter of no inconsiderable joy. For Daisy had often provided Huff relief in a way that he had not been relieved since, well, since he'd parked one dark night in a Texas cotton field with Mary Jo Porter, the fat girl who was about the only date he could get in high school. Now, at first he'd felt a little foolish about what he and Daisy did, since it did seem like regression into juvenile behavior. But Daisy had this way—well, she'd come up with this thing she called “Daisy's Hot Oil Treatment,” and truth be told, the woman had skillful hands.
In fact, her skills made Huff wonder what other tricks of this nature Daisy might have up her sleeve. He was keen to find out.
Here was their routine: they would work through the normal lunch hour. Then Daisy would enter Huff 's office, as she had done on this very day, and allow herself to be fondled (but not undressed) for about ten minutes. Then they would drive in separate cars to the Oaks, arriving after most of the lunch crowd emptied out. After lunch, which lasted exactly thirty minutes, they would leave about five minutes apart. Taking different routes, they would arrive at Daisy's house. Huff would pull the Escalade—though it was a tight fit—into her garage, which Daisy opened with a push-button gizmo clamped to the visor of her black 1994 Nissan Sentra. Huff would hit a switch that closed the door behind him and then enter the house from the garage into the kitchen.
Daisy would meet him and fondle him, usually getting his trousers down around his cowboy boots in a minute or less. With her help, Huff would waddle into the bedroom and sit on the edge of Daisy's oversized brass bed, where he would shuck the rest of his clothes. Daisy would then undress, but—thus far at least—only down to the girdle she always wore. This girdle was a frustrating mystery to Huff, as he was of the opinion that Daisy required no outboard appliances to improve (and certainly not constrain) her voluptuous figure.
Then there would begin some variety of sexual hijinks, usually, but not always, ending in the Daisy Hot Oil Treatment.
A lot of surprisingly naughty talk accompanied these sessions, and Huff, who had almost never done more than grunted during sex, would find himself shouting things like, “I'm gonna ride you one day like a cowboy on a buckin’ bronc!”
To which Daisy would respond with things like, “You will, cowboy! I want your spurs in my flank!”
Huff usually did not last very long after such an exchange, as Daisy always took advantage of his super-aroused state to (as she put it) put him out of his misery in some clever way. There was a point when Huff realized that he was being reduced, sexually speaking, to a quivering schoolboy—and was equally disturbed to discover that he didn't really mind.
Now, Huff had always had huge disdain for those transparent hounds like Juke Charpentier who seemed to lead their messy lives with their peckers. But he realized that in Daisy he might have met his sexual match—even if they had not had real sex yet. And he had a very clear picture in his mind of what real sex would be—and he wanted to be wearing a cowboy hat, boots, and spurs when he did it!
When he confronted Daisy about the girdle issue, she explained that she, being actually modest and shy in the sex department, was “saving herself ” for Huff for just the right moment. The girdle, thus, was worn mostly as a foil to ensure that this most magical and excruciatingly anticipated moment would not be ruined by a premature lapse on her part. (Huff might have realized he was in way over his head when, uncharacteristically, he found Daisy's reasoning oddly touching.)
Daisy and Tom had followed their routine to the letter on this very day; the office groping, the quick lunch, and the finale at Daisy's house. Huff had been put out of his misery more quickly than usual, this by a shockingly unexpected yet pleasing application of whipped cream. And then, as was also part of their routine, Tom and Daisy cuddled up and began talking.
“How was that, Tom?” Daisy asked. It was almost always her first question.
Huff answered as he always did. “You know I like what you do, darlin’. I just want more. I want the real thing.”
Daisy, as she always did, tousled Huff 's hair, which took Huff some getting used to as it played havoc with his combover. “Oh,” she replied, “there's lots more where that came from. You just wait and see. Daisy will show you.” Then she giggled.
Now, here was the only mildly annoying thing about Daisy, in Huff 's mind. God, the woman loved to talk, and she had this thing about referring to herself in the third person. When she wasn't primping, powdering her nose, or adjusting her girdle, she was talking and saying things like “Daisy thinks this” or “Daisy was just wondering.” Huff had gently suggested to Daisy that she might not overuse this endearing little tic, but such suggestions seemed to go right over her head.
Actually, there were a few other mildly annoying things about Daisy. At work, for example, she did not quite achieve Louella's efficiency. In fact, she didn't even come close. Her typing skills were abysmal, her dictation laugh able; she had not yet, after numerous and patient explanations by Huff, figured out how to transfer a phone call. Even her Xeroxes were crooked.
On the plus side, she was a lot more cheerful than Louella. And at least, as part of her incessant need to talk, Daisy to her credit spent a lot of time talking about him.
In fact, Daisy, though her knowledge of the Oil Patch was about an inch and a half deep, seemed to love Huff 's stories of his take-no-prisoners corporate philosophy. She thrilled to them—couldn't get enough. She peppered him constantly with questions, which, though it seemed to him he'd answered them several times before, went to the core of what made Huff such an effective executive—a linebacker among the titans of the Oil Patch.
Now, at first this linebacker analogy had been wasted on Daisy, as she did not follow football. But once she grasped the fundamentals—that, as a linebacker, Huff pummeled his opponents until he got his way—she'd latched on to it with the tenacity of a snapping turtle. In fact, she was always asking him to “tell me a linebacker story, Tom.”
Huff was almost always happy to oblige. He'd gone all the way back to his Alaska days, when he was able to convince a downtrodden Eskimo village to sign away some highly valuable and controversial drilling rights on their native caribou-hunting grounds; oh, he'd paid a pretty penny for them (an unlimited whisky budget and Ford Explorers for the local chief and his seven sons). But mostly he took immense satisfaction in the fact that the Sierra Club had spent four or five years trying to convince the natives that drilling would be a scar upon their pristine ecosystem. (What scar? The place was ugly-ass, frozen, barren tundra, forgodsakes!)
And of course, not wanting to run short of stories, he'd brought Daisy up to date on his recent quarterback blitz that had sacked Justin Pitre (“That sorry coonass never knew what hit him!”).
Today, Daisy's question was similar and, Huff thought, more perceptive than usual. Of course, she'd been on the job for a while now. “Tom, how come Big Tex pays so much in taxes? I was going through the mail the other day and, well, saw the tax bill and my mouth just fell open.”
Huff chuckled. “Hell, now you don't want to get me started on that one, Daisy. The damned government soaks us to death. Between taxes and the cost of regulation, we're lucky we come out a nickel ahead.”
“It doesn't seem fair,” Daisy said.
“Fair? Hell, since when is the government fair? The government is a lib eral conspiracy to relieve the working man and the entrepreneur of his money and buy welfare votes with it. That's why, if you're in my position, you've got to do anything you can to try to lower your exposure. Hell, Daisy, take pollution control alone—if you followed the letter of the law, it would cost enough to break a lot of small companies. But, 'tween us chickens, we've got a little money-savin’ project goin’ on with that as well.”
“You do?”
“Damn straight, I do. Let's just call it another investment, but we've figgered how to cut our waste-disposal costs by about three fourths. Under all these rules, we're supposed to be truckin’ every bit of our drilling waste way upstate to a bureaucratically controlled dump where the guy who holds the EPA permit commits bank robbery every time we deliver a load. Makes not a lick of sense. So we've just found a place a tad closer.” He chuckled again.
“Is that what you pay B.J. Duplessis to do?”
Huff found himself mildly startled by this question. He hesitated to answer.
Daisy giggled. “Oh, Tom, I'm sorry. I'm not tryin’ to be snoopy, but you know, I do go through all the bills now, and, well, Daisy's heard her linebacker say a few things now and then, and, well, Daisy might not look so smart to Tom but Daisy can put one and one together.”
Huff propped himself up on an elbow and looked at his beauty with newfound appreciation. “Well, darlin’, aren't you somethin’. And, listen, Uncle Tom here would never think of Daisy as anything but the clever gal she is. Me and ole B.J. have figgered out a nice plan. He makes a little money and I save a helluva lot. We simply opened our own little dump on some marshland a little closer to town. You spent much time out in the marsh, Daisy?”
“Ugh, no,” Daisy replied. “Marsh smells! I don't want to go near it.”
“There ya go. Made my point for me. If there weren't any oil under it, the marsh would be completely worthless. Now, this is all really 'tween us chickens 'cause it is true that certain kinds of do-gooders and bureaucrats, if they found out about this, might try to make a stink.”
Daisy spoke with a voice rich with concern. “Oh, Tom, of course, Daisy totally understands.”
“Anyway,” Huff went on, “I got it rigged so that if somethin’ does happen, B.J.'ll take the rap. Don't get me wrong—I like B.J. He's somethin’ else, and about the only Cajun I get along with. But if push comes to shove, it won't be Tom who gets shoved.” He laughed uproariously.
Daisy batted her big brown eyes at her man. “I'm a Cajun, Tom,” she replied in her sexiest voice, “and I do think you get along with Daisy. In fact, I'm sure of it.”
Then Daisy ran her hand slowly over the rounded contours of Huff 's paunch and very soon surrounded her quarry.
Daisy's hands were always so nice and warm.
“Oh, yes, darlin’,” Huff said, closing his eyes and hearing the faraway call of arousal. “Tom does get along with Daisy.”
In closing his eyes, Huff didn't see Daisy frown, or adjust her girdle in an odd way.
Daisy, in fact, did like her Tom, liked him more and more every day. Daisy liked the way her Tom thought. Daisy didn't like regulation, either. Certain people had quoted regulations and laws to Daisy as a way of making her feel bad about things she'd done. But Daisy knew she'd done nothing wrong.
Daisy also knew Tom might not like Daisy so well if he knew the real reason she'd kept her girdle on. These same people—bad people—were making Daisy do things that Daisy would rather not do.
No, Tom could never be allowed to see her secret—the thing she had hidden in her girdle.