Chapter 15

Luz and Raphael went home the next afternoon -- the birth had been without complications and the baby was a fine, healthy little squirt with big lungs and even premium health insurance wants you in a wheelchair going out the hospital door while the anesthetic is still working. I figured that Luz would be off-line for a couple of weeks, minimum -- and so did everyone else.

Babies cry -- something I find nerve-wracking. Raphael was LOUD! Luz moved into the nursery to be close to him and keep the reaction time down, with Carmen on backup. Carmen wasn't a producer of milk, but she had big chewy nipples and Raphael loved his pacifiers; problem was, he would chew Carmen's nips and she would get hot and horny -- and I would get raped. I know it sounds like I'm complaining, but frankly, the more Raphael chewed, the more I liked it...

Cheryl cleaned up after Luz at Manny's the next day -- and handled his other problem, too. Manny was solicitous and brought Luz some flowers at the house on Wednesday. "I can't do marriage and I can't do babies, but I LOVE that pussy..." he confided in me.

Luz was philosophical about it. "At least he's a regular." Nothing seemed to bother her -- especially if she had a teat in Raphael's mouth.

Thursday evening, I was sitting in my office, hiding from Raphael, when Ted came back from the reception desk of the store. "Woman to see you, Don." I treated Ted as a necessary evil; if he was watching the phone and scheduling calls, the girls were all out and I wasn't doing it...

I went out to the counter and took a look -- nice-looking classical Italian face, tastefully dressed in a little jacket over a thin white halter that showed off some juicy-looking jugs and an above the knee skirt that displayed some curvy, muscular legs. Her feet were in some dressy-looking wedge sandals and she wore an ankle bracelet -- always a draw with me, especially when the ankle looks nice -- and this one did. Nice, wavy dark hair framed that face... She was in her early to mid-thirties, I figured -- the age of chicks I OUGHT to be dating... "Your assistant didn't call..." she said.

"Gladys?" I was floored! This woman looked nothing like the harridan at the free clinic!

"You didn't recognize me? I hope that means I clean up nice..." Gladys smiled winningly.

"There's, uh, no question -- you certainly do!" I exclaimed.

"At work, I need to be motherly and supportive to women and threatening to men -- and I'm pretty practiced at it," she related, "But I'm not a sexless old hag and I'm not a lesbian..."

"Duly noted!" I muttered.

Gladys gave me a sultry sidelong glance, "Then my efforts weren't wasted. I came to see your little empire..."

"Who's in?" I asked Ted.

Ted glanced up at the board. "Darla. Cheryl and Evvie are out. Luz, too, naturally..." Ted was organized -- and persnickety about it -- I had to give him that. He had a whiteboard up with magnetic markers to indicate where people were and a log of addresses -- all kinds of stuff.

"Let Darla know Gladys is here. Luz, too, for that matter." I returned my attention to Gladys, "It's a cleaning business."

Gladys cocked her head. "Don, I told you a long time ago that I'm not a cop."

I shrugged. "I have to protect my people. This is a business that contracts cleaning, hospitality, and some other personal services. I have partners and I have employees, and they don't need to lose their jobs or their investment in our future because I claimed something else." I waved her along with me. "Let's go upstairs and see Luz and Darla and we can talk about things." Once in the stairwell, I said, "I made a rule that we never discuss 'extras' in the office. We don't contract for 'extras' in the office -- the employee on site does that or we call back from a disposable phone or whatever. As long as the business is sacrosanct, I can protect the girls. If one gets picked up, I'm her employer, not her pimp. If someone comes here and wants to look at the books, they're all above board. We charge an hourly rate for cleaning and hospitality services that varies a little bit based upon how messy things are. Sex is nowhere on the written schedule of services. In-house, the only sex that goes on is between us -- we don't entertain on-site."

"Maybe you should have patted me down for a wire," Gladys suggested.

I stopped dead on the stair. "You'd like that, wouldn't you?"

"The girls sold me in Luz's hospital room, Don. I'm too old to pussyfoot around. Yes, you're in the crosshairs," Gladys declared.

I shook my head. "I never cease to be amazed."

"There's something else," she added. "I always wanted to be a madam -- only I wanted to do for the girls what YOU'RE doing for them. I see so many come and go and life is just too hard on them. Pimps are just too hard on them."

I blinked. "Were you ever in the business?"

"Once, for a very short time. I just had to have the rent money and an opportunity came my way. The people involved knew I was an amateur and paid extra for me to make it personal, not a trick. It was less than a week, but I learned a lot -- including how you get ripped off." Gladys smiled crookedly. "I made the rent, though."

I nodded and turned to finish climbing the stair. At the landing, I made to open the door, but Gladys grabbed my wrist. "Are you SURE you don't want to check me for a wire?"

I frowned. "Either you want to be felt up badly or you're hinting broadly that I've already screwed up. I have no problem feeling up women, but stairwells are a little too, I dunno, impersonal. If I'm in trouble, it would be good to know it."

Gladys sighed. "Okay, there's no wire -- I promise."

"Okay. I'll make a point of feeling you up, somewhere. Deal?"

"Deal."

I turned away, rolling my eyes. When did I become absolutely irresistible to women? At least Gladys made sense -- she was my age and her options were no doubt limited by her everyday persona. Carmen did NOT make sense -- but it didn't stop her from finding her way into my bed and going nuts on my cock on a regular basis.

The women had gathered in the living room; I settled back in my recliner and let Luz and Darla be absolutely candid about what went on around the house and in the business. Gladys was fascinated. Carmen came in and she and Gladys took one look at one another and it was clear even to me that there was a fight over territoriality in the making. Carmen saw Gladys as a threat, and Gladys saw Carmen as the competition -- which begged the question, "What are Darla and Luz? Chopped liver?" The reaction was totally different...

I got up and took Gladys on a tour of the place, pointing out the room where Cheryl's girls slept and the nursery... "And this is Carmen's room..." I muttered.

"Where do Luz and Darla sleep?" Gladys asked. "And Cheryl?"

"Uh, with me..."

"Uh huh..." Gladys eyed me. "How long has it been since Carmen slept here?"

"I'm, uh, not sure. Luz slept here for the last couple of days, I think, but she said something about it being lonesome..."

"Uh huh..."

We moved on. "This is, uh, the master suite..." I muttered.

"Two beds pushed together? What are those, queens? You STUD, you!" Gladys simpered.

"I usually get the crack..."

"I bet you get more than one crack..."

I hunched my shoulders and let it pass. As we headed back down to the living room, Gladys said, "It isn't going to happen here, is it?"

"No."

"Okay. Have you had dinner yet?"

"Well, no..."

"Can I blackmail you into taking me out?"

So when we hit the living room, I announced, "I'm taking Gladys to dinner."

Luz looked up. "Okay, Boss. I don't think anyone is cooking. Darla just left. Have a good time; Gladys is nice people." But she looked behind me.

I didn't -- I kept my eyes straight ahead and marched out of there.

Gladys suggested a good, middle-of-the-road Italian place. Inside, she took off her little jacket, which exposed enough of her to make me wonder if she could come out of that top by accident, and she enjoyed my reaction as we ate and drank wine and talked. When we'd shooed off the waiter and his dessert menu, she leaned up and murmured, "Not here, either, huh?"

"Too public," I sighed.

"My place?" she asked.

"If I stay overnight, I might as well have brought you home -- in fact, it would be better if I did, rather than sneaking around," I said quietly.

"She can't expect to monopolize you."

"Neither can you."

"She's what, eighteen? She'll recover. She has her whole life ahead of her. Too much of mine is behind me."

"I keep telling her that."

"So..."

"So we go home and face the music. It's straight up or not at all," I declared.

"Very well -- take me home, then, Don," Gladys insisted.

It took Carmen about six seconds to find us in the living room. Luz sat there, rocking the baby, and nodded to herself. I wondered what it was about until Carmen said, "Luz said you would be back, with or without her."

"Luz is anything but stupid," I agreed.

"Luz said I shouldn't be stupid, either," Carmen said, eyeing me carefully.

"Like I said..."

"I just don't understand," Carmen protested, "She's..."

"My age?" I cut her off.

"Sweetie, you're sharing Don now -- what's one more? I can't be any more possessive than you are," Gladys insisted. "Maybe it won't work -- in which case, you lose nothing. Maybe it will -- in which case your piece gets just a little smaller -- but Don has plenty..."

"They were here first," Carmen objected.

"And they accepted you, didn't they? Even helped, I bet. Don tried to be noble, didn't he?" Gladys asked.

"Yeah..." Carmen seemed to deflate.

"Okay, then. Fair is fair. Give an old woman a shot at happiness."

"All right." Carmen turned and padded out.

"Where can we sit?" Gladys asked, backing into me. "The recliner?"

"No," I shook my head. "That's..."

"Carmen's," Gladys finished. I nodded.

"Help me up, Boss -- time to put Raphael in his crib." He was still attached to Luz's nipple, but she was offering a solution, so I went over to help. Gladys took the other side and we got Luz onto her feet without disturbing her precious cargo. "Carmen will be okay," was Luz's parting shot.

We settled onto the couch and turned off the lights and set the TV on low and I proceeded to do a very thorough job of feeling Gladys up. She had great feeling breasts; they wouldn't look incredibly hot, but they felt great in your hand, soft and squeezable, with gristly nipples and big areolas that crinkled down to half the original size when she was aroused. She had a hungry, demanding mouth, too, that wanted my tongue and wanted it to play with hers. It took her a while to get up the nerve to reach for my cock, but once she did, she couldn't leave it alone -- and I found the inside of her slit to be wet and slick and ready. "I want it all," she whispered, moaning softly. "Take me to bed."

But Carmen was in bed, reading -- or pretending to -- clearly proud of herself for shutting off access. "Have you ever made love to a man with another woman in the bed?" she asked, her eyes glinting maliciously.

"Only a couple of times," Gladys replied, surprising us both, "But they were memorable. Take my clothes off, Don, then I'll get yours." Gladys returned her attention to Carmen, "Come on, you don't sleep in that nightgown -- and you CERTAINLY don't have sex in it..." She then demanded my attention with her lips and I tried to give her everything she wanted while tugging her out of that halter top and skirt.

When I finished and she went to work on me, she backed off to do it; the first thing I saw when I glanced away was Carmen sitting on the bed, naked and nervous. I didn't blame her; I wasn't sure where this was going. I returned my attention to Gladys and enjoyed her efforts. Her approach wasn't the same as when I removed her things and we pretended that she needed distraction. Instead, she was doing this for me, more or less ceremoniously, as a service. As she was helping me out of my pants, she looked up and said, "Don't let her go, Don."

Carmen stopped; she'd gotten up and was headed for the door, her nightgown in her hand. Her eyes were wet. "You want me to watch?"

Gladys looked at her and said, "No, I want you to help. We have to share -- you know that. There are only so many like Don to go around. Come here and help. Do you suck him? Sure you do -- and I bet Darla and Luz taught you some tricks, didn't they? Will you teach me?"

Somehow, it was as simple as that. Carmen knelt beside her and dropped the nightgown on the floor and took my half-hard cock in her hand and said, "He likes this..." -- and they were off! I had a pair of lips on either side of my shaft -- which is a kick to watch, if nothing else, but they were making it work, too. Somehow, I managed not to erupt during this and we moved to the bed and I sank myself into Gladys while kissing Carmen and stroked her for a bit before Gladys put up her hands and croaked, "Now Carmen..." So I shifted out, and the respite let me get control of myself. Somewhere in there the girls decided that it was all right for them to kiss each other -- something Darla and Luz had never done with me -- or Cheryl either, for that matter. Usually, if one of them wanted sex, the others just hung back and let it happen -- but then, Carmen HAD been somewhat more demanding and more prone to want something after I finished with someone else. The others... well, they were hooking, after all... I started moving back and forth when it started getting way too good -- being able to bring one of them to orgasm before a move was asking a bit, initially, but I succeeded, first with Gladys, and then with Carmen. Once started, they seemed perfectly happy to kiss one another and suck each other's nipples, as well as presenting them to me.

I was probably in the saddle for thirty minutes; I know that by the time I let go in Gladys, I felt like I'd run a marathon. I'd had plenty of time to prime the pump, too, so I unloaded both balls in long, hard squirts. Gladys' eyes popped, "Oh, Jesus! I can feel it! What a load!" Then she got a little quiver -- I think it was another small orgasm.

Once I was done pumping, I lost the high I was running and stopped being Superman -- abruptly. I collapsed like a puppet with cut strings. I flopped down atop Gladys, soaked in her comforting warmth and softness and went out like a light, basically without transition. I awoke some time later because I had to take a serious leak and because Cheryl was crawling into bed. "Who's this?" she whispered as I untangled myself.

"This is Gladys -- long story," I whispered. "She works at the free clinic. You met her at the hospital, I think."

"Oh, yeah, I remember," Cheryl nodded. "She looks different with her hair down."

"Yeah." I waved Cheryl back out into the hall. "How is everything?"

"I'm the last one in. No problems. Had a good customer. Ted and Evelyn closed up and went home."

"Okay, I've got to pee. Save a place for me." I went off to handle nature's call. When I came back, I crawled up from the bottom of the bed to the vicinity of Gladys and Carmen -- and Gladys made sure I spooned Carmen then came in behind. Aside from a couple of howling attacks from Raphael, that was that.

I had to get out the door to work in the morning and I was the only one, but, as usual, somebody got up to get me fed and out the door. This morning, that person was Darla. Gladys got up, too, and Carmen padded out into the kitchen while I was drinking coffee -- and made it clear that the conflict between her and Gladys was over by rubbing her shoulder as she passed on the way to the refrigerator and Luz's breast milk. Gladys went down and out with me. "So..." she murmured when we were down in the lobby, "It took a while, but..."

"Yeah." Shit, where did I go with this?

"Don, I know I'm pushing, but everything I see makes me want more. The girls were right -- you're... unique. I want to see you again," Gladys declared.

"Well, it's mutual," I agreed, "But there is a lot going on. I don't want to drag you in and then make you feel... slighted."

"You need help," she declared. "I'd like to do that, too."

"Aren't you busy? You have that night job..."

"That's one night a week," she replied dismissively, "and the pay sucks. Please?"

"Okay," I replied, hoping I wouldn't regret it.

"I'll be back tonight around six." She gave me a peck on the cheek and headed off.

I waited until around noon and called the house. Darla answered. "So, who's around?" I asked.

"Just about everybody," Darla answered. "Luz and Cheryl and I -- and Carmen."

"Can you get them? Put this on speaker?"

"Sure..." In a moment, she came back. "Okay, the gang's all here..."

"Gladys wants to help," I said without preamble. "I don't know what 'help' means, actually, but she said at one point that she wanted to be a madam. Something about helping girls she sees at the clinic."

"Well, she's never hooked..." Darla murmured.

"Actually, she said to me that she did a little amateur hooking once," I advised. "Not anything serious or lengthy, just a one-shot deal over a week or so to pay the rent."

"It's not a career, but she probably learned a few things," Cheryl opined. "I haven't been at it that long -- and I thank God I have Darla and Luz to give me help and advice."

"What about the other piece, Boss? She was a party in your pants last night, right?" Luz asked.

"Well, yeah. Carmen wasn't thrilled, though," I admitted.

"No, she's okay," Carmen replied. "I thought you liked her."

"Well, I do, but everybody is pretty cool right now and I don't want trouble in the house."

"Donnie, either you want her around or you don't. We can handle it, one way or the other," Darla pressed.

"Okay, I like her. But we're already packed pretty tight..."

"We need to redo the master bedroom and double it up, anyway," Darla opined. "Maybe Gladys can help."

"I have to stop taking women into my bed sometime," I muttered.

"Yeah, but you could at least CHOOSE one, rather than having her chosen for you!" Cheryl retorted. "I just wandered in, and you took on Darla and Luz because -- and Carmen is SUPPOSED to be the babysitter. If you like Gladys, at least it's your choice!"

"Well, she's kind of pushy, but it's a compliment, you know? I like talking to her and I like having her around..."

"Then don't over-analyze things, Donnie. We like Gladys -- even Carmen does," Darla replied. "And who knows -- maybe she CAN help!"

"Okay, well, she'll be back this evening -- I don't know what she expects to do," I warned them.