A Grave Mistake. Stella Cameron

      “Did you do it?”

      Laura closed the bedroom door and gave a smile her best shot. “I haven’t—no, I can’t do it.” Wes was an angel, a tough angel and her drug of choice. And even after she’d been married to him for seven years he could still frighten her. “Everyone’s gone but one of the nurses.”

      Wes gave her an open-handed slap on the shoulder and sent her sprawling over the shoes he’d taken off and onto the floor by the bed.

      She could tell him Daddy would punish him if he knew, and she’d be right, but Wes would only beat her in places that didn’t show until she was too cowed to fight back.

      The anticipation made her shiver. They danced to different beats. Wes got off on pushing her around, then turning into a whimpering puppy. Fortunately, Laura preferred the opposite scenario.

      The perfect couple.

      He kicked her hip. “Don’t look at me like that. I gave you one little job to do and, as usual, you let me down. I hate the sight of you. It’s about time you stopped dyeing your hair red. It makes you look so old.”

      “I don’t dye it.”

      “What’s so hard about paying someone off and making sure you’ve got enough on ’em so they never come back—or talk out of school?”

      Wes was a looker and he knew it. He swaggered, even at times like now when he was barefoot and wearing nothing but a pair of black bikini briefs.

      She made herself look straight into his green eyes. “If it’s so easy, why don’t you do it?”

      He kicked her again.

      Laura curled her legs tightly. She’d have blood-filled bruises by morning.

      The membership in a high-class New Orleans gym, a personal trainer who worked Wes over every day, and lifetime access to a tanning bed kept him bulked up and bronzed. When he smiled, he flashed white teeth. He kept his dark brown hair cut short and carefully gelled up to camouflage a thinning area.

      “Give her money,” Wes said. “I already said you could have as much as it takes. It’ll be a lot less than you think because there’s no way she understands what she could get. You’ve seen how he is with her. I want her out of our lives before he gets into her pants, and she gets into the will.”

      “I don’t believe she would sleep with him. She’s got other interests.” And Laura also thought Jilly had a real honor and honesty about her.

      “What other interests?”

      “Some man who works for Homer Devol out at the gas station.”

      Wes laughed. He stood close to Laura, close enough that the toes of his right foot slid easily upward, between her thighs to her butt, then forward where he could always get a reaction.

      She didn’t try to stop him.

      “A gas jockey is going to hold her interest when Daddy waves the big green bills in front of her face?” he said. “I don’t think so. In fact I’d put money on my Daddy fuckin’ her whenever he decides the moment is right. And she’ll be good. She’s got that thing about her. You can feel it.”

      Laura stared up at him. “Can you? I think you feel that something every time you see a nice ass.”

      “Could be.” He laughed and flexed his shoulders and arms. “But we’re talkin’ about a piece of ass that Daddy intends to get. This time won’t be like the others. He wants her to make him feel like he’s gettin’ fresh Edith all over again. It excites him. I’ve seen sweat when she’s mentioned and Daddy doesn’t sweat.”

      “Sick,” Laura muttered.

      Wes snickered. “Yeah, well you might know about that. We’re goin’ to make a plan, you and me. Our future could depend on it.”

      Laura grabbed his ankle, yanked his foot from between her legs and jerked it upward. All in one motion. Wes lost his balance and fell backward onto the carpet with a loud-enough thud to bring a “Shush” to Laura’s lips.

      “Bitch!”

      “Bastard.”

      Wes pushed up on his elbows. “Where’s Daddy now?”

      “He’s got a cot in Edith’s room.”

      “Cute. He’s not going to hear us from there.”

      Laura turned her mouth down at the corners and got to her feet. “On your knees,” she told him. She stuck out her tongue and wiggled it.

      Under the tan, Wes turned pale. His eyes looked suddenly feverish and moisture glistened on his forehead.

      The black briefs didn’t stop any movement down there. He was long and thick—that was one of the things she had married him for. That and the money. And she loved him.

      With his eyes at the level of her breasts, he pumped his hips up and down from the floor.

      “You know what you have to do,” she told him. “On your knees, now.”

      Wes followed orders quickly this time and knelt there demurely with his hands clasped over his crotch.

      “Have you gotten better at speaking nicely to me?”

      He shook his head. “You’ll have to make me.”

      Laura went into the closet and returned with a box she’d taken from the top shelf. From inside she pulled out a full helmet fashioned like a metal cage and snapped it open from hinges on top. The contraption slid easily over Wes’s head—it ought to, it had been made for him. A small key locked the leather neck band on both sides.

      “I’m going to have to punish you again. This time I won’t stop until you promise to do whatever I ask you to do.” She poked a finger through the bars, directly at his eye but stopped just short of jabbing him with her fingernail. “Hiss.”