Page 7 of Something Has To Give

Quint didn’t care. He leaned both hands on the edge of the sink and concentrated on breathing. Let her go ahead and think he’d awoken angry. Sheshouldbe afraid he was angry. Hell, he ought to be angry, not sporting the love-log of all erections!

“Jesus, man,” he growled, baring his teeth at his reflection. “Get it together.”

A small fist battered the other side of the door. “You’re not the only one who needs to pee first thing in the morning!”

Quint smacked the door right back. “There’s another bathroom in this house. Find it!”

“Jerk,” she sniffed, and stomped back to the bedroom.

Switching from sink to tub, Quint turned on the shower. Under the hot, pelting spray, he planted one hand against the tiles and vigorously rubbed one out just as fast as he could manage it. He closed his eyes while he did it, trying to see anyone’s face but Elsie’s, but his was the body of a son-of-a-bitch and it kept trying to feel her whisper-soft breaths moving across his chest, the way her fingertips had trailed him on their way to rub the sleep from her eyes and the slow caress of her leg stroking up so sweetly along the underside of his cock.

He swore, gripping hard as pure heat and need shot out through his hips and drizzled into the bottom of the tub. The spasms were beyond pleasurable. He held himself frozen, fighting the urge to keep right on pumping until the final spasm stilled and his seed at last was spent. The spray of water washed both the tiles and his frame, sweeping tell-tale semen down the drain. His eyes closed, Quint kept his forehead pressed to the tile until he could breathe without panting.

That was pathetic. Absolutely pathetic. He was made of stronger stuff than this. She was the enemy who was trying to steal his house out from under him. He did not need to spend his first morning home masturbating furiously to get her out of his system!

A soft bump rattled the bathroom door.

Lifting his head, Quint glared through the plastic shower curtain in that direction. He raised his voice to be heard over the falling water. “I said, use the bathroom downstairs!”

There was no answering reply.

Snorting, Quint straightened up under the spray and finally applied himself to using the shower as it was originally intended. He soaped every inch of himself, shampooed his hair three times and didn’t get out until he had exhausted the hot water supply. She wanted to live here, fine—he shut the water off and got out of the tub, toweling himself vigorously to get dry—but he wasn’t going to make it easy for her. In fact, he was going to make this the most miserable experience of her life. Give him a few days, and she’ll be running to get out of here before the winter snows made it impossible for either one of them to escape the other.

Having escaped to the bathroom without a change of clothes and in nothing but his underwear, Quint pulled his shorts back on and reached for the doorknob. With any luck, Elsie would be downstairs making coffee or breakfast and he’d be able to dash back to the bedroom to get dressed in peace.

Except that the door wouldn’t open.

Quint tugged, turning the old porcelain knob first one way and then the other. The door budged only the merest centimeter and then no more.

“The hell you say,” Quint muttered, tugging again and again, but budging it no further than before. “What the—” He stopped. He thought. “Oh, hell no.”

He searched through the medicine cabinet and the under-the-sink cupboard, then finally rummaged through half of the six shelves that made up a very narrow linen closet located behind the bathroom door. Finally, he found something that would work—one of Maydeen’s many makeup compacts, fallen to the floor and kicked into the very back of the closet where it hadbecome lost and then forgotten. Quint opened it up, laid it flat on the wood-floor slats, and there was just enough room under the door to push it through. He tipped and angled the small mirror until he saw Elsie, propped up against the railing overlooking the stairs. Arms folded across her chest, she gazed down at the small compact, looking smug.

The second thing he saw was the rope. He didn’t know where she’d got it, but she had tied one end to the doorknob and the other to the banister.

“You…bitch,” he said, marveling.

Pushing off the banister, Elsie squatted down over the compact. She hunkered close enough for him to really see her face and then she smiled. Just before she snatched the compact away, she flashed him both middle fingers.

“Who’s the bitch now?” she said, laughing as she walked away.

* * * * *

Nanny Cactus, Nanny Sage, and Nanny Pita (which was really spelled P.I.T.A. and for very good reason) were patiently waiting for their morning milking when Elsie came out onto the back porch.

“There’s my babies,” Elsie greeted as she pulled her coat on. Her breath fogged the air. It was really getting cold here lately. Close as it was to Christmas time, she supposed she shouldn’t be surprised, but then this was supposed to be the desert. If she’d known the days would get as cold in the winter as the nights often were, she’d have picked a more southern highway to get stranded on.

Holding the milking can well up so the bottom wouldn’t tangle with inquisitive little goat horns, she pulled the short stool away from the wall and sat down. Cactus always went first, and from the moment Elsie sat down, she assumed the position with no prompting and waited to be relieved of her swollen discomfort.Of the three, Elsie liked Cactus the most. Cactus made the daily milking chore so much easier because she was so well-behaved.

Sage ran a pretty close second. She tended to lean if Elsie wasn’t paying attention though, and now and then she still lipped at clothing, though she rarely nibbled.

P.I.T.A. not only nibbled, she swallowed.

This morning, however, all three stood in a neat cluster, chewing their cud while they waited for the milking to be done, and now and then, they cast wary glances at the house where muffled cursing could still be heard coming from the upstairs bathroom. Elsie was casting glances now and then, too. Rydecker didn’t seem to be settling down much. Tying him in the bathroom where he couldn’t interfere with her morning had seemed like a good idea at the time, but she was beginning to second-guess herself now. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a whole lot she could do but leave him where he was until he calmed down.Ifhe calmed down…

Taking the milk to the kitchen, she headed back outside again. With collar bells clanking, seven goats came running out of the field to join the three nannies trailing along behind her to the sheds behind the house. Apart from the garage and barn, there were four small outbuildings total. Two she had converted into a chicken coop and goat shed, respectively. A third held the grain for both animals and the fourth she’d pretty much left alone. As she passed out the morning feed, she took a quick count: two billies, three nannies, the pretty spotted female who’d be ready to breed next spring, and Curries 1 thru 4, whom she was going to have to harden her heart against and butcher before winter set in. She gave them each a greeting and friendly petting and when it got to the Curries, she did her best to convince herself that she wasn’t checking to see how plump they were, then she turned her attention to the chickens.

Fifteen hens and two roosters came running the minute they saw her at the door. Spreading the grain mix in a wide arch so everyone would get fed, she gathered the early morning eggs and then headed back to the house.

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