Bidding War (32 page)

When she broke the kiss, she stared into my eyes, still holding my face so I couldn't look away. My eyes flicked back and forth between hers.

"That was just a kiss," she said quietly. "Thank you for the lovely meal. It was amazing."

Then she released me and wriggled into a more comfortable position, leaving an arm around my shoulders and inviting me to give her my hand.

We sat like that for a few minutes, cuddling and drinking our coffee. My heart slowly calmed down, but I was nervous, more nervous than I had been while cooking.

"Gwendolyn-"

"Shhh," she said. "I am digesting."

"Gwendolyn-"

"Shhh."

"I'm scared."

She sighed.

"I am on the edge of panic," I said. I was. I didn't know what I was doing, but I had a pretty good idea what she was doing.

"Pamela," she said quietly. "We are just sitting on the sofa like we have before."

"I know, but I know what you want next."

"Dessert."

"You want me for dessert."

"I want that lovely chocolate torte you promised me. And a game of go."

"With a wager?"

"A fun wager. Playful. You'll like losing."

I laughed, then sobered. "So you don't want me for dessert?"

"I don't want anything you don't give me willingly," she said. "As far as I am concerned, you could kick me out this minute and I would feel you had more than given me my money's worth from the auction. I thought the most I would get were three chaste goodnight kisses plus maybe a few stolen ones, for which you would berate me terribly."

"So you wouldn't be hurt if I sent you away?"

"Yes, I would, especially if I thought you did it because you were afraid of me." She paused. "If all you want from this moment forward is friendship, then friendship is what we will have. But if you chase me out now, friendship might be difficult. It might be easier after dessert and a game of go."

I laughed.

"I have no intention of chasing you out." I paused. "Go slowly, okay?"

"I am. And playfully. Is that all right?"

"Playfully is good." I snuggled into her a little. "What is the wager?"

"You said playfully is good." She paused. "If I win, you will allow me to tie your hands together."

"No!"

"If you win, I will do anything you order until it is time for me to leave."

I thought about it. "Anything?"

"Anything that remains between the two of us and isn't foolish." She paused. "I won't let you tie me up though. I'm not sure I would respond well."

"Just tie my hands together. Not to anything else, not taking clothes off, not trying my legs?"

"Right."

I thought some more. "If I thought I had a remote chance of winning, I'd say yes."

"Thirteen stones."

That shut me up for a moment before I asked. "Seriously?"

"Yes."

"Are you letting me win?"

"Honestly, I don't know," she said. "It depends on how well you took to the lesson I just gave you. I would have beaten you last weekend at thirteen stones, fairly easily. I have absolutely no idea now though." She paused. "I would still win at nine."

"Are you going to be upset if I win?"

"No. Will you try to enjoy it if I do?"

"Yes. All right. Thirteen stones." I sighed. "I really am not very good at this game."

"You'll get better fast. You're smart, and you understand it better than most beginners. Even if I win today, I'll never give you thirteen stones again and expect to win. We'll have to keep future wagers at nine stones and tame until you start winning a few."

"This wager isn't tame."

"It is, in a way. I'm not making you get naked for me. I am only tying your hands. You can still tell me 'no' afterwards."

I thought about it. "I don't want to go straight from our game to bed. I want more of an evening than that."

She thought about it for a moment. "Do you have more ways you wanted to show me that you can take care of me?"

"Yes. I wanted you to see that there is more to a relationship than sex. I wanted to do something simple, like watch a movie. A non-porn movie."

She laughed.

"Or play a game without any sexual undercurrents. No wagers."

She thought about it for a while, then pulled me to another heart-pounding-inducing kiss. When she released me from the kiss, she said, "You've already given me a taste of all that. It's my turn to give you a taste."

"I still am not sure."

"I know. So, dessert. Go. Wagers. Then we see. We might end up with a very frivolous evening and end as friends, not lovers."

"You don't believe that."

She smiled. "Neither do you."

I got up from the sofa, and she followed me. We returned to the kitchen, and I began whipping the sweet cream. It took several minutes before it was ready. I took out the torte, added the cream in little puffs around the edges, then cut it. I poured ganache on two desert plates, added a piece of the torte, then drizzled more ganache over the top. Gwendolyn watched the entire process.

"It's half art."

"Yes. Presentation matters. Let's play in the other room."

I took our torte out, then grabbed the coffee carafe. Gwendolyn brought the go set with her. She sat on the sofa and I moved to a chair opposite her, the coffee table between us. I slid her dessert to her and picked mine up, then watched her.

She looked at me, and I nodded. She took a piece of the chocolate and slide it slowly between her lips, then closed her eyes and moaned.

My reaction to it wasn't all that different.

I set my plate down, holding the chocolate in my mouth, and began setting up my stones on the board. I swallowed and looked at her. "I don't know where the last four go."

She placed them on the board for me, then eyed it. "I've never played against thirteen before." She looked at me. "I may have over-calculated." She paused. "Honey, I play to win."

"I know."

"I am going to be mean."

"It's not mean."

She smiled.

She made her first play, then took another bite of her dessert.

I played conservatively. Everywhere she attacked, I retreated slightly and set up for a position of strength. She acquired territory, but so did I.

Our desserts were finished just about when the board was starting to take on real shape.

She frowned at me. "I really wanted to tie your hands tonight," she said.

"I play to win too."

She stared at the board, then made a play deep into territory that was firmly mine. It was a suicide play, and I ignored it. I made a minor move in an area that was slightly contested, and play moved there for a couple of moves. Then she placed another stone deep into my territory again. I looked at it and decided she was getting desperate. I made another minor move, worth a point or so.

At that point, she stared at the board for a long time.

"More coffee?"

She didn't look up. "Sure." I poured coffee for her and added cream. She sipped it, still staring at the board.

She stared at the board for over five minutes.

"You're not falling asleep, are you?"

She looked up at me. "Honey, I'm sorry." She added a third stone deep into my territory.

I stared at it. "You're bluffing."

I made another minor play, worth a half a point. She took my stone off the board and handed it to me. "No. You have to respond to what I just did."

"You're committing suicide. Or trying to trick me."

"I'm giving you a chance," she said, looking at me. "I won't make you take back your move again, if that's what you really want to do."

I stared at the board. I didn't see any threats. I had a huge area there. No way could she take all those stones. I played the play I wanted.

She added a fourth stone, and her entire body language changed. I looked at her. "You see something," I told her.

She didn't respond, but she looked me in the eye.

"If you're bluffing, then I have won."

"Yes."

"Have I lost?"

She thought before responding. "Please don't ignore my last stone."

Normally in go, playing into the opponent's territory is just giving your opponent more points. Playing into your own territory is taking points away from yourself. You only do the first when you think you can win whatever you're trying to do, and you only do the second when you think you have to. I stared at the board. Gwendolyn had handed me four prisoners. I could afford to fill a space. I played into my space.

Gwendolyn didn't even think. She played immediately.

That was when the trap became obvious. I stared at her in horror. "I don't have two eyes in there."

"No."

In go, an eye is an area you have completely surrounded. If you have one eye, your opponent can fill it and capture your stones. If you have two eyes, she has to fill both, but that takes two plays in a row, and she can't do that. So one eye can be killed, two eyes can not.

I stared at the board. I couldn't see any way to form two eyes with her stones where they were. I looked to see if there was any way I could connect that big group to another group, but it was completely surrounded.

I looked at Gwendolyn. "I don't see how to make two eyes."

"Neither do I," she said.

"Would you have said that if you did see how?"

"No. I would have stayed quiet. If I didn't want to win as badly as I do, I might tell you to look harder."

"I can't connect outside."

"No."

"They're dead."

"Yes."

I sighed and played out the points in the other parts of the board.

She nodded, and the game wrapped up over the next three or four minutes. When she pulled off all my prisoners, I still had nice territory on the other side of the board, but by the time she filled it in with all the prisoners she had taken, I was left with six points.
The game had been close, but the score was deeply lopsided.

She looked at me. "Are you upset?"

"No, Gwendolyn."

"You played exceedingly well. I would have won at nine, but at thirteen, you saw how it was going."

"Until I screwed up."

She smiled. "In the future, if you are ahead like this, and your opponent plays into your territory, assume she sees something you don't. Look for it."

I nodded.

"Do you know the questions to ask yourself?"

"Do I have two eyes? Do I have a weak point?"

She nodded.

We put the stones away, and she stood up, fetching her shopping bag from where she had left it in the kitchen. I got up to follow her, but she told me to sit. She came back and sat down on the coffee table, facing me, and pulled a coil of rope from her bag. She looked at me.

"You can say 'no', Pamela. I'll understand."

"Will it hurt?"

"No."

I held out my wrists with them crossed. She moved my hands so my arms were parallel in front of me instead. Then I watched as she folded the rope in half. She wrapped it around my wrists, just above the wrist bones, and fed the tails through the loop. She doubled it back on it self, wrapping the rope around my wrists several times.

I stared between what she was doing and her. I couldn't believe I was letting her do this. I couldn't believe how excited it was making me. I wet my lips. She glanced at my face and smiled.

She tucked the tail of the rope between my arms, then did a couple of wraps around the rope. She tied it off with the knot on the bottom where I couldn't see it. She smiled. "With the knot there, it is much more difficult to untie with your teeth."

I smiled nervously, then looked at my wrists.

It was actually rather pretty.

I felt vulnerable, like I was one of the prisoners she'd taken during the game. I looked up and she was watching me.

"Is that all right?" she asked. I nodded.

"I want to take a photo," she said.

"No!"

"Just of your wrists," she said. "No distinguishing marks. No one but you and I will know whose wrists they are. Please."

I thought about it. "All right," I said.

She pulled a small camera from her purse, and she had me arrange my wrists against the coffee table for a background. She took the photo and showed it to me.

"Oh god," I said.

"No one can tell whose wrists they are, and no one is going to recognize the coffee table background."

"Sam, Bonnie and Suzanne might."

"Might. If they saw it. And wondered. None of that is going to happen. May I keep this photo?"