Susie Learns the Hard Way (34 page)

‘Well...' She looked shrewdly at Susie, and then went on. ‘It was quite an ordeal, you know. At the end.'

‘I suppose it must have been.' Annie looked inquisitive, and Susie remembered she was supposed to be pretending that she didn't know what had been happening above her. ‘It was, um, quite noisy, really,' she added, realising she was only making things worse. ‘When you were all up there, I mean.' She smiled apologetically.

‘Oh, yes, I suppose it must have been.'

‘With the television and, um, everything.' She gave Annie another little smile, and to her surprise and consternation the girl burst into tears. ‘What is it?' she asked, wondering how she should react. ‘What's the matter?'

‘Oh, nothing,' she mumbled between sobs and sniffs. ‘Just relief that it's all over, I suppose. Being here and talking about it brings it all back...' and she broke down again.

Susie felt a little helpless, and then fetched some tissues. ‘He seemed okay to me,' she said, as she guided the sniffling girl to the sofa. ‘Not that I did any more than pass him in the hallway once or twice.'

‘He is – was... well, I thought so too...' More sniffles into the paper hankies followed.

‘But?' Susie prompted, keen to hear how such a girl could become a prostitute, especially after her own recent skirmish with the profession gave her a more than passing interest.

‘Well, we met at work,' she sniffed. ‘I was his assistant and, and he was handsome and the rising star, destined for great things. Everyone said so, and we got on well, and one thing led to another – you know what it's like, working late together?'

She didn't, but she said she did anyway. Encouraged, the girl continued.

‘We became an item. It was nice at first. Very nice, in fact. But then he got obsessed with this one project. It took him over completely, so that he was always at work, always talking about work or thinking about it, but very offhand when he was there, arguing with people, not doing what he should have been doing because he was chasing this one idea. And then about a year ago he went berserk, behaving even more strangely, and they fired him. But he didn't get another job. Oh no, not him. Instead of getting another job he just started work at home, on his own project.'

She started crying again, and Susie put an arm round her shoulder. ‘Come on then, Annie,' she said soothingly. ‘Let's go and get your things while we know the place is definitely empty.'

Annie nodded, sniffed, and stood up.

Moments later she started with delight as the key turned in the lock, reminding Susie to be surprised as well. Walking into the short hall she remembered, her mind filling with memories of the layout of the flat and especially of being in the bedroom. She quickly dismissed the memory and asked casually, ‘So, what job did he have that he could do at home?' pretty certain of what the answer would be. But she was very wrong – so very wrong.

‘He was a biochemist,' Annie said calmly. ‘He did research work.'

‘I'm sorry?' Susie could hardly believe what she'd just heard. ‘He was a what?'

‘A biochemist,' she repeated, not noticing the stunned look on her companion's face. ‘It sounds grand, but it isn't really.'

‘But don't you need a laboratory and equipment?' she asked, her mind racing ahead.

‘In there.' Annie waved towards the kitchen.

Susie hadn't been in there during her previous visit, and when she pushed the door wide she wished she had. For this was no ordinary kitchen, with cupboards and kettle and toaster, but one filled with glass jars and rubber tubes and curly glass pipes, and small electronic devices. She knew at once that this was the source of the clinking and clanking late at night. He wasn't an obsessive polisher of pots and pans, as she'd imagined, but a mad scientist rattling jars.

‘So – so what was it then, this, er, project? The one he was so obsessed with?' She was hoping she was wrong, but pretty sure she wasn't.

‘He was trying to perfect a drug to counter impotence in men,' Annie replied, her voice indicating a lack of interested. ‘One that would make them last for hours on end when having sex.'

‘Why would he want to do that, if Viagra exists already?'

‘Because it didn't a year ago.'

‘When he suddenly went berserk?'

‘Exactly. He said his product should have been the first to hit the market, but he blamed everyone for a lack of support. The whole forgotten genius bit. You see, when he started he was doing it all alone, on the quiet, it wasn't part of his job. He was supposed to be working on something to do with blood and bleeding and operations, but then he found this side-effect. But his bosses weren't interested and told him to concentrate on his proper project. So he said nothing more about it, but he was secretly working from here all the time, and they fired him when they found out – just before he'd finished his experiments. All it needed was clinical trials, but they wouldn't go along with it.'

She started sobbing again, and Susie felt compelled to give her a little cuddle.

‘He said they didn't deserve to have it after the way they treated him, and we'd do it ourselves.'

‘Go on,' Susie prompted carefully, knowing she'd stumbled onto something big, and not wanting to blow it now.

‘Well, he was talking about so much money – millions and millions – that I agreed to help him. We both left work and set up here, and at first it was easy, working in the lab together.' She nodded at the paraphernalia on the worktops. ‘And then one day it was ready, he said, and we had to try it.' Her cheeks blushed prettily as she paused for a moment, and then she gathered herself and added in a conspiratorial whisper, ‘He was like a man possessed!' She smiled at the memory, but then her face clouded again. ‘But he said he couldn't observe it properly if he was the subject, so he started giving it to blokes down the pub to try with their wives and girlfriends, as long as they gave him a debrief on how it went. They all said it was fantastic, and they could go for hours and hours, which we already knew.' She shrugged, and fresh tears meandered down her cheeks. ‘But he said it had to be better than Viagra. It had to work faster, and he said it had to actually
make
blokes randy and give them a hard-on, not just keep it up once it was hard...'

‘Go on,' Susie urged, although she thought she knew the rest already. She gently stroked the girl's pretty fringe from her brow.

‘So what he had to do, what we had to do, if we wanted to test it properly, was to give it to a bloke who was already sexually exhausted, and see...' she faltered, ‘see if... if it worked.'

‘And?'

‘Andy said he wanted to control those tests very carefully.' The flow of tears increased and her chin trembled. ‘He said he had to be sure. He said it was the only way. I don't think he really cared about me at all.'

‘What was?' asked Susie as gently as she could. ‘What was the only way?

Annie took a deep breath and stiffened her resolve. ‘He brought a bloke home one night and then, after I... after he... when he was, you know, sexually exhausted, Andy gave him the pill and then... then... he wanted to do it again. And then again, and again. It worked perfectly, the bloody stuff.

‘But he said once wasn't a proper test, and we had to have a representative sample of ages, physical types, and races. Every night he'd bring home a bloke and I had to... had to... until they were totally exhausted, and then Andy would give them the pill and see if they wanted to do it again. And they always did. I could have told him it worked after the first one. I don't know why he had to keep on doing it. I think he secretly liked the idea of all these strangers taking advantage of me.'

Susie instinctively gave the girl a comforting peck on the cheek. Her tears tasted salty on her lips.

‘But then people started to talk about coming up here, and what they were doing. And then everyone wanted a go, and before long they were paying Andy to test it for him, and he was bringing home two or three a night and some of them didn't even want the pill, they just wanted me.'

Susie could understand why. Annie was very pretty, small and dark, with deep brown eyes and an absolutely perfect figure. She could quite easily fancy her herself, she thought, but wisely remained silent as she held the gently sobbing girl close, arms tight around the shapely young body.

‘Andy sort of went mad about then,' Annie went on, oblivious to the thoughts of the lovely young lady who comforted her. ‘No pharmaceutical companies wanted his pill, and we didn't have the money to make any more. So he said we would just sell the last few in the pubs ourselves. But I didn't want... didn't want... oh, I just couldn't go on with it any more. I had to leave.' She sobbed a while longer, and gradually regained her self-control. ‘Sorry,' she added.

‘No need to apologise, I can guess how you must feel,' said Susie, with real understanding. ‘So has he gone off to be rich and famous without you?'

‘Don't really know,' Annie answered, looking about her. ‘He seems to have cleared out completely,' she decided, looking through drawers and opening cupboards. Susie joined her, trying to appear as if she was casually looking for evidence of recent occupation when what she was really looking for was evidence of any kind that would tell her for certain that this was the man Harry had been looking for. Harry! Her heart gave a little lurch. He might have been right all the time, and now she might just be able to prove it.

She searched diligently through cupboards and drawers while Annie absently moved bits of the various contraptions around, piling jars and tubes up at one end of the kitchen worktop.

All Susie needed was one sample of the pill, and the thought had hardly formed in her mind when it was fulfilled. Stuffed at the back of the last drawer she found a crumpled envelope, plain white, no writing. But in it she found a small white pill, slightly powdery to the touch. She was so surprised and pleased that she just wasn't quick enough to prevent Annie from seeing it.

‘That's one of them!' she cried. ‘That's one of the damned things that caused all the trouble,' and Susie was still holding the small white offender between finger and thumb when they both heard the unmistakable sound of the front door being opened with a key.

‘Andy!' hissed Annie.

Susie suddenly felt extremely vulnerable, still wearing only the T-shirt she'd been to bed in, grateful at least that she'd left her knickers on.

Andy appeared in the kitchen doorway, holding a newspaper he was reading carefully.
The
newspaper, Susie saw at once. But she needn't have worried.

‘I'm rich,' he said very slowly and quietly to Annie, as though he didn't quite believe what he was saying, ignoring Susie completely and holding up the paper. ‘I'm rich.'

Annie looked at him in silent awe, clearly nervous of his presence. But he seemed to have forgotten that she deserted him, or just didn't care. ‘They rang this morning,' he said in wonder, ‘after they read this. They've doubled their offer.'

‘They?' Annie asked.

‘German company. They came here a couple of times. You must remember them. Car the size of a boat.'

Susie remembered the huge black limousine, and the swarthy white slavers who'd arrived in it. So much for that theory.

‘And now they've offered me millions,' said Andy.

‘Just because of the headlines?' asked Susie.

‘Partly, yes,' he said, directing his answer to Annie as though it was her who'd asked the question. ‘But mostly because I gave them six to test, and of course they worked perfectly, just like I told them. Especially on women, they said, which I hadn't even thought about. Apparently it's even better on them. So they've offered me millions for the last one. Hear that, Annie?' he said. ‘I'm rich!
We're
rich!' he corrected hastily.

‘Not me,' said Annie. ‘It's nothing to do with me.'

‘So, er, what exactly does it do to women?' Susie asked tentatively, not sure she wanted to hear the answer. ‘Given that we all know what it does to men.'

‘You probably don't know, actually,' said Andy acidly, ‘but I can tell you briefly.' He was a bit on the thin side, pondered Susie, but he wasn't too bad. Firm jaw, she thought, as well as firm buttocks, which were moving enticingly in his jeans as he searched through the cupboards and drawers. ‘Erections depend on desire and circulation,' he went on. ‘Viagra simply keeps all the blood in the penis trapped inside once it's arrived there. My pill,' he said, turning to face them, ‘not only keeps it there, it actually increases blood supply to certain kinds of tissue found only in the genitals.' Susie looked down at Andy's groin as he droned on about muscle construction and so on. The warm glow between her legs had become a hot flush, and she felt the liquid fire seeping into her knickers, feeling the soft cotton against her flowering body slowly getting wet.

‘And best of all,' Andy concluded proudly, ‘I found a way to stimulate the receptors in the brain dealing with sexual arousal, so that my pill actually creates desire. In other words, it makes you randy.'