The Auditor 
by Marknew
Brian's first investigation as a manager into misappropriation of resources runs into a scheme far beyond his training.


Prologue

Until very recently I hadn't dreamed of Sara, Sara Wilkens, my first
girlfriend, for years, not since high school. I thought of her as she was when
I first met her, tall, willowy, kind of artistic (certainly much more than
me!), quiet and gentle. I can see now that she and I didn't have very much in
common, but back then it didn't matter. She smelled good, had long light brown
hair and fit exactly right in my arms, it seemed. We dated for a little more
than a year, and when I broke up with her right before I left town to go to
business school, instead of marrying her, I felt horribly guilty, especially
because our relationship had become much more physical in the final two
months. She wrote me some long, tear-stained letters, which I responded to
only with only brief, impersonal notes, and we had some awkward phone calls
and one awful meeting when I was visiting home for Christmas, and that was the
last I saw of her, I guess until the dream. I heard from some friends who
stayed in town that she got married a year or two after I had left, and that
it did not go very well, but no one knew exactly what happened to her after
she moved away, although there were stories, very sad stories, about her being
in serious trouble. I realize that my friends might not have wanted to give me
all the details, and I did not press them very hard. After all, by that time
it really was not my business, not anymore.

Even before I heard about that, in fact, toward the end of my relationship
with Sara, I had realized I had to learn to control my base, bodily desires
and to take my moral and ethical obligations more seriously, as I had been
rightly taught by my family, by my teachers at school and by the preachers at
my church. This had a strong influence, for some time, on my choice of career
and on my relationships with women, although that has changed recently, as I
will explain. But given what happened, I feel I should tell you about my dream
first, which like many of the dreams I remember was probably about my fear of
losing this control.

The dream with Sara in it was intense, very intense. I once had a dream about
my grandfather, a year or two after he had died, and like that one, this dream
felt like a visitation from the dead, with the shock of seeing someone in the
flesh whom you thought you would never see again.

I was on a typical business trip, working in a bare hotel room after a full
day at the office, putting the facts down about a waste-to-power generation
facility that was not making the profits that had been projected for it,
looking for patterns in the data, seeking the truth. Suddenly Sara was there
next to me looking over my shoulder, looking just as she had in high school.
She didn't say anything, but instead ran her long finger over the lines of
notes I had taken, my theories, and as she did the writing changed. It wasn't
about my work anymore. It was all about her and me and a blow by blow
description of the sex we'd had in the months at the end of our relationship,
before we'd broken up. The words were as vivid as the experience itself and
they were terribly distracting. In fact, the words themselves were arousing me
physically, as can happen in dreams.

"What are you doing?" I thought, panicked at my reaction and the loss of my
work. "I've got to finish this tonight."

"No you don't. You don't need to pay attention to that. You need to pay
attention to me," she said, her deep green eyes now very serious, looking into
mine.

I turned away from her and looked at my data, neat columns of figures that I
had used to make my notes. As I read them she brushed her fingers across the
first three columns (Burn rates, waste and shipments) in the first row, and
the numbers changed to 32 25 31. That was her figure, bust, waist and hips.
Perfectly good, although not terribly feminine (I knew that she was an "A"
cup) or dramatic.

"Sara, you have to stop that! Those are wrong. I need those numbers."

"You don't need them. You need me. We have to finish what we started."

"I can't! I have to work."

"What's wrong with me? You think I'm not good enough?" She stood up and
reached over me to brush her fingers along the second row of the first three
columns for a later period, and the numbers changed again, this time to 35 23
36. I looked at her, stretched out across me. Her figure had changed. She was
busty now (definitely NOT an A cup), and her usual conservative looking blouse
looked tight on her with spaces open between the buttons across her chest.
"Now. How about now?"

I was hard now. I couldn't help myself, but I didn't want her to know. "Change
them back! You have to change them back so I can finish what I need to do!" I
said insistently, trying to concentrate on what the numbers used to be before
Sara had changed everything, trying to will them back into existence, but they
were gone. All I could think of were Sara's new numbers. I had to keep control
of myself, although like any man I couldn't help myself from looking into the
new gap in her blouse.

"You don't need those old numbers. You need new numbers instead, like these."
She reached toward the paper again. I caught her hand. It was warm and the
touch of her fingers made me tingle, pushing me further to where I didn't want
to go, so I let go, and immediately she touched the third row of numbers,
making them 39 21 37.

"Oh no!" I said, swallowing, as her chest pushed outwards. The top three
buttons on her blouse had disappeared. They must have popped off, and now her
breasts flowed out of her blouse, supported by a black undergarment that
rested beneath them and served only to push them up. It hid nothing,
especially not her fully erect nipples. Her conservative dark navy skirt was
gone too. Instead she was wearing a tight mini-skirt that clung to her waist
and then flared out around her womanly hips and stretched across her tight
round bottom, which swayed from side to side as she spoke.

"You need to pay attention to me. To me!" she said insistently. Her hands were
on her hips and she twirled her shoulders side to side, showing me her
voluptuous bosom from every angle. "Isn't this what you really wanted? Aren't
I good enough now?" She shook her head and her thick hair flowed around it in
slow motion.

"It's not what I want," I tried to explain.

"Oh yes it is! And it's what I want, what I need," she said, desperately.
"Don't you understand what will happen if you don't?" she said. "You know what
I can do, what I'm capable of! Why won't you? Do I have to make you do it?"
She looked at me, her green eyes boring into me. "So, yes, I have to make you.
And I will!"

I was right there on the edge, but I couldn't let it happen. Not now. Not
after I'd already broken up with her. And wasn't she was married already?

"It's wrong," I insisted. "The numbers are all wrong now. And you're wrong.
This is all wrong!"

"I don't care!" she said. "Right and wrong doesn't matter to me. You need to
do me, not your work. I have more numbers you know, not just these. The other
ones are important. I know that as well as you, and I can change the other
ones too!"

The next columns were a long series of numbers that showed the capacity of the
different plants for power generation. "No! I need them!" I cried.

"I know you like those numbers. I know you need them. But that's why I need
them more!" she said and pushed her finger across the next six columns in the
first four rows. In the first row they changed to 11, 18, 32, 25, 16 and 12.

"What are they? What are you doing to my power numbers?"

"They're not your power numbers. They're for me! They're MY power numbers,"
she said hotly as the "power numbers" in the second row changed to 13, 21, 34,
23, 19 and 15.

Her blouse was gone, and so was her black undergarment. She was bare to her
waist, her impressive breasts swayed near my head. Trying to resist their
allure I looked at up her arms. Biceps? She had biceps? I felt a warning
tingle in my member. I wanted to look away, but instead glanced further up and
firm, toned muscles had appeared on her neck and her shoulders. Her pecs were
more prominent and her waist seemed tighter, while her thighs and calves were
becoming quite muscular, nearly as much as mine. She had the build of an
aerobics trainer, with tight, hard muscles. She tightened her hand into little
fists, and the muscles of her arm contracted with them, bunched and hard. Her
face tightened too into a tight, hard smile. I was glad I had stuck to my
exercise program. I was still stronger than she was, if it came to that. I was
still in control.

Then the third row of "power numbers" changed. They were now 16, 23, 36, 21,
23 and 19. I heard a low, groan of satisfaction from Sara and she grabbed my
shoulders and pulled me into a long, hard kiss. I felt it to my core, as
though she had a direct line to my sexual switch. I grabbed her arms to push
her away and was shocked to feel bulging, hard biceps that were so large my
fingers could scarcely grip them. Instead I flattened my hands and just
pushed, exerting all of my strength to dig into those muscles. Slowly I was
winning, my longer reach rather than my strength the telling factor in the
contest. Our lips separated and her head moved slowly backwards.

"Sara ... it's ... not ... right!" I was saying, and then I saw the fourth row
of power numbers change to 20, 26, 41, 22, 28 and 24. An even larger, denser,
harder biceps muscle pushed up against my hand, bending my fingers backwards.
I withdrew my hand slightly to straighten them and renew my efforts.

"Mmmmm, why do you bother?" she said, chuckling. "Mine are so much bigger, so
much stronger than yours!" She took my wrist and pulled one arm to the other,
and then held them both together in one hand, her forearm muscles tensing into
a crushing grip.

"Aaaahoohawwh" I said, unable to bear the pain.

"Awwww. Did that hurt? I think I'll kiss it and make it better," she said. She
relaxed her grip slightly and brushed her lips against my wrist and then ran
her tongue up the inside of my arm, sending shivers all the way to my
resurgent hard on. "This is much nicer," she said and ran her finger across
the fifth row, this time across ten columns. 44, 21, 39, 24, 28, 42, 21, 32,
28 and then 10. Her 21 inch waist was now by far the smallest measurement in
the row, except the last column, which was new. Her muscles pulsed outward
again, absolutely bursting with power. She held my wrists together with just
her thumb and forefinger and crushed my body against her massive chest,
feeding her hard, extended nipple into my mouth and curling my legs between
hers, positioning me for sex. Trying to keep control, I wondered what that
last column meant, the 10 -- no part of her was that small now, when I felt my
erection stiffen, grow and enter her, and then she ran her finger all the way
down the last column so that it read 10 all the way down the page. "So you'll
stay that way as long as I have you, and I'm going have you forever, my
darling. You're mine now. You're mine. You're mine. Mine. Mine."

I came. I just couldn't help it. And then I woke up, sticky and wet with my
seminal emissions.

It was just two weeks after that shameful dream that I went to Indiana.

1

It happened when I was on a long term assignment for my employer, ARA Fittings
Inc., the standard six month trial audit team leadership exercise for
promising employees, as specified in our guidance manual. To be clear, at this
time in my career I was regarded as a promising employee.

At my level in the organisation it was all done by the book. After a series of
very basic assignments close to headquarters, several projects as the junior
member of the team at a small sales offices, an investigation into a payments
irregularity involving a small customer and the wife of a salesman, which I
headed, and then a two month assignment rewriting our product rebate credit
policy to ensure that the misallocations I uncovered would not recur, it was
my opportunity to conduct a full "manager review" of the travel expense
reimbursement processes of the Indianapolis office, which had acquired a
reputation for looseness in accepting deviations from the ARA Fittings travel
expenditure manual and the procedural rules that were provided to all offices
in three ring binders and also published on the company intranet. These
applied to all employees, from assistant sales representatives to our Chief
Executive Officer, with different allowances for discretionary approvals
appropriate to the level of authority attached to the role. I was instructed
that if one office was known to flout the policy it could jeopardize
compliance with other policies set by our compliance team, our board of
directors, and even with our obligations under the law.

I felt strongly that infringement of properly authorized and disseminated
policies of behavior was something to be avoided, and if necessary prevented,
at all costs. Disobeying these policies would undermine respect for the
company's rules everywhere. Ensuring that this did not happen, and
particularly not in any circumstance in which I was involved, gave me immense
personal satisfaction. It was why I had sought employment as an internal
auditor in the first place. And now I had my first opportunity to put my
beliefs and, more importantly, my responsibilities, into action as a manager.

2

Almost immediately upon my entering the Indianapolis office the instincts I
had developed from my years of training as an auditor told me something was
amiss, even though to the untrained observer everything appeared as it should
be. The ARA Fittings logo was hung properly, slightly off-centre and to the
right, as our style manual requires. Our company brochures were laid out,
fan-like, on the standard round glass table next to the two standard green
chairs facing the logo. The three sentences that formed our key mission
messages were posted prominently on the wall. The receptionist's work station
faced the door directly and her computer screen was fixed at a sixty degree
angle so that a casual visitor would be unable to read any confidential
information about our employee lists or the other visitors at the office, but
any supervisory employee passing through the reception area could immediately
tell whether the receptionist, who was invariably a young, reasonable
attractive woman with limited training, ambition and intelligence, would not
abuse her computer access for inappropriate purposes, such as shopping,
reading about celebrities or engaging in email gossip with her friends. (Most
internet chat functions were blocked by our network protocols.)

The problem was the receptionist herself. It was not her behavior. She greeted
me as I arrived, took down my details, confirmed I was on the guest office
list, and asked for my identification and employee number. She asked me to sit
and to wait and phoned the district manager's secretary promptly to let her
know I was ready to start. It was how she looked. She was too pretty, far too
pretty. In fact she was stunningly beautiful, with shining, perfectly cut dark
hair, high cheekbones with rich red natural color, deep blue eyes, a pert nose
and full, ruby red lips. When she stood up to show me where to put my coat I
saw she was 5'11", just half an inch shorter than I, with a heart-stopping
figure, bust and hips that practically exploded away from her tiny waist. Even
at our head office in Raleigh-Durham, an area noted for attractive,
well-groomed women, none of the secretaries or receptionists could compare
with her, much less the women in non-administrative positions. What was a girl
like her doing working as a receptionist for the Indianapolis office of ARA
Fittings, the world's fourth largest distributor of precision fittings for
industrial pumps?

The further mystery, I noted, was that no one else in the office reacted to
her spectacular appearance or even looked at her. In fact, the reception area
was oddly quiet, even deserted. Something was seriously amiss. Human behavior
is the same everywhere, and as a student of human behavior, I knew that in
9,999 out of 10,000 offices with a receptionist who looked like Ekara (putting
aside for the moment the fact that there could not be so many offices with
such a receptionist) the men working there would use any excuse to walk by
her, pause, look, ogle, chat, ask a favor, do a favor, etc., and even the
women would find a reason to walk by just to notice what she was wearing so
that they could gossip about how inappropriate today's clothing was. Normal,
heterosexual men will do anything to find a way to observe a pretty girl, and
when the girl's attractions are as potent as Ekara's, the men in the company,
mostly boisterous, aggressive, hard-drinking salesmen, should have been
swarming. But although I could hear my colleagues in the rooms, cubicles and
meeting rooms behind the partition, no one appeared. I even spotted two men
walking around the outside of the building to enter through a back door. They
were acting as though Ekara were a short, fat, pimply, forty-six year old
daughter of the business founder, someone with bad breath who insisted on
talking right next to you, someone who on the prowl three hundred sixty-five
days a year for an office Sadie Hawkins dance date. During the fifteen minutes
I was kept waiting the reception area stayed empty except for one, frail, bent
old man, who quietly brought her a cup of coffee, mumbled something, and then
hurried away.

An auditor must be observant -- one never knows which of the thousands of
incidents that take place in a day will reveal itself to be the critical fact
that unmasks inappropriate behavior, or even fraud. I knew full well that
there was no objective reason for me to think her appearance or the men's
strange behavior was in any way connected with the irregularities I was asked
to investigate in the office's travel expense reimbursement processes. But
also, there was no objective reason to think they were not connected. My work
would naturally center on reviewing megabytes of authorization forms,
conducting interviews with supervisors, travelers and secretaries, and
comparing the travel patterns of the Indianapolis office against statistical
studies of our other offices. However, until I had a better explanation, I
would, for professional purposes of course, also be sure to keep Ekara the
receptionist under close observation.

In the meantime, I sat and waited. To pass the time I looked up at our mission
statements. Even though I knew them by heart, seeing them gave me a small
feeling of comfort. Everywhere I might go, all over the world, these
statements were posted in our offices in the same lettering, the same size,
the same color. Even in foreign countries, they would appear in the same way,
and in English, the mother language of our company. (Although officially
approved translations of our mission statements into the local languages would
also be posted, they were not shown in the same style, so that the difference
between the original English and the mere translation was always apparent.)

"You never know how much you need us until you try us. After that, you'll find
you can't live without us!"

"Once fitted, always fit."

"Our community, our employees and our customers make us stronger every day!"

I loved the direct optimism of these statements, the spirit of inevitable
success. And I was a part of it. I loved my job. I was proud to be one of the
"moving parts" of ARA Fittings, another company slogan often repeated at our
team meetings.

3

As I noted above, fifteen minutes after I arrived, Muriel Cawle, secretary to
the office's general manager, entered the reception area to escort me to the
small office that would be my temporary station during my project. I noticed
she looked briefly at Ekara and then at me and her lips curled slightly in an
unpleasant kind of smile before we left the area to go to the rest of the
office. Muriel looked like a typical career secretary in her mid-forties and I
decided she must be jealous of Ekara's youth and beauty.

"You're Brian, right? Brian Stephensson? Two essess?"

I nodded. "Three actually, if you count the first one."

Muriel looked concerned about something and shook her head. Obviously
precision did not interest her as much as it did me. "Oh dear! You find her
pretty, don't you?" Muriel said as the door closed, making conversation and
confirming my suspicion about the look she'd given Ekara.

"Yes," I said agreeably and then to change the subject to one more appropriate
I added, "I assume the headquarters long distance authorization codes work on
the phone system here?"

"They normally do. Let me know if you have any problems. Keith Hartnett is the
office IT technician. He works only afternoons on Mondays and Fridays, so if
you have a problem connecting you'll have to wait. Although sometimes Ralph
Healy, the office manager can help you. If he's in a good mood. Bringing him a
donut or two always helps get what you need."

"Thanks for that advice." I looked around the small, dimly lit office with its
broken in-tray, a telephone that looked as though it began life with a rotary
dial and a 14" CRT computer screen. "So, Ralph's the go-to guy to get things
done here?"

"Yes. And me, of course."

"Of course. What about the receptionist? Ekara is it? At most of our offices
the receptionist takes on a lot of miscellaneous duties, for when she isn't
busy answering phones or greeting customers."

Muriel looked at me, pausing, like she was considering carefully just what to
say. "You seem like an okay guy. Ambitious? You like the company?"

I nodded.

"My advice to you is steer clear of her. But we haven't had this conversation,
and we won't have it again. Understood?"

"Why is that? I have to ask you why."

Muriel shook her head, sighed, and went on in an official, somewhat robotic
voice. "Ekara Imponerende is a high performer. You will see from her annual
contract review that she excels in every category of her duties and has or
will develop the skills to progress as far as she wants, in this company or in
any task she chooses."

"That's quite different from what you said just before." Muriel looked at me
blankly. "And it's unusual. Usually an employee with that kind of review would
move from a receptionist job to something more challenging very quickly. Is
there a reason why she is still doing such a simple job? Is it her preference?
I assume the office here is well-acquainted with our non-discrimination
rules."

Muriel looked at me carefully. Her eyes moved up and down my body as though
appraising it and then she nodded. "Yes, that's certainly true. I suppose then
that you'd better investigate her. That's what you do, right? I just help run
the office here. I'm certainly not the one to tell you what to investigate."
She looked away. "So, Mr. Stephensson, how long do you expect to need this
office?"

I noted her reaction. Did she think my interest was related to Ekara's
appearance? Although it wasn't, I knew any denial would only confirm the
connection in Muriel's mind, so I chose to say nothing about it. "Between one
and four weeks, depending on the state of the records I review and the
cooperation I get."

"I'll make sure that is recorded in the log," Muriel said. "We don't have much
extra space and I have to manage it carefully. Please let me know if your
plans change." She looked at me again and left.

I didn't think too much about her remark at the time other than to wonder who
else would ever want to use this office. I unpacked and was pleased I was able
to set up my workstation without any help from Ralph or Keith. I put a few
finishing touches on the list of records I would request first for review and
then sent it by email to the general manager. By the afternoon I was busily
reviewing the expense authorizations and preparing for my first interviews
later in the week.

4

I assume that for most people, business trips are very sociable occasions,
with meetings, business dinners with team members and fellow travelers, late
night drinking in hotels and other entertainment that is, at least partially,
intended to grease the wheels of the business that is to be done and
compensate for the inconvenience of travel. That surely was the picture I
pieced together from my audit work, but my own experience was very different.
I'm not an unfriendly person, nor am I unattractive, at least not objectively
speaking. But I have noticed that when I enter a group, conversation sometimes
tends to slow down and even stop. I don't take offense. Co-workers could
naturally be concerned that in my role as auditor I was obliged to use and
report, if relevant, all information that came my way, by whatever means. I
wasn't dishonest about that or underhanded. Everyone knew where I stood, and I
took pride in my role and in my honesty about it.

It did, however, mean that I got lonely at times, especially when I was on
assignment.

To fill the extra hours I had on the road, I normally doubled my gym time.
That's why instead of adding weight around my waistline when away from home, I
would invariably come back in better shape than ever, my biceps harder and a
little bigger. I was very proud of them, and enjoyed surprising my fellow
employees who met me for the first time and expected to find only the typical
kind of small, nerdish person in my kind of job. I wanted them to know there
was nothing wimpy about being an auditor, and especially not THIS one. I also
thought it helped me exercise the authority I needed to ensure I always had
the fullest responses to my questions. I don't use my muscles to intimidate,
but I think people have an instinctive reaction to my size and evident
strength that makes them want to cooperate. And being in good shape has its
other benefits, like the admiring look I got from the young female clerk on
hotel reception when I checked in. Even though my values do not permit me take
advantage of the Licias of this world (going by her "Trainee" name tag), I'd
be dishonest if I didn't admit that ‘come hither' glances from the weaker sex
were enjoyable confidence-boosters, affirmations that when the "one" came
along my chances would be better than average.

After I checked in to my standard Radisson hotel room, where the company had a
corporate account, I found a local gym and negotiated a temporary membership.
Soon I was into the repetitive, mindless body work that flushed away the cares
of the day. By the time I was done, I had, unconsciously, completed the
structure of my plan, the framework of my report, and the first set of
questions I would pose. I had a light dinner and recorded my plan before
settling into bed at 10:30. It was, I felt, a very successful first day of my
trip.

5

The rest of the first week went as expected, and I was quietly confident that
my first manager review would be a success. I had not yet established the
identity of the office wrongdoer, or defalcator. But my success would not be
measured solely by finding the culprit. An audit is a process that must be
followed, and my duty, first and foremost, was to complete the process to the
requisite standard. If the process failed to reveal the wrongdoer, then the
flaw lay as much, or more, in the process as in my own abilities. This is not
to say that I didn't have a strong interest in finding the wrongdoer and
ensuring that he or she be punished. Identifying and punishing breaches of our
rules was the reason I chose my profession. But becoming too focused on the
final result could be as negative for my job performance as neglecting the
purpose of the audit by being too caught up in the process, as it could cause
me to neglect the basic steps of the investigation that served as the
foundation for reaching the final result. I certainly hoped that the identity
of the defalcator would become plain from my basic audit work, that one of the
workers in the office would identify him or her for me or give me hints or
clues so that I could more easily make my own "independent" discovery, or even
that the culprit would become fearful of the consequences and seek to take
advantage of official or unofficial channels for leniency. And while I hoped,
I worked. As it was, by Friday of my first week I had completed the review of
the business records 27% more quickly than our company standard, conducted 60%
of my interviews and had identified at least three possible vectors of the
improper actions, all of which I would pursue the following week.

I was also satisfied that the way I conducted myself during the work day
routine had established the correct rapport with the general manager and other
members of the office staff I encountered. It was true that no one yet was
willing to use the opportunities I gave them to reveal "confidentially" the
identity of the defalcator, at least not so far. But they accepted the role
the company had assigned to me without resentment and seemed cautiously to
wish me success. Interacting with them I noticed there was a certain
uniformity of response among office members when I explained the subject of my
review. This indicated to me that the defalcator must be a person who was
universally treated at some distance at the office, was feared to a certain
degree but also tolerated or even liked for some reason. It also indicated to
me that most employees knew the identity of the defalcator. I had to believe
that, on balance, they were rooting for me, and this gave me further
incentives to end the improper practices that were, obviously, blighting the
lives of my fellow compliant employees.

At my level in the company, the reimbursement policy for weekend travel home
during extended business trips was not available until the third weekend of
the trip. In compensation for this, the company continued my meal and hotel
allowance even on non-working days, and did not insist that I officially log
any work time during those days. Some employees, particularly those with
families, considered this policy unfair, but I clearly understood the
rationale, particularly because business travel was so expensive and so much
work time would be wasted on back and forth trips on Fridays and Mondays.
Instead of complaining or using the extra time for a quick affair with Licia
(who continued to eye me from behind the check-in desk each evening when I
returned to my room), when I was away on assignment I treated my weekends as
an opportunity to tour parts of the country I hadn't yet seen. And so, after
doing my laundry, I spent my first free Saturday walking through the pioneer
village exhibit just outside of town, of course bearing the cost of admission
and additional gasoline usage myself. By the end of the day I was a bit tired,
especially after my double workout, so I was planning to eat a light dinner
and get to bed earlier than usual, leaving Sunday free for a relaxing walk in
one of the local parks after attending a service at one of the local Lutheran
churches.

Instead, when I returned to my motor hotel I was surprised to find Ekara, the
receptionist, in the lobby, evidently waiting for me. She was dressed in
casual weekend clothes: blue jeans, which were fairly tight on her shapely
hips, a black one piece wraparound that covered part of her bust but left her
full cleavage visible, and a light blue cardigan that hid much of what her
wraparound left open, except when she moved her arms or shoulders or bent down
or tugged at it or leaned to one side or fixed her hair or breathed or laughed
or stretched or did any of the countless things a young, lively and attractive
woman might do, so that it continually shifted position and left different
parts of her extremely attractive chest open for me to see.

It was very distracting for me, you have to understand. As a normal male in
good health in my twenties, I have a very strong sex drive. I should point out
that after I reached a certain point in my life I put myself under very
definite restrictions, sexually, and I have a strong moral drive, as I
mentioned in my Prologue and as one could probably guess from my choice of
profession. For this reason, when I travelled on business, even when I was not
in the middle of a serious relationship (at the time I was not) I refrained
from visiting pick-up bars or taking advantage of local women who might find
an out of town visitor with good job prospects and an attractive
well-developed body difficult to resist. I won't go into the opportunities I
have passed up, especially at the local gyms I have frequented, but I will
just say that there were opportunities and I did consciously and intentionally
let them go. I also had a strict policy about dating fellow employees, for
obvious reasons. I needed to avoid possible conflicts of interest, and even an
appearance of a conflict, especially when I was on assignment. So Ekara's
presence, and by that I don't mean only that she was present, with me, but her
overpowering presence, the way she filled space, the way she smelled, the way
she looked, the way she smiled, and most of all the way several square inches
of her flesh continually became exposed and then covered again, the way it
moved, with a will and rhythm all its own, the way it shaped and was shaped by
her cardigan and her top, which pulled and was pushed, and then pushed back,
which curved and folded and stretched and slipped and was put back into place
only to fall all over again until I ....

No. It didn't happen quite like that, for a number of reasons. Because we were
talking, in the lobby of the motor hotel, and I was the auditor and she was a
junior employee at the office I was auditing. I knew all that. I was confident
that she did too. And so I wouldn't let that happen. But ... well, I wouldn't
have let it or anything happen, if what actually happened hadn't happened.