Laura raced to the telephone the moment she got inside the door at home. She was going to call Sara at work, but first she checked her home voice mail. Surely Sara had left her a message there, especially after the message Laura had left on Sara's answering machine the previous evening from Dallas, after Ada had departed.

And Sara had left a message, the third one in the queue. Unfortunately, it was not what Laura had hoped for. Sara was very somber. She spoke slowly and very softly. Her voice was deep, very unlike her usual voice, and sounded somehow disembodied, denatured, even wooden.

"Laura . . . I know you won't think it's right to leave you a message like this," Sara said evenly. "I've thought about it, and I'm going to do it anyway. I don't want to see you. I don't want either one of us to go through that." [There was a pause here while Sara swallowed and composed herself further.] "Dee Dee told me about you two. [Another pause.] She drinks . . . smokes weed . . . snorts. I don't know how you thought she wouldn't spill it sooner or later. Anyway, she's jealous of me and likes to hurt me." [Another devastating pause, during which Laura could actually hear her own whimpering, which until now she had been unaware of.] "I want you to know I really did love you. I never loved anybody so much. But I don't love you any more. I don't want to see you. Please don't try to see me. It was a mistake. Let's leave it at that. Don't call."

The cloying, automated whine of the voice mail lady came on the phone. "End of message. To repeat message, press one. To reply, press two. To erase—"

Laura was so shattered that it was all she could do just to get her quivering hand to hang up the phone. After a few moments she noticed that her nearly silent moaning and whimpering had stopped. The tightness in her chest and stomach was agonizing. Silent tears were sliding down her cheeks, dripping off her chin onto her hands. Her throat was so tightly pinched that no sound could escape. She was sure she had never felt such intense emotional pain.

For an immensely long time, she sat like this, alone in her living room, unable to cry, unable to do anything but hurt. She knew she had brought this on herself. Her own recklessness had been the cause. Dee Dee had tempted her, but she should have been able to turn away. No one had ever meant as much to her as Sara, and she had thrown it away for a few cheap moments of thrilling sex.

She wanted to talk to her but knew it was impossible. Also unwise, given both Sara's admonitions and her own certainty that she would simply blubber and grovel and plead and beg and look altogether as despicable and contemptible as she felt. She remembered losing some boy, when she was a teenager, to a high school rival and feeling a devastating loss, as though she could not live without him. This was the way she felt about Sara. Only now she was no longer a teenager, no longer theatrically suffering the sharp though callow yearnings of adolescence, but a responsible adult who simply felt like she was going to die of this pain, this horrible agony of loss. I love her, she thought bleakly. I love her forever.

She cut herself short on this one, not letting her mind linger on it. Yes, you love her. Now you can love her in her absence. Don't think about it, at least not right now. You'll only feel worse. As if that were possible.

She had arrived home at 3 p.m. and at eight-twenty she looked at a clock and realized that she had no idea what had happened in the past five and a half hours. She was not hungry. She was numb. She looked at her face in the bathroom mirror and realized that she had been crying, apparently pretty heavily, but had little memory of it. Her throat, however, was sore from the tight sobs. Now she felt drained, giddy. Is it grief that makes you feel this way? she asked herself.

Again she plotted and had to stop herself. What would she do if I just showed up there, on her doorstep? Like when she gets home from work? There I am. Would she be cruel? Send me away? Would she let me in? Would she listen to my apologies?

Oh god, I hate myself. I want her to know how much I hate myself. Maybe I should call her and leave her another message, tell her how much I hate myself. How sorry I am. Maybe I should send her a letter. Maybe I should send her flowers. Ha, maybe that's it! Remember how happy Dawn was to get those flowers I brought? Maybe I could send her something else. A telegram. A simple telegram. 'I Love You. I Always Will. I'm So Sorry. Signed, Laura.'

Oh shit, no, she thought.

I can't do any of that. Something like that only makes things worse. It only hardens her and makes me look pathetic. What am I going to do? I have to do something!

But Laura knew it was hopeless. She believed Sara when she said she had truly loved Laura. They had touched each other's inner core, and not only sexually. She knew that under Sara's joking, happy-go-lucky exterior there was a flinty, tough, and resilient woman, a rock, a woman one could actually love and respect and adore, as well as desire. This was the woman Laura had offended, and she had done it not with some stranger or past lover but with Sara's own feckless but wildly sexy younger sister.

True, time could dissipate pain and anguish and feelings of rejection, even sexual betrayal. If Laura had cheated with someone else, that person would perhaps disappear, die, move, get hooked up in another relationship. But every time Sara looked at Dee Dee—whom she was constantly rescuing from the consequences of her own worst impulses anyway—she would see Laura writhing naked with her in bed, grimacing and screaming with Dee Dee's face between her legs. You couldn't go on living with such a vision.

Sara would not forgive it. Laura knew she never would. Some things, maybe, but sleeping with Dee Dee, never. Would I forgive it? No. A thousand times: NO.

Months of alternating between sodden remorse and piercing grief lay head for her, Laura knew. Worse, she had to return to work the following morning as if nothing had happened, as if she had not been crushed and left bleeding by this horrible event. She was in a daze, not having eaten since Dallas, having got little sleep, her insides feeling knotted and raw and clenched in the effort to conceal her pain, even from herself, though it gnawed at her like an evil, poison worm.

She was staring glassily at her desk top, daydreaming, abstracted, still vaguely wondering what she could do to set things right again, when Randi came into her office in the mid-afternoon. Laura looked up. Randi might not have this effect on everyone, but to Laura—even in this depressed, abstracted state—the girl was just as vivacious and ravishing as she had been the first time she had seen her. Randi could be a mischievous and coy little twit, but with her sexy long braids swishing around her shoulders and her beautiful face and tall, supple body, which Laura had so thoroughly devoured on many occasions, she was eye-candy and catnip rolled into one.

Laura smiled wanly at her. There were at least some consolations in life. Sex with Randi was as hot as it could get. Maybe they could work something out that would take Laura's mind off Sara.

"Hi there, you gorgeous creature," she said softly, hearing her voice emerge very husky and sexy. "Long time no see."

Randi smirked and flirted silently, like a small child with a secret. Her lengthy relationship with Laura had given her deep knowledge of the things about her that aroused Laura's desire. In fact, like a few other women Laura knew, Randi had that talent instinctively and could ignite fires in the most unsuspecting people, male or female, by a few well-chosen bodily movements. She also had an enchanting face that, even now when Laura was down in the dumps, gloomy, sluggish with lovesick pain, could pierce Laura's heart.

"It's going to be even longer next time," Randi flirted. "This is my last day. I came to say goodbye."

This news hit Laura like a ton of bricks. From feeling a pleasant, expectant glow (though still tinged by the ineffable, gnawing sadness she felt from losing Sara) and an agreeable tingle in her pussy at the prospect of rubbing flesh with the delectable Randi she was plunged into a further despair and painful shock. She knew better than to expect things to last forever, but she had always comfortably kept Randi in the back of her mind, especially since they had developed some space in their relationship and weren't constantly feeding on each other's body and emotions, as a friendly and deliciously sexy possibility. She had felt Randi thought about her now in the same way.

"Laura?" Randi came over to her desk, leaning down, so much so that her long, thin braids swished against Laura's forearm, and Laura could smell her sweet, warm breath. She was enjoying every second of Laura's dismay. "Are you okay?"

"I . . . I'm okay," Laura muttered, shaking the confusion out of her brain. "Last day? Are you kidding?"

Randi looked down at her. To look into her eyes, Laura's gaze had to travel up her body, across her jutting breasts, which was the way she had planned it. Laura loved those breasts. Randi knew it. Her eyes were flickering a message: Don't you wish you could have them again? Don't you wish you could just rip this blouse off?

Smirking with self-satisfaction and sexual allure, Randi stepped back a little. "I'm moving back to North Carolina. You knew I was from there, didn't you? I'm going back. I got a job in Charlotte. At a bank. They're giving me a better job than this one." She tossed her head arrogantly, fetchingly, her braids swinging around her lovely neck. "Won't have to work for that stuck-up cunt Shontay Gibson any more, either." She winked salaciously at Laura. "Maybe when I'm gone you can suck her little Neegro pussy for her and get her to lighten up a little bit, eh?" But then she sneered with contempt. "On second thought, it probably looks and smells like a rotten old prune. Not a sweet little black snatch like the one Laura is dying to slurp, right?" She looked down at her own crotch suggestively, baiting Laura.

Laura blushed. At the same time, she realized that two big tears were rolling down her cheeks. She had cried so much in the past eighteen hours or so that she had thought there was no water left in her.

"Oh, Laura, that's so sweet," Randi purred, leaning down again. "Are you crying because you'll miss me?"

"Oh god, yes. I will," Laura blurted out, meaning each word.

The combination of losing Sara, and now Randi, was converging inside her chest into a huge, horrible wail of pain. It was all she could do not to let it escape. Her shoulders were even shuddering with incipient sobs, but she stiffened her muscles with a ferocious act of will and got them under control.

"Gee," Randi said, "I didn't think you'd take it so hard. You been screwing that dwarf so often lately that I thought you forgot completely about me."

'That dwarf' was Randi's cutting description of Deshona, for whom she had long felt a fierce rivalry.

Laura sniffled. "Why North Carolina?" she asked, reaching for a kleenex.

"I just told you. I'm from there. I was raised there. I have a girl friend who works in a big bank. Charlotte is becoming sort of a banking capital, you know. She offered me this job."

"What about Nate?"

"What about him?" Randi said, waving her hand as if he were an afterthought. She leaned closer, whispering now in Laura's ear, rubbing Laura's shoulder with one of her firm breasts. "Between you and me, he never was as good as you anyway." She glanced down at the carpet next to Laura's desk. "Remember the time we were doing it right there when the dwarf came in and caught us?"

Laura rolled her eyes, laughing. "What is this, a trip down Memory Lane?"

Randi pouted playfully. "Bet you never bopped her in your office."

Laura gave her a half-grin and shook her head. "God, I will miss you so much," she said softly.

Randi continued to smirk and angle her long, curvaceous body in provocative poses for Laura, her hips tilted forward. "Sure you don't want to give me a going away party?"

"I'm likely to get us both fired if you don't try to be a little less tempting," Laura confessed.

"Correction," Randi grinned. "You can get fired. I am history. They can kiss my pretty little black ass around here, Rhonda Reardon included."

Laura could not help feeling both terrible and sexually stimulated at the exact same moment. Her bad feelings grew out of her realization that she was so vulnerable to this kind of temptation, and something very similar had occurred with Dee Dee, which had led to her losing Sara. The circumstances had been different, but this warm, hungry, sensual feeling that was spreading throughout her body as she bantered with Randi was exactly the way she had felt when trying to resist Dee Dee. She had failed then. The consequences had been disastrous.

Of course, there were no consequences for giving in now. She could not resist Randi either, and she desperately needed to forget, even if only for a few hours, the mess she had made with Dee Dee and Sara.

"I . . . I," she stammered, shuffling papers on her desk. "I . . . just came back from Dallas . . . so I really have to work the rest of the day. How about tonight? When are you leaving for Charlotte?"

Randi tilted her head. She was rarely hard to get, but she now enjoyed toying with Laura. "Why do you want to know?"

"Because I want to give you a going away present."

Randi walked over to the window and looked out, ostentatiously, showing Laura the smooth curve of her delicious rump under her skirt, and the long, smooth, shapely black calves of her legs. She looked coyly back over her shoulder, swishing her braids in a way that she knew made Laura's pussy ooze and flutter.

"Will I like it?"

"You've always liked it in the past," Laura whispered, holding her gaze.

"I'm not flying to Charlotte until Tuesday," Randi whispered back. She walked back to Laura's desk. "I don't know where you live now. You moved."

Laura wrote the address and a simplified map on a memo pad and tore off the sheet for Randi. "Six?" she said.

Randi leaned down again, very close, whispering in Laura's ear. "You know, we won't see each other for a very long time after this. I hope it's a very good present."

Then, before Laura could respond, she left the office, her beautiful ass swaying as she walked away. Laura could tell that Randi was very conscious of Laura's eyes on it.

Oh dear, Laura suddenly thought. What if Sara should have second thoughts? What if she should show up unexpectedly while Randi and I are fucking? What if she just sits out front in her car and sees her arriving, or leaving? Oh god, I can't go through with this!

But this, Laura knew in the back of her mind, was insane. There would be no second thoughts. Sara was not going to reconsider. Still, the thought of killing her chances twice, even in fantasy, had a way of deflating all her exciting expectations of a torrid evening in bed with this delectable girl, whom she could never accuse of being lukewarm. Randi was an enthusiastic and ardent lover, and Laura tried to remember that as she again fought the relentless demons of her depression.

But by the time Randi was out of sight, Laura could feel the sadness returning, seeping into her mind and her body, filling her pores, dragging her down.

Yesterday's kisses are still on my lips,
I had a lifetime of heaven at my fingertips.

Now all is gone, gone is the rapture that filled my heart,
Gone with the wind, the gladness that thrilled my heart . . .

She hummed this song all afternoon, as she worked. She could not kick it. Daydreaming, looking out the window, she saw not Randi's supple, desirable body, but Sara's face, her sensual, pillowy lips, her limpid black eyes, flickering with deep humor, alternating with fiery scorn.

Just like a flame, love burned brightly then became
An empty smoke dream that was gone with the wind . . .

Laura wanted to speak to her, speak to this . . . wraith, this specter, this beautiful fantasy face. She suddenly realized why people usually exacerbated these kinds of problems, instead of backing off, or easing up. The urge to communicate was too fierce, too implacable. You had to say something. I have to say something to her. I have to tell her how sorry I am, at least. I have to let her know how hurt I am, too.

But it was only vanity, Laura realized. The urge to communicate was very intense, but fundamentally, she understood, it was only her own vanity pushing her to get relief, to say 'I'm sorry,' 'I love you so much,' 'Please forgive me,' 'I could kill myself for hurting you,' et cetera. Vanity. Self-regard. Guilt relief. Just forget it, Laura, she told herself. If you were Sara, you'd just be waiting for such an opportunity. Kill this love twice, just to make sure it's really dead.

Randi arrived at Laura's condo at five minutes to six. Laura had only been home ten minutes herself, sorting through the mail, hoping for a phone message from Sara, even if it were a brutal and dismissive one. There was no message.

The second she saw Randi, letting her in the door, she felt the flood of sadness mixed with urgent sexual desire return. Randi could see something troubling in Laura's eyes.

"You okay, girl?" she whispered. "You look a little green."

"I . . . I'm fine. Just so glad to see you."

Randi's eyes twinkled. "If you're so glad to see me, how come I haven't heard from you in a month? You and that wild woman friend of yours come over and fuck the shit out of me, then you don't even call back. At work, you're always locked up in some meeting. I don't think you're going to miss me at all," Randi pouted.

"Oh, but I am," Laura purred, embracing her, running her hands up and down Randi's long body as she kissed her very slowly and thoroughly.

Randi kissed back. She slithered her tongue into Laura's mouth, exploring the under-flesh of Laura's lips, then inviting Laura's tongue back into her own mouth, sucking it playfully.

"I love the way you kiss," she murmured to Laura, her eyelids heavy, her sensual lips wet and parted. "Nobody kisses like Laura."

"I want to kiss every inch of your body," Laura purred.

Randi laughed. She grew coquettish. "You want to put your hand in my pussy, you bitch?"

"I didn't say that."

Now Randi pouted. "You don't want to? And pull my hair? And tie up my pretty titties. And do me with that thing Kim raped me with?"

"Whoa, now," Laura stopped her, putting one finger up to Randi's luscious lips. "Aren't we getting a little ahead of ourselves?"

Randi grinned. "Maybe. But I want it. What's the chance I'm going to get that again, back in North Carolina? Answer me. Ain't gonna trust nobody to do that but you, Laura. Guess you'll have to come visit." Her eyes twinkled. "If you aren't going to come and visit me, then you have to do it now."

Laura twirled several long strands of Randi's braids in her fingers, acting like she was thinking it over. "I really turned you into a nasty little devil, didn't I."

Randi smirked. "Yes." She nodded. "You did. Now . . . take me in that bedroom and do something I'll never forget."

They had already shared moments that neither would ever forget, but Laura, still suffering inwardly from the lingering, gnawing, painful emotions of her loss, was more inclined than ever to recreate some of those moments with Randi. Anything to take this pain away, she thought.

She kissed Randi's smooth dark cheek, then the edge of her jaw, then her earlobe, breathing into her ear. "I'm going to fuck you so well you'll be sorry you ever decided to leave," she whispered.

Randi threw back her head and laughed, exposing all of her delicious throat to Laura's lips. "Promises, promises," she laughed. Then she stopped laughing and looked seriously at Laura. "Promise me, now. The whole thing. No holding back."

Already her dark eyes were dancing with fires of sexual excitement, and Laura knew hers must be too.

"You know I never hold back, darling," Laura smiled, taking her hand and pulling her in the direction of the bedroom.

Randi, following Laura down the hall, had her blouse off by the time they reached the bedroom, and when Laura turned and saw her half-naked upper body, all smooth and dark and sleek and gleaming slightly in the dim light of the bedroom, the white straps of her bra vividly etched against the marvelous black velvet of her skin, she was quickly overcome by sharp physical hunger.

"God, you are so beautiful. How am I going to be able to live without you?"

"Why Laura," Randi said sarcastically, tilting her head quizzically, her dark eyes flashing with provocative glints. "I do believe you say that to all the black girls you get in here. We all know you just interested in our pretty black pussies."

"Mmmm, you have the prettiest," Laura murmured, grabbing her hand again and pulling her close.

Randi smiled warmly, changing the mood abruptly. "You know, it's great to be alone with you like this," she whispered. "It was fun with your friend, that wild woman, but I like this better. Just us. Just kissing and teasing. I brought you something. It's my going away present to you."

Laura pouted. "I'm the one who's supposed to be giving you something."

Randi's eyes flickered. "You are going to give me something. Did you forget?"

She went to her purse, which she had tossed onto the bedside chair along with her blouse, and came up with a pair of fur-lined handcuffs, dangling them in front of Laura's face. Laura felt an instant hot flush spread quickly throughout her body. She smiled.

"You're even a worse pervert than me, girl," she murmured to Randi, taking them out of Randi's extended hand.

Randi rubbed one wrist playfully with the fingers of her other hand. "Those other ones you got really hurt my wrists."

Laura ran her fingertip along the fur that completely line the inside of each cuff. "Well . . . I guess you won't have that problem with these," she winked. She tossed them on the bed and grabbed Randi's hand again, pulling her close once more. "I want you naked." She kissed Randi's shoulders, each side, next to the bra straps. "I want to kiss every inch of your body."

She let her lips travel down Randi's smooth chest to the valley between her breasts, still covered by the white bra.

"Ooohhh . . . Laura . . . that tickles!" Randi shivered.

"What happened to the red underwear? You know how it lights my fire."

"You don't need anything to light your fire, Laura. Just breathe on Laura a little and she wants to fuck, right?"

Laura slid her tongue into the crease between Randi's breasts. "When you're in the room I go up in flames," she purred.

Randi, pleased by Laura's feverish ardor, reached behind her back to unfasten her bra. "I never knew anyone as crazy about this body as you are, Laura," she breathed, panting softly now. "I don't know what I'm going to do without you either."

Laura's lips crawled back up to Randi's smooth black neck and she began to suck it. Giggling, Randi squirmed free.

"Cut it out, girl! You're giving me a hickey."

Her bra, now loose, collapsed and slid down her arms, exposing her delectable breasts, which swayed delightfully as Laura kept trying to suck her neck. Laura raised her hands to cup them and caught some of the bra fabric in her fingers as well. She pushed it aside and gently but passionately clipped Randi's large, soft black nipples with her fingers.

"I'll give you such a hickey that people will think you got a new tattoo," Laura murmured, sucking harder.

Randi giggled and tried to escape again. "I already do have a new tattoo," she laughed, wriggling away from Laura, her bra now falling to the floor, her enchanting naked breasts jiggling. "Look."

She dipped one shoulder and pivoted her body slightly so that Laura could see the swirly black rose just above her shoulder blade.

"Oh my god . . . too much ink on this beautiful body," Laura said, quoting Nate, who—Randi had once told her—had said this about her first tattoo, the ankh.

But she instantly bent forward, before Randi could again dodge away, and licked it, following her tongue with hot kisses. Randi paused to let Laura get her fill. She moved her shoulder a little under Laura's lips.

"I want to kiss your rose . . . and your ankh . . . and your—"

"What else?" Randi interrupted her, panting harder now, her black eyes pulsing with sex.

Now Laura was kissing up from the tattoo, over the top of Randi's shoulder, back down her smooth chest. She cradled both of Randi's exquisitely shaped oval breasts in her palms, kissing the upper slopes.

"I'm going to take your big, juicy clit between my lips and make you beg me to suck it," Laura whispered, looking up from under her heavy eyelids, panting herself too by now.

Randi looked down at her breasts in Laura's hands, waiting for Laura's lips to reach one of her nipples. "Go get that rope," she panted.

Laura ignored her.

"Laura . . . go get that rope of yours," Randi said, a little more urgently, taking Laura's head in both hands but not jerking or twisting it, letting Laura's lips continue to move inevitably toward one of her gleaming, thick black nipples.

Laura looked up at her and shook her head. She was half-tempted to give in, since Randi clearly wanted it, but she had done her best in recent months to steer clear of the rougher aspects of sex that she had indulged in with a few of her friends. Once or twice she and Randi had engaged in a little bondage, and Randi had experienced thrilling climaxes. Ever since then she had wanted Laura to repeat it, while Laura had been trying her best to be good, to restrain these darker impulses, to avoid the kind of depraved masochism and sadistic pleasures she and Karen, or Earlene, had often shared.

Moreover, the whole thing with Sara made her want to avoid it even more. True, Sara was not really uppermost in her mind at the moment, which was exactly why she had invited Randi over. But even though it was finished, there had been something about their relationship that was supremely wholesome; healthy, honest, sweet, and pure. No perversions, no degenerate prurience or twisted sexual needs on either part. Not that they wouldn't have got more adventurous later, Laura realized, if the relationship had lasted. I know I couldn't have resisted tasting that beautiful ass for long, she thought.

"Why not?" Randi intruded on her thoughts, her brow furrowing.

"I . . . stored it away when I moved here."

"Where?"

"In the . . . garage."

"Liar. I didn't see any garages out there. You don't have a garage, just a parking space."

"I mean . . . you know, I rented a storage garage and stored some extra things in it," Laura lied, since the rope was still in the drawer with all the other toys. God, now I can't let her see the drawer, she thought.

Randi's face fell. "You can't be serious."

To distract her, Laura now opened her mouth and sucked one of Randi's big, soft nipples into it, laving it with her tongue, slowly drawing the large bulb deep into her warm, wet mouth. Randi's eyes rolled up and she quivered.

"Oh god. Nobody ever made me feel this way by sucking my boob except you, Laura. Ohhnnnnnn . . . god, that feels good! You really know how to do that."

"I really know how to do it to the other one, too," Laura grinned, moving her mouth across Randi's breasts.

But Randi stopped her. "Get undressed. Let's get in the bed. I can't wait."

Laura raised her mouth to Randi's and kissed her hungrily. "It's been too long, hasn't it."

"Yes! Here, take this off."

She began unfastening Laura's clothes, while Laura just as eagerly began tearing at hers. The only problem was that Randi was already half-naked, and Laura had trouble keeping her hands off her bare, smooth flesh as well. In just a few seconds Laura was down to her underwear and had Randi's skirt off. She slid her hands under Randi's panties, clutching one firm moon of Randi's ass in each palm.

"I thought you wanted me to do all that stuff," she laughingly panted as she squeezed Randi's wonderful bottom.

Randi pulled one of Laura's bra straps off her shoulder, then the other, tugging down Laura's bra and sliding her own mouth down to Laura's naked breasts.

"I do," Randi laughed too, "but you don't have the rope. I wanted you to tie up my titties and squeeze them and suck them and bite them. When you did that once I thought I was going to die, I came so hard. I never came that hard before or since."

Randi's words, while she was busily licking and sucking Laura's own breasts, sent a hot, thrilling sizzle through Laura's pussy. It didn't sound so bad to her, from the way Randi put it. In fact, it was pretty arousing. She was almost sorry she had lied about the rope. What would a little light bondage hurt, especially if Randi craved it?

Laura pulled away from her long enough to shed her own panties and finish unfastening her bra. Randi skimmed her panties down her legs too. Now they were completely naked. Somehow being naked altered their rhythm, and instead of hopping eagerly onto the bed together, they modulated into a slow, sensual dance, coming together in a romantic embrace, their naked breasts touching, swishing together, then mashing together as their mouths met and their hands began exploring.

They kissed hungrily for a long time, tongues intertwining, sucking each other's lips, until they were both panting and squirming together.

"Do you really want to do that?" Laura whispered, tentative, embarrassed. "You know . . . with the rope?"

Randi pulled back a little, glowering, but still sexy and playful. "See! I knew you were lying. You are such a liar, Laura. I can see right through you. Now, where is it?"

Laura looked down at the floor, in both a teasing and shamefaced mood at the same time. "I . . . can get it."

Randi tapped her foot ostentatiously, grinning at Laura. "I'm waiting, girl."

Laura raised her hands to Randi's naked breasts, cradling each luscious globe in her palms, running her thumbs lightly across Randi's large, gleaming black nipples. "They are so beautiful. Are you sure you don't just want me to . . . you know, caress them . . . and kiss them . . . and lick them . . . like this? Instead of that awful—"

"I'm waiting, Laura!" Randi looked down at Laura's fingers and lips on her breasts. She lowered her voice, which was now more smoky and thick. "I'm waiting."

Laura looked up. She released Randi's breasts and, feigning reluctance, though she knew she too was dying to do it, she moved across the room to the bureau and pulled open the drawer. It had been a long time since she had used the rope. In fact, she could not even remember how long. It lay in the bottom of the drawer, under all the other toys.

The sight of the Double Penetrator instantly reminded her of Dee Dee, which in turn reminded her of Sara, and she had to make a supreme effort to drive both thoughts quickly out of her mind, lest they ruin the sweet and scintillating moment she and Randi had created here. She skimmed the other things aside and grasped the bristly coils in her hand, taking it out and closing the drawer. This was not a nylon or velvet rope but was made of rough, bristly hemp and felt harsh against the skin. Laura and Karen, in their days of most perverted masochism, had acquired it precisely for these features, but Randi had felt it before, as she was making abundantly clear, and was not deterred.

Randi took the rope from Laura's hand as Laura approached the bed. She looked at it with fascination, running one finger along the rough hemp.

"God, it's as evil as I remembered," she said softly, awed.

"Sure you really want it?"

Randi's dark eyes were glassy with sexual excitement. "You aren't going to do it real tight, are you?"

"Only as tight as you want, darling," Laura purred with playful menace, pushing her gently down onto the bed and taking back the rope.

"Wait," Randi stopped her. "Get the handcuffs. And get that strap-on thingee."

Laura looked at her meaningfully. "You want the whole nine yards, eh?"

Randi nodded. Her voice, when she replied to Laura, was faint and clotted, thick and labored with sexual fever. "I told you . . . I'll never be able to do this again."

Laura pushed her down on her back, kissing her bare shoulders and her neck again, caressing her cheek with her fingers. "I might have to make a trip to Charlotte, if it means so much to you," she teased softly, sucking Randi's full lower lip.

Randi was single-minded. "Get the old handcuffs too," she panted. "I have an idea."

"What."

"You fasten one ring to the chain on the fur ones, then the other one to the bed post. That way I can lay further down here on the bed instead of rubbing my hands against the head of the bed."

A slow smile spread over Laura's face. "You've been giving this a lot of thought."

Randi positively twinkled with pleasure. "Lately, when Nate is fucking me, I keep thinking of us doing this."

Now Laura was beaming too. "Really."

Randi nodded. "Shit, it makes me come almost immediately . . . no matter what he's doing."

"I'm not surprised," Laura listened, smoothly moving across the room again to the drawer to retrieve the old handcuffs and the strap-on dildo.

"Sometimes I even come again, just thinking of it again. Nate thinks he's suddenly become this super-lover and gets all proud of his cock. Making me come two or three times in a row. He don't know it's really you."

Laura rejoined her on the bed. "I'm so flattered," she purred.

With a sultry look deep into Randi's eyes, she reached down to the end of the bed and grasped the new, fur-lined handcuffs. Next, she kissed Randi's mouth in a long, slow, wet, sensual manner, distracting her so much that Randi barely knew what was happening until one of the cuffs snapped shut on one of her wrists. But the sound of the metal locking was startling to them both.

Randi's eyes suddenly flashed with fear and excitement. "Oh," she exclaimed softly, almost uncontrollably.

Laura nibbled Randi's lower lip suggestively. "Give me your other wrist," she murmured, as sexy-menacing as she could be.

Obediently, eyes wide and shiny, Randi, falling into the game along with Laura, acting as if she were being disciplined, raised her other arm, offering her wrist. Very slowly, as if to enjoy each micro-second of this loving imprisonment, Laura opened the fur-lined shackle to receive Randi's shapely dark brown wrist, then pushed the metal together again until it locked with an audible click. Randi chewed her lip, the one Laura had been nibbling.

"I'm very wet," she whispered to Laura, barely moving her lips, her dark eyes swirling with hot lust. "Very."

"Me too," Laura grinned. "Now lie back."

Following Randi's suggestion, Laura quickly fastened one ring of the old handcuffs to the chain between the ones imprisoning Randi's wrists, then snapped the other one to the corner bedpost. Randi's arms were stretched now above her body, pulling up her lovely breasts slightly, and her smooth black stomach dipped between the protruding cambers of her ribcage on either side. Her collarbones were contorted upwards too, and her whole torso was somehow alluringly distorted by this unnatural position, which somehow aroused Laura's sexual hunger fiercely.

"You want to fuck me," Randi smiled salaciously, seductively. "I can see it in your eyes."

"I always want to," Laura breathed.

Randi's dark eyes burned as she intently watched Laura fishing around with one hand on the sheet below their bodies for the coils of rope.

"Not too tight," she said softly.

"How tight?"

"I'll tell you when." Randi paused, looking at Laura meaningfully. "You've had it done to you, haven't you?"

Laura nodded slowly. "A long time ago."

"Then you know. You know how it feels. There's a second, just an instant, when it's just right . . . and I can feel my whole body suddenly . . . I don't know how to describe it, like it just comes alive . . . with some hot juice, some electrical current, though it's really not a shock or anything like that. More like a thick, spreading syrup that suddenly fills your body. And when it happens . . . god, I nearly lose it."

Laura nodded, remembering the sensation herself. It was a fatal moment, when you felt that. You might do anything to achieve sexual release, suffer anything, initiate anything. It was a kind of abyss that one didn't dare gaze into very often.

But Randi wanted to stare into it right now, and she squirmed impatiently while Laura untangled the rope coils. Laura carefully looped a strand of rope around one of Randi's luscious breasts. Then she looped it again, so that Randi's naked breast was entrapped by two coils. Randi watched intently, barely breathing.

"Pull it tighter," she panted softly.

Laura did as she was asked, but very slowly. "I don't want to leave marks," she whispered, feeling her own throat swell up as a result of her own lust.

"Don't worry about it," Randi panted. "They'll go away."

"If it's too tight, you won't get that feeling you want," Laura warned.

"I'm almost getting it right now."

Laura pulled the rope coils a little tighter, watching Randi's large silky black nipple swell and puff up and begin to gleam, then turn shiny as it grew tauter. She glanced up to see Randi's dark eyes streaked by silvery, liquid fires of sexual arousal.

"That's enough," Randi gasped softly. "Do the other one."

"Are you okay?" Laura asked before continuing.

"God, yes."

Laura didn't know why this was so exciting, but she had experienced it herself in the past, as she had acknowledged to Randi moments ago, and she did know how your body could absolutely go up in flames if it was done right. Randi was already quivering, breathing hard, biting her full lower lip, as Laura looped the rope loosely around her other lovely breast.

Since she had not knotted it anywhere yet, she had to keep holding the first coils with one hand to make sure they did not loosen.

"You . . . do this pretty well, Laura," Randi panted, trembling slightly as she watched.

"I want to suck them," Laura murmured, voicing her deepest need at the moment, which was not to follow Randi's wishes but her own.

"Wait!" Randi gasped, not loudly, but very firmly. "Don't do it yet. I'll . . . I'll go off, Laura."

"Okay, okay," Laura said, softly.

She looped another coil of rope around Randi's other breast, then slowly pulled both coils tighter, hearing a deep chuff and gurgle in Randi's throat as the sexual excitement almost overcame her. But she quickly regained control.

"Do you feel it yet?" Laura asked.

Randi shook her head. "No. Almost."

"You'll have to lean up a little bit. I have to run the rope around your back to make it stay in place."

With Laura's help, Randi lifted her torso off the mattress so that Laura could slip the strands of rope under her, crossing them, then pulling them out the opposite sides. Now she drew them over Randi's bare shoulders and looped each one once more around Randi's breasts, then knotted them between the imprisoned globes.

Randi's mouth was slack and her eyes pulsing. "I don't know if I can make it any further," she panted. "I . . . I'm dying for it, Laura."

"You, my darling, are going to make it all the way," Laura purred.

She bent her head down and began licking Randi's gleaming, swollen, black nipples, but very carefully, knowing how aroused Randi already was. Laura knew that only a little more tension on the rope would bring the girl to that precipice she was seeking, and she knew exactly how to accomplish it.

"Hhhhh!" Randi gasped, tossing her head wildly, looking down at Laura's clever tongue on her wet, shiny black nipples. "Hhhhhh! Oh . . . oh shit, Laura! Unhhhh!"

"Mmmm, wouldn't you like me to suck them real hard?" Laura teased.

"Oh god, yes! Unhhhhh!"

Randi squirmed and panted, her hips jumping and twisting, her long body flexing and arching uncontrollably. Laura trailed one of her hands down the girl's smooth, dark flesh to her crotch, running two fingers through the tight, glistening black curls of Randi's pubic patch, just above her gaping, festering pussy.

"Put the rope there . . . put the rope there!" Randi suddenly gasped. "Like you did that one time. In my pussy. Remember? Oh shit . . . I just came apart. Oh god, Laura, do it!"

But Laura slowly shook her head. "I have other plans for your sweet pussy, my darling," she purred, letting two fingers slip even lower, until her fingertips grazed Randi's large, swollen, wet clit, which was very exposed now, bulbous and hard.

Randi flinched. "Ahhh!"

She knew how Laura loved her clit, the biggest, ripest, juiciest one Laura had ever seen. It was also very sensitive, and Laura knew that to reach the objective they were both aiming for she would have to treat it with extraordinary care. But she could not resist the desire to touch it with her tongue.

"I want it," she whispered, smiling, nipping one of Randi's bulging, wet, black nipples with her teeth. "I want your clit in my mouth."

In spite of her frantic arousal, Randi could not suppress a giggle as she looked down at her nipple between Laura's gleaming white teeth. "If you do, I'll come," she warned. "If you touch it . . . I'll come."

"Mmmm, that's the point, isn't it?"

"Pull the rope tighter," Randi gasped, her head falling back.

"Everything in good time," Laura purred, now kissing Randi's smooth, flat stomach where it sloped between the protruding sides of her ribcage. "I'm going to make you wait."

"Oh . . . oh! Laura . . . you're sick!" Randi gasped, twisting under Laura's descending lips. "If you touch my clittie, I'll explode!"

"Oh . . . not yet," Laura murmured. "Not yet."

Laura very much enjoyed prolonging the sweet agony, which she had not taken the opportunity to do for a long time now. She loved to toy with Randi, to torment her with sweet, probing caresses, to make her whimper and squirm and beg for release. Like Laura herself, Randi could come pretty easily, pretty quickly, and it was doubly hard to hold it off, and doubly challenging. Laura loved bringing her to the edge, then drawing back, then slowly bringing her there again, until the sexual tension in Randi's body was so severe that she was quivering with pent-up need, cawing, twisting, begging Laura, her body undulating and flexing.

She was not there yet, but Laura also knew it wouldn't take much to get her there. Finally, she reached Randi's groin with her lips, skirting the shiny black puff of pubic hair, flicking the tender inner flesh of Randi's delicious thighs with the tip of her tongue, inhaling the thick, pungent odors of Randi's aroused pussy. It was not a perfectly-shaped little slit like some but instead a juicy, meaty, fleshy cunt, large and gaping, and at the moment runny and slick with flowing nectars, deep purplish-red inside.

Laura was intimately acquainted with Randi's thick, swollen, delectable cunt, having passionately explored every inch of it on countless occasions, but each time she came close to it like this, she wanted absolutely to bury her face in it. The thought that Randi would be living across the continent soon made her desire even more urgent, and she had to exert maximum self-discipline to refrain from gobbling this glistening, splayed black pussy hungrily, throwing caution to the winds. Randi would erupt in horrific spasms in only seconds if Laura gave in to this desire, she knew.

"Oh yes . . . oh yes!" Randi was whimpering, squirming, her hips churning already, dying for it.

Avoiding the large, grape-sized bulb at the top of Randi's cunt—it was already springing out and up from its hood, stiffish and tumid, like a tiny erect penis—Laura began running the tip of her tongue up and down Randi's wet vulva in a slow, sensual circuit. At the same time, she slipped one finger up into the crack between Randi's buns, finding the girl's tight little anus with her fingertip, then caressing it. She had no intention of penetrating her here yet but knew that just the hint of it would send a delightfully intense mix of sensations through Randi's straining body, feelings that would intermingle with those caused by Laura's clever tongue on her vulva to turn her instantly to hot jelly.

"Ungghhh!" Randi suddenly cried out, quivering sharply, then falling back into a more gentle undulation. "Oh god . . . Laura! Unghhhhh!"

"Careful . . . careful," Laura teased, immediately backing off, realizing that she had come very close to triggering Randi's orgasm.

"Oh god, you bitch, make me come!" Randi gasped, her words sounding angry but her tone of voice pleading, imploring.

"All in good time," Laura purred, again rubbing Randi's anus with her fingertip, encircling Randi's bulbous, swollen clit with her tongue but not touching it, making Randi crave to feel Laura's tongue on it. "I want to drink a little of this sweet pussy juice."

"Oh god!"

Now Laura's tongue moved from the swollen edges into the wet, fiery pit of Randi's gaping pussy, slithering between the lips and deep into Randi's streaming slit. She could taste the warm, tangy juices and smeared her lips with them, licking and sucking, but doing it all very gently, carefully, forever vigilant, intent on keeping Randi from coming until the proper moment.

"Ohhhnnnn!" Randi moaned, her pelvis churning, trying to jam her pussy hard up into Laura's face. "You better fuck me, girl! Make me come. I'm dying!"

Laura realized that it was never going to last as long as she wanted to. I could keep this up for hours, she thought. Slowly, she drew her tongue up the creamy, darkly pink trench of Randi's large, fleshy pussy to the top. Do I dare? she wondered. Will she pop if I touch it? God, what a gorgeous huge clit. I can't keep my tongue off it.

Slowly, very slowly, she risked pushing the flat part of her wet tongue against Randi's large, distended clitoris, feeling the full, oval berry nestle in the groove that ran down the center of her tongue. Instantly, Randi's body seized up.

"Unhhh!" she let out a semi-hysterical groan.

Laura did not move. Slowly, Randi's body relaxed again. Oh, I love the feel of her clit in my mouth, Laura thought. I've got to have it. Again working ever so slowly, she drew the taut, bulbous berry between her lips, feeling Randi's flesh quiver and strain. I can't suck it, Laura thought. I want to suck it, I want her to explode, but I can't. I have to wait. Maybe later.

Instead, she held the throbbing bundle of nerves motionless in her mouth for a few seconds, then reluctantly released it, sliding two fingers into Randi's greasy quim and kissing the sleek muscles of her thighs, as if to distract her from the sensations that were centering relentlessly in her tormented clit.

"Oh . . . ungghhh . . . oh god . . . oh Laura . . ." Randi panted, twisting, looking down at her breasts jutting up from the coils of rope. "You promised . . . you promised," her eyes begged Laura. "You promised . . . that feeling . . . just a little tighter . . . please!"

"Yes . . . yes," Laura purred to her. "You'll get what you want. I promise."

Laura knew the point at which it didn't pay to prolong the teasing any more, and she knew they had reached it. If I whispered in her ear for her to come, she probably would come, Laura thought. I just love seeing her this crazy for it.

Carefully, she slid two more fingers into the squinchy, oozing channel, then her thumb, nestled in the cup provided by the fingers. Now she pushed her whole hand slowly but relentlessly up into Randi's pussy, feeling it slow down when the upper knuckles reached Randi's stretched pussy lips, then pushing only a little harder until the whole thing slipped inside.

"Ummnngghhff!" Randi grunted softly.

Her eyes watered as she looked down at Laura.

"You like that?" Laura smiled up at her.

"Oh shit."

Again Laura held very still, fearing Randi would come abruptly, too soon. Let her get used to it, she thought. Her hand was buried up to the wrist in Randi's glistening cunt, and Randi was quivering and whimpering uncontrollably. Still, at the same time Laura could feel, as she always did during this act, the solemn intensity of deep emotion enveloping them both, the stirring physical intimacy that accompanied sliding your hand up into a beautiful woman's pussy, the hot, throbbing, magnetic moment that linked you both in a single radiating nerve of incipient ecstasy.

"Oh . . . Laura," Randi sighed, her dark, throbbing eyes now locked with Laura's. "Pull . . . the rope . . . tighter," she gasped, almost inaudibly, her eyes rolling up. "Please."

"Yes," Laura whispered. "Yes yes."

"Don't you have a gag? I'm going to scream."

Laura smiled. "Go ahead and scream. I love it when you scream."

Laura began to move her hand, slowly, patiently, carefully. Randi's inner pussy walls had expanded enough by now for Laura to make a loose fist, and as she rotated her hand in the squinchy, greasy, tight depths of Randi's cunt, her knuckles running across the spongy flesh making Randi wince with pleasure, and mewl excitedly.

"Oh god! I'm going to scream!"

"Go ahead and scream."

Randi's eyelids fluttered open, though her face was torn in a grimace of excruciating sexual pleasure. "You never wanted me to scream before."

"I want you to scream now," Laura smiled, twisting her fist, now pumping Randi a little harder.

Randi was already straining and flexing, her arms extended above her head, her wrists securely shackled by the handcuffs, her entire sleek naked body undulating rapidly, her lovely face torn and contorted by the fierce sensations she was experiencing. Some may not have thought it a beautiful face—some people are blind, too, Laura thought—but to Laura Randi's face had always been exquisite enough to pierce her heart with its beauty. Seeing it now, all distorted in a sweet agony of pleasure, was so sharply arousing to Laura that she thought she too might come just from the overheated intensity of this moment.

"Ohhnnnnn . . . ohhnnnnn!" she moaned, twisting, her breasts swelling, her shiny black nipples flaring, in the coils of rope that were wrapped around them.

Laura knew the end was near. Randi was barely aware what Laura was doing as she took the two strands of bristly rope that dangled from the knot and drew them up and around Randi's neck, in back of it, then down to her shoulder. This way one sharp pull would increase the upward pressure on the coils entrapping Randi's luscious, swollen breasts. In an instant she would receive the final tightness she was craving, the trigger, the moment when your body threatened to explode in a gusher of thermonuclear fury, and she would come like a nest of firecrackers hit by a flame thrower.

Now Randi was grunting maniacally and fucking down on Laura's fist, a crazed, demented expression of sexual need contorting her beautiful feature, her mouth slack, her eyes streaked by liquid fire.

"Unnhhhh . . . unhhhh!" she grunted, "ohhhhh . . . oh Laura . . ."

"Yes."

"Fuck me harder."

"Yes."

"Oh god, it's so good! It's . . . ungghhh! It's never this good with anybody else! Ungghh! Oh shit! Oh! Oh . . . I think it's . . . it's almost . . ."

"Yes, honey. Yes, honey."

"Do it HARD! Oh god, Laura!"

Laura did fuck her a little harder now, thrusting her fist in deeper, twisting it, but she really did not unleash any fierce fuck-attack because it was clear Randi didn't need it. Nothing would stop her from blowing sky high any second.

Instead, Laura reached up and grabbed the two strands of rope with her free hand, letting the full connection she had with Randi's striving body and Randi had with hers seep into every pore of her being, feeling her deepest core vibrate right along with Randi's seething, clenching spasms as the girl rose to the moment of her complete sexual immolation. When she began to pull on the rope, Randi's frantic eyes suddenly caught hers, and Laura glimpsed the deep recognition in them, the affirmation that the moment she had been seeking had arrived.

"Oh YES! UNNGGHHH!" Randi groaned.

There was a split second of almost suspended animation for both of them, when they were both caught briefly in a freeze-frame of Randi's impending ecstasy, immobile, paralyzed, poised on the edge. And then everything poured forth.

"Annnnggghiiiieeeee!" Randi cried out, completely pulverized by the most horrific orgasm Laura had ever seen her have.

Paradoxically, it seemed to start slowly, first throttling her and stunning her with its impact, then giving way to a flood of wrenching spasms and an outpouring of strangled cries.

"Unnggmmmhnnngggiiiaaaiieeeee!" she wailed, surging off the bed, her body suddenly alive with three times the strength it usually had, her thighs clenching, her wrists yanking painfully at the fur-lined handcuffs, her toes curling so dramatically that Laura was worried she might have a foot cramp. "Auungghh! Ungghhh! Oh . . . oh oh . . . annnnggghiiiieeeee!"

It was a shattering moment for them both. Not only was it just about the sharpest, most intense orgasm Laura had ever seen Randi have, but it also lasted very long, and even when it was finished Randi seemed completely obliterated by it.

"Are you okay?" Laura finally murmured to her, untying the knot between her breasts, loosening the coils.

While doing this, she couldn't keep herself from caressing the freed globes, and running her tongue over Randi's big silky nipples, having wanted to do it desperately earlier, when the urgency of Randi's need had prevented it. Randi wriggled and gasped.

"God . . . Laura! You're going to make me want it all over again!"

Laura buried her face between these delectable breasts that she so enjoyed love-mauling. She looked up at Randi. "I think I'm next in line."

Randi gave her a sardonic grin. "I can't do very much with my hands like this," she cracked, letting her eyes rise to her wrists, still in the handcuffs.

Ordinarily Randi would reply with some tart remark at a moment like this, when Laura asked if she were okay, but this time her eyes were limpid and pulsing with love and gratitude, and she treated Laura with great tenderness. When Laura had released her, Randi wrapped her arms around Laura's body and mashed her naked breasts into Laura's, kissing Laura enthusiastically.

"Maybe I shouldn't move away after all," she purred, almost sounding as if she meant it. "You are the best, Laura. You did just what I asked."

"Of course I did. I want you to remember me," Laura teased.

Randi nipped Laura's earlobe, and intentionally swished her braids in Laura's face. "Tell you what. You give me two more of those, I'll never forget you."

"I don't know if you can survive two more."

Randi frowned playfully. "Sure be fun trying, though." She pulled Laura down on the mattress, kissing her again, dropping one hand to Laura's crotch. "Woooeeee . . . you are wet, girl!"

Laura turned sultry and very seductive. "Wet for you," she murmured in a husky, hungry voice, twirling a few of Randi's sexy braids in her fingers. "What are you going to do about it?"

Randi gave her a salacious grin. "I'm going to stick this long tongue . . ." She extended her wet, pink tongue suggestively beyond her sensual lips, wiggling the tip of it, toward Laura's nose. It was indeed very long. ". . . right into the middle of all that wet," she said, finishing the sentence.

Laura could feel the pulse leap in her neck, and a hot, fervent fluttering started deep inside her pussy. Of course fucking any lovely creature made her wet and horny, especially when they ended up fist-fucking and throbbing together in that hot, mystical trance that accompanied it. But Randi's face was a needle of the heart to her, too, and she suddenly felt like she might just melt away with lust at the sight of Randi's wet, naked tongue wriggling suggestively in front of her like that, and Randi avowing that she was now going to eat Laura's tingling, aching pussy.

Oh god, I'm going to come quicker than she did! Laura realized. "I . . . can't wait," she panted, barely able to get out the words, her breath was coming so fast.

Randi grinned, now kissing Laura's shoulder, her upper chest, stroking her hips, purring and sighing softly as she made her way down Laura's body. "Mmmm, you don't have to wait," she purred. "All you have to do is lay there and take it." She looked up questioningly, her face half-nestled between Laura's small breasts. "You want the handcuffs? You want to do it that way too?"

Laura shook her head. "I gave it up."

"What, for Lent or something?" Randi cracked, her fantastic, sensual lips moving toward one of Laura's nipples.

Laura shook her head again, giggling softly.

Randi began to lick Laura's excited nipple slowly, in such a way that Laura was quickly trembling and climbing the walls. "If you don't want them," Randi murmured, "I might have to take them with me."

"Oh god . . . that feels good!" Laura interrupted her. "Ohhh!"

Now Randi took Laura's nipple completely into her wet mouth, and Laura nearly swooned with pleasure. For several minutes they did not speak while Randi, very patiently and skillfully, using the techniques she had learned from Laura herself during their lengthy affair, made love to Laura's naked breasts. By the time she looked up again from Laura's erect, saliva-wet nipples, Laura was quivering and mewling with sexual need.

"I can see you're ready," Randi whispered.

"I've been ready since we walked in the door," Laura smiled down at her, panting.

"You want me to put my hand in there . . . the way you did?"

Laura shook her head, but smiled. "Look at your nails."

Randi had never been one of the 'long-nails' girls, but recently she had grown formidable talons. They were painted ruby red. She must not be getting much girl-girl loving, Laura thought. Not from me for a while, and I guess not from Rhonda or anybody else either. No wonder she's so hot for it.

"You're right," she said, admiring them. "Took me weeks to grow those. I wouldn't want to snap one off inside your pussy."

Laura shook her head in agreement. "That long tongue will do just fine."

"Mmmm . . . this one?" Randi let it snake out of her marvelously sensual mouth once again, teasingly.

"That one."

"Can I slip it in your booty hole too?"

Laura was gripped by a delicious shiver, which was very apparent to Randi.

"Guess the answer to that is 'yes,' eh?" Randi joked, now kissing Laura's stomach, her smooth belly, dipping lower.

Laura lay back, surrendering completely. All thoughts of Sara or Dee Dee vanished like dissipating smoke from her mind as she felt Randi's tender lips and caressing fingers on her skin, Randi's warm breath on her thighs, Randi's wet tongue on the sensitive borders of her vulva. They had often loved roughly, urgently, even with a twist of perversion as they had done only a few moments ago, but for some reason Randi seemed now overcome with sweetness and slow, simmering desire for Laura.

She was in no rush, and the touch of her fingers and lips was marvelously gentle, vibrant with tender affection. Laura was overcome suddenly by deep emotion, accompanied by raging sexual arousal. She had been in love with Randi once, not as deeply as she was in love with Sara; but still, a fierce, glowing passion had burned in her for the girl. And somehow now her feelings for Randi, so complex and confusing, became mixed in and stirred together with her pain and longing for Sara until her mind and body were simply consumed with an intense throbbing and yearning that centered totally on the lovely girl who was so tenderly beginning to lick her flowing pussy.

"Oh!" Laura gasped, grabbing Randi's head in both hands, feeling the coarse, rippling rows of braids under her spastic fingers. "Oh! God! Oh!"

Randi pushed her entire moving mouth into Laura's wet pussy, giggling softly, affectionately at the same time. "Careful, girl . . . you're going to pop too soon."

Laura knew she was telling the truth. Already she could feel the telltale swelling and trembling in her lower body. And the intense, unexpected emotion she was feeling somehow enveloped it all in a hot, throbbing cloud of thrilling sensuality that enlarged and expanded by the second.

Randi knew what she was doing, and like Laura earlier she was not willing to let it all blow up in their faces without trying to prolong it. Sensing Laura's vulnerability to a quick, rending orgasm, she drew her mouth back. At the same time, however, she slid one hand back up Laura's undulating body to her breasts, still damp with Randi's warm saliva, and scissored one of Laura's nipples between her long fingers, pulling and kneading it, while Laura could feel the fingers of her other hand slithering between her tight little buns.

"Ahhh!" she gasped as she suddenly felt Randi's fingertip press against the pinched-closed ring of her sensitive rectum.

Her body even leaped a little on the bed, making it sway.

Randi giggled huskily again, rubbing it in small circles. "Here comes the tongue," she teased.

"Oh god!" Laura gasped, feeling her body stream with fire. "I think if you did it . . . I might just come in an instant!"

"Mmmm, then maybe it's worth a try," Randi purred, kissing Laura's inner thighs.

"No . . ." Laura panted semi-hysterically, pulling Randi up by the hand that was caressing her breasts and pinching her damp nipples. "Kiss me . . . kiss me first! Oh god, I want you to kiss me!"

Randi slithered up until she was face to face with Laura. Her sensual, kittenish smirk was something to behold and made frantic little fire alarms go off deep inside Laura's already excited pussy. Randi extended her long, pink tongue and ran it playfully around the edge of Laura's lips.

"You're so romantic, all of a sudden," she whispered, then slipped her tongue between Laura's open teeth and into her mouth.

Laura wondered if she were going to faint from the influx of sexual and emotional thrills that poured through her squirming body as Randi kissed her. She remembered in the past, after having suffered romantic setbacks or disappointments, how she had often wanted to be sexually hammered and obliterated, as if to scour completely from her mind and body the pain of loss by fierce, sometimes violent, conflagrations of orgasms. She remembered being the center of orgies of double-penetration by Rob and his brother, and of course many of her more painful trysts with Karen had been fired by this very need.

But now, with Randi kissing her so tenderly and aggressively in the same instant, she felt herself almost melting with bittersweet emotion and molten sexual need. Randi's long, wet tongue explored the inner recesses of her mouth, Randi's fingertips caressed her face, Randi's thick, erect nipples brushed against her own, Randi's thighs clamped one of hers, and the smooth, sleek muscle of one thigh pressed against the wet, blossoming lips of Laura's throbbing pussy.

Randi breathed into Laura's ear. "Roll over so I can do you in the ass with my tongue," she whispered. "You want it, don't you? I'm dying for it myself."

If she were not already at the end of her sexual tether, now writhing and whimpering in a hot lather of need, Laura might have smiled in wonder at Randi's warm enthusiasm for practices she had never grasped with such relish before. Laura and Randi had been making love for nearly two years, and Randi was often an ardent lover, but mostly Laura was the devourer and Randi the devouree. Rarely, if ever, had she taken such initiative.

"Yes . . . me too," Laura panted, rolling over, surrendering her body completely, charmed by this thrilling development and equally saddened by the brief thought that it would not happen again, now that Randi was moving away.

Randi was immediately all over Laura's body with her hands and mouth, kneading Laura's taut little ass cheeks, and kissing Laura's lower back, slithering tongue sexily into the crack between Laura's buns.

"Oh god, Laura, you have such a pretty little creamy white booty," Randi murmured, kissing it everywhere. "I never knew you had such a pretty one until now. I always saw it, I guess, but I never wanted to kiss it until this minute. Can I bite you a little . . . like this?"

"Aiieee!" Laura laughed, giggling, as Randi nipped at chunks of her smooth, round ass.

"You've almost got a good enough booty to be a sister, Laura," Randi breathed, getting more serious, pulling apart Laura's buns to reveal the secrets within.

Laura was about to die of sexual excitement. She knew she would come, any second. The merest feel of Randi's warm breath on her pussy would be enough to ignite her. She knew it.

Hurriedly, Randi, who knew it too, grabbed the two pillows at the top of the bed and pulled them down, stuffing them under Laura's belly to raise her hips and tilt them slightly backward. Laura had done this many times herself with others and knew the point of it. Now her bottom was uptilted and her festering, throbbing pussy was right underneath it, all gaping and swollen and vulnerable.

Randi wasted no time.

"Oh! Ooooiiieeee!" Laura squealed as she felt Randi's fingers—with just a hint of her long nails—pulling apart her cheeks, then felt Randi's long wet tongue slide into the crack.

Oh god, she's really going to do it! Laura thought, feeling her body quiver and ripple with liquid fire. Randi was clever. She knew her nails were long and had alarmed Laura. Now she pressed her thumbs against the inner walls of Laura's buns, prying them open further, carefully using the pads of her thumbs and keeping her fingernails from even slightly pushing into Laura's skin.

Laura squirmed and panted, face down on the sheet, suffering agonies of anticipation. The first touch of the tip of Randi's tongue against the small ring of her asshole, pinched so tightly shut but wildly sensitive, nearly sent her through the roof.

"Aaooiiiioo!" she howled, twitching uncontrollably. "Oh shit . . . oh shit that feels good!"

"Mmmm . . . gonna feel even better, girl," Randi purred, quickly ratcheting up the heat.

She inched the pads of her thumbs down even closer to Laura's tightly clenching little rectum, pulling it open too, then wriggling about an inch of her long tongue into the acutely sensitive passage. It was all Laura could do to keep her body from leaping crazily off the bed, straight up into the air. She whinnied softly and gulped down two quick deep breaths.

"Ahhnnnnn!" she moaned, looking back over her shoulder at Randi's beautiful face, which was now embedded between the cheeks of her ass.

The only thing she could see was Randi's shiny, high forehead, the tangle of her black braids, and a flickering glint of her dark eyes as Randi burrowed her mouth even further into Laura's ass crack, bringing wild whoops and mewlings from deep in Laura's chest.

"Ohhnnggggg . . . oh god! Ungghhhh! Oh god . . . Rand—"

And then she totally lost it. Randi's tongue in her ass felt like a hot, wriggling worm, shooting sexual flames deep up into her writhing bowels and making her insides melt into a foamy froth of exultant coming, a billowing, swelling bubble of exploding pleasure. At almost the same instant that Laura spilled over with coming, Randi's hand slipped underneath to Laura's flooding pussy and began to rub it wildly, making the sensations in Laura's ass even more piercing and fiery.

She came in sharp, wrenching jolts, pushing her face into the sheet, letting out a yelping shriek of ecstasy that startled even her by its force.

"Auunnnggghnmmmggniiieeee!" Laura cried out, her body not flipping or surging but simply straightening out into a stiff, vibrating plank of flesh, shuddering as spasm after spasm rocked her. "Unngghhmmnnggiiieeee! Oh! Ohnnnnggggg!"

By now Randi was rubbing her wet pussy more gently, though her tongue was still embedded in Laura's ass, and Laura, the most severe shocks having passed, was slowly undulating her pelvis down into each swirling motion of Randi's wrist. But at the same time that her climax was slackening off, Laura knew that it wasn't over. Oh god, there's another one! she realized. Oh god, yes! Yes!

With a kind of crazed sexual mania, she reached back with one hand, fishing around for the hand Randi was not using to rub her pussy. She found it and quickly drew Randi's hand up to the thick flag of her hair, frantically trying to get Randi to clutch.

"Oh . . . Laura . . . girl," Randi panted softly, lifting her face out of the crack between Laura's buns. "You want it?"

"Oh god, yes! Please!" Laura groaned, feeling Randi's fingers suddenly grasp thick clumps of her hair. "Yes!"

Randi did not gather her energy, or her determination, or waste any time whatsoever. Immediately she gave Laura's hair a savage backward yank that caused Laura to be simply incinerated by a short but killing string of orgasms so shattering that she could not even cry out. At nearly the same instant that she pulled Laura's hair, Randi's hand closed like a voracious clam on Laura's throbbing pussy, squeezing it, while she held Laura's head up by her hair from the mattress. Laura's back was bowed, and her body flailed and jerked as an unmercifully acute succession of crushing spasms wracked her.

"Ungghhh! Onngghhh! Ungghhh!" she finally groaned as breath again seeped slowly into her lungs, and as Randi finally relaxed her grip, the most violent of Laura's spasms having seemed to pass.

Laura slumped forward onto the sheet. She could feel through the flames that seared her flesh Randi's tight hand releasing her aching pussy. She could even feel again the tiny, almost tickling scrapes of the edges of Randi's long fingernails against the sensitized skin of her inner thighs, and the cheeks of her ass. Slowly, Randi loosened her grip on Laura's hair. Laura's scalp tingled and burned, but the strong, rhythmic throbbing that continued in her pussy and womb and in fact her whole lower body obscured anything else.

By the time she came to her senses, Randi was stretched out beside her, gently nudging her body off the pillows, turning Laura to face her. Randi was beaming, grinning from ear to ear.

"Wow," she said softly. "I guess we gave each other something to remember that time."

Laura embraced her fervently. She clung to her, kissing her, mashing her naked body into Randi's, feeling a desperate need to almost crush her with a fierce, lasting hug. Randi believed it was because of the shattering orgasms she had just helped Laura have, but in reality, Laura knew, it was more than that. A deep, unconscionable sadness had begun to flood into Laura the moment the orgasms faded, the same sadness she had felt earlier, though not as piercingly as now. It was a mourning for Sara, and a shocking pain at the imminent loss of Randi, all mixed together in a miserable jumble of agony that she could not shake, that was stronger now than ever.

Without warning, she began to cry, almost tragically. Fortunately, Randi, though puzzled, just held her tightly and didn't let go, even when Laura's tears began to drip onto her bare shoulder.

Finally, she whispered, "Why are you crying, girl? This was good!"

Laura fought for control of her wracking sobs. She pressed her wet face into Randi's neck. "I know . . . I know. I won't be able to live without you!"

In her heart Laura knew she was saying, 'I won't be able to live without Sara,' which made her feel ashamed and doubly rotten. In my defense, she also thought, I won't be able to live without this gorgeous, wild creature either.

Randi pulled back so that she could look Laura in the eye. She wiped away some of Laura's tears with her fingers. "Look, I want you to listen to me," she said, solemnly.

Laura, sniffling, nodded.

Randi nibbled Laura's lower lip affectionately. She seemed to be pondering what to say, wondering how frank to be. "We may be even better friends, Laura, if I'm living in Charlotte. Then we can visit each other."

"I know," Laura nodded.

Unspoken was their mutual understanding that their rocky relationship wouldn't be as satisfactory if Randi remained.

"Now. You gon' kiss me, girl, and show me how much you love me one more time, before I turn into a pumpkin?"

Laura smiled and laughed. Her sadness was waning, receding in the background, and she realized it may only have come flooding into her with the release of her sexual tension, as one occasionally bursts into uncontrollable laughter just after climaxing.

"Do you think we can reach those heights again?" she teased Randi, beginning to stroke her marvelous smooth body, tangling tongues with her.

"I doubt it," Randi purred, "but we can sure try."