Death Sentence

30

I SPUN AROUND and came face to face with Linda Hvilbjerg. She was holding a plate and had a small wry smile on her lips. Her slim body was poured into a long, black dress with thin shoulder straps. Her breasts pressed against the fabric as if they were part of the dress. Her dark hair had been curled since the interview and her lips glistened in a vibrant, traffic-light red. Her pupils revealed that she had recently applied her beauty powder.

I forgot all about what I wanted to tell her and simply stared at her.

‘I presume your message refers to your next book?’ She fluttered her eyelashes a couple of times and smiled. ‘Just between us, shouldn’t you try to keep work and reality apart?’ She laughed.

I still couldn’t think of anything appropriate to say.

Linda Hvilbjerg came up very close to me and made a point of looking around the room.

‘But could it be true? Am I really in danger?’ She giggled. ‘And are you the hero who’ll save me from the baddies?’

I decided to play along.

‘This ain’t no joke, ma’am,’ I said with the thickest American detective accent I could manage, possibly inspired by my recent encounter with the police. ‘Your life and honour are at stake and I’m the only man who can save them both.’

‘Oh,’ Linda Hvilbjerg exclaimed. ‘Is that really true, Mr …?’

‘Pinkerton’s the name. Dick Pinkerton, at your service.’ I tried to bow, but stopped just in time to prevent my food from sliding off the plate.

‘Oh, the great Dick Pinkerton. What an honour.’

‘The pleasure is entirely mine, ma’am.’

‘And what precisely is your mission?’

‘I’m afraid I’ll have to keep you under surveillance for the rest of the evening.’

‘Close?’

‘Very close.’

‘It sounds like I’m in very good hands, Mr Pinkerton.’

‘These hands will take good care of you, ma’am.’

Linda Hvilbjerg laughed and I laughed with her.

I don’t know how I was able to laugh or where the words came from, but I sensed I was on the right track. It seemed utterly impossible to explain the situation to her as we stood there, tipsy, by the buffet, and the next best thing was to make sure I was near her. This wasn’t only a gallant motive for protecting her from the killer. I have to admit that when I saw her in the black dress with her red lips, I was horny as hell.

However, it’s still beyond me what turned her on that night. I had been drinking heavily for several days and I think I was still wearing the same clothes as when she interviewed me the day before. All I can think is that she was so high that she overlooked my appearance or perhaps she saw something else, something her body demanded, like a fry-up for a hangover.

We continued our charade for most of the evening and I think we both enjoyed burying the hatchet for a while. We immersed ourselves completely in our little game and flirted with words, looks and light touches so at last it was only a question of where and when we finally lost our inhibitions.

Even though I carried on drinking and she had been out to ‘powder her nose’ a couple of times, I controlled myself and didn’t simply take her down the hall and screw her behind one of the stands while books cascaded around us. I restrained myself because it was my only chance to protect her, but also because I longed for the warmth of a woman.

Heavily intoxicated and exceedingly horny, we took a taxi back to Linda’s around midnight. I was enormously pleased with myself. Admittedly, I hadn’t told her that she was genuinely in danger, but I was with her and I imagined that in itself would deter the killer. In fact, I regarded myself as something of a saviour and felt so confident that I decided to relax and enjoy myself now that I was there. I deserved it, I convinced myself, and I surrendered to her increasingly intimate groping in the taxi. I noticed the taxi-driver’s eyes in the rear-view mirror, but decided to ignore him.

We carried on play-acting. She was the doe-eyed client and I was the hard-boiled detective who was there to protect her and tend to her needs in every way. To this end a thorough physical examination was required, I insisted, to determine what state she was in and also to check for possible wires or other electronic equipment she might be concealing about her person.

Linda giggled at my suggestions and wanted to hear more. Would I be devoting extra attention to certain areas of her anatomy? Did I have special equipment to explore her body? I readily confirmed this and demonstrated how I could examine her mouth most effectively with my tongue. While we kissed, she checked out the rest of my equipment and she was duly impressed at the erection she could feel through my trousers. I, too, was surprised. Despite drinking heavily all day, I still had a hard-on like a teenager.

We were so randy that I almost forgot to pay the driver when we finally reached her house, a two-storey villa in Valby. We spilled out of the taxi and headed for the front door where Linda rummaged through her handbag for the keys. I grabbed her buttocks and kneaded them. They were small and firm, like two balls, and she moaned tenderly and pushed them out towards me.

Finally, she managed to unlock the door and we tumbled into the hall. She didn’t switch on the light, but dropped her handbag and turned around to embrace me. We kissed again. In a thick voice, I suggested that she undressed.

Linda Hvilbjerg took one step back. Moonlight shone through a small window above the front door and on to her torso. She wriggled out of her shoes and reached around to her neck. The thin straps fell and with a snakelike movement the black dress slithered over her slim, white body. Her nipples were hard and bobbed up and down towards me like an invitation every time her breasts heaved and fell with her breathing. Her arms were still raised above her head and her back was arched. The skin on her belly was covered with goose pimples and her pubic hair was a close-cropped black rectangle that disappeared between her white thighs.

She asked if I could see anything and I replied that everything looked very, very good, but that I had better carry out a hands-on examination. I stepped towards her and unfairly blocked the moonlight. She let her arms fall around my neck, but I caught them and lifted them back over her head. She giggled, grabbed hold of the coat rack above her and pushed the rest of her body towards me. I kissed her nipples and her laughter was replaced by a small gasp followed by a low moaning. My hands caressed her arms, breasts and stomach. She quivered and the goose pimples rose prouder on her stomach. She sighed loudly and her body trembled as I touched her groin. She was warm and very wet.

I whispered softly that I might have found something and she whispered something affirmative. I took a step back to allow the moonlight to illuminate her body again. She stood with her eyes closed, squirming as if even the light tickled her. I expressed the opinion that it was necessary to use tools and she acquiesced with a sigh. I quickly undressed and left my clothes in a pile on the floor. I was fully erect and the blood was rushing around my body. My hands trembled as they seized her hips and turned her so she stood with her back to me. She pushed her arse towards me and spread her legs. I grabbed her buttocks, bent my knees slightly and entered her in one slow movement.