My

hapter

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presentable. Her start had ridden up enough to show the rest of her well–muscled legs and treer thighe. The grey business suit, on the whole, was in dire need of a trip to the cleaners.

west had scuted the top part of the white blouse so that her cleavage was visible, ending at

the top of her 辩题。

I don’t know how I can ever thank you!” she said.

For what?” I replied. “Getting in the way of his fist and hitting the ground?” My complete lack of ability to come to her aid was not lost on me. I felt like a complete fool.

“He surprised me,” she said. “He had me pinned with his full weight before I could even defend myself. I was stupid and I almost paid dearly for it. If you hadn’t come along and given him another target, I would have been in serious trouble.” She paused adjusting her clothing and looked at my chin with concern. “You’re hurt!” she said.

I touched the stinging area on my chin and noticed the blood for the first time. The son of a bitch had caught me with his ring. It didn’t seem serious. I probably did more damage myself

shaving that morning.

“It’s nothing,” I said. She had managed to pull herself back together and, except for the wrinkles and sweat, you wouldn’t have known she was in a fight at all. I became aware of

how bad I must look. Blood spots stained the front of my shirt and my pants were filthy from my trip to the ground. So I was feeling a little self–conscious about my appearance when she said “Come on, let me take you back to my apartment and patch you up

“I’m fine.” I protested. “It’s just a scratch. Nothing serious at all.” For a brief moment, I

thought she might be coming on to me, but I quickly dismissed the notion. What would she see in me? My clothes said I had little money, I was a good 15 years older than she was, and I obviously couldn’t handle myself in a fight. She had no way of knowing whether she liked my personality yet since we hadn’t even had a reasonable conversation. From her point of view, I was practically a poster child for “Losers“.

“Nonsense!” she said. “If you’re going to act all chivalrous and come to my rescue, the least you can do is let me play the damsel and bandage your wounds.” She was smiling when she said this and I had to chuckle too.

“Yeah, that’s me, alright. A regular knight in shining armor. If I had been a real knight I would have probably fallen off my horse while the dragon munched on the princess.”

She thought this was genuinely funny and laughed out loud. “Well, Lancelot, my chariot awaits, thanks to you recovering my buggy whip,” she said as she dangled her keys before climbing into the driver’s seat and opening the passenger door from the inside. “Besides, I’d

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Chapter 69

like to buy you a drink and I’m pretty sure Wang’s is closed by now,” she continued.

As I thought about it, I realized I did not have a good reason to say no. Without work tomorrow, I had no commitments until the end of the weekend. I had nothing to do at all. I put up my hands in acceptance and climbed into the car. She locked the doors and drove out of the parking lot.

As we headed to her apartment, she smiled and said “In all the commotion I forgot all the usual pleasantries. My name is Rita.” “Hello, Ri m Bill.” I replied. “A pleasure to meet you.”

Looking over at her I could tell she had something else on her mind. After several seconds. she finally asked “By the way, Bill, how did you know my keys were in his pocket anyway?

“I was watching you two and the heavy guy in the bar before you left,” I said. I could see a look of concern wash over her face when I said this so I

hurried up with a more complete explanation. I laughed nervously and said “I wasn’t being as creepy as that sounded. I was eating dinner and watching the people in the bar. You know, just for fun. There were a bunch of drunks in front of the TV, a group of salesmen and secretaries teasing each other, and the three of you. I was at the bar when you went to the ladies room and I saw Frank rummaging through your purse and stealing your keys. When you left, I figured I’d better follow you out to the parking lot and make sure that Frank behaved himself.” I paused and added, “Apparently I was right to follow, but if you hadn’t been a regular Charlie’s Angel I would have been pasted all over the pavement. Where did you learn to fight like that, anyway?”

The explanation seemed to satisfy her and I could see the tension that had built up on her face easing away. She started telling me about how she had taken Tai Kwan Do as a child and had moved on to study several other martial arts. She was still angry herself for letting her guard down with Frank. I told her it was a natural thing, which explained why there were so many dates [censored],

From there the conversation shifted to our respective jobs. I told her about my office and she said she worked for the local branch office of a large company with Frank. The heavy guy was Harry, a division head from out of state. About twice a year Harry would visit the local offices and one of the junior executives would take him for dinner and drinks before he left. It was Rita’s turn and Frank volunteered to come as well. At the time she thought he was being nice. Harry was known to talk for hours telling war stories from the early days of the company. An extra person would make it more bearable.

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Frost there we get to the

dect of frank. I

had hit on her twice at work and she’d told

sit was like a date invitation she couldn’t

him on 14 48 wertale tree. To him Harry

fure shown I read unnat tight tar

the was getting meet again so I changed the subject to the more

ዝም tey to the noti

Apr, hoede, mastic, art, etc were all covered to some degree. We found we had o be in men: Quirky movies, jazz, Warhol. By the time we arrived at her artment, 1 was starting to feel like I was on a date.

It all seemed sort of bizarre to me since I hadn’t been on a real date in years. My first marriage had endest sadly with the death of my wife. A year passed before I could even think about dating after that. Then three weeks later I met Chrissy. We lived together for 3 years before getting married. The funny thing was the marriage only lasted a little over a year. We knew it was a mistake after just a few months but stuck it out hoping against hope that things would improve. They didn’t and when Chrissy got a lucrative job offer from out of state, we hired a law firm to do the paperwork for an amicable divorce. We could have saved several thousand dollars if we had just waited a little longer to get married. After she left, things picked up at work and I got so absorbed in the job I didn’t think much about dating.

When I did think about it, I certainly never considered dating anyone as young and pretty as Rita. I had to keep reminding myself that this wasn’t romance, only gratitude. The more we talked, the harder it became to make that distinction. Rita had a wonderful sense of humor and we were still laughing and joking after she parked the car and led me to the door of her home.

“You’ll have to forgive the mess.” She said as she unlocked the door. “I wasn’t expecting to entertain tonight. As she entered and turned on the lights I looked around. Except for a small disarrayed stack of magazines on the loveseat and an open newspaper on the coffee table, the apartment was immaculate. She quickly collected the magazines and put them next to the sofa which was on the opposite side of the coffee table.

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