“That could be fun,” Cat offered with an evil grin.

“Yes, it could.” Dylan grabbed Cat?s wrist and headed the toward the bathroom. “Let?s go.”

Dylan laid on the floor, propped up on several fluffy pillows. Cat was lying with her head in the tall woman?s stomach, drawing lazy designs on a corded, naked thigh only inches away. She was completely relaxed, filled with the kind of blissful lassitude that only a hot shower and a bout of enthusiastic lovemaking could inspire.

Dylan was leafing through pages of the playbook, obviously impressed.

“These are really good, Cat. You may have the makings of a decent coach.” Looking over the top of the playbook, she playfully narrowed her eyes at her lover. “You?re not gunning for my job, are ya?”

“Hell no. You think I want to deal with the slug who walks like a man any more than I absolutely have to? No thanks. I?ll stick to playing. The coaching job is allll yours.”

Dylan let her fingers slip through Cat?s silky hair as she put the papers aside. “Thanks.”

“So what did the smarmy little bigot want this time?”

“His spies caught me having dinner with you and your folks last night.”

Cat rolled up to a sitting position, eyes wide. “Shit.”

“No, don?t worry about it. I convinced him it was harmless.” She sighed. “But that convincing came with a pricetag attached.”

Cat?s eyes narrowed. “What kind of a price?”

“He wants me to do some print ad for Nike. Gratis for me, lots of nice shiny new equipment for him.” She sighed again, shaking her head. “Manny is gonna shit bricks when he hears.”

“I don?t understand. Doesn?t your contract specify that you get a percentage of all those endorsement deals?”

“Yeah, but if you read between the lines, I need to scratch his ass for him when he asks.”

“Or?”

Dylan hesitated, but something in those flaring emerald eyes convinced her that the truth would be the only thing Cat would accept. “He comes down on us.”

“You mean me, don?t you.”

“Cat, it?s okay?.”

“No it isn?t, goddamnit!” Jumping to her feet, Cat began to pace. “Dylan, I will not have you whoring yourself just to protect me. It?s not right, damnit!”

Rising, Dylan put a tender hand on Cat?s shaking shoulder and gathered her into an embrace. Cat struggled for a moment, her anger overwhelming, but Dylan?s hold didn?t loosen, and after a moment, she gave into the inevitable, finally resting her hot face against the silken skin of her lover?s chest. “Sweetheart,” Dylan murmured in a low, soothing voice, “when I said it was alright, I meant it. This?whoring?isn?t anything new for me. It?s all part of the game I?ve been playing since High School. It was just a lot more discrete back then. Do you think anyone was paying me to be seen at oh-so public events with Thad Hunter or any one of the legion of men I?ve been seen with over the years?” When Cat didn?t answer, she continued. “If he couldn?t use you as an excuse, he would have come up with another one, or even none at all. It?s part of the game, and I accept that.”

“It?s not fair,” Cat mumbled, her anger slowly leaking away in the strength of Dylan?s embrace.

“No, it isn?t. But if it keeps him off my back, and lets me have some peace in my life, it?s worth it. I have no regrets.”

Cat slowly lifted her head, eyes shining with tears not-quite dried. “None?”

“None.” And with that, Dylan lowered her head and gave Cat a kiss that erased every single doubt?and every single thought?from Cat?s head.

An hour later, they were back in their same positions on the floor, sipping the promised plum wine as their heated bodies slowly cooled. With an idle hand, Cat flipped open the folder that Dylan had dropped on their nest when she came back with the wine. What she saw caused her to choke on that wine, and she sat up, eyes glued to the glossy print in front of her. “Jesus Christ!!”

“What?” Dylan asked, startled out of her pleasant daze. “What is it?”

“This!” Cat shouted, thrusting the paper into her partner?s face.

Taking the glossy, Dylan examined it, impressed with the attention to detail. It was an incredibly lifelike drawing of two figures?herself and Marquis Jackson, the reigning king of the NBA?pressed chest to chest, belly to belly, melded together all along their lengths. Sweat beaded brightly against their naked skin; his a deep ebony, hers a beautifully contrasting ivory. Both were naked save for their feet. Marquis was clad in white Nikes with a black swoosh, and Dylan in the opposite. Artistically, it was breathtaking, and she understood fully why Johnson was salivating over it. If it looked this good as a simple drawing, Dylan could only imagine what it would look like with live bodies and expert photography.

“You?re not saying anything,” Cat commented in a dangerously low voice. “Why aren?t you saying anything?”

Dylan lowered the mock-up and found herself bathed in pure green fire. She fancied she could feel her insides roasting under the heat of Cat?s glare and was, quite uncharacteristically, at a complete loss for words.

Cat?s eyes narrowed to slits. “Don?t tell me you don?t see anything wrong with this?this?.this?travesty!”

So, this is what being caught between Scylla and Charibdes feels like. Shit.

Cat?s eyes gradually widened at Dylan?s continuing silence, and she peered down at her lover, examining her like some particularly atrocious species of bug she?d just discovered stuck to the bottom of her shoe. “You don?t see anything wrong with this, do you.” Her voice was deceptively soft, but carried the thunder of a summer storm in its undertones. “I don?t believe this.”

Coming to her feet, she grabbed for her clothes in a series of jerky motions so unlike her usual smooth grace that Dylan could only stare in stunned disbelief. Finally, she found her voice and coaxed it out of hiding. “Cat?”

Pulling on her t-shirt, and not realizing it was inside out, Cat pinned her lover with another glare. “No. You just?do whatever it is you feel you have to do. I know where the door is. I?ll let myself out.”

“But?.”

“Goodnight, Coach. I?ll see you at practice tomorrow.”

Everything in Dylan wanted to jump up and prevent Cat from following through on her actions, but her more rational mind told her it would be one of the larger mistakes in her life to go after Cat now, when she was this angry. At her.

She was totally unaware of crumbling the glossy mock-up in one clenching fist as she watched, helplessly, as Cat stalked from the house, slamming the door behind her.

Dylan collapsed against the pillows, running her free hand through her hair. “Fuck.”

Cat cried all the way home. She cried once she was inside the door. She cried as she lay across her bed, wishing she could stop crying.

Why should she be mad? Dylan was a grown woman and if she wanted to do pornographic ads that was up to her. She didn?t have anything but a few nights of ?

Of what?

Cat considered it. She had blurted out to Dylan that she loved her. Did she love her or was she just saying that because her mother had pushed the envelope?

She rolled over on her back, angrily swiping at her cheeks to keep the tears from rolling down her face. String at the ceiling of her bedroom, she considered it. When she was with Dylan she felt things she had never felt before. And she knew it wasn?t just the physical aspect.

When she was with Dylan she felt ten feet tall. She felt smart, funny, and more mature. Dylan made her stomach flutter, made her heart pound and made her brain mushy. All the feelings she felt were good. This was the first time she?d ever felt bad when it came to dealing with the tall woman.

Obviously Dylan didn?t feel the same way. She hadn?t responded to Cat?s declaration of love in any way. Now Catherine realized all the older woman had done that night was get her clamed down before telling her they would talk later and ending the call.

Dylan didn?t love her. That was becoming perfectly clear to the young woman.

If Dylan had felt anything that remotely resembled love she would have agreed not to do the ad simply out of respect for her lover.

If you love someone, you don?t do anything to purposely upset them, do you?

Cat asked herself this question over and over as she finally felt the last traces of Dylan?s touch leave her body and she slipped into an emotionally exhausted slumber.

Dylan laid across her large bed, naked save for the T-shirt she?d hastily yanked on after Cat had stormed from the house. Ever vigilant to their Mistress? moods, Siegfried, the chicken, had repaired to the far corner of the house, while Brunhilde laid with her head in Dylan?s lap, looking up at her with eyes both sorrowful and compassionate. Dylan stroked Brunhilde?s sleek head with an absent hand as she peered at the smoothed-out ad mock-up held in the other.

As she looked at the ad, the voices of Horace and Cat swirled through her head in an unending loop, only serving to increase the pain in her head and in her heart.

“Why is it that every time I deal with you I feel like a street corner whore?”

“You don?t really want me to answer that do you.”

“You don?t see anything wrong with this, do you.”

“You be a good little coach and keep me happy, and I?ll stay away from the dyke.”

“No. You just?do whatever it is you feel you have to do.”

“You be a good little coach and keep me happy, and I?ll stay away from the dyke.”

“Goodnight, Coach. I?ll see you at practice tomorrow.”

“You be a good little coach and keep me happy, and I?ll stay away from the dyke.”

“I know where the door is. I?ll let myself out.”

Tossing the glossy away as if it had suddenly grown fangs and was threatening to bite, Dylan cradled her head in both hands, her face set in a hard grimace, teeth bared, eyes tightly closed. “Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, FUCK!!!”