I got a surprise for you."I smile at him. "You are going to behave yourself right Marie, Daddy says?"I nod yes."Good girl." He replies.Daddy then unti...s the rope from the other tree and lowers me to theground. Then he takes off the handcuffs, ankle hobbles, four-pointharness and ball gag."Here you go sweetheart, Daddy says handing me a pink gym bag. Go overthere behind those bushes and put them on, all of them. Give me yourshirt you will not need it anymore either." Thank you daddy." I say as I. “Buses are great because you encounter so many interesting people. Take that woman there...” he gestures and the camera follows, showing an attractive Asian woman not much older than Jake. “ ... I think she’s a tourist.”Sure enough, the woman takes out her phone and starts taking pictures of some of the landmarks they pass. The man in the seat behind her asks her a question but she just smiles and nods at him. He doesn’t continue the conversation.“Watch this,” Jake says, and he gets up. She is. She brought the hand she’d raised to tilt his head down, so she could touch his ear, activating the earbud that Troy was wearing.“That ought to do it.” Helen said with a smile. Troy nodded that he was receiving her. She then told him to “Mingle” and wandered into the crowd.Troy touched his ring before walking toward another part of the crowd. He wasn’t used to wearing one on that finger. His wedding ring was a simple gold band with “I love you” engraved inside. It was identical to Julie’s,. Perhaps on some fundamental level, he had taken in her quietness, but if he did, he failed totally to make any mention of it. If her resolve needed strengthening, that small, selfish and typically male act finalised her decision.Jacqui only made a half-hearted attempt at dressing for allure. Throwing her make-up on while thinking that she really didn’t want to do this, but not having a good enough reason not to. They drove in silence, a silence that had been growing of late, neither knowing how.