DISCLAIMER: Not mine

NOTES: Thanks for the kind reviews. I'm really enjoying writing this.Ohh also ...I'm not a native speaker, so please forgive any mistakes!

In Demand

Sam Seaborne woke up to the sight of a glass of water and two Tylenol waiting for him on a white nightstand. He squinted against the bright sunlight, streaming in through a window at the other end of the room. This was not his bedroom, he noted. And he was naked, which was strange since he did not sleep naked. In fact, more than often he slept fully clothed, just falling onto his bed and falling asleep immediately after coming home at two or three o'clock in the morning. Well, there was a dull ache in his head….and there was the distinct sound of somebody showering in a bathroom close by.

He turned around in the comfortable king-sized bed, looking at a blond hair glittering on a nearby pillow….and he remembered. Vicky …..Vicky…something; English, curvy, fast-talking with the most adorable crisp English accent. A doctorate in social-history…..She was blonde….wasn't she?

He located his boxers and T-shirt flung over a nearby armchair and put them on.

Well….two hook-ups in a bar in four years, that really wasn't that bad, was it?

He looked around. The bed took up almost half the room. There were expensive art-prints in big frames mounted on every wall. Vicky seemed to favour the Pre-Raphaelite era, if he was not mistaken. He could make out two Waterhouse, one Rosetti and one Edward Burne-Jones. There was a coffee-table strewn with books, newspapers and two piles of pictures…one very untidy, one neat. A box of silver-pictures frames was shoved under the table….as though she had not gotten around framing those photographs yet. There were more boxes, stacked more or less neatly at the far off wall….it was obvious that she had not lived here…wherever here was…..for very long. She had to be living with a friend or roommate though, how else would she afford such a great apartment? Sam asked himself as he looked around. Her place was better than his!

Sam leaned down and picked up a few of the pictures: Vicky standing between an aristocratic-looking older couple in front of a big iron gate, smiling. A younger Vicky sitting atop a chestnut-coloured horse, decked out in all kinds of fancy riding-regalia, a blond girl of 8 or 9 yearshe surmised to be Vicky surrounded by at least a dozen dachshund-puppies. Vicky with a strangely familiar looking fellow in a ghastly Hawaiian-print shirt in front an Asian temple of some kind…..how did he know this man? Oh heavens, Sam let go of the picture with a little shriek, thankful Toby or Josh could not hear him. The guy in the ugly shirt was Lord John Marbury…..how was that ….possible?

His eyes were drawn to the other pile of pictures. There was Vicky in a magnificent ball gown complete with long black gloves and a tiny tiara next to…..Prince Andrew? Oh, this was not good.

Sam swallowed hard, his throat suddenly dry. He went through the rest of the pile…..and it got worse: Vicky next to Tony Blair, Vicky in a cocktail dress with a plunging neckline dancing with Prince Albert of Monaco, Vicky with a couple of Formula 1 pilots in Silverstone, Vicky with a guy who might or might not be Salman Rushdie, Vicky with Boris Becker, Vicky with a bunch of burly man wearing nothing but Kilts, Vicky talking to Sean Bean, Vicky and Lord John Marbury on a park bench, Vicky drinking shots with ….Keith Richards and Mick Jagger?

Sam closed his eyes. How could this happen to him …again?

"You up?" he heard her yell from the still running shower.

"Yep…." He answered resigned.

"Did you find the Tylenol I sat out for you?"

"Yes…thank you." Sam pinched the bridge of his nose, struggling to come up with the right words to phrase the delicate question his mind was sternly demanding him to ask. How much did he drink last night?

"Ah….Vicky, um …can I ask you something?"

"Yes, we did have sex last night. You were lovely." She yelled over the sound of the rushing water, laughing.

"I was?" Sam asked, grinning, and then remembered what was going on a nd shook his head.

"Thank you but …..I... uhm, was wondering…"

"Yes?"

"Don't take this the wrong way, but …." Was there really a right way to take this, he wondered. It could not be, could it? Sure, she was pretty, but hardly a model's size he guessed was a requirement for that kind of profession. Laurie had been tall and beautiful…..But the pictures….. "You are not by any chance some high-end call-girl for the rich and famous, are you?"

A throaty laugh answered him from the shower. "Why would you …oh god, the pictures! I did not even bring them, my gran must have smuggled them into the box when I was not looking. Shethinks Ishould take more pride in how many people I have met!" she laughed again.

The sound of the water died down and a few moments later Vicky came through the door in a bathrobe, drying her hair with a towel. "Why …do you have a habit sleeping with call-girls?" she quipped.

"I wouldn't call it a habit…." Sam murmured. "And I didn't know she was a call-girl…I didn't …I mean."

She looked at him with a confused smile. "I was just being silly Sam, relax!"

Right ….silly. He could really get used to that crisp accent. Still…..it did not explain how she met all these people. His eyes fell onto a big framed photograph on a bookshelf nearby: Vicky ….again with Lord John Marbury at what looked like a new year's party, his arm draped around her shoulders. A very different scenario of much more horrid proportions shot through Sam's mind. She had the expensive apartment …all those pictures ….things could be worse than her being a call girl! What if he had slept with the ambassador's mistress? He could just see the headlines …."Senior White House staffer in bizarre diplomaticlove triangle"….

C.J. was going to kill him.

"Ahhh ….you know the British ambassador?" he said, trying hard to sound casual.

"Ha?" She had her back turned to him, sorting through a drawer of clothing. When she turned around, Sam found himself gesturing towards the picture. "Lord John Marbury…."

She frowned mockingly. "Don't tell me you actually call him that to his face!" she said with an amused grin.

"Yes, we do …" Sam answered a little confused. "He is her majesty's ambassador after all."

"Right…..I don't call him that though." She told him, turning towards the drawer again, retrieving a T-shirt.

"Well…..what do you call him, if you don't mind me asking?" Sam asked, rubbing his forehead with a sense of imminent doom. In his mind a whole tapestry of really bad answers unfolded. Master, lover, honey-Bunny, dear…..he mentally prepared himself for everything….

"Dad." Vicky said, shrugging at him. "Why? What do you call your father?"

Well….maybe he was not prepared for that. C.J. was going to kill him. Before he could find any words or maybe...pass out, just a little, both his beeper and his cell-phone started ringing simultaneously.

"You're quite in demand, aren't you?" She shrugged out of her robe with a sly smile. Sam swallowed. "I'm dead."