Princess Ch. 07

While I was messing with pursuer number one, the second car had hurled past me in the breakdown lane to take up the lead position behind Carrie.

Carrie did another maneuver cutting between two other cars that gave her a slight distance advantage on the pursuer. The police car hurled past us with full siren and lights; the other cars moved to give him an opening.

As the police car drew near the two cars, I could see Carrie slowing, even flashing her brake lights for effect. The other car rammed her once; however, Carrie kept control by assuring that the strike happened in the line of motion of the two cars instead of at an angle.

The police car took advantage of the lower speed. He careened into the back end of the pursuing car at a good rate of speed and at an angle. The dark sedan that had been the second car, started to spin, made a complete turn, and two-thirds of the way through the spin, flipped over twice and ended sliding several hundred feet on the roof of the car.

The police car followed him into the ditch where he stopped. Two officers emerged from their car with drawn weapons. One had a bullhorn.

I stopped about a hundred yards from the scene, angling my headlights at the upside down car. We couldn't hear what the policeman said, but I could guess. Both cops had their weapons pointed at the car where the tires were still spinning.

A solitary figure crawled out of the car on the uphill passenger side of the car. He was obviously shaken, as he had trouble standing next to the car. He held one hand up, and the other hung somewhat lifeless beside his body. Then we saw him kneel and lie face down on the shoulder of the road. The officers advanced on the fugitive from different directions.

Another police car rolled up, and two more officers raced to assist. The man was in handcuffs, and in the back of the first police car before a third and fourth car arrived.

Marjorie hung up with 911. I said, "Call Carrie."

Nearly a minute later, Carrie's voice came over the car speaker. "Are they gone?"

"There might be a third car according to Jerry. Watch out. Where are you?"

"I just turned onto the Interstate headed north. I don't think anybody's following me. I'm going on the slow side, and I'm shaking all over. Something fell off my car a while back, maybe my back bumper. I got rammed me pretty hard."

I inched up to near the police cars, and got out of the car. Marjorie also got out and stood in the headlights so they could see her. I walked towards the gathering of cops with my hands outstretched.

As I came up to the police, I said, "I've been observing this whole scene since it started. The woman in the Land Rover they were chasing is my wife. We were at a function together."

One cop grilled me quickly about who we were and why they called out the entire state militia to intervene in our chase. As soon as I mentioned Princess Caroline, he understood and his whole attitude changed for the better.

I offered him the opportunity to talk to her on the cellphone. He snapped up the phone, quickly asking where she was. Soon, he was on his police radio vectoring other police cars to intercept Carrie from any further trouble. Once the other police cars made contact with her, he passed the phone back to me.

I asked about the car with two men in it. He said, "We got 'em too. They're in custody."

I said, "I'd like to catch up to my wife. I gave him a business card; "Here's all my contact information."

He thanked me for stopping when I did, and then told me where I'd find Carrie and her protective cordon.

About five miles after I got on the Interstate, I found the Land Rover surrounded by three Maryland State Troopers. I'm sure the other cars passing thought the cops had nailed a dangerous criminal; the last thing someone thinks is that they might be offering protection to someone under attack. Carrie was still in the car, but chatting amicably with two of them through the driver's window. I pulled up, and as my presence was expected one of the troopers waved me over.

Carrie bolted from her car into my arms, and suddenly there was a flood of tears. She cried, "Oh, God, I was so scared. I did everything I'd been taught ... and ... and ... and ..." She couldn't finish the sentence because the faucets opened up and the wild sobbing began, and I tightly held her against me, feeling her tears soaking into my shirt. Marjorie came over and hugged her too, and soon the two of them went over to Land Rover and got in the back seat together so Carrie could be held in private. She was shaking all over, and I figured she might cry for an hour before she got the experience under control in her head.

One trooper told me the Virginia police had four men in custody. They were being charged with such a long list of felonies I doubted they'd make bail or be seen in public for a long time. Apparently, there had been a third car, but the man driving it had seen my side swipe of the car passing me, and then left the parkway at the exit near the accident.

I'd been in contact with Jerry. He was cursing his own stupidity regarding how he got taken out so easily. He told us he'd had puncture proof tires on his car for years, but when he got a new car he neglected to make the changeover. He found us about one o'clock, and stuck with us until we left the scene.

Several detectives showed up at the scene, and they took statements from Carrie, Marjorie, and me. We got a police escort by one car all the way home. We also didn't get home until four a.m.

Carrie stood in the bedroom and stripped naked, got into bed, and declared that I had to hold her the rest of the night. I restrained myself from trying to do anything but hold her close and sooth her. Marge snuggled into Carrie's other side.

We dealt with the fallout of the car chase for at least a week, and some things changed permanently.

Jerry tightened security to a point I thought Carrie would scream, but she just accepted all his edicts. She would not drive alone again -- ever. She would complete more of her training in martial arts and weaponry. The Land Rover got bullet proofed so that anything short of a major RPG attack would bounce off. Carrie got further high speed and defensive driving training.

The house also underwent more major security upgrades. The safe rooms that Jerry wanted us to have got installed. When in the house, Carrie and the rest of us were never more than fifteen seconds from safety.

We treated the changes like taking an umbrella on a partially cloudy day. Once you have it, you probably won't ever need it again. That said, it was the second attempt to kidnap Carrie, and this time the caper had involved more people and seemed more carefully planned.

Carrie remained shell shocked from the chase and attempt to force her off the road, even at the risk of her life. While she went to work everyday, with Jerry or one of the other bodyguards close by, when she came home she wanted Marjorie or me to hold her most of the time. We liked that although neither of us initiated anything sexual.

Carrie did the initiating. About five days after the chase, she said over dinner, "You two are pussy-footing around me as though I'm about to explode. I am mostly fine, and I am not planning on being celibate the rest of my life, so could we please go upstairs in an hour and will the two of you fuck my brains out, and if Jerry is around, he could assist in this onerous task." She smiled lecherously at each of us.

Jerry was around, and so the three of us focused our love and sexual energies on Carrie when we headed off to bed on the early side. Carrie acted insatiable. Marjorie had Jerry and me focus on Carrie for all of our climaxes, consequently by the end of the night Carrie was dripping or oozing man juice from each orifice. She was happy.

The news media got ahold of the story about how Princess Caroline had again been subject to an attempted kidnapping for ransom. Somehow several news outlets got ahold of the detailed police reports.

Two elements of the news stories emerged. First, the image of Carrie being a Super-Hero, with strange and nefarious skills got further reinforced when it was learned that she did the fancy driving that forced one pursuer off the road, and that she adroitly avoided capture with barely any effort. The previous kidnap attempt and her skills in overpowering her abductor got replayed as well.

The fact that her husband (me) had been in a following car and had also acted heroically also got blasted across the front pages of all the local papers. I felt good about the ego stroking, and the halo effect of Carrie's image as a more than capable individual. We were painted as an indefatigable team dedicated to our own protection and to justice.

The second part of the news stories followed a day or two later. The stories had noted that I was with 'another' woman -- one Marjorie Henson, who was listed as a close friend and consort of Princess Caroline.

The way the story broke indicated that Carrie was bisexual, and had a deep relationship with both Marjorie and me. Of course, the story was accurate; however, the way the media treated it was as 'breaking news' of a huge scandal. Side bars talked about other sexual scandals the royal family had endured: Prince Harry and the stripper (and a few others), Prince Charles and Camilla when he'd been married to Diana, and Prince Andrew and some underage girls, just to mention a few they raised in appealing to the prurient interests of the readers.

The U.K. papers picked up the 'scandal' and blew it up even more, and that just made the American press even more eager to trade on the malicious gossip.

We received several calls asking us to comment on the allegations and the scandal; however, we got so we didn't answer or at best said, 'No comment.'

Carrie got an idea from the whole exposé oriented press and ran it by the programming staff and executives at WDC-TV where she worked. They liked the idea, if for no other reason that the same reason the newspapers liked it -- it brought in revenue.

Marjorie and Carrie spent the next two weeks working twelve to fourteen hour days on the new 'Special.' During the daytime hours they were on the road, sometimes together and sometimes apart, doing interviews. A few times one or the other flew off to New York, Boston, or some other major city. I also heard mention of videoconferencing they'd been involved in. I had to appear at the studio one evening while Marjorie, Carrie, and I sat and talked about how we lived. We laughed a lot but got through the videoing.

I plodded along in my systems management job, lacing together some disparate systems so they could exchange data, and raise the bar considerably on our competitors. Of course, I got no end of questions at work, but for the most part my living arrangement had been well known about since before I married Carrie and did the commitment ceremony with Marjorie.

WDC-TV started to promote the TV Special about a week before airing in prime time. This also gave them the opportunity to sell advertising in the hour at outrageous prices per second.

The title of the special was 'Marriage and Partnership Arrangements: Princess Caroline Speaks Out.' A few salacious one-liners were used to accompany the short commercials promoting the broadcast: 'Every man's dream?' 'Having your cake and eating it too,' and 'Bigamy is alive and well.'

Polls on the street revealed that a huge viewership would be guaranteed. This was coming in the midst of a meaty scandal where sex, in some form, was at the core.

As before with Carrie's specials NBS snapped up the rights to also broadcast the one-hour program; however, they left the airing as an option to the other stations in the franchise. The station hosted another viewing party, and this time practically every person at the station showed up to watch the final presentation, and to assess the first hour's worth of comments from the social media.

The TV show started with a close-up Carrie. She said, "Good evening. I'm Carrie Westerly, and many of you also know me as Princess Caroline. Recently, there has been much salacious, titillating, and even licentious press about my lifestyle, as though it was new news. That approach infuriated me at first, and then gave way to this hour's broadcast, not only to clarify exactly how I live, but also to take a look at how what we believe is the traditional model of family or home life is all but gone."

The camera panned out to include the three of us. Carrie said, "This is Jim Westerly, my husband and lover, and Marjorie Henson, a close friend and lover. Yes, I live in a threesome and we have a comfortable and happy partnership with each other. All our relatives know of our arrangement, and have since Jim and I got married, and on the same day held a short commitment ceremony with Marjorie so she too would feel included in our living unit. Many of you watched the entire ceremony on television, including our commitment ceremony. Our lifestyle is not new news except to those media outlets trying to use it to inflame and incite."

"We are not unique. Plural or polyamorous relationships comprise between three and five percent of current living households. One estimate is that up to fifteen percent of the population has at one time or another lived in such arrangements. So, you see, we are not a rare exception deserving of news coverage, although I guess Marjorie's fame as a network anchor and host, and mine as a producer of notable specials and a former princess, has brought the visibility of such arrangements to the forefront of people's minds."

She went on, "Here are a few of the statistics that we'll explore in this hour. There are widespread variations in living arrangements. The news has focused on gay and lesbian marriages; however, those are just a few of the unique living arrangements around. We'll show you some others."

"Today in America, and in some European countries, less than half of family units are married, and this is a long-term trend we'll trace back to the 1940s when over 70 percent of units was married. Also, single mothers birth almost half of the babies born today, and that percentage is rising as well. Many of those moms live in interesting family units, and we'll explore those too."

Carrie continued tossing some other stats around to set the stage, and then Marjorie and Carrie started to appear with others living in unique ways: threesomes; foursomes; wife lives in distant city but I have to be here, so I have a 'second wife.' The videos touched on lesbian and gay centric homes, but then expanded to plural relationships. While sex occurred in most relationships, it was absent from some too. Mention was made of the Cable TV show Sister Wives, and a brief interview with Cody, the patriarch of that family became part of the Special.

We were enthralled. I felt cheated when the hour-long show ended. I wanted more of the material to chew on. I loved it. She'd made the case for unusual living arrangements, and pressed for tolerance the same way the country was becoming tolerant of gay and lesbian marriages. She even speculated that someday, we may allow plural marriages among a mishmash of males and females who love each other and want a way to pledge their lives together.

Everyone in the viewing auditorium broke into applause as the Special ended. Carrie and Marjorie again went up to the front of the room, and made it a point to thank everyone on the staff that had contributed time and energy to the special.

Carrie laughed, and gestured to two staffers, Sarah and Annie, who sat at the edge of the group and were cruising the social media websites looking for comments. She said, "And now we'll hear from the public -- at least a few preliminary views."

Annie spoke up, "I sense a lot of positive opinion out there, maybe 60:40 or more in favor. Here's one typical comment, 'I loved two men and would have married both of them. They were buddies. Instead, because of societal pressure I moved on and ended up with the schmuck I'm married to now.' We all laughed. Annie pumped her fist.

Sarah said, "Quite a few quote the Bible both supporting and opposing the thesis of the Special. I'll give you a negative comment. 'God will strike you down for your sins. Repent. Relationships such as you propose are a sin in God's eyes,' and so on." She laughed and said, "Hmmm, must be a Republican or from Oklahoma."

Annie and Sarah shared a few other comments, and then the party formed into smaller groups for conversation and comment.

Carrie came and found me standing and watching everyone. "Come and stay with me." I spent the rest of the evening playing the dutiful husband and partner to Carrie and Marge.

Subtle changes occur in a relationship that we are sometimes unaware of or that we seem to see in ways different than our partner. Such was the discussion that Carrie, Marjorie, and I had one night over cocktails.

Carrie had her iPad out and had been scrolling through some of her friends on Facebook. She showed me a twenty-second video clip of a toddler apparently taking her first steps to Mommy as Daddy filmed the event.

Carrie said, "Isn't she adorable? Don't you want one of your own?"

I'm sure I nodded. I liked kids, and I knew we'd take moves to have our own some day, but I didn't understand that we had just had THE DISCUSSION in its entirety about starting a family.

I also missed cues that were pointed out to me about three months later, making me seem like the densest father-to-be in existence.

Clue #1 -- Carrie stopped drinking alcohol.

Clue #2 -- Carrie cut back in sex with other guys including Jerry

Clue #3 -- Carrie made men other than me wear a condom when engaging in sex

Clue #4 -- Marjorie and Carrie talked about the colors and décor for a nursery

Clue #5 -- Carrie went through a period when I though she had the flu in the morning

Oh, when I learned of the impending arrival of a Little Westerly I was overjoyed. I apparently said all the right things, and paid her just the right compliments and attention. I also checked with Marjorie to see if she was also in a 'family way,' but she said she was going to wait a year.

I must have commented on not realizing she was trying to get pregnant, and that's when I learned about the various 'Clues' I should have picked up on, and about how I'd tacitly approved our family's growth. I was not that observant it appeared.

Carrie did a second TV Special six weeks after the first onRelationships in America,skirting around some of the same turf she'd covered in the controversial special I'd appeared in. This one too was well received and stirred up lots of discussion and controversy.

Carrie announced her pregnancy in her fifth month when she started to show her baby bump in earnest.

Attendant with the announcement, Jerry doubled security on the Princess. One of the things we hadn't realized until the outpouring of attention and joy at the news was how Carrie had become 'THE' American Princess. She had a larger following in the U.S. than she would have had she continued to live in the U.K. The press blasted news of our impending arrival across the press with even more fervor than our wedding.

We did several charitable appearances in the last few months of her pregnancy. I felt that over those months our entire relationship between the three of us matured in a beautiful way.

We were still an oversexed bunch of people who needed our outlets through passion and physical playtime. We went to several monthly swinger parties, and in contrast to what Carrie expected, the larger her baby bump got the more desired as a partner she became. She also became hornier and hornier as each week passed, so the combination was a good one.