FURY: A Rio Games Romance

by Alison Ryan

  “I’m not hurting you, am I?” she rasped into his ear.

  “Just the opposite,” he assured her, his hands on her ass pulling her as tightly as he could to him. Her hips churned as they kissed and his hands explored her sleek flesh, running up and down her naked back. Suddenly, she stiffened, teeth sinking into his shoulder to keep from screaming as the climax took her.

  His shorts and boxers were soaked with their combined fluids, and he growled into her ear.

  “I need to be inside you.”

  Four hands fumbled at his belt buckle as she rose off him just enough to allow his cock to spring free.

  Her dress pooled around him as she descended, accepting his searing hot length, inch by inch. Thoughts of his wound, raindrops falling more frequently, their lack of a condom, and the fact that they may not ever see each other again after the next two days, were forgotten.

  They made love before an audience of crashing waves and a trillion stars, her body melting into his. All his past conquests paled in comparison to her. Nothing had felt like Laini did, the liquid vise of her body threatening to pull him over the edge each second she writhed atop him. He struggled to control his breathing, to look past her and somehow count the stars, anything to prolong their ecstasy.

  Lightning crashed down on the horizon, peals of thunder shaking the beach, and the once peaceful breeze rustling the palm fronds around them now causing the thick trees to sway.

  Their eyes met amid the frenzy of the storm, soaked by the rain, and they shared an orgasm the fury of which neither could recall experiencing before. It was as if their bodies were trying to show the maelstrom that they could match its intensity, if only for a moment.

  As the rain began in earnest, Laini and Jack surrendered the beach to the elements, shuffling back to the sanctuary of Jack’s hotel through the havoc of the storm. Arriving at the room, they discovered Wyatt and a guest, Suzy, one of the Oxford coeds.

  Leaving the lovebirds to resume after the untimely interruption, Laini and Jack dined together. With the weather worsening, Laini excused herself to return home, to one of the smaller, “non-touristy” islands. She had young cousins who expected her in the morning, and if conditions didn’t change, there was no telling when she’d make it home. An uncle with a boat waited impatiently as the couple shared a kiss, promising to reunite the following afternoon.

  Sadly, the reunion would never happen.

  As Jack’s plane ascended into a welcome break in the clouds two days later, he scanned the islands below through eyes glistening with regret. Due to the storm, Laini had been unable to leave her island for two days, and the kiss on the dock had been their last.

  He wanted nothing more than to leave Ohio behind, forget grad school, and remain in Fiji with Laini. Forever. But the real world beckoned, and she was destined to remain a memory, albeit a delicious, spectacular one.

  A baby has a way of changing everyone’s plans.

  Chapter Six

  Solomon

  Jack, it’s Gavin. Mom got some letter, an airmail letter that was forwarded to her from your old apartment address in Columbus. I can mail it or bring it when I come up to visit, just let me know what to do with it.

  Jack listened to the voicemail from his brother twice, not quite sure who’d be sending him a letter from outside the country, especially to the apartment he lived in during his senior year at Ohio State. After his return from Fiji, he spent a month with his parents in Cincinnati before striking off for grad school at Penn State.

  School was going well, his wound had healed nicely, and he was already looking forward to Spring Break 1994, a return to Hawaii, where he and Wyatt would keep themselves sharp for a trip to Australia in the summer.

  Jack phoned his older brother Gavin regarding the mysterious letter.

  “Dude, just go ahead and open it. Read it to me. I have no clue,” Jack requested.

  “Sure thing, give me a sec. Okay, it’s from…holy shit, Jack.”

  “What? Who’s it from?” Jack heard laughter coming through the line, then Gavin cleared his throat and composed himself.

  “You didn’t tell me how much fun you had in Fiji, bro.”

  “I almost got my leg bitten off by a shark. ‘Fun’ isn’t the first thing that comes to mind.”

  “And what did you do for ‘physical therapy’ following the accident? Does the name Karalaini ring a bell?”

  “Yeah, of course, she was a girl I…” Jack’s voice trailed off.

  “A girl you what, bro? Had unprotected sex with?”

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” Jack sat down, suddenly feeling lightheaded.

  “Wish I was. Looks like you left a souvenir behind in Fiji. This Karalaini is pregnant and she says it’s yours.”

  Jack had always been careful. He’d had more than his share of fun and had no problem attracting women, but he was always adamant about a condom being involved.

  Well, almost always.

  Once Karalaini realized she was late, got a test, and her suspicion was confirmed, she immediately knew who the father had to be. The American, Jack. There had been no other.

  She briefly considered finding a way to terminate the pregnancy, as she was nineteen, barely knew the father, had no real way to contact him, and was positive he’d deny everything and pretend she and her child didn’t exist, anyway.

  But abortion was only legal in Fiji if either her life or the life of the baby were in danger, and she didn’t relish the thought of either of them being at risk. Her best friend, Lucy, had family in Australia, and she thought that laws were different there, but she didn’t have the money to make that a reality, either.

  Besides, it had never been a question she would keep the baby. Despite what many would have told her, she knew it was her destiny. Jack had come into her life for a reason. And now she knew why.

  She had enough family to help her, and despite whatever embarrassment the whole ordeal would cause her own parents, she couldn’t imagine that they’d turn their backs on her, especially once the baby arrived.

  She had to at least try to find Jack, if not for financial assistance, simply because it was the right thing to do. He deserved to know he was going to be a father. The hospital had to have some sort of contact information for Jack, and although they were reluctant to release it to her, she eventually talked an administrator into slipping her a mailing address for the local mini-celebrity, their American shark bite victim, Jack O’Connor.

  Karalaini wrote a letter and mailed it to an apartment located someplace called Columbus, Ohio.

  The letter arrived to find Jack long gone, but the new tenant decided, fortunately, that an airmail letter was likely of some value and the piece of mail meandered its way from the landlord, to Ohio State University, to Mrs. Margaret O’Connor, Jack’s mother, and finally to Jack’s eldest sibling, Gavin.

  The call went silent so long that Gavin thought his brother must have hung up, but finally Jack spoke. “Wow. Uncle Gavin has quite a ring to it, eh?”

  Gavin chuckled. “So, do I get a sister-in-law out of this deal? And does she have any sisters?”

  Both brothers laughed, but Jack knew the time for mirth was past. On a speck in the ocean, half a world away, his baby was coming.

  Jack O’Connor cancelled a dinner date he’d arranged with a pretty young Penn State coed and he sat in his apartment just off campus with a six pack while he stared out the window, watching the afternoon sun set and the stars begin to fill the sky.

  After mulling it over for several days, Jack O’Connor picked up the phone and dialed the number Laini had put in her letter. Living with extended family, a group sharing one telephone, and with a sixteen-hour time difference, it took the better part of three more days for the pair to make contact.

  Karalaini’s voice trembled when she picked up the receiver after being summoned to the phone by her cousin.

  “Bula! Jack, is it really you?” Karalaini greeted Jack with the Fijian version of “aloha,” the ver
satile “bula,” a word Jack grew familiar with during his stay the previous summer.

  “Bula, Laini. I got your letter. Well, obviously I got your letter. How are you? How’s the…is the baby okay?” Jack’s reply included “bula,” which best translates to English as “health,” wishing good health to the recipient. He’d never meant it more.

  Jack heard her exhale. She couldn’t quite believe this was happening, that she’d actually tracked him down, and that he responded, when her friends had convinced her that no guy on the other side of the planet would bother to take responsibility for something that he’d inevitably think of as a holiday fling.

  “Yes, Jack, the baby is great. I’m fine. I’m so glad I found you, that you called. How are you? Your leg?”

  “As you might imagine, I’m a little surprised by all of this, I mean I’ve thought of you so much, and I was so frustrated that I didn’t have a way to contact you once I got home. My leg is perfect. What does your family think about you being, you know, about you having a baby?” Jack couldn’t get over hearing her voice again. He would have done anything at that moment to climb through the phone and hold her. She had to be terrified.

  “They’re excited, most of them, but it’s hard for my parents, this isn’t at all how they expected to become grandparents. I mean they haven’t even met you,” she explained.

  “I intend to rectify that just as soon as I can. I’m in school now, but I have a break for Christmas and then Spring Break a few months later. I wanted to see if I could visit for one or both if I could,” Jack offered, suddenly realizing how badly he needed to see her again.

  “I’d like that very much. Calling here must be so expensive. You have my address. Let’s write and maybe we can talk sometimes and you can tell me when you can come. I miss you, Jack.”

  With Wyatt’s help, Jack scraped together the money for a December visit, and despite the insistence of his parents that they accompany him, he made the trip alone.

  He and Laini spent a heavenly week together, a reunion marked by a feast in his honor thrown by Karalaini’s family at which he met so many Fijians, with so many vowels in their names, that his head spun.

  They made love again. And again. And again. It was better than they both remembered, each time better than the last. Jack couldn’t get enough of Laini and Laini couldn’t bear to be more than a few inches away from Jack at all times.

  On the eve of his return to the States, Jack promised to return in the Spring, hopefully to coincide with the stork’s arrival. She’d been adamant that she didn’t want to know the sex of the baby, and he didn’t pressure her.

  His second trip to Fiji convinced him that he was in love with her, and that he could make a happy life for himself in the islands. It was the right thing to do, she deserved it, and the baby needed it – he intended to propose on his next visit.

  Chapter Seven

  Solomon

  Spring Break 1994 arrived, and Jack O’Connor touched down in Fiji accompanied by his parents, Thomas and Leslie. Nobody but Jack knew about the diamond in his carry-on, but everyone knew that a new baby was due, a baby that had waited until its daddy and grandparents were there to witness the birth.

  Karalaini had remained active, surfing up until the last few weeks, and she took Jack’s breath away when they met at the airport. Her glow was unmistakable, even just seeing her face. Her hair was thicker than ever, black waves pouring down her back. Any discomfort she felt was buried deep within the joy of seeing Jack again and meeting his parents. Her uncle, Peter, had brought her over to the big island, and he embraced Jack’s family warmly.

  Hugs, kisses, and greetings were exchanged, and once baggage was retrieved, the quintet made for the docks to get home. A squall made the water choppy, but Peter assured the group that the storm would get no worse. He offered to wait it out for a bit, but Karalaini was too excited to have the O’Connors home, and she trusted Peter’s experience and judgement.

  What a pregnant woman wants, she gets.

  They boarded the small craft and got underway.

  Within ten minutes, all aboard realized their mistake. The water swirled and churned wildly about them, and although they attempted to remain brave, panic spread throughout the small group. As the first waves swamped the small vessel, Peter instructed Karalaini to get vests for the passengers as he tried to navigate the tempest, and break through into calmer waters and get to land, any land.

  As she made for the life jackets, the first contraction hit, sending her back to her seat, breathing hard.

  “I just felt something weird… that was really strong. Oh my God.” Karalaini suddenly panicked. This couldn’t be happening. Not now.

  Jack knelt beside her, trying to comfort her, as his father began pulling out the life vests, attempting to secure one on Jack’s mother, when disaster struck.

  Off the port bow, a monster wave ripped through, out of nowhere, and suddenly chaos erupted as Peter’s boat rolled onto its side, then seemed ready to right itself, but then was hopelessly flipped as its hull was battered by another angry blow from the storm.

  Water poured into the cabin, rain from above and ocean below, or vice versa, it was impossible to determine up, down, left or right. Jack caught a glimpse of his father being flung backward away from his mother, and he saw a shoe, which he thought must be Peter’s, whip past him. He heard Karalaini scream and then their world went topsy-turvy again as the boat was tossed above the waves and began to come apart.

  Thomas and Leslie, Jack’s beloved parents, were past their physical primes and unaccustomed to the power of the ocean’s open water. They succumbed first, putting up very little struggle. Their bodies were never found.

  A search vessel fished Peter’s remains from the water hours later. He’d managed to locate a life jacket, but he swallowed too much water and drowned.

  Jack and Karalaini somehow wound up within arm’s length of each other and struggled to hang onto a chunk of the hull together. Jack was in a bad way, having suffered a head wound as the boat was hastily disassembled by the storm, but enough of his faculties remained to finish what he’d set out to do in Fiji, storm or no storm, ring or no ring.

  “Laini, hold on! Hold on and don’t let go!”

  “Your head! Jack, your parents! We have to do something we have to…” Karalaini was losing her strength.

  “I haven’t seen anyone. I don’t know what to do… I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.” Jack struggled to get the words out, both of them screaming to be heard over the pounding rain and wind, despite being close enough to touch.

  “The baby! Our baby, Jack!”

  “Look in my eyes,” Jack implored. “You don’t let go, no matter what. Do you understand me? You hold on! I love you, Laini. I came here to marry you. I…” Jack’s voice trembled and he pressed a hand to his head, feeling faint as their handhold in a world of angry water was buffeted to and fro.

  “Jack! Jack!” Karalaini heard the father of her unborn child groan in anguish before he put both hands on his head and disappeared from sight.

  As her contractions grew in intensity and the duration between them shrank, Karalaini tried to find a place to go in her head, a peaceful beach, a place of refuge. Jack’s arms enveloped her, and she heard the soft cooing of a baby in her mind.

  She battled gallantly, timing breaths between waves, praying every prayer she knew, searching for a glimpse of land, somewhere, anywhere, something solid. She’d get her baby to safety or die trying. No matter how long it took, no matter how exhausted she was, how cold, or how scared.

  As the storm began to wane, a fishing vessel came upon the wreckage of Peter’s boat as it floated in the general direction of Vanuatu. As they searched for something by which to identify the craft, someone spotted Karalaini’s desperate form bobbing in the water, still clinging, but unmoving.

  “Holy shit, there’s somebody out there!”

  Solomon Sharma dove headfirst into the water, awaiting no command from his captain. He s
wam furiously for the lifeless girl, reaching her as a rowboat was lowered into the water behind him. He found her unresponsive, but thought he felt a pulse in her neck. Weak, but he’d felt it. She was somehow, against all odds and reason, still alive. He waved his arm furiously in the air, summoning his fellow fishermen to make haste. It wasn’t until they pulled her up and into the boat that they realized that not only was she pregnant, she was very pregnant. There was no telling how long she’d been in the water or if the baby stood a chance, but they meant to pour everything they had into saving mother and child.

  They radioed for help, a desperate plea as no man aboard had the experience or knowledge to deliver a baby, regardless of the mother’s well-being. As they lay Karalaini on a table, she managed to sputter a plea of her own, regaining consciousness briefly –

  “Save my baby. That’s all that matters. Do what it takes.”

  With that desperate request, she coughed, a choking that sounded as though she were underwater, and she was gone.

  Six fishermen stood around the table, each looking to the next man for guidance, a brave word, a plan.

  Again, it was Solomon Sharma who sprang into action. “Get me a knife. The sharpest we have. We’ve got to get this baby out if it’s to have a chance. Now!”

  One man fainted as the blade entered Karalaini’s lower abdomen. Solomon’s wife had undergone a C-section, so he knew the approximate location and direction of her scar, and he attempted to duplicate it. He feared most of all injuring the baby, if by some miracle it had survived the mother’s ordeal, but he also knew he need make no allowance for vanity. His incision didn’t need to be perfect, it just had to allow for the removal of… a baby boy.

  Solomon cut and tentatively reached a hand inside, where sure enough, he felt movement. As carefully as he could, he explored with his fingers until he felt he had enough to grab onto, and he pulled.