Christmas Present

by Lauren Wood

  What really amazed me was Blu. She didn’t show any fear at all. She reached down with both hands a big smile, palms finding that belly, crackling with laughter to match the dolphin’s own. The big mammals seemed to sense Blu’s innocence, her youth. They seemed to approach us like a family, because they were a family too, and they knew what it was to share that kind of bond, one which could ignite in a moment and last for a lifetime.

  But the dolphins were just a warmup.

  The jet ski was fast and loud beneath me, pushing across the surface of the ocean. Blu and Hutch shared a similar bike just a few yards to my right. The sun was hot but I was awash in a traveling cloud of salty spray, dampening my cheeks and my hair, still flowing with the speed. The water was choppy, and the engine ground louder with every drop against the countless little waves and crests. I was locked into the machine, my long legs straddling each side, pursing my thighs to give me a better grip on the roaring, streaming missile beneath me. It was moving fast and I was hanging on for dear life. I controlled the throttle, but that mechanical monster could get the better of me at any time, throwing me off and circling around to crush my skull and leave me to sink to the bottom of the sea.

  Hector’s warning came back to me, but I pushed it out of my mind. It’s silly, I told myself as the gulls cried above me, the vultures of the sea. Anyway, his dream happened on the ground, or on deck. But my blood ran cold to imagine a third alternative: The beach.

  So I held on tighter, the thrill of the danger only making my muscles draw tighter, hands clenched around the handles, throttle sending a hot vibration up my arm, the engine sending a hotter vibration straight to my crotch. The speed of the motion, the constant pounding from below, the shake and the roar and the heat and the salt of the spray was too much for me to resist, juices swirling inside me as well as outside all around me. I didn’t dare turn to see Hutch and Blu, this was a private moment, a moment to transcend my surroundings. And I couldn’t deny a certain secret shame, a dirty little secret that I was enjoying right there and then and which neither one of my companions could have anticipated.

  Faster, louder, harder, my body started shaking a bit, still overwhelmed by the power of the jet ski. But the power of my orgasm was fast approaching in volume and capacity, pushing through the endless sea of my own inner self, racing toward the center of my secret soul, where inside and out met in explosive eruptions, streams rolling out to the salty seas. My orgasm splashed and frothed like the ocean waters, and it almost seemed to me that it was all part of the same chaotic churning of life, pounding and rolling, increasing, fighting back against me, threatening me with its ageless power, ready to consume me with a mere flick of it’s watery wrist.

  But I only went faster, the pounding harder and irresistible, the muscles of my legs pulling tight, heart pounding, breath thin and damp.

  My body quivered, shuddering to match the machine itself. I was almost afraid I was going to pass out, my hands wrenching that throttle and the jet ski skittering and threatening to lose its course and jerk to the side. I knew if it rolled, I’d be crushed between the craft and the hard surface of the water. At that speed, I wouldn’t stand a chance.

  But my sense of control gradually returned, my orgasm remaining but willing to recede, temporarily at least. I slowly realized how fast I was going and was able to let up slowly on the throttle. I found a comfortable cruising speed and turned to get a bead on Hutch and Blu in their jet ski. Not seeing them, I turned to scan the waters behind me. They were lingering way back in the distance, idle in the water, but I could tell they were staring straight at me. I was glad they weren’t close enough to see me blush and I took my sweet time cruising back toward them.

  Only an hour later we’d cleaned up, changed into some new clothes Hutch bought on the spot, and were sitting at a sidewalk cafe in the harbor. I was still exhilarated. Even though I was sitting in a chair near the pier, I felt like I was still moving forward, still racing along the surface of the water.

  The jerked pork was spicy, the rice fluffy and the veggies roasted and peppery, flavors commingling perfectly in my mouth. The cold, crisp chardonnay was a perfect and refreshing compliment, adding just a heady touch to my already hyper-alert senses.

  “What a day,” I said, instantly sounding like a bit of a rube, turning to the nine-year-old sitting next to me. “You are great in the water, Blu, like you’re half a mermaid or something.” We all shared a chuckle. I glanced at Hutch and he back at me, and I knew the unspoken reply. Blu fostered a lot of fear, that was true. But she wasn’t afraid of dolphins or of water, not of speed, not of a lot of things.

  She was afraid of people.

  “Anyway, so much fun,” I said, hoping to keep everything light. This was a moment for happiness, for a bright future, and for me that meant only one thing. So even though I regretted saying, “It’s kind of a shame it has to come to an end,” I knew I’d wind up saying something like that sooner or later.

  Hutch seemed to give it some thought, nodding with a casual smile as he pulled a forkful of lobster meat from the red claw and dipped it in melted butter. “Can’t live on vacation forever,” he said, winking at Blu and eating his lobster. “I’ve got business to deal with, Blu here was talking about going back to regular school.”

  “Is that so? You’ve been ... homeschooled for a while?” Blu nodded, her mouth filled with the jerked chicken and rice in front of her. I said, “I was too, matter of fact, had a tutor on the ship and everything. It was kinda cool, but it was a little bit weird too, y’know?” Blu nodded again, Hutch’s attention keenly fixed on me and the point I was trying to make. “I kind of missed regular school a bit, all the other kids. They weren’t always that nice, I guess. But kids can be like that. And a lot of them were really cool too, they were friends. I was sad to say goodbye to them. I often wonder what happened to them all, where they are in the world.” I gazed off over the horizon, but their attention interrupted my reverie. “Anyway, it was fun to have a lot of friends, go to school, do science projects, things like that.”

  Hutch nodded. “I know Blu’s looking forward to it too. Right, Blu?” But she only shrugged, preferring to sip her lemonade than to deliberately shatter her father’s delusion. But I could tell, and I believed Blu knew it. It was yet another thing we had in common, as we were both coming to realize.

  Chapter 15

  Dana

  After our late lunch we strolled along the streets of Hamilton, modern shops and cafes across the street from old colonial government buildings, cars both new and old streaming down the boulevard in both directions. We strolled down the street, Blu clinging to Hutch while I walked along on her other side.

  I asked Blu, “Is this the furthest you’ve ever been from home?” Blu nodded but said nothing, so I suggested, “I guess you wouldn’t mind going home?” Blu shook her head, Hutch and I sharing a chuckle. “Sorry you’re not having a good time.”

  But I couldn’t help but smile. “I am ... ‘cause of you.” I couldn’t help but blush and look away, and for the life of me I couldn’t come up with a reasonable response. I’d been bowled over by a nine-year-old! But I didn’t have long to enjoy it.

  The mugger hit me hard from behind, but his focus was sharp and on my purse, hanging over my right shoulder between me and the shops, Hutch and Blu on my other side. Before I knew what exactly was happening, my memory flashed with images from Hector’s dream; my body crumpled on the ground, Hutch standing nearby. Is this it, I wondered, is this how I’m going to die? Is today the day? Was Hector right?

  The man was running, so I stumbled forward, away from Hutch and Blu and barely remaining on my feet, and the pull of the man as he tried to wrench my purse free pulled me even further forward. Pedestrians around us jumped back aghast, their eyes round, mouths open. But nobody had time to react. The mugger pulled hard, snapping the purse strap at the joint. The strap slipped easily out of my fist as he ran, a burning line in my palm, the brass buckle banging against the side of
my hand before disappearing as the man made his getaway.

  Hutch acted almost as quickly. He thrust Blu into my arms, and I was just about at her shoulder level. The poor girl was screaming in a high-pitched, shrill cry of panic, her little arms wrapping around me and mine around her. But both of our attentions were fixed on Hutch, who was just then catching up to my mugger about three car-lengths away. Blu and I clung to each other and could only look on at the spectacle; we couldn’t join in to help, yet we couldn’t look away.

  Hutch grabbed the guy by the shirt collar and yanked him back. He was tall, lean, very dark-skinned, hair shorn almost to the scalp. He flipped backward and threw a wild punch, managing to land a blow square on Hutch’s perfect face.

  I screamed his name, but instantly regretted it, pulling Blu close to somehow soothe us both.

  But soothing was the last thing on Hutch’s mind. The blow snapped his head back, but from the shoulders down Hutch was still fully in control. His long, powerful legs were splayed, giving him an immovable stance, turning at that slender waist to deliver a fast, hard shot of his own into the mugger’s gut. The man’s feet left the ground with the force of the blow, a gasp spilling out of his mouth as he bent forward. A second and a third blow rendered the man a crumpled mess.

  But Hutch didn’t stop there. I saw a certain fire in his eyes I hadn’t seen in them yet, a fury that was one year brewing and getting stronger everyday. I could see the pent-up frustration, the sense of helplessness at the loss of his wife, the outrage at the violence of a world that would threaten him or his family, which at that moment included me.

  This was yet another facet of the amazing Preston Hutchinson that I hadn’t seen; the primitive beast, the natural man, hunter and gatherer, protecting his tribe, acting out of instinct and drawing on a raw, masculine power that was his to wield. This was an attacker without the laws of man, and that made him subject to the laws of the wild, with Hutch there to dole out the justice in an impassioned and almost lethal barrage.

  “Hutch,” I called out, not willing to leave Blu’s side, “stop it, Hutch! Stop!”

  A crowd gathered around them. The mugger made a stupid move and took another random swing at Hutch, inviting another flurry of punches, these to the face. Hutch held him up by the collar with one hand and pummeled him to the ground with the other, each punch inspiring a furious grunt, bloodied teeth spilling out onto the sidewalk.

  I called out again, “Hutch, please, he’s had enough!”

  His senses seemed to return to Hutch, a lapse of reason drawing to a slow and bloody close. He looked at that immobile man beneath him, only Hutch’s own fist keeping the man from laying facedown in a pool of his own blood. Soon enough, he let go, the man hitting the concrete with a wet thud. But it was at that moment when the local constables arrived, white uniforms and whistles, the crowd parting for them as they surrounded Hutch, grabbing his arms.

  Blu screamed again, even worse than before, holding her little hand out to Hutch.

  “Take it easy,” I said to her before turning my attention to the police, voice louder and more commanding. “It’s the guy on the ground you want, he stole my purse. That man is this girl’s father, he only wanted to get my purse back.”

  One constable spat back, “By beating this man to death?”

  “What if he’d grabbed ... ” But Hutch glanced at Blu and stopped himself. “Anyway, I don’t deny what happened.”

  The constable glanced at his white-uniformed cohorts, then back at Hutch. “We’ll have to go to the station house, see what all this is about.”

  “I already told you what it was about,” I was too quick to say.

  “It’s okay, Dana,” Hutch said, “I can handle this.”

  “Hutch, are you sure? Do you have a lawyer, somebody I can call?”

  “Won’t need it,” Hutch said, turning back to the lead officer. “How long will this take?”

  The constable shrugged. “Hard to say, sir. A few hours, a few days ... who knows?”

  Blu started to panic, her breath shortening in her narrow ribcage, her face pressing into mine, slender arms showing the amazing strength of rising panic.

  Hutch said to us, “I want you two to go back to the ship and wait for me.”

  “No, Daddy, no!”

  “Yes, Blu,” he said in his very authoritative tone.

  But I had to say, “Hutch, I know you’ve rented the cruise for the whole week, but the ship’s still on a time-table. It has to leave here tomorrow and be back in Miami on time. I don’t think any amount of money is going to change that ... or being anybody’s daughter either.”

  Hutch looked around, lips tight over his teeth as he reasoned things out. He turned to the officer. “Is there a good hotel near the station?”

  “Across the street,” he said with a shrug.

  “You’ll let me check them in first?” The constable thought about it, then finally nodded. Hutch turned to us and tried to smile. We tried to smile back, and we all headed off with the police, who dragged the enfeebled mugger behind us.

  *

  The room at The Hamilton Arms hotel was the best they had, and it was perfectly lovely, with big, open windows and magnificent views of the capital city and the ocean beyond.

  But our attention was on that police building station across the street, Blu and I sitting on the bed. The girl leaned heavily against me and I rocked her gently, my arms around her.

  “I’m just so sorry you had to see that. But y’know, that guy, all he wanted was my money. And if he’d gotten that, it wouldn’t have been that big a loss.”

  “But ... what if he wanted more than that?” I wanted to ask her to elaborate, but I didn’t need to. Her tighter embrace was all the elaboration she could give.

  “Well, you saw your father. My gosh, I’ve never seen a man fight like that, have you?” Blu shook her head. “Whatever that guy wanted, I don’t think he was gonna get it. Do you?” Blu shook her head, burying her face in my side. “I mean, all those punches and stuff. And you saw the way that guy punched your dad, he hardly even noticed! That was really something, don’t you think?” Blu pulled her little face away and looked up at me with dewy eyes and a little nod. “So I’d say that, as long as your father is around, nobody who’s with him has very much to worry about, right? I mean, that was the scariest thing that’s happened to me in a while, but he was right there and he took care of it.”

  “But now he’s gonna go to jail!” Blu started crying, pushing her face deeper into my shoulder.

  “No, Blu, no, I guarantee he won’t.”

  “But you can’t promise that, you can’t!”

  I didn’t want to get into the politics of the situation, or the power of money among small and corrupt police departments, but I did want to calm the girl’s worries, which I did think were unfounded. “But he didn’t do anything wrong, Blu, and people who didn’t do anything wrong really don’t have to worry about going to jail. That makes sense, doesn’t it?” She couldn’t disagree, and that was all the opening I needed. “But I’ll be right here with you, right by your side, no matter what. As long as we stick together, we’re going to be just fine.”

  “But ... you said the boat’s gotta go home tomorrow.”

  “The ship,” I said out of pure habit, chuckling at myself. “Anyway, let it go. We’ll be here ‘til your dad gets out and then we’ll all go home together.”

  “Together ... like a family?”

  I couldn’t help but smile. “I’d like that, Blu.” Blu’s face brightened, but it wasn’t just because of my sweet sentiment. I followed her line of sight to see Hutch strolling out of the police station, looking both ways before crossing the street toward the hotel.

  I was relieved, a lingering concern vanishing to be replaced with a flush of warmth, a rush of gladness as Blu and I clung to one another and ran to abandon our rented room and meet Hutch in the lobby. But part of the sorrow of our stay clung to me, made even worse by my new glee. It only brought ho
me the sorrow I’d be feeling when Hutch and Blu left the ship, and me, behind. And that was only a few days away from happening.

  Chapter 16

  Hutch

  I knew I had to go see Capt. Ballard. Blu was in the Imax theater, Dana was taking care of some business of her own. I was fairly confident the captain would see me, even without notice. I was his only paying passenger, after all, but that was a situation he seemed to regret more and more.

  He was stiff behind his well-polished desk in the little cabin, even smaller than the Presidential Suite I’d rented, a fact of which he was well-aware. But it was almost certainly the last thing on his mind.

  “Thank you for seeing me, Captain.”

  “Please, Hutch, sit down.” I did, adding a friendly nod. But I didn’t doubt that our civility would soon be severely strained. “How can I help you, Hutch? Everything ... satisfactory on your trip so far?”

  “Actually, Captain, I’m afraid everything is not.” I wasn’t accustomed to beating around the bush. Getting right to the point was a business tactic that took my opponents off their guard and gave me the edge. And at that moment I had every right to believe that the man would wind up my adversary, at least before becoming my father-in-law. “I’m here to talk about your daughter, Dana.”

  “Is that so?” His posture stiffened and so did his tone.

  “It is. You see, Seth, I’ve developed very strong feelings for your daughter.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Mister Hutchinson, really, she’s just a child!”

  “No, Seth,” I said, straining the use of his first name, “she’s your child, and she always will be. But she’s a woman now, she’s twenty-one years old -- ”

  “But that’s just the point,” he said. “You’re her ... ” It was hard for the man to say it, and I didn’t blame him. “You’re her first significant relationship, let’s put it that way. And I don’t doubt that you’re a fine man who can provide for her everything that she needs. She may already be in love with you, if I’m not misjudging that look in her eyes. But I don’t want her to marry the first man she loves, no matter how rich or convenient he may be.”