Linda Gayle

by Surrender to Paradise

  A blaze lit the sky, casting Moana’s shadow over the face of Kanaloa. Rahiti spun around, his eyes huge, and his hand flew up for protection.

  Chapter Ten

  Rahiti had seen Moana only in the flash of lightning—a powerful, angry god, streaked with black rain. Now the figure sagged, and Rahiti leapt to his feet to catch him. “Moana!”

  Limp arms wrapped around him, and Rahiti pulled his friend against his chest. “Moana,” he gasped. “Are you hurt?” He turned his hand over and looked at it over Moana’s shoulder. He realized it wasn’t black rain coating the other man’s skin. “You’re bleeding.”

  “Just scratches.” The warrior shook his head, and a large rock fell from his hand. His fingers gripped Rahiti’s biceps. “I almost… I would have… If I hadn’t heard your words over the rain…”

  Bending his legs, Rahiti let himself and Moana sag to the ground to kneel face-to-face. He braced Moana and forced him to look at him, though the night was very dark. “Whatever you intended, I forgive you. You are not to blame. I am. I was wrong. I am—was—full of jealousy and hatred. Whatever you would have done, it would have been the right thing.”

  “No.” A crack of lightning played jaggedly across Moana’s grim face. “I, too, was jealous. Proud.”

  The torment in Moana’s voice tore at Rahiti’s heart, although his relief at seeing his friend was almost more than he could bear.

  The rain tapered, and in the sudden growing quiet, Rahiti heard Moana’s whispered words. “I stole Mohea from you because…because I envied her. I wanted her because she was a part of you. It was never her I wanted. At least not at first.” A sliver of moonlight from the parting clouds touched his eyes, which pleaded for forgiveness.

  What new secret was this? Rahiti turned away. He tightened his grip on the other man’s arms as anger and regret swamped him. “So much suffering,” he muttered at last. Like a storm surge, his anguish burst through him. “I loved her. She was my world. She was beauty and life and everything good, and you—you took her, and now you’re saying you didn’t even want her? You charmed her from me. Did you think that would make me love you?”

  “I don’t remember what I was thinking! Only that through her, I might have you, too. I never meant for her to fall in love with me. And then, when you demanded her back, I–I wanted to hurt you as you’d hurt me, ignoring me all those years.”

  Stunned, Rahiti thought back to all their competitions. To how hard the slighter Moana had worked to keep up with him. To gain his attention, his praise. His love? He peered at Moana through strands of dripping hair. “Why didn’t you just tell me?”

  “Would it have made a difference? Would you have left her for me?”

  Rahiti flexed his fingers on Moana’s arms and felt his trembling. He knew what this confession cost him. “We could have lived together. Shared what we had, as the gods intended.”

  “You would never have been able to do that. Look at what just happened with Lyric.”

  Her name made Rahiti flinch and shut his eyes tight. Another life ruined. “Lyric…” he whispered. His heart skipped a beat, crowded with guilt. “I saw her loving you, not me, and…” Opening his eyes, he shook his head. “You…you were always the lucky one, the charming one. Everyone adored you. Men. Women. I don’t have your clever tongue, your face. You could have had anyone.”

  “But I wanted you. And then…” Moana dropped his arms to his side, defeated. “I wanted Mohea. I lured her away to torment you, but it is true. I fell in love with her as well. And then it was too late. You were too angry to reason with, and I could not let her go. Losing her was like having my heart torn out with a stone dagger. I blamed you, but now…” He jerked away and stood, his hands over his face. “Oh gods…”

  His friend had suffered enough. They both had. Their misunderstandings had ruined their lives, and they had to stop. Rahiti got slowly to his feet. “We must fix this…my friend.”

  Moana tore his hands from his face and glared. “Are we still friends, or will we be at one another’s throats for an eternity? Will Kanaloa make us walk through the underworld like this forever, always together, always apart?”

  “No.” Strength and courage welled up in him—the courage to admit what he’d been denying for so long. He reached out and pulled Moana to him. “It can’t be too late. Do you love Lyric?”

  “I–I know I could. She is everything Mohea was, and more.”

  He nodded. “While we don’t know her well, already she has shared her world, her body, her honesty with us.”

  “And we have not respected it.”

  “No.” He ran his hands up and down Moana’s strongly muscled arms and felt his cock grow heavy with a longing he no longer denied. “We have not been honest with her, or with each other. Moana…” He leaned in and touched his mouth to his friend’s parted lips, which opened more with surprise.

  Moana pulled back. “You do not have to do this. I know it’s Lyric you desire.”

  His heart thundering in his ears, Rahiti followed him and kissed him again, harder, feeling clumsy and unsure, like the first time he’d kissed a girl. Only this was different. This was Moana, his companion in life, a third of his soul as Lyric would be the other third. This time, Moana caught his face between his hands and kissed him back.

  Sweetly. Softly. Lapping inside Rahiti’s mouth, teasing Rahiti’s tongue to come and explore. Catching his breath and drawing away, Rahiti murmured, “Look at how hard you make me. You can’t believe I don’t desire you, too.” He furrowed his brow. “When I watched you with Lyric, I wasn’t sure which one of you I was the more jealous of.”

  Moana kissed his cheek, his jaw. “You don’t have to be jealous of either. You can have us both. We can all be together, finally.” He looked down to where their stiff cocks jutted toward each other and slid his hand over Rahiti’s chest. Rahiti sucked in a breath and let it out in a hiss of pleasure when his friend circled his fingertips around his nipples.

  “You liked this on the beach,” Moana said, the hint of his old familiar grin edging up the corner of his mouth.

  Rahiti could only nod. “And you liked this.” Feeling bolder, he clasped Moana’s cock in his hand and stroked firmly. His friend nearly came up on his toes, and his head rolled back on his shoulders, exposing his throat for Rahiti’s kisses. His skin was rain-sweet and hot, his pulse pounding beneath Rahiti’s lips. Suddenly, Rahiti wanted everything with Moana. No more barriers between them. No more lies or secrets. No more hidden hurts.

  “I want you,” he said, trapping his own thick staff alongside Moana’s and working them both together. “You belong to me. I belong to you. We belong to Lyric.”

  “I wish she was here now…” Moana ended in a groan when Rahiti curved his free hand around his hip and probed his fingers into his crack. A moment’s uncertainty disappeared when he saw his friend enjoyed having his hole touched as much as he had. Bringing their bodies closer together, still pumping their cocks, Rahiti bit Moana’s shoulder and worked his middle finger into the narrow, hot clasp of Moana’s body.

  Moana writhed, holding on to Rahiti for support.

  “Tonight is for us,” Rahiti said into his ear. “We cannot make things right with Lyric until we are of the same mind.”

  In answer, Moana swept his tongue into his mouth, his passion climbing with every thrust of Rahiti’s finger, with every tug of Rahiti’s hand.

  Rahiti’s blood rushed like fire through his body, searing from the inside out. Moana’s channel was smooth and hot, and Rahiti’s cock thickened. How good it would feel burrowing into that sleek tunnel. He craved release. He needed Moana, to make them one so they would never be separated again.

  Drawing out his finger, he pressed his hand on Moana’s shoulder, bearing him to the ground. Moana went willingly to hands and knees, raising his ass in the air, swaying slightly and moaning. Moonlight silvered his back and broad shoulders. That ugly possessiveness that had once been Rahiti’s downfall boiled through him, but th
is time, as he smoothed his hand up Moana’s spine to close his fingers around his nape and tangle in his silky hair, it felt right. When love was freely given, it could be freely taken. He never need fear losing Moana, as long as he was willing to give all to him. And he was.

  Wetting his fingers, he did his best to prepare his friend. He knew only by the rumors he’d heard of mahus how to proceed, but judging by the way Moana gasped and squirmed back against him, he must be doing something right. His cock was stiff as a club. Both of theirs were. Rahiti heard his own breath coming in rough pants. As he slid his fingers in and out of Moana’s relaxing channel, he could hardly bear the pressure in his balls. He slid the fat head of his cock up and down Moana’s crack, pressing at the small hole that could not possibly take him.

  As if sensing his hesitation, Moana glanced at him over his shoulder. “Don’t be afraid. You will not hurt me. I’m ready. You are my lover, my life. Fuck me now.”

  With a grunt and thrust of his hips, Rahiti pushed his thick cock into Moana’s hole. There was a moment’s resistance, and then he slid all the way in, bit by bit, unstoppable as the incoming tide, and Moana tossed his head and growled.

  “All right?” Rahiti ground out.

  “Fill me. Take me.”

  No lover had ever spoken sweeter words. Slowly at first, then matching Moana’s eager pace, he fucked his friend’s tight hole. The fecund scent of jungle and night air surrounded them like an embrace, and the cries of night birds accompanied their grunts and moans. Ah gods, it was like nothing he’d ever known. And that this was Moana, his soul’s companion. Draping himself over Moana’s powerful, tattooed back, Rahiti reached beneath him and wrung his fist around Moana’s heavy shaft with every thrust.

  “Rahiti!” Moana cried his name as he came hard, his toes curling into the earth, his cum coating Rahiti’s fingers, making his grip slippery. The drag and pull of his body tore the climax from Rahiti, and he bucked his hips against Moana’s ass, emptying himself into his friend’s spasming body.

  They collapsed in each other’s arms on the rain-soaked jungle floor, sweating and panting, then kissing, gently, letting every touch express their wonder with each other.

  His heart at last at peace, Rahiti curled his arms around his drowsy friend and knew the gods had forgiven them.

  Now, they just had to convince Lyric to do the same.

  It wasn’t Henri who came to collect Lyric the next day, but his wife, Maria, a quiet, elderly woman. Tiny in stature and old as the islands, she must have been a legendary Polynesian beauty once. Her eyes were still a soft, deep gold, and her silver hair shone in a braid that hung down her bent back. Seeing her gnarled hands curved around the steering wheel she was just about able to peer over would’ve normally made Lyric smile, but nothing could do that today.

  Everything just sucked.

  She looked for the millionth time up into the hills behind the hut. Still no guys. She’d waited all night, all day, right to dusk. She’d searched the jungle paths, called up into forest. No guys. Finally, a sinking feeling in her gut told her they weren’t coming back. The rain had pummeled the beach clean of footprints, so she had no idea where they’d gone. They knew the island a hell of a lot better than she did, though. Probably they’d just taken off, finally through with her or through with each other. They were finished with the whole business.

  Worst of all, in the bright light of a new day, she began to have serious doubts about their whole story. I mean, c’mon… Dolphins? Really? It had to have been a trick of her imagination, a clever conjuring on their part. It was pretty suspicious that as soon as they’d gotten their rocks off, they left. Thoroughly mortified, she began to realize she was just the victim of a couple of smart island boys who used their good looks and sweet words to take advantage of another dumb tourist.

  They hadn’t stolen anything, though. Not her phone or her laptop or the wallet she’d left on her dresser. Just her heart, which she felt shutting off from the world as if iron walls were forming around it, closing it off in cold, dark shadows.

  She didn’t think she’d ever be able to give it again, to anyone.

  She hefted her two suitcases as Maria slowly rolled the golf cart up to the front of the hut. Henri’s wife didn’t say much, which seemed to be her usual habit. She just smiled her gappy smile and nodded. Lyric managed to return the smile wanly then dragged her luggage over and tossed it in the back along with her laptop case, next to the staff Maria used to help her walk. Since she hadn’t expected to see anyone, she’d packed light.

  “You stay?” Maria said cheerfully.

  Lyric waved to her luggage. “No. I’m leaving. I know it’s a few days early, but I’ve had enough. I need to get back.” To all her other problems. She really didn’t want to go but felt she’d worn out her welcome pretty damn well on Tormala.

  “You no like island?”

  “Island’s great. I’ve just…had enough.” She got into the white golf cart with the peeling paint and waited for Maria to drive, but the old woman just sat there staring at her. “Maria, is something wrong? Where’s Henri?”

  “Henri busy. Henri mad that plan not go as planned.”

  What did that mean? “Which plan?”

  “You know.” She smiled and nodded.

  “I really don’t. Look, can we just go?” She glanced at her watch. “I have a plane to catch.”

  She didn’t really. She’d have to wait in the airport and hope to catch a flight, but it would be better than waiting in the hut.

  For the first time, Maria’s cheeriness dimmed. “You no find love?”

  Lyric scoffed. “Love? With who?” Her pulse pinged. No way could Maria know—unless she was in on it. Feeling her heart drop to her shoes, Lyric narrowed her eyes. “Hey, did you know about those guys?”

  “Guys, yes. Love for you.”

  “No love here, sorry.” She paused and bit her lower lip. “Who were they, really? I mean… Never mind.” She decided she didn’t want to know. They hadn’t done anything other than con her and give her great orgasms and break her heart. She folded her arms across her chest and stared at the rutted path. “You know, you shouldn’t let those two go around bothering the tourists. They’re gonna be bad for business.”

  “Henri very mad at them for long time.”

  “Well, no wonder. If they did to other people what they did to me…” She trailed off before she went into graphic detail.

  Maria sat up as much as her bent back would let her, and an obstinate light came into her eyes. “I see you, say, curse over! Time for love.”

  Oh for Pete’s… “Please, I heard the whole curse routine. I don’t believe it. Not that they did anything awful, but… Look, is it part of the whole island-getaway package? Like a fantasy island scenario you arranged?” She waved her hand, getting pretty disgusted. How could Maria and Henri and…whatever the guys’ names really were…do this? Or had Nina ordered it up for her, thinking two hot guys would cheer her up? “You should probably take into consideration that some people—some women—might fall for it. You know?”

  Maria tilted her head, looking like a curious little silver bird. “You no understand. You, they, eh…?” She tapped her fists together, which Lyric interpreted as a hand gesture for fucking. Her whole face went up in flame.

  “Yeah, well, I was weak.”

  Maria clasped her arm with her cool hand. “No. You strong woman. What they need.”

  “I thought they needed a woman with a pure heart.”

  Maria snorted and waved her off. “Henri tell you that?”

  She nodded.

  “He say anything to win.” She jabbed a thumb into her chest and squinted one eye. “Since islands were young, we play game. He say, Rahiti and Moana be cursed forever. I say, only ’til good woman come. He say, no woman good enough. I say, here she come!” She chuckled then grew stern. “You no leave. I no lose.”

  Lyric shook her head. “Are you saying this whole setup was a game to see if I’d fall i
n love with Rahiti and Moana?”

  The brilliant, toothless grin was back. “Oui.”

  “Oh for the love of—” She put her hand on her forehead and slumped in the seat. She supposed it was almost a relief to know she’d been duped, and the guys were just players in a game. She should have gone with her first gut feelings after all. “Look, Maria, it was fun while it lasted, but seriously, can we go?” The more she thought about it, the worse she felt. She turned her head to gaze out at the ocean so the old lady wouldn’t see the pain in her eyes.

  Just where the lagoon began to deepen, a shining shape moved through the waves. Two shapes—two dolphins. She held her breath and watched them surface in tandem, spraying breath, and her stomach sank. Well, if she’d needed any other proof, there it was. The two trained dolphins, probably waiting for their handlers and their next mark. A big ball of pain began to expand in her chest. “Maria, please.” She looked at Henri’s wife, knowing her eyes must be going bloodshot from the pressure of held-back tears. “I really want to go home.”

  The woman’s weathered face fell as her words finally sank in. “You no love Rahiti and Moana?”

  She shook her head. “How could I? I only knew them a couple days, and—and they’re not even real.”

  That seemed to stiffen old Maria’s upper lip. She cast a disparaging gaze on Lyric that she was sure she didn’t deserve. Then, muttering something about losing and winning and “woman not strong” under her breath, she started up the golf cart and began the trundle to the dock on the other side of the island.

  Lyric tried not to look out at the ocean as they traveled deeper into the forest, but it drew her gaze inexorably, and the dolphins she could see through the breaks in the trees seemed to follow them along the shore. Through a haze of tears, she watched paradise pass her by.

  Like a dream. The dream Rahiti had said she’d woken up to.