by Maren Smith
Emil gave everyone the same dry frown. "This ship is, at least cosmetically, a prize replica of a sixteenth century Spanish galleon. She is part of a fleet of twelve, every one of which stands proof for why you should never agree to name your ships by drawing employee recommendations out of a hat."
"Oh, but that sounds very modern. Very democratic," Tessa's boyfriend, Mark, said. Sun-tanned and bleach-blond, he fixed Emil with a beaming smile. "More companies should follow your lead and adopt that kind of policy. It's good for employees. Good for boosting morale."
"Uh huh," Emil said, even more dryly. "Today the Glory Ho will be sailing you out to tour Fleetwater, the Colony Island. Tomorrow, the Poxy Strumpet will take you on to Pirate Cove, and the Goat Humper will happily bring you home again sometime the following day. Enjoy your tour of the smaller islands, as well as our morale-boosting ships."
"My word," the woman ahead of Maddy giggled behind her hand. "If I were working here, I'd vote to rename those."
"Why?" Pulling a digital camera out of his Bermuda shorts pocket, Mark stepped back from the gangway far enough to snap a picture of Tessa as she posed in front of the ship. "Guests will be coming here for one thing and one thing only. They're not going to care what the ships are named."
"No one will want to sail on a ship named the Goat Humper."
"Are you kidding?" Changing out the batteries on her own camera, Maddy adjusted how the wide strap lay across her neck. "Everyone's going to want to sail on the Goat Humper, just for the thrill being able to tell their friends about it once they're home again."
Camera in hand, she stepped back, searching with a critical eye for the best vantage through which to snap a picture of the Glory Ho for her article. She found the perfect angle when she spotted the figurehead at the prow of the ship. In actuality, there were two—twin female carvings manacled at the wrists, crawling up along the right and left of the stemhead toward what appeared to be portholes depicted on both sides of the black-painted wood. The 'glory hole', she realized. She covered her mouth, but there was no biting back her smile.
How racy, to have such a sexual activity so openly portrayed, but then, the resort islands weren't exactly open to the public. Yes, eventually there would be people here. Lots of people, in fact, day in and out. However, the islands were privately owned and situated a good eighty miles from their nearest non-resort neighbor. Although meant to sail back and forth in unrestricted ocean waters, none of these graphically designed ships would be docking anywhere but within the confines of the resort. Who, apart from those who paid for the privilege (and perhaps the occasional shark) would be scandalized by this?
Maddy studied the nearest figurehead, her affinity growing the longer she stood there. Which was ridiculous. She'd never seen a real glory hole. Apart from this, she'd never stood so long in contemplation of one, and certainly she'd never given what occurred at one anything approaching a passing thought.
What she and Dominick had thus far done together had nothing at all to do with the two sinuous young beauties carved into the high-reaching prow, and yet there was an unmistakable BDSM quality to what they depicted. More than just the bondage cuffs on each of their wrists, it was in their faces. The way they crawled toward the unknown of that hole; ready, willing and eager to service whoever demanded with the thrust of his cock for them to attend him. The kind of guts that took, Maddy didn't think she owned. In fact, the only commonality she shared with either figurehead lay in the seductive satisfaction on both their artfully painted faces as they waited to be of use.
Maddy envied that look. For just a few minutes last night, when Dominick had heaved her legs up, folding her back onto herself, opening her up to his whims in the most base and explicitly vulnerable of ways, she had sampled the tiniest taste of what it felt like to be a submissive woman under the influence of a man hungry to take all he wanted from her.
The salty ocean breeze tugged and teased at her hair, pulling stray wisps free of her ponytail as she stood on the dock. The warmth of the tropical sun spilled across her shoulders and down her back… following much the same path her sweat had taken last night while she had wallowed on her belly in the dirt and sand, with Dominick's hard thighs clasped around hers as he pumped… expending every last ounce of strength and desire until she couldn't even cry out anymore and all he could do was flop over onto his back, laughing and panting and sucking for air as he said in that husky, sultry way of his, "We have got to do that again."
Of course, none of that sultry sexiness had survived to morning, and then he'd spanked her. Five disciplinary swipes of his belt that had left her lower bottom and upper thighs scalded, and from which she could still feel twinges of discomfort when she moved just right, or climbed a big step, or had to sit down. Sitting was by far the worst. His was a hand well-practiced to administering spankings that mattered. His aim had been spot on; there was no position she'd found in which she could perch herself that didn't encounter a tender spot, and no amount of padding or cushioning seemed to make sitting easier.
He'd left welts on her. Two, in fact. The first four strokes had banded together in a single wide, dark red stripe that wrapped the entire base of her bottom before spreading out to leave four bruise-kissed tails to the right of her hip. The second welt was lower down, showing a good half inch of redness well below the hem of her shorts. Although she'd brought several different pairs with her on this venture, none were long enough to hide the lasting evidence of her spanking. She knew that because she'd spent ten frantic minutes trying on pair after pair while the Glory Ho blew its whistle and Emil kept knocking on her door, dourly calling out that everyone was waiting on her and if she didn't want to miss this tour, then she had better come now.
Unable to endure the embarrassment of people seeing that redness and possibly laughing or joking behind her back about how she'd got it, Maddy had done the only thing she could think of. She grabbed the only long-sleeved thing she'd brought with her—a thin white sweater, just in case the nights here grew cool or windy—and tied it around her waist. The slightly bruised end of the welt still showed around the side of her thigh, but all the rest was covered, and that was the best she could do.
Raising her camera to eye-level, Maddy backed from the prow until she could capture the whole of the carving in her viewfinder. She was so busy snapping pictures that she didn't notice Tessa had crept in beside her until the other woman purred, practically in her ear, "Bet you didn't know they'd named a ship after you."
There was nothing covert or friendly about the way she was smiling now. Apparently, the gloves must have come off. That suited Maddy fine; she was still stinging from Tessa's snarky comment regarding her spanking that morning.
"Must be part of the service." She took a few more pictures of the figureheads before letting her camera hang around her neck again. "Tomorrow we travel on the one named after you."
She headed for the gangplank to board the ship with the others, but Tessa grabbed her arm.
"Hey!" she hissed, but the second Maddy felt claw-like fingernails digging in around her elbow, she just reacted.
Yanking free of Tessa's grip, she jerked around and shoved. All she wanted was to throw the other woman back far enough to make her let go. What she forgot was that they were both standing on a dock and docks had abrupt edges, followed by long drops into very big puddles of water. Unfortunately for them both, Tessa found that edge.
Eyes and mouth rounding in surprise, Tessa managed one flailing windmill that failed to grab anything, including Maddy's equally frantic attempt to catch her hand, and shrieked as gravity took her straight down. The resulting splash was large enough to be seen as high as the decking.
"Oh shit!" Maddy leapt for the edge just in time to see Tessa break the ocean's surface, coughing, sputtering, and spewing curses back at her in high-pitched screeches that got everyone's attention. Unable to swear and swim at the same time, she promptly sank back under the waves.
A stampede of running footsteps th
undered down the dock behind Maddy.
"Baby!" Knocking Maddy out of the way, Mark dove off the dock after Tessa. Whether he actually meant to do that or if he simply couldn't stop in time was hard to tell, but he belly flopped, making an even bigger splash than Tessa had.
Her arm was grabbed again. Yanking Maddy back from the edge, Dominick assumed her spot. He frowned, first at the floundering rescue taking place below him and then at her.
"I-I didn't mean… She—I… but—" Maddy pointed at the water but never quite managed to blurt out the obvious: It wasn't her fault. Tessa had started it.
Not for the first time, Dominick seemed to hear what she couldn't make herself say and the steely-eyed look he fed her said clearly he didn't care who had started it, because he was going to finish it. And it wasn't Tessa he was giving that censuring stare.
Maddy's whole bottom crawled. She'd have backed away, except Dominick kept a firm hold on her arm. Any tighter and his grip might leave bruises.
"I can't swim!" Mark glubbed, splashing disjointedly even as he went under again. Still coughing and swearing, Tessa climbed his sinking body as if he were a float, and above them all, Emil suddenly appeared over the Glory Ho figureheads. Taking aim, he threw down two orange and white striped life floats while two other pirates jogged down the gangway, one carrying a long pole and the other, a rope ladder.
Tessa came up the ladder first, helped by Mark from below and half a dozen pirates from the dock above her. Mascara running in black streaks from eyes to chin, she looked like a half-drowned badger. A wet, blonde, limp-haired badger in ruined designer swimwear that had never been made with water in mind and only one Gucci leather platform sandal. The other had cast off all attempts at swimming and relocated itself to the quiet of the ocean floor.
"You!" Tessa seethed, her demonic voice aggravated by both the salt water and her screaming. "That was assault!"
"Assault?" Half-drowned angry badger must have been a disease, because that was when Maddy caught it. Her temper reared violently and Dominick's grip on her arm became the only thing that prevented her from closing the two steps needed to get right into Tessa's face before knocking her back into the ocean. "You assaulted me first!"
"Shut up!" Eyes flashing blue temper, hand shaking, Tessa pointed straight at Maddy and shouted, "I want this bitch arrested!"
Maddy felt the tension ripple through Dominick before his grip on her arm tightened. He shoved her behind him, though whether for her safety or Tessa's Maddy couldn't tell. What she did know was, if he hadn't, she really might have shoved Tessa back into the water. She didn't care if she went to jail for it; she'd have done it just to see the look on her black-streaked badger face.
"You grabbed me first!" she insisted. "I didn't mean to push you. Although if I'd known it was going to feel that good—"
Eyes bulging, Tessa lunged at her, ready to deliver another screeching order for her arrest, but Dominick silenced them both.
"Enough!" he bellowed, giving Maddy a sharp shake for good measure. "I mean it. Both of you!"
Snapping her mouth shut, Tessa folded her arms across her heaving chest and glared at Maddy.
"I didn't do it on purpose," Maddy repeated, stubborn but calm. After all, not only was she not in the wrong here, but she had something Tessa didn't. She had Dominick. Folding her arms across her chest now, too, she struck the same snotty pose back at Tessa and waited expectantly for him to do what lovers—even one-night stand lovers—were supposed to do. Stick together. Stand at her back and support her through an awkward situation with an irrational woman. He'd said he didn't want Tessa, had made it perfectly clear that he could barely stand to be near her. Well, this was his chance to prove it. Arching her eyebrows, Maddy gave him a 'what are you waiting for' look.
Perhaps if she had perkier tits or a wet shirt, it would have turned out differently.
Shaking his head ever so slightly, Dominick stared at Tessa for a long time. Her eyes narrowed; so did his. She hiked her chin; he shook his head again, and then breathed out a heavy sigh and pushed Maddy even further behind him. Away from him, Maddy suddenly realized, and into the waiting grip of Island Security.
"What are you doing?" she blurted, as Dominick signaled them to take her. Her arms were seized.
"Clap her in irons," he told them.
Clap her in irons?
Tessa's mascara-streaked face relaxed into a smug smirk, and Maddy was so shocked that she almost let the two guards take her.
"Really?" the first man asked, glancing at his companion uncertainly. "For pretend, or—"
"Go!" Dominick thundered, snapping his fingers and pointing back at the ship. "Now, damn it!"
Digging in with both feet, Maddy ripped one arm free, though the pirate-clad security guard quickly grabbed her again. He held on tightly now, and both he and his companion moved together, using brutal strength to muscle her along. But not before Maddy thrust in real close to Tessa, startling that smirk right off her face.
"I was wrong," she hissed. "You're the Goat Humper!"
Tessa's smile vanished.
She jerked her arms, but she just wasn't strong enough to break free again. Unable to do anything but give them all the same furious stare, Maddy was dragged away.
* * * * *
"What did you expect?" Lowering himself to perch on the edge of a small table (nailed to the floor, thank God—that made it the only thing on this entire ship currently not moving), Dominick stretched out his long legs and braced them against the rocking floor. He frowned across the hold and through the bars of the brig in which Maddy had been detained. He hadn't really meant for them to clap her in irons, but damn if they hadn't found an extra set of manacles and done exactly that.
Sitting in a sulky heap in a dark corner of the completely empty cell, Maddy scowled back at him. Her knees were drawn up to her chest, her arms hugged around them, her bound wrists held together, a length of heavy chain dangling past her shins and clinking with every lurching back and forth sway of the ship. She didn't answer him with her mouth, but 'drop dead' was written all over her unsmiling face.
Dominick sighed, scrubbed a hand over his mustache and beard, and tried a different tack. "Do you know what an investor does?"
"I'm not an idiot," she deadpanned. Not the most promising of replies, but at least she was talking to him. "Of course I do."
"Do you know what an investor's wife does?"
"Off the top of my head?" she countered. "Walks around the Caribbean looking for as many different ways to be a pain in my ass as she possibly can."
"Close," he allowed. "Except it's not your ass on the line here. It's Rita's, and when you rock her boat, it becomes mine. Now I have to go up there—" he pointed through the ceiling to the unseen deck above them, "and I have to make nice kissy-face with her until she agrees to drop the charges!"
"It's all part of the job description, right?"
He couldn't just read 'drop dead' on her face, now it was underscored, italicized, and spelled out in giant, bold font. This right here was why it never paid for a man to break his routine. "Yes," he reluctantly agreed. "It is."
The first fragile crack appeared in her sullen mask and beneath all her anger, he caught a tiny glimpse of unhappy regret. Then she looked away, swallowed hard, and when she turned back again, her anger was bolstered and her mask firmly fixed in place. "Then what are you doing down here? Go. Make nice already."
"Fortunately for me, she's already preoccupied."
"Found someone else to piss off, did she?"
"Not exactly." Halfway rolling his eyes, Dominick looked to the ceiling and tried not to be irritated by what he knew was happening above deck. "As appealing as some might find the idea of being pleasurably plundered on the high seas, I don't think Rita quite thought this resort through. Right now, as we speak, half the crew and all the guests—Tessa most certainly included—are lined up along the rails, tossing their breakfasts to the fish. In fact, the only one seemingly unaffected by the mo
tions of the ocean is Emil, and that's because I suspect he remembered his Dramamine."
Maddy let her mask slip again, this time to a sympathetic wince. "That explains the faint ralphing noises I keep hearing." She frowned. "You're not seasick."
For the first time since coming aboard the Glory Ho, Dominick allowed himself to smile. Pushing off the table, he managed a mostly straight walk over to the cage, catching one bar for balance before taking hold of the collar of his shirt and shrugging out of it far enough to show off his motion sickness patch. "Be prepared," he drawled. "It is the Boy Scouts' marching song."
"Ha," Maddy softly laughed. For the first time since coming aboard the Glory Ho, he was inclined to think she meant it, too, although by her look he could tell she wished she didn't. "Like you were ever a Boy Scout," she scoffed.
"Webelos to Eagle Scout." He shot her a relaxed, three-fingered salute.
Her chains clinked as she hugged her knees closer, clearly not impressed. "And then Scoutmaster, I suppose?"
"Nope. Stripper," he corrected, and she barked another startled laugh. "A slight change in uniform," he acknowledged, then winked. "But only until I ripped it off."
"You're impossible." She looked away from him, squaring her back against the wall and trying so hard to shore herself emotionally against him. Her angry mask was harder to re-establish. She never did get it all the way back and instead of 'drop dead', what he read on her now was a much diminished, 'I'm mad at you, buddy', lurking in narrowed but twinkling eyes. He'd take that over 'drop dead' any day.
"I try." He smiled, then inclined his head toward her. "I'm glad you're not sick, either."
She swiveled around far enough to drop one tank top strap and show him her right shoulder, and the tan patch she already wore.
"Webelos through Eagle Scout?" he guessed.