by Maren Smith
Heat burned Maddy's face. Scrambling to her feet, she yanked her hands from her aching bottom and quickly shoved her skirts back down.
"You son of a bitch," Dominick said, almost conversationally.
"Yes, well. If you want to continue on, that's fine, but the boat's waiting on the other side of the island and we do offer something more gastronomically appealing than lizard." Emil glanced past Maddy to the campfire. "Which are, by the way, a vulnerable species—you know what, let's talk about that later. For now, consider yourselves rescued, so we can go home."
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Dominick knew Rita was looking for him, not because anyone gave him a head's up, but because all the way from the conference room he heard the crash of the main door as it hit the side of the building, and then Rita's unmistakable voice boomed out, "Where is the son of a bitch?"
Standing at the window, overlooking the airport where the first outbound plane since he'd arrived at the resort was, even now, beginning its taxi to the runway, Dominick braced himself. Arms folded across his chest, with nothing to do but wait as the proverbial shit splattered into his personal fan, Dominick squared off against the window.
Beside him, his posture every bit as tense, Emil asked, "Want me to stay?"
"No," Dominick lied. "The fewer targets we give her at this point, the better."
"Thank God. No offense, but I sank all my eggs into this basket. I can't afford to be without a job right now." As if he knew how that made him sound, Emil offered Dominick a wince of a smile, a commiserating clap on the shoulder, and then he fled, abandoning Dominick to face the owner's wrath alone.
Fingers idly drumming on his own arm, Dominick kept his gaze locked on the plane. It was almost to the runway when Rita found him. Leaning heavily on her cane, she didn't exactly slam into the conference room, but the softness with which she closed and then locked the door behind her belied the full measure of the storm that followed her. It was in the tightness of her hard mouth, the flash of her angry eyes, and the high flush of color that her immaculate makeup couldn't begin to hide.
"Good morning," Dominick greeted, more polite than cheerful.
The fury in her eyes flared hotter. But ladies did not scream, or shout, or throw tantrums, no matter the provocation, and Rita was nothing if not a lady. She came at him, every thunk of her cane sounding heavier than the thunk before. Her look scathing, she didn't stop coming until she'd reached his side. Although a good eight inches shorter than he was, she did an admirable job of staring him down the length of her perfect nose.
"I have questions," she announced, short and clipped. "Everyone I've asked has told me you are the only one authorized to answer them. You! Which I find extremely annoying since I own the damn place. The last I checked, this was still my island, my resort, my project, and if anyone is going to assign authorization to withhold information from me, that person should be me. Which leads me to only one conclusion: You, sir, have the balls of a brass elephant."
His fingers drummed again. The plane was just now turning onto the tarmac. "It's good to be indispensable."
Rita's eyes narrowed. "You're nowhere near as indispensable as you think, I assure you."
The plane began to move, lining out before picking up speed. Dominick didn't realize he was holding his breath until he saw it lift, hover, and then begin to soar, climbing rapidly into the distance as it left the island resort. Fingers drumming one last time, he turned from the window and, for the first time, faced Rita straight on. "Ask your questions."
Chin hiking higher, Rita clasped angry hands over the head of her cane. "Let's start with the easiest. The crew of the Poxy Strumpet."
Pulling out a chair, Dominick seated himself at the conference table. "What about them?"
"All forty men are running laps around the island."
"Five laps each," Dominick agreed. "Frankly, they're lucky to get off that lightly. They disregarded safety procedures and sailed away, abandoning two people on an island without any provisions whatsoever."
"You and Miss Cameron," Rita snapped. "And only because they had confirmation that you had both returned to the ship."
"Tessa's confirmation," Dominick emphasized. The color on Rita's cheeks deepened a brighter shade of pink, but Dominick didn't give her a chance to regain her argumentative footing. "Our names were on the away-sheet. The duty master keeping track of that sheet had not checked us off. I don't care if the Pope himself declared that we'd gone back to the ship, they never should have set sail without making sure we were both present."
"Oh, they had other concerns," Rita scoffed. "They had one guest in the crow's nest, and another stuck halfway up the rigging before he remembered he was afraid of heights. Emil's attention was justifiably redirected to higher priorities than your fuck-fest in the sand."
"And when it happens again, only to two paying guests?"
"Stop being melodramatic," she snapped. "You were stuck there less than five hours. As soon as Emil unloaded the guests from the ship, he realized his mistake and turned around to fetch you both back again. I think the more important issue is the two men who have passed out from the heat—"
"The more important issue," Dominick interrupted, feeling the first sparks of anger now himself, "is the potential lawsuit that can close this entire place down if it happens to a real guest. So, two out of forty idiots passed out. Big deal. I told them how to run without succumbing to heat exhaustion, if they can't follow those simple instructions then they can recover as long as they need to in the medic's office and then either finish their laps or pack their shit! Next question."
The two frowned at one another for a long moment in silence, Rita's mouth closed but working, as if she were struggling to keep from saying something she knew she'd end up regretting. At long last, she yanked a chair out from the table and sat down facing him.
"Mark," she said tersely.
"What about him?"
"He was waiting outside my office this morning with some cock and bull story about how you broke into Tessa's room while they were…" Her mouth worked again, striving to find the right word.
"Pounding the mattress?" Dominick dryly supplied. "Yes, I did."
"He claims you had her forcibly removed from the room."
"Security did the actual manhandling, but it was done upon my orders so, yes."
"As of this morning, Mark claims he has seen no sign of Tessa and that you refuse to tell him where she is."
"Since she is not his spouse, I deemed her whereabouts none of his damned business."
Rita's blue eyes flashed and her chest rose under her next angry inhale. For a woman of her advanced years, she had a really nice set of breasts. Were his temper not so highly pricked right now, Dominick might have been tempted to pay them better notice. "I sincerely hope, for your sake, you do deem it my business to know," she said.
A corner of Dominick's mouth curled. He was sorely, sorely tempted to tell her just how badly it had gone for the last woman who had threatened him. He could still see Tessa's face, drained of all color, her eyes huge with disbelief as she'd sat in this very conference room, wrapped in nothing more than a sheet, with everything she'd brought to the resort already packed in a neat pile of suitcases just outside the door.
"You can't do this," she'd said, as hoarse as only someone who'd been screaming non-stop profanities from the moment Security clamped hands on her could be. "I'll sue you."
"For what?" Dominick had coldly countered. "We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone. Right now, that means you."
"You can't—"
"I absolutely can, I will, and I am."
Hiking her chin, pretty much the same way Rita was doing now, Tessa had spat, "When I tell my husband what you've—"
One of the best feelings in the world had been when Dominick had picked up the phone and handed it to her. It amplified when he said, "I'm sure he's on pins and needles waiting to hear from you, since I've already told him my side. As of two hours ago,
he was officially uninvited from investing in this venture and I've already contacted the Castle attorneys to begin the legal process of removing him as a shareholder from there, as well. You are, of course, banned from both establishments."
Tessa's already pale face turned paste white. "Wh-what…"
Bracing his hands on the table, he'd leaned over her then, looming as he'd said, "I warned you. You knew this wasn't a game I had any intention of playing with you, but you kept pushing for my attention. Well, now you've got it, and you're going to continue to have it for quite a long time. As I've already mentioned to your husband, I intend to keep a very close eye on what you post or say about your experience here. One wrong word out of you, my dear, and I've got all the witnesses I need to nail your ass for libel and slander."
Although he was sure Tessa would have her fighting claws unsheathed before her plane touched down in her home state, getting her to board a flight back to Nassau hadn't been difficult after that.
"Dominick!" Rita snapped, yanking him back to the here and now. "If you have her locked in a dungeon on the island somewhere, that's another potential lawsuit and one I need to know about! What have you done with Tessa Zanderson?"
He let himself smile, much the same way he'd smiled at Tessa. It was likely something he'd come to regret, but after the week he'd just had, it was one he'd damn well earned. "I kicked her out of the resort." He was in no way successful at keeping the enjoyment he'd got out of doing it out of his tone. "Currently, she's on her way back to the Bahamas."
As if on cue, the rumble of a low-flying jet trembled the building and Rita turned. Shock and dread crawled on her features as the plane, having reoriented itself back toward the mainland, flew directly over the resort. Within two startled blinks, it was out of sight from the windows; another blink and nothing more could be heard of it, either.
Rita stared at him, appalled. "What have you done?" she breathed, hands clasping white-knuckle tight over the silver head of her cane.
The horror in her eyes was enough to kill his smile. Although older, she was as much a battle-axe as any Mistress he'd yet met, and he couldn't help feeling just a little sorry for her then. "I've saved you from the biggest pain in the ass you'll ever encounter in your life. That is what I've done."
Vaulting to her feet, at once all her shock and horror gave way to a rush of fury even more volcanic than before. "You've killed my resort! You arrogant, pompous, bastard son of a bitch! Have you any idea how hard I had to work to schmooze Zanderson into banking with me in the first place? It took almost a year! I'm ruined! Ruined!"
Holding up a hand, Dominick tried to calm her. "There are other investors."
"You think I haven't already talked to them?" When she took a lunging step at him, Dominick stood. Not because it looked for a moment as if she was going to hit him with her cane—although it did—but because when she tottered like that, he was sure she was about to fall. "Everyone loves the Castle, you stupid motherfucker! Have you any idea how often I hear 'Why come to the Island?' when everyone knows they could go there instead? Oh. My. God!" Rita bent almost double, nearly hitting herself with her own cane. "I'm ruined. I'm ruined."
When she tottered again, Dominick tried to ease her back into her seat. "It's not as bad—"
She snapped upright so fast, the top of her head nearly clipped his chin. He yanked back in time, but the look she gave him was as close to pure loathing as he'd ever seen. "You were sent here to help me!"
He tried again. "Take a breath and let me—"
"Get off… my island!" Rita seethed.
"I've got an idea, if you'd just—"
"Get. Off. My! Island!"
For being an old woman, standing in at little more than five feet and next-to-nothing, she did an impressive job at getting right up in his face.
Fine. Hands raised in surrender, Dominick gave up. She was Marshall's friend. He might have better luck smoothing this over with her, and if not, well…
Shit.
* * * * *
Cocooned in a black sheet and a blanket decorated with various historical pirate flags, Maddy lay with her eyes closed, but she wasn't sleeping. At best, she'd dozed once or twice through the night, but her brain refused to let her rest. It kept replaying her argument with Dominick. It kept replaying the spanking, twisting and confusing what had actually happened with all the wrong kinds of emotional and physical feelings. She had no idea what to make of them. It bothered her.
Apart from that initial lurch in her stomach when he'd grabbed her arm, she hadn't been afraid of him. Not once. Not throughout the whole ordeal, from first swat to last. And yet, at the same time, she didn't think it was quite accurate that she should be remembering it now as a comforting occurrence. Yet that was what her brain kept telling her. From the moment Dominick jerked her down across his lap, hefting her into position with his arm wrapped around her waist and his other hand clamped between her thighs, her memories seemed determined to make that moment the most secure and cared for and loved that she'd ever felt in her life.
She rolled from her back to her side, covering her eyes against the brightness of the morning sun as it filtered in around the curtain's edges. What it couldn't do was block the spanking from her mind. At the time, it had felt as if Dominick had spanked her for hours. In reality, he'd struck only twenty, maybe thirty times, but every one of those spanks had landed hard. Very hard. The kind of hard that would have had her begging for mercy at two, if only she could have managed to breathe.
And yet, although the heat had followed her during that long walk back to the ship, and even blazed in deep, throbbing discomfort under her skirts for the majority of the voyage to the Cove, virtually nothing of that awful ache remained by the time she'd bedded down in this tiny guest room above a fake pirate tavern. Alone.
Cradled in the lonely warmth of a bed three times bigger than any one person required, Maddy reached behind her. She touched her bottom, probing for any hint of tenderness, only to find disappointment. Nothing, no tenderness at all, could be felt now. As angry as she'd thought he'd been, as soundly as he'd scolded her—
This is what I think of old!
…Fat!
…Gratitude!
…Pity fuck!
—didn't she deserve to be at least a little bit sore?
Tucking her hand under her cheek again, Maddy wished there were some switch she could throw and just shut those thoughts off. There was no peace in replaying all the things he'd said, or worse—the things she had. Small wonder he wasn't sleeping here beside her.
Exactly who he might have found to sleep beside tickled unwelcomely at the back of her mind. Tessa, she wanted to guess, but she knew better. If she discovered them both standing naked in the same room, she'd still have a hard time imagining Dominick as a willing participant. Still, Tessa wasn't the only woman at the resort. Four in total were acting as guests, but who knew how many female employees there were. Or how many of them might fit Dominick's preference. Maybe the Island was like Hooters or Twin Peaks, where employment was contingent upon how well a girl kept herself height-weight proportionate. She doubted it. Although she hadn't been on the lookout for chubby women, she had noticed one or two. Both were here at the Cove. Either one could be with Dominick right now.
Maddy wasn't prepared for the pang of loss that hit her square in her chest just at the thought. Her common sense reared just as fast. It wasn't likely. It just didn't feel like something Dominick would do. Of course, a lot of men did things the women in their lives never would have guessed at.
Virgil certainly had.
Thrashing out of her cocoon, Maddy rolled all the way over onto her other side, burying her face under what should have been Dominick's pillow—had he been there—but her brain refused to stop.
How the hell could I love any part of you? Virgil had raged. She could still hear the way he'd shouted at her from across that counselor's desk, just the way she'd heard that echo of him through all the worst nights these last
four years. And yet, as Maddy clapped that pillow to her ear in an attempt to smother out the sound, she suddenly realized she wasn't in tears. At least not until Virgil's voice began to shift, melting into Dominick's lower, deeper tones.
Do you know how long it's been since I've had the chance to fuck a woman who wasn't a bony stick?
Dominick wasn't Virgil.
Her hand wandered down under the sheet, caressing an exploratory path over her stomach, the curve of her hip and down the slope of her thigh. There wasn't anything bony or stickish about her body, and yet every time she and Dominick got together, he could hardly seem to keep his hands off her.
I'm going to slam into you. I'm going to break the goddamn bed with you.
So far, they'd had sex everywhere but in a bed.
Maybe now they never would, not after what she'd said to him. Not that she hadn't said the truth. They were mismatched and yet, how right it felt every time they came together. It was a trick of the vacation, she told herself firmly. Part of the magic that made island flings so memorable.
Right?
Of course it was. It had to be. What other explanation could there be for how someone as perfect and handsome and as experienced as Dominick could be interested in her?
So, why couldn't she sleep? Why did she just keep hearing him over and over again in her head—that low growling voice of his, demanding: Tell me you're in love with someone else… Tell me you feel nothing for me… That you never will…
Maddy fought back a groan, knowing already that she'd never be able to tell him that. Not any of it. Because the truth—as terrible as it was—was that she just couldn't imagine herself being in love with anyone other than Dominick. And that really was awful because, although she didn't think she was quite at the emotional point of no return, after only five ridiculously short days, already she could feel herself tottering unsteadily at that precipitous edge.
Tell me you feel nothing…
She wished to God she did feel nothing, but he'd ruined her. She didn't love him. She wasn't ready to go so far as to say she did, but the potential was there. Dominick was exactly the kind of man she could fall in love with if she didn't break away from him soon. If only she'd let herself.