Paradise (The Erotic Adventures of Sophia Durant)

by O. L. Casper

  Anna invited me to walk on Anse Lazio one evening and we met on the beach at sunset. The sky was ablaze with beautiful red and purple hues, which were intensified by the Buddha we smoked. Anna talked to me slowly in a sort of muted tone. I didn’t understand what she was saying but I watched as she spoke and scanned her body when she looked away. She wore a light summer dress that clung to her, except for protruding edges flapping in the breeze as she swayed her hips or elucidated her meanings with hand gestures. It was turning out to be a very calming and peaceful evening.

  At last I did understand some of what she said. I guess I was coming down a bit.

  “Everything go alright in Azerbaijan?”

  “Amazing. Better than I could have ever expected.”

  I meant it.

  “Do you and Mark enjoy Eleuthera now that you are back?”

  “He’s not here. I’m waiting for him to come back from Nassau. He’s doing some business there.”

  “No. I saw him last night. He was going up to bed. He said he get in yesterday.”

  I excused myself to my room, saying I had to go check something.

  In my room—I hadn’t fully moved into Stafford’s room yet—I flipped open the MacBook. I turned on Minerva and honed in on the positioning of Stafford’s phone. The pulsating blue dot indicated that he was at Sky Beach Club in Governor’s Harbour.

  I got in the Porsche 911 Turbo, got on Queen’s Highway and punched it. I was outside the Sky Beach Club in about ten minutes, disguised in a long coat, a large hat, and sunglasses.

  Chapter 24

  Sophia Durant’s Diary (continued)

  I had never been to Sky Beach Club before. It was the most luxurious spot I’d seen on the island or anywhere in the Bahamas. High ceilings of polished wood, marble floors and countertops. There were few people about. I walked around to where I could hear the sound of a piano and a surprisingly talented singer. What was she doing here, singing to a basically empty room? I found an audience of one sitting attentively before her. It was Stafford. I stood at the opposite side of the bar so as not to draw attention to myself and watched them. A tall, Asian bartender with a kind face asked me what I wanted. I ordered an orange vodka. I watched as Stafford fawned over the singer.

  “Who’s that singing?” I asked the bartender.

  “Mia Kabra. She’s incredibly talented. Lives on Nassau. Plays all over the islands.”

  “She’s extraordinary. Very young.”

  “She looks younger than she actually is. She’s twenty-nine.”

  “Amazing. I thought she was all of nineteen.”

  “Most people do.”

  “I’m surprised she’s playing when it’s so empty here.”

  “She’s playing for that gentleman over there. He’s patron to a few local artists.”

  “All of them as young and pretty as she is?”

  He grew suspicious.

  “What’s it to you?”

  “Nothing. I just work for him.”

  “Is that so? You enjoy his big house on the north end of the island?”

  “Something like that.”

  “I hope you come more often.”

  “I’m surprised I haven’t been here before. I didn’t even know about the place. I’ve been working on the island since last summer.”

  “Extraordinary island, isn’t it? One of the hidden wonders of the world, I say.”

  “Do you now?”

  My voice and manner was flirtatious but I didn’t take my eyes off the flirtation that was happening by the piano. The music ended and Ms. Kabra came down off the small stage. I excused myself from the bar and went to hide out in the bathroom.

  In one of the stalls I took out my HTC and opened Minerva. Just as I did, I heard the bathroom door open and a pair of heels walk in. They entered the stall next to mine. I recognized the heels below the side panel of the stall. It was Mia Kabra. What the fuck is this? I asked myself. True—I wasn’t exactly faithful to him. But this place? In public? With her? Perhaps he wasn’t having an affair. But everything about what I had seen tonight said the opposite.

  I heard the spray and smelt an intoxicating perfume. Rage exploded like bursting flame up through my legs, making it hard to stand, and into my stomach. I was livid. But why? I began to rationalize. I’d known he was like that. But, with us, I thought it’d be different. Though why should I have? To be fair, I wasn’t acting any differently in this regard since we married than he was. Why the double standard? Then all logic went numb.

  I heard her leave the stall. Dark thoughts had already entered my mind. It was like an addiction. But it gave the most tremendous sense of power, I thought, that anything could. Apart from being a dictator and committing mass murder. I had definitely formed an addiction.

  Mia left the restroom and I looked at my phone again. I saw the pulsating blue dot move out to the beach. I decided to leave the scene before getting any more heated. But then I changed my mind. I headed for the beach.

  I was able to see Stafford and Kabra by the waves as I stood behind a line of bushes that separated Sky Beach Club from Tarpum Bay.

  He kissed her. I flew into a rage, but was paralyzed by indecision. I began fantasizing about buying a gun. A nice, metallic 9 mm. I could hunt her down and shoot her the way everybody else did when they killed. I decided to run away from the scene before doing something stupid.

  Back in my room I ordered a .40 cal Beretta Storm from a member’s only site that was akin to a black market eBay. I also ordered a few hundred rounds. I figured I would need some extra for practice. It was shipped to the villa on Eleuthera and arrived a few days later. I drove out to a secluded part of the island one afternoon with it, loaded it and started taking shots into the dunes.

  The recoil was pretty powerful but not what I’d expected it to be. I was also able to get through a lot more rounds a lot faster than I’d thought I would. It was a sleek, well designed handgun.

  I returned to Sky Beach Club and found the Asian barman I’d met before. I asked if Mia was singing again, and he said he didn’t know but she was staying at the club for the next ten days. He took my phone number and said he would message me when she played again.

  On the way back to the villa I thought about ways I could find out which room she was staying in and how I could get in. Obviously it wouldn’t be hard to figure out which room she was in seeing that it was the off-season and she was probably the only one staying there. I began to fantasize about shooting her. I imagined the power I would feel after it was over. I craved it.

  That evening I saw Stafford in the kitchen. It was the first time I’d seen him since he’d been back. At first he wouldn’t look me in the eye when we were talking, but eventually he warmed up to me.

  “You’ve been back a few days,” I said.

  “Yes. I’m sorry I didn’t get to you sooner. I’ve been so involved in this favor I’m doing for the Washington boys.”

  “I understand. It’s probably a little nerve-wracking.”

  In my mind’s eye I saw him fucking Mia Kabra on the beach in broad daylight. Her luscious tits bouncing to the rhythm of his thrusts.

  “It’s not too bad. But I’ve been…tired. Keeping to myself.”

  “Me too. After all that happened in Azerbaijan I haven’t felt like seeing anyone.”

  “It’s a lonely feeling you get dealing with those boys. Since you can’t talk about what you’ve done…”

  I cut in: “I don’t even know most of what happened.”

  “It was interesting to watch. They really helped us out.”

  “That’s quite an understatement.”

  He looked at me.

  “I know what they did got you kind of shaken up. Maybe you got too close to them. Started to believe in their authority a little too much. I don’t know.”

  “What’s your secret to dealing with them? Your friends’ secret?”

  “I don’t know exactly how they did it. But you have to see it all as a sort of economic pu
zzle. A business deal. You’ve got to have something they want enough to put you in a sort of position of power. A place you can negotiate from. They bend the rules. You know about it. It’s okay. You bend the rules. They know you know about what they did. It all sort of balances out. You’ve just got to keep all the moving parts in mind. And stay a few steps ahead of the game.”

  “I guess that’s why you are who you are.”

  “Who am I?”

  “Mark Stafford. The hedge fund manager. The entrepreneur. The government operator.”

  “That sounds kind of shady. Government operator.”

  A smile formed around his lips.

  Sophia Durant’s Diary

  January 26, Eleuthera Island, Bahamas

  Minerva revealed a string of texts from earlier in the afternoon between Stafford and Mia Kabra. I was able to work out that he was taking her to some waterfalls. I thought they would probably be the same waterfalls he took me to when we were first becoming intimate. It turned out I was right. Following their location via GPS, I watched them on my phone as they pulled off the highway and parked in proximity of the falls. I had the Beretta, which was tucked into the athletic outfit I was wearing. I also brought a machete. Strangely I thought I might need it if the brush was thick. I don’t know why I thought this. Looking back, it seems odd. Perhaps it was a subconscious inclination toward something else. I drove into the region where they parked and stopped a few hundred feet from Stafford’s Land Rover, concealing my car in the brush. It was concealed only partially, however. I didn’t much care if I was found out at this point. I felt, in some weird way, I had a right to be there. Of course my thought process was skewed. My mind was racing a mile a minute. My heart beat faster than normal and I could feel it in my throat. Sweat condensed in my palms. I took the machete and got out of the car, closing the door quietly. Dangling the machete in one hand, I crept into the forest in the direction of the falls.

  After a short walk in the woods I came to the water. Peering through the trees, I could make out the heads of Stafford and Kabra poking up out of the water as they kissed. I watched as they got out of the water, fully naked, and he led her behind a waterfall. I couldn’t help but notice his full erection, sort of bouncing as he went. It was his defining feature.

  Suddenly I was possessed of a kind of mad resolve. I knew exactly what I intended to do. Now I would carry it out, methodically, singularly. It was what Nietzsche might call the will to power. I stepped down into the water quietly, still gripping the machete, eyes constantly on the prize. I could barely make out their forms behind the falling water. I dipped my head under and swam for the opposite shore.

  The water was crisp and cool and refreshing. I swam with my eyes open, taking in the blurred, gray shapes around me. I knew the exact direction they were in from the movement caused by the pounding of the waterfall into the pool.

  I get to my feet, stepping slowly out of the water. Stafford sees me with the machete, looming closer. A look of confusion flashes in his eyes.

  “Sophia? What’s going on? How…why are you here?”

  He is genuinely surprised.

  “What are you doing…with that?”

  I near them. Twenty paces out.

  Mia turns, sees me and lets out a piercing scream.

  I let out a loud shriek before I run at her, drawing up the blade.

  Life passes in slow motion. She turns to run. I swing at her ankle.

  Direct hit.

  I watch with reptilian satisfaction as a chunk of her legs is sliced away, left dangling off in the sand. Droplets of blood scatter. Blood and sand.

  She turns to get a view of her assailant.

  I swing hard, all my force, driving the machete down into the place where her neck meets her shoulder. The sound goes low. All I hear is my heart pounding and my shallow breathing. Blood sprays from the neck wound.

  I feel this is not enough to do the job so I plug the blade into her chest.

  She falls to her knees, tears flowing like the crimson bath she takes.

  In a rapid series of movements, I hack wildly at her head. I can’t even explain why. She will die from the wounds I’ve already inflicted. The rest is pure rage. Wild savagery.

  Like a physical form of invective. Hatred.

  So much crimson. It’s all over her and me. My water-soaked, blood-flecked clothes.

  I don’t so much as glance at Stafford. I notice him backing away, hands up, out of the corner of my eye.

  Why doesn’t he do something? A remote part of my mind wonders. My disconnected self.

  My empathic mind abates.

  I hack Mia’s face to bits. Her face looks like shredded beef covered in blood. There is no suitable analogy.

  I swing on her neck a few times, hoping to smash the head completely off. But I’m unsuccessful. The head is on there pretty good.

  Half-realizing what I’m doing, I drop the machete.

  Mia’s body lies on the ground, twitching.

  I look on her hyperactive corpse, adrenaline fusing in my blood.

  Did I do that?

  Yes.

  What have I done?

  Oh God, I sob. I put my head in my heads. Dazed.

  I look up at Stafford. He is staring at me in amazement, hands still raised. I’m shaking. Adrenaline coursing through my body. I fall to my knees.

  Looking up as tears roll down my face, the sky appears to have film-grain like in an indie movie. All the colors around me are brighter and more intense, highly saturated like in a film. Nothing feels real. There are white streaks in my vision. I don’t know why.

  Stafford comes over, slow like a zombie, bends down and embraces me. My eyes find his, his mine. The expression shared is primal. Almost reptilian in its cold, passionless, hunter-like nature. The transcendent feeling of having killed replenishes me. One of the pinnacle experiences of life. It is a brighter world. I see reflections of eternity in all the objects around me and the infinite space they suggest.

  An electricity passes between us as we touch. It’s like the first time we touched all over again. We are two wild animals in a world gone mad with civility. It’s difficult to describe but this is at the heart of our chemistry.

  He kisses me. Fireworks explode in my brain. I’m not being sentimental; that is the nearest way of describing it to the reality.

  I turn my head and spit out some of the salt-tasting crimson flecks. My face is covered in her blood and it screams out at me. The rage of her escaped soul mingles with the wind and dances around us like an invisible fire.

  It’s too much to bear.

  I put my head down and confess: “It was me…”

  He looks at me in question.

  “It was me that did it all.”

  “Did what?” he whispers.

  “Emma Green. I smashed her up on the boat…left her for dead in the water…then finished her off in the hospital on Nassau.”

  “You did?”

  I nod almost imperceptibly.

  “I poisoned the model you were dating and one other girl by accident at the party. The ones who died in the hospital weeks later.”

  He rubs his face with both hands.

  I sob uncontrollably. I’m shaking variously in my legs and arms. Adrenal aftermath.

  “Emily Mordaunt—I programmed her plane to disappear and crash. I watched it go down…sort of.”

  “Sort of?”

  “As a blip on a computer screen.”

  “Isabella too? Did you do that?”

  I move my head slowly to either side, fixing my gaze on his.

  “No. That really was an accident,” he says. He turns rapidly to one side, in a vain attempt to hide tears. He regains control, puts his head down. Then he looks at me.

  “You’re dangerous.” He’s solemn, reflective. Then he looks around. “Come on, we’ve got to clean up this mess. You’re probably more of an expert than I am.”

  “Am I?”

  “I don’t usually do things like this
myself.”

  “I don’t have a problem with it,” I say.

  I used my clothes to scoop up any crimson-flecked sand and toss it into the pool. I washed all the blood off my skin and got as much out of my clothes as I could by scrubbing it between my knuckles in the water. I retrieved a duffel bag from the car and packed Kabra’s body into it.

  “What are you going to do with that?” he asked, a look of concern on his face.

  “Dispose of it.”

  “How?”

  “With fire.”

  That night there was a large bonfire on the west end of Anse Lazio. I was the only one in attendance. I watched as the duffel bag and its contents went up in flames. The bonfire had burned three to four hours before I shoved the duffel bag in at the base. With all that heat it still took a long time for the contents of the bag to burn through. The following evening I scattered the ashes in Tarpum Bay. The overwhelming feeling of the experience was sheer exhaustion. No longer knowing what I wanted in life, free of desire for any future experiences—other than prolonged sleep—I moved in the listless haze of a zombie. The exhaustion had penetrated the marrow of my bones. For some reason I found myself thinking about little Savannah more frequently. She was the piece of the whole puzzle that had set everything in motion. The desire to have her as my own, even before my feelings for Stafford developed, was the catalyst. At this particular point in time it struck me as some very bizarre logic indeed. I didn’t see the cause for the initial obsession at all. Did she represent some deeply hidden lack I subconsciously felt? That wasn’t it. There are easier ways of getting a baby. When I think of her now, I think of those diaphanous eyes, those round cheeks, the beautiful smile. And I think of the immense sadness of the idea of her growing up without a mother. Perhaps somehow I related to the tragedy of that.