by Selena Kitt
“You like that, don’t you?” Drew’s thumb was all the way in her now, moving in rhythm with his cock.
“Yes,” she gasped, not wanting to admit it, but oh god, she did like it—she did.
“Tell me.” He stopped thrusting, keeping his thumb buried deep.
“I like it,” she admitted, feeling her whole body fill with heat. “Oh Drew, I love it. Please, don’t stop—finger my ass while you fuck me.”
He gave a low growl, driving his hips forward again, his cock swelling even bigger inside of her. Gretel cried out, her fingers rubbing her clit in fast circles, matching his rhythm. His thumb in her ass made her feel completely filled, her already swollen pussy hugging the length of his dick.
“Oh baby,” she whispered, the feeling beginning to peak. “So close. So close.”
“Yeah,” he urged, his breath coming faster, slamming his cock into her. “Do it, baby! Come for me!”
“Ohhhh!” She let it come, her orgasm setting off a chain reaction in her body, her nipples tingling as they grazed the bed with every thrust, her clit throbbing, her pussy clamping down around his pistoning cock, and her little asshole clenching his thumb in a hot, steady rhythm.
“Oh fuck.” Drew slipped his cock out of pussy and his thumb of her ass at the same time, making her cry out at the loss of him, but then he was bathing her in a white hot eruption of cum. He pressed the head of his dick against the hole his thumb had just vacated—not inside, just at the opening, fiery blasts leaking out around the tip and down the swollen pink folds of her pussy.
“Oh Jesus.” Drew collapsed beside her on his belly, burying his face into a pillow. “Now I’m the one who needs fluids.”
Gretel laughed, going to the bathroom to clean up. She opened a bottled water and brought one for him, too, finding Drew already snoring. She left the water next to the bed and went to the window. The yacht was moving again, out of port just that morning, into open water now. That made her think of Hans and she wondered what he must be thinking about her.
“Where are you going?” Drew asked as she pulled on her sundress. It was the only clothing she had to wear, not that she’d really needed any in the past forty-eight hours.
“Take a nap,” she whispered, kissing his cheek and pulling the covers up to his shoulder blades. He was already snoring softly again.
The hallway was empty and for that she was grateful. Dinner had been left for them and it smelled delicious, but she ignored her growling stomach and continued down the hall. Her brother’s room was next to hers and she knocked, waiting for him to answer, but not really expecting it. Instead, she used the universal passkey she’d stolen from Double to open the door and slip inside.
He wasn’t there. The lamp was on and his bed was made and unslept in. Housekeeping came in to clean up, and even the clothes he must have discarded on the floor had been folded and left on a chair. There was no sign of him, or where he might have gone, but she had a pretty good idea.
Gretel made her way down to the lower deck, passing some of the crew. They just nodded politely, but a few of them gave her knowing little smiles that made her want to sink into the floor. So the whole boat obviously knew where she’d been the past few days. Great.
When she got to the lab door and saw the light on, she knew he would be in there. She knocked softly, glancing up and down the hall, still not sure she was even supposed to be down there.
“Hans?” she called, knocking again, a little louder. “It’s me! Open up!”
His face appeared in the window, just his eyes, wide and alarmed. “What are you doing here?”
“Looking for you.” She rolled her eyes. “Come on, open up!”
“I can’t,” he choked, more of his face filling the little window. “Gretel, she’s locked me in.”
“What?” She stared into his scared eyes, incredulous. “Who?”
“Our grandmother,” he spat. She’d never seen him look so angry. “She’s had me working on something for her company, and I’ve figured it out. Well, really, you figured it out for me. It was the yeast, Gretel. Yeast! I never would have guessed it. But it worked!”
“What are you talking about?”
“I should have listened to you about her,” he lamented, leaning his forehead against the door. “She’s awful. She’s evil. I think she’s going to kill us.”
“Are you…insane?” She blinked at him. “Have you been sniffing something wonky in there? Now open the door!”
“I CAN’T!” He jiggled the handle and she looked down, remembering her passkey, but this door was different. There was no place to slide a card. This door opened with a real key. “She’s locked me in, from the outside. There’s no way out of here.”
“What’s going on?” It finally occurred to her that he might actually be making some sort of sense, that what he was saying might, in some way, be true.
“Does anyone know you’re here?”
She shook her head, glancing up and down the hallway, seeing no one. Not that it mattered. There were security cameras on either end, and if someone wanted to find her, they could.
“You have to get me out of here,” he whispered.
“How?”
“I don’t know.” He sighed. “Gretel, listen. The thing I’m working on—it’s an alternative energy source made out of sugar cane and it’s worth a great deal of money. If I don’t give it to her, she’s going to kill me. But if I do give it to her, I’m afraid she’s going to kill us both. You have to find a key and get me out of here.”
“Okay.” She nodded, backing away from the door. “I will. Tonight. I promise.”
“Hurry!”
* * * *
He should have listened to his sister. The door had remained locked, and no food or water had been brought to him for twenty-four hours. His grandmother had come by only once, shadowed by the formidable Double, his big arms crossed, a new addition at his hip—a .44 magnum. Hans knew he was in real trouble when he’d seen that.
“Just give me what I want, Hans, and this will all be over,” his grandmother soothed.
Yeah I bet, he thought, glancing at the gun. She had no intention of letting him go. She never had. The only thing she’d wanted was a solution to her problem. Even if he gave her what she wanted, he and his sister would be at the bottom of the Great Barrier Reef feeding the sharks and the fish.
“How can you do this to your own grandchildren?” Hans asked, hoping to distract her, looking for a way he might be able to grab Double’s gun, maybe make a break for it.
The old woman scoffed, waving his words away. “Your mother was a whore and her daughter is no better. Your stepmother was certainly eager to get rid of you both, and I can see why.”
Hans stared at her, trying to comprehend the words.
“She sold you to me, you know.” The old woman laughed—more of a cackle really. The sound of it gave Hans chills. “Wanted to be rid of you entirely. Scuba accidents happen a lot out here, especially with such inexperienced divers.”
Hans thought of Gretel, alone with his grandmother’s other bodyguard, the one who had promised to teach her to dive—who said she’d be safe with him. Andrew was part of this, just as Double was, standing there with his big arms and his big gun, he knew it. Gretel wasn’t safe, and he had to find a way to protect her.
“I’m going to get what I want,” his grandmother insisted, her blue eyes turning to steel. “You might as well give it to me now.”
“Then you’ll just kill me,” he said, stating the obvious.
“Oh Hans, are you so naïve?” The old woman looked back at her bodyguard and smiled. “Let’s let’s just say I’m not above using your sister as leverage. Double likes her. Really likes her.”
“No!” Hans felt his whole body go cold and numb at the thought.
“Now, do you have something for me?”
He shook his head slowly, choking out the word again, “No!”
“Persuade him.” The old woman stepped back and the b
ig man stepped forward. Hans felt the first few blows—definitely the teeth-jarring one to his jaw, and two more to his kidneys after he’d dropped to the floor, but thankfully things pretty much faded to black after that and then, at least, there was no more pain.
* * * *
“Hans.” Gretel whispered her brother’s name, tears falling onto his bloody face. “Oh god, are you alive? Are you awake?”
He came to slowly, opening only one eye. The other was swollen completely shut.
“What did they do to you?” She mopped at the blood with the edge of her shirt but stopped when he winced and waved her away.
“How did you get in here?” he asked, although it sounded more like, “How dijoo gihn her?” from the mashed-up mess of his mouth.
“A key.” She took his hand. “Drew is going to help us get out of here.”
“He’s in on it,” Hans insisted, shaking his head. “Has to be.”
“No.” Gretel helped him stand, steadying him as he began to totter. “He has a plan. All the cameras are off right now. He gave me the key to come get you. He’s waiting at the side of the yacht in a raft.”
“He’s going to take us out into the middle of the ocean and kill us,” Hans hissed, bloody spittle flying from his lips, and Gretel took a moment to translate his run-together words.
“Trust me,” Gretel insisted, poking her head out into the hallway, listening for voices. Her knees felt weak and she was shaking with fear. “Just trust me, okay?”
“He doesn’t care about you.” Hans turned his one good eye toward her. “She used him as your babysitter.”
“Hans, stop it.” She said the words to soothe both him and herself. She didn’t like how much the words sounded like sense. “Drew is a good man. He’s on our side, not hers. Please, just trust me.”
“How can you be so sure?” he asked.
“Because he told me so.”
Hans gave a choked laugh. “I guess a boat in the middle of the ocean is better than a locked room.” He grabbed a Petri dish off the table, shoving it into his pocket.
“Shh,” Gretel reminded him as they crept down the corridor, Hans stumbling beside her, holding his hand out to the wall for support.
She had memorized the way, back beyond the laundry room and through the darkened kitchen, up a back set of stairs to the main deck and then over the railing. There was a rope ladder waiting for them, Drew sitting at the bottom in a raft. If all went according to plan, they would be in it and rowing to shore in less than five minutes, before anyone even noticed that all the security cameras had gone oddly dark.
The kitchen was eerily quiet as they crept through, the glow of an oven clock illuminating their way. Gretel’s heart was racing and she thought of Drew, what he was risking by doing this for her brother, for both of them. Hans might not trust him, but he didn’t know Drew like she did. She knew he wouldn’t do anything to hurt her—that all he wanted to do was protect her. When he’d been faced with the knowledge that the woman who employed him for the past six years had taken her own grandchildren captive and had every intention of killing them, he had believed her without a second thought.
And isn’t that kind of odd, Gretel? Asked a little voice in her head. Why would he have believed her over a woman he’d known for six years? He’d hardly asked her any questions. Instead, he’d gone straight into action, formulating a plan to get them all out of there.
Hans grabbed her arm, pulling her body in close and clamping a hand over her mouth to keep her from screaming—and she was about to. Standing at the big, industrial-sized refrigerator was the hulking frame of their grandmother’s bodyguard. It was three in the morning, but Double was fully dressed—and fully armed, Gretel noted in the bluish glow of the refrigerator light—as if he had been up and ready for action.
Now he was brandishing a long pepperoni like a sword, biting bits off the end as he hunted through, looking for something more satisfying. The two of them stood there, frozen in place, the bodyguard between them and the door to freedom. Hans began to slide slowly toward the floor, taking Gretel with him, until they were both kneeling behind the long metal countertop. Underneath, the cooks had various pots and pans stowed away, but she could still see Double’s shadow cast across the floor in the light of the refrigerator.
A crackling sound startled them both but they managed to stay quiet as the bodyguard answered his phone in walkie-talkie mode.
“Double here.”
“Security just informed me the cameras are down.” The static burst of their grandmother’s voice made Gretel’s breath catch. “It’s probably just a power problem, but I need you to check on my grandson.”
“Will do,” the big man agreed, closing the refrigerator. Hans gripped her hand, squeezing hard, shaking his head and holding a finger to his lips. Gretel tried not to move or even breathe as the bodyguard made his way up the center aisle, passing them on the other side of the counter, heading toward the door behind them.
“We don’t have long,” Hans warned, the adrenaline clearly moving him now as he pulled Gretel toward the other end of the kitchen. The door opened up to a back stairway and Gretel took the stairs first, Hans nudging her from behind, whispering, “Hurry! Hurry! Hurry!” The night air was cool against her face as she came up onto the deck, looking for the little red flag Drew had promised would be there on the edge of the railing, marking the site of the ladder.
“Where is it?” she whispered, not finding it even with the evening deck lights lit over her head.
Hans came up behind her, glancing over his shoulder, both of them listening for the sound of Double coming after them.
“Isn’t he supposed to be here?” Hans grabbed the rail, leaning over to look below. Gretel did the same, seeing Drew secured in a raft next to the yacht, being towed in its wake—but there was no ladder.
“Where’s the ladder?” Gretel tried to keep her voice low, calling down to him.
“Sorry—ladder was a no-go,” Andrew apologized, waving them down. “You’re gonna have to jump.”
Gretel looked between the two men, judging the distance. It was a good twelve feet to the water—but it was dark, and she couldn’t see what was in the water. Because they weren’t just going to have to jump, they were going to have to swim to the raft, attached to the yacht, and get it in before Drew cut the line.
“Don’t be scared,” Hans whispered, checking the Petri dish in his pocket, making sure the lid was on and secure before shoving it back in. “It’ll be okay.”
“So you trust him now?” Gretel retorted, looking over the side again where Drew was urging them to hurry and jump.
“He’s our only possible way out of this.” Hans pulled a knife out of his other pocket. It was just a little steak knife, something he clearly picked up in the kitchen. “And if he tries anything, at least I’ve got this.”
“Oh my god, I should have left you locked in that stupid little room.” Gretel rolled her eyes, turning away from her brother and diving head first over the side. The water, even at night, was bath water warm, but still a surprise to the system. She came up gasping and swam toward the raft as Hans dove into the water beside her.
“Are you okay?” Drew grabbed her arm, hauling her into the little boat. “I’m sorry about the ladder. It wasn’t where I put it. I had to find another raft too.”
“It doesn’t matter.” Gretel hugged him close as Hans found the side of the boat, hauling himself up the side. “We’re all here and safe.”
Drew let her go to help Hans into the boat, giving a low whistle at the sight of him.
“They worked you over good, didn’t they?”
“Drew, hurry,” Gretel urged, looking up toward the railing. “They know the cameras are out and they’re going to find out Hans isn’t in his room.”
“Too late,” Hans wheezed, his gaze focused high above. Gretel followed his line of sight and saw Double running along the railing, heard him yelling something about “escape!”
“Get
down!” Drew grabbed the back of her head, forcing her to the bottom of the raft, but even from that vantage point she saw him loosening the line, detaching them. And she saw the rising, white side of the yacht moving slowly away from them into the night.
“It won’t be long before they find out we’re gone,” she whispered, turning over in the raft to look up at Drew, noticing for the first time that he, too, was soaked. “Why are you wet?”
“Yeah, I had a little accident getting the boat.” He gave her a sheepish sort of smile. “Good news: we got the boat. Bad news: my phone is dead. Which means we have no GPS.”
“We’re lost out here?” Gretel sat up, looking between him and her brother. She knew they hadn’t left port too long ago, but they were still miles from even the sight of any land. “We’re in the middle of the Pacific Ocean!”
“Yeah, I said it was bad news.”
“It’s okay,” Hans spoke up. “We can follow the sea sparkle. Look.” A long trail of glowing blue water stretched out behind them, caused by the yacht’s forward motion through the water.
“Excellent.” Drew gave Hans an appreciative look. “Let’s hope they don’t turn around. Can you oar?”
“Give me one,” Hans said, holding out a hand, and Drew gave him an even more appreciative look as her brother, in spite of his physical condition, hooked the oar into its rest and positioned himself to row. Both men began without speaking, rowing them swiftly through the waves, and Gretel breathed a deeper sigh of relief as the white speck of the yacht began to grow even smaller.
“Drew, I have to tell you something.” Gretel snuggled close against his back for warmth, feeling his muscles working as he rowed.
“Hm?”
“My brother has a knife in his pocket,” she informed him. Hans stiffened and gasped, his oar slipping slightly. She stuck her tongue out at him and said, “Don’t poke a hole in the boat with it, Hans, or we’re all dead.”
“That’s okay, I have something to tell you both.” Drew chuckled. “I’m not exactly who I said I was.”