by Kris Pearson
Was that English?
It could have been anything, but at least he didn’t look unkind.
“I’m fine,” she called down, all too conscious that her ripped shirt exposed not only her shoulders but a plump breast as well. She cursed her lack of a bra, but she’d wanted to be comfortable on the long solo flight and had dispensed with anything that might chafe or bind. Her flying harness had been bad enough to endure, and now she had the entanglement of the parachute as well. She felt as trussed-up as a chicken awaiting the roasting pan. As helpless as Fay Wray in King Kong’s clutches.
Marianna blanched as the beast made a sudden scrambling run and hauled himself up the tree next to hers. He was bigger than she expected. Tall and greyhound-lean, with well defined, powerful muscles.
He watched her as he tested a branch that veered in her direction. She held his gaze, avoiding looking at his unclad groin. For she’d glimpsed what was happening there...
“Marianna,” she said, tapping her chest with a finger.
“Anna,” he managed.
“Marianna,” she repeated, as though to a small child.
He cleared his throat again, and closed his eyes in frustration. “Marianna,” he managed. “Orry—O-one talk to.”
“What?” she demanded, appalled.
“No-one talk to.”
“No-one? There’s only you?”
He nodded, glancing down at himself and attempting to hide the evidence of his arousal with a large hand.
They hung in the trees together, just a few feet apart. Eventually he rolled his eyes, shrugged his broad shoulders, and gave up any pretence of modesty. He stepped with caution along the branch toward her until he could anchor a foot in her tree. She scrunched her eyes closed—anything rather than see that long, dark shaft rearing from the junction of his thighs.
He moved closer and bent for the knife strapped around his ankle, taking his time to cut her free, testing the cords as he worked, careful not to send her plummeting to the ground. Soon she was supported only by one of his strong arms and the footholds he’d found for her in the branches.
She jabbered like a frightened monkey, asking him questions, watching for nods or shakes of his head as she tried to piece his story together. His hoarse voice was hard to understand, but he definitely spoke English.
“So you had a boat? And it sank?”
He nodded, and then shook his head. “Ran ground.” He pointed across to an area of dense vegetation.
“And there’s only you? Or were other people drowned?”
“Me,” he said, tapping his own chest to emphasize the point. So he’d been sailing solo...
“How long ago?”
He held up a hand, fingers spread wide, then folded them down and held up just two.
“Seven weeks? On your own?”
“Months. Long time. No talking.”
Marianna heard his voice returning as he exercised his unused vocal cords.
She blanched. Seven months on his own?
Once he’d cut her free he indicated they should make their way to the ground. He kept a strong arm around her waist as she descended. The hard ridge of his sex rubbed against her hip; she tried not to look.
“Wait,” he ordered once they were down.
She watched, astounded, as he climbed into the nearby tree where much of her parachute had draped itself. The sun lit up the play of toned flesh as his long legs stretched and flexed. He cut off a portion of the parachute and returned to the ground.
Turning away from her, he squatted, hacking through the fabric with his knife, fashioning a rough breech-clout which he passed between his thighs and knotted around his hips. Well, it covered him, but she was still all too aware of what lolled behind the layer of flimsy fabric.
He turned, and with surprising tenderness arranged the rest of it around her shoulders to shield her from the sun.
“Ian” he said, proffering a mahogany hand. She shook it primly, smiling a little.
“Marianna Edgecombe. With any luck they’ll pick up my beacon’s signal and rescue us both.”
He shrugged, as though he wasn’t expecting a miracle any time soon.
They walked together across his island; rough grass and Pandanus palms...rocky ridges and smooth sand...to the area he’d indicated from their perch. Concealed in the trees a little way up from the high tide line his boat lay—the hull stove-in beyond repair but the cabin still whole. So this is where he’d lived for so long alone? She shivered, despite the fierce heat.
“Water?” He indicated a Heath-Robinson affair she presumed must be a still. The liquid tasted flat, but she was desperately thirsty and grateful for the drink.
“Celebration meal,” he croaked, waving a hand at his few remaining cans of food once they were aboard.
“Because of me?”
“First woman on my island.”
Marianna speculated what he planned for their second course. She’d have no chance of fighting him off if she was to be dessert.
“Have you been living on fish?”
“Fish. Seaweed. No coconuts growing here, but they get washed up sometimes.”
She ran a hand over his remaining supplies. Three cans of beef stew. Two of tinned tomatoes. Several unopened bags of pasta. One of rice. Most of a bottle of brandy. A first-aid kit. That was all. He reached out for a can of stew.
“You should keep it.”
“Tired of fish,” he said, sending her a warm smile.
Ian lay on the bed, right hand still busy.
Fuck it—this is my fantasy. I don’t want dinner, I don’t want her point of view, I want the sex.
He fast-forwarded viciously.
Marianna knelt before him, tugging at one of the knots holding the parachute fabric secure. She peeled it away, licking her lips as she gazed at his body, then slid the fabric down his thigh...over his knee...down his iron-hard calf. He raised his foot for her and she tossed the scrap aside. Now he stood naked in the sand, knees locked back.
The low sun lit her pale hair as she leaned closer. She placed a gentle hand either side of his waist and smoothed her fingers over the taut skin of his belly. He craved her pleasurable grip on his shaft, but she had other plans.
“Legs apart,” she demanded.
He obeyed.
She slipped a hand between his thighs and cupped the heavy weight hanging low in the tropical heat.
“Now you’re at my mercy,” she said, squeezing gently. She released him and ran her fingers backward between his buttocks, searching until she found her destination. She teased him with a fingernail, scraping over the puckered skin, sending a jolt of pure sensation through him.
She leaned back a little, looking him full in the face, and licked the fingers of her other hand.
“Do you think that’s going to feel nice inside you?” she asked, sliding them over the head of his cock. She ran her tongue over her hand again until it was very slippery, and caressed him once more.
Ian’s breath caught in his throat as she changed direction and pushed up his ass with lubricated fingers. She found his prostate and pulsed against it exquisitely until he let loose an animal howl of ecstasy. All his muscles clenched with contractions so powerful he might have broken her fingers.
“You bitch!” he ground between clenched teeth. “You lovely little bitch.”
CHAPTER 29 - MANDY HAS MAIL
Thursday. Mandy found news from the publisher almost always arrived on Thursday. Did they post all their rejection letters the same day every week? Did that account for the uncanny timing?
She wondered about that as she proceeded along the path snipping the spent flowers off the rose bushes and bending to dead-head the French Marigolds below them. She liked a bright display at the front of the house to welcome guests.
Max was away at sea again. If she got another rejection letter at least he wouldn’t know about it.
After the last meeting Mandy had written feverishly until she had three short pithy chapters.
Airmail package-rate postage was a killer, but she’d discovered if she confined herself to thirty pages, plus self-addressed envelope and international postal coupon, she could just sneak in at letter rate—heaps cheaper.
She bent down and peered into the box. The distinctive creamy envelope was there, much faster than usual. She caught her bottom lip under her teeth as she concentrated on opening it. Only one page again. Another rejection, no doubt.
She sighed. She’d had a lot more hope this time. The discussion at the writers’ meeting had really helped. She’d finally seen the point of conflict. Not just endless arguing about the right treatment for the patient, but the important reasons why her doctor and nurse couldn’t be together. The differences in their beliefs. The changes they would have to achieve. The compromises on both sides as each drew closer to the other.
She’d really enjoyed plotting out the ‘closing down the hospital/protest march/police/broken leg’ scenario with the wealthy devil-may-care doctor and the underpaid idealistic nurse.
She unfolded the letter. And dropped the secateurs with surprise, slightly spearing her big toe.
“We have now had a chance to read your submission and if the manuscript is complete, would appreciate receiving it for further assessment.”
She collapsed onto the garden seat and re-read the letter. Bugger the toe—it was only a bit of blood. Further assessment. They wanted to read the whole book! Somehow she needed to work that wonderful elevator scene into it. It was just so sensuous. If she changed the names and wrote a new ending, it would be dynamite. She pulled her mobile from her pocket and stabbed in the code for her mother.
“Sorreee—not here to talk to you. Leave me a message,” her mother’s voice trilled.
“Mom, it’s Mandy. Such good news. I’ve been asked to send a whole manuscript for further assessment for publication. Phone me back eh?”
Darn, she really wanted to share! She tried Romy. She’d understand, being published herself.
“Can’t talk to you just now, but leave your details and I’ll be straight back to you.”
“Romy, it’s Mandy. I’ve been asked to send the whole book. The one with Addy and Brad. Can you get back to me?”
Who else could she try?
Liz? Maybe not.
Vi? She might be home, being retired. Mandy trotted inside and looked her number up. It rang on and on. Not even an answer machine to take a message...
Ian? No, that would be a bit cheeky. He was probably carrying something heavy at the far end of the Garden Center. He didn’t work at a desk with the phone by his elbow all the time, and she didn’t know his cell number.
Meg!
“Sorry, I’m out of the building on a half day seminar, but do leave your details and I’ll return your call as soon as possible.”
She sighed and broke the connection. She wanted an actual human being to talk to. She sent them all a text for good measure, but it wasn’t the same. She’d leave a message on Meg’s home phone anyway. Meg was the group’s convener, so she should be first to hear the wonderful news.
Mandy was amazed to have the phone answered.
“Hello?” Bobbie honked.
“Who’s that?”
“Bobbie Rutherford.”
“It’s Mandy. Have I got the wrong number?”
“No, I’m staying here at Meg’s for a bit. There was a fire in my flat.” She coughed. “And I’ve had the flu.”
“Oh, Bobbie, what an awful combination!” She swung into nurse mode. “Are you resting up? Drinking plenty of fluids? Taking any cough mixture? How bad was the fire?”
“Pretty bad. The whole house is done for. Worse for the McArthurs, my landlords upstairs. But my hair got burnt. I looked a real fright.”
“You didn’t get hurt?”
“No, only my hair. Liz took me to her hairdresser and got me—um—modernized. You’ll get a shock on Saturday. Can I give Meg a message? Is it about the Christmas meeting?”
“No...” Mandy purred. “Just a piece of personal news. I’ve been asked to send a ‘full’—an entire manuscript for them to consider.”
Bobbie squawked her surprise and pleasure, and Mandy preened. How sweet it felt, at last. She wouldn’t let Max know yet—just in case. A hundred and ninety more pages and she could send it away. She exchanged further pleasantries with Bobbie and bustled into her writing room, checking her watch to see how much time she had before her afternoon shift started.
Not enough...not nearly enough...
CHAPTER 30 - TIME AT TONY’S
Liz tugged at his sleeve as though he might bolt at any moment. And Ian was still considering it. He really wasn’t looking forward to this.
“Come on,” she insisted, pulling harder as they neared the door. She towed him inside. He gazed around in despair and disbelief.
Silver walls. Pink ceiling. Purple feather boas suspended on fine nylon threads so they swirled and dipped as the air from the hair driers caught them. Peggy Lee singing ‘Fever’. And at least two of the hairdressers bopping along and snapping their fingers.
“Lizzy, my lovely!” someone yelled.
Ian flinched, and steeled himself to meet the famous Tony who Liz made such a fuss about. Six foot four of fiendishly thin hottie grinned at them. Ian assumed he was what the women called a hottie, anyway. The way Liz fawned over him, he had to be.
Wicked eyes. Huge smile. Jeans falling to bits. A strange T-shirt that stopped at waist level to reveal his belly button and a line of hair dyed a deep disturbing green. How far down did the green go?
“Tones, this is Ian, who I told you about. A really great re-style please.”
She yanked Ian’s unbuttoned shirt off his shoulders and hung it on one of the pegs by the door, adding her own jacket to the collection, too.
Tony reached across and plunged his fingers into Ian’s thick dry mop.
“Plenty to work with,” he said, dropping his hands onto Ian’s black-T-shirted shoulders and turning him so they were reflected in one of the big mirrors together. Ian found it difficult to look away—the man was beautiful… bewitching.
Christ, am I turning queer? he thought in a panic.
Liz stood behind them, watching with interest.
“If he turns out as well as Bobbie, he’ll be great,” she said.
“Bobbie?” Ian asked, momentarily distracted.
“Fire in her flat. Her hair got burnt. Best thing that could have happened. You should see her now.”
“Jeez—poor Bobbie. You should have emailed. Is she all right? Not hurt or anything?”
“Lost all her stuff, what there was of it. She’s staying with Meg. But no, not hurt, thank heavens.”
Ian sat where Tony indicated and thought about Bobbie while he watched Liz. She drew Tony away to one side and began to talk and gesticulate. What the hell were they going to do to him? But he had to admit she’d been good value for the clothes. Hopefully the hair would be okay too.
Tony returned and lifted a hank of sun-scorched fibre. “Split ends, man. No conditioner, I bet? You spend a lot of time outside?”
“Garden Center.”
“Soooo…that explains it. All this UV damage.” He ran a comb crosswise through Ian’s hair and peered down at the darker roots. “We’ve got two ways to go. I can give you some paler streaks or darken you up a bit. You’re caught in the middle right now.”
Paler streaks? Did he mean blond? Ian couldn’t imagine it and didn’t want it. “Dark,” he muttered.
“Tall, dark and handsome, eh? Never fails.”
Was he being chatted up? He sank lower into the chair, fists clenched over his groin. One of the salon assistants wrapped a large silver cape around him. Tony snapped some incomprehensible orders, and she nodded and hurried away.
Ian waited with trepidation. Off to one side, he saw Liz being shampooed, eyes closed, hair full of bubbles.
The stylist returned with pungent bowls of gunk and proceeded to part his hair into sections, painting each
tenderly with her disgusting concoctions, and separating them with shiny silver squares which overlapped like futuristic armor. Ian was way past embarrassment now. Total humiliation was more accurate. He looked like a metallic porcupine and smelled like a chemical factory.
He accepted a cup of tea and tried for a re-run of the shipwreck scene, but today Liz refused to co-operate. Instead, Tony leered at him, pierced nipples glinting in a mat of dark green chest hair, beckoning him below decks. Ian wasn’t going there!
At last a timer beeped, and he twitched out of his brooding reverie. Tony strode over and inspected various pieces of his hair. “Estelle,” he called.
Estelle was blonde. In places. She was also about sixteen, as far as Ian could estimate. She led him across to one of the backward-facing sinks and positioned him to her satisfaction. Bernie the barber didn’t do that.
Bernie also didn’t smell like vanilla milkshake and hang a very pretty pair of breasts in his customers’ faces. Estelle leaned all over him as she shampooed and re-shampooed and conditioned his hair, and then gave his scalp a deep and very pleasurable massage.
Her low cut top was baby blue. Her even lower cut lacy bra was violet, edged with black. As she rubbed energetically, her barely encased breasts jiggled and bounced, sending wafts of perfume past his nose. Through his not quite closed eyes, Ian soaked up every shuddering second, and nudged Big Willy into a more comfortable position, grateful now for the all-concealing silver waterproof shroud.
“Ready to become the real you?” Tony asked.
Ian felt it was definitely not the real him in the mirror yet. His hair had turned menacing midnight shades.
“Onwards and upwards?” he hazarded.
Tony sensed his concern. “Yeah—don’t worry about it looking so dark. The damaged stuff at the ends has really soaked up the color.”
“I look like an Elvis impersonator.”
Tony grinned, and attacked with speed. “Not for long.” He worked with such assurance Ian registered very little—except that he’d have no hair left if the scissors didn’t stop very soon.