Captain Charming (Tales of 1001 Flights)

by Alice May Ball

  Then I surprise myself with a climax that pretty much takes all my energy out of me. He’s breathing heavily, as I tell begin to cry out and scream the way I did with him.

  It’s not the same, of course. This is good, really good, but it’s not quite the way it was when he pinned me down, held me by my hips, and plowed into me with the desperation of a man who’s got something to prove.

  I sigh and breathe out, surprised we’re still on the phone. “Oh, wow,” I whisper. “Look… I’m really tired. It’s time for me to go to sleep, okay? I’ll talk to you… soon.”

  “Two days. I’ll be back, then,” he says.

  “Okay.”

  “Goodnight, beautiful,” Jagger says, clicking off.

  In the silence of this bedroom, I let myself relax again, ready to drift off to sleep.

  My last few thoughts before falling asleep involve Jagger’s story.

  I can’t help but wonder if the story he told wasn’t really a love story after all…

  EIGHT

  S SOON AS I end the call with Alexa, I lean back into my pillows, bearing the full weight of my body down. I should probably go to the bathroom, shower off.

  I’m a sticky mess, listening to Alexa and stroking my cock along to the sounds of her.

  She’s amazing. A real knockout. She fascinates me in a way I can’t describe.

  But enough of that. I’ve already cum, surely I don’t need to dwell on her any longer?

  It’s not like me to do this.

  I get up, reach for the tissues kindly provided by the hotel presumably for this very purpose, and I wipe off on the way to the bathroom.

  Tossing the bunched up tissues, I catch my face in the mirror.

  Still looking great. Well, that’s a relief.

  “Why go through all this trouble?” my image in the mirror seems to say.

  I blink and wonder what the fuck is really going on right now. Did my mirror image just speak to me?

  Then I realize I am actually talking to myself, and immediately start feeling like a moron.

  All this trouble? All I did was tell a pretty girl a silly story. I was posturing, admittedly, about how much I love telling stories — never thought of that before, but I enjoyed it enough that I don’t mind continuing.

  Still, it’s a lot of mental and creative energy expended on a girl I slept with once.

  And worse, it’s based on a true story, too. At least, some portions were true. Barcelona was true. And there was a cafe, too.

  Oh yeah, the half dozen orgasms part was real, as well.

  But I can’t even remember the woman’s name, and I don’t even really feel any particular desire to try and find out.

  Yet, Alexa, I want to find out everything about her. I want to goddamn go spelunking with every detail about her, what makes her tick. What is it that makes her so interesting.

  And trust me, she is very fucking interesting.

  “Once I bang her again, things will stabilize,” I muse to my mirror image. “I’ll be over her.”

  He doesn’t look convinced, trust me on this.

  “What?” I ask. “You don’t think I can make myself focus on the things that matter most, after I cum?”

  This is a somewhat contradictory line of thinking, as I have just cum and yet I’m still thinking about her.

  “Challenge me, I dare you,” I tell the skeptical mirror image. “All little games have an end. Once I sleep with Alexa again, I’ll start thinking straight. That’s a goddamn promise, okay?”

  Nope, all I’m doing is frowning to myself.

  There’s a knock on the cockpit door. Will stands up and gets it. “Yeah?” he asks. I’m glancing in the reflection from the cockpit display to see Serena pop her head in.

  “Miss Karina would like to speak to the Captain, privately,” she says. She’s not insinuating anything with her voice, unlike the way that she usually does, but I can already pick up on the suggestion.

  Will nods and shuts the door as Serena leaves. “Sounds like it’s time to glad-hand some passengers. Want me to do it instead?”

  Oh yeah, Will would love to get some alone time with Miss Karina.

  “That’s all fine, man,” I tell him, placing my hand on his shoulder. “Why don’t you take over for the rest of the flight? I’m more than happy to let go of control once in a while, believe me.”

  “As if,” Will smirks. “You’d die before you were giving control over to anyone.”

  “Just ’cause you’re flying this plane doesn’t make you the captain,” I shrug and tell him. “You got that much right. I’ve got to, as you said, glad-hand some passengers.”

  “The rest of the flight?” Will raises an eyebrow. “Is she going to want that much gladhanding from you?”

  “Mind your own goddamn business, Will,” I laugh at him, exiting the cockpit and entering the main cabin area. We’re flying one of the nicer jets in the corporate fleet, which means there are several rooms, not just a single long cabin.

  It’s like a smaller version of goddamn Air Force One. I don’t even know how Miss Karina has this sort of money.

  “Lead the way,” I gesture to Serena, just to amuse myself by putting her to work.

  “She might ask for me too,” she grins.

  “Let’s hope so,” I say.

  Serena raises an eyebrow, but says nothing.

  Whenever we fly with Miss Karina, we have to modify the second room in the plane into a special luggage area for her many cases and trunks of clothes. She likes to have her room, which normally just has a couchette, decorated as a dressing room, too.

  Which explains why when I enter her cabin, she’s barely dressed.

  Fuck’s sake. I know exactly where this is going.

  “Oh, thank you, Captain,” she says, seeing I’m here. She has her back to me, her dark hair flowing down. Oh yeah, and her back is bare — her dress is unzipped.

  I don’t offer to zip it up for her. She might want it to stay that way.

  “Flying makes me trés nervous,” she says, speaking faster than normal. “Yet it remains a necessity that I do it. For the world remains a large place.”

  “Good thing you’ve got private jets,” I point out.

  “Yes, yes. You’re very right. And a private doctor, to soothe my nerves. That would be wonderful. But apparently I don’t have one,” she says, tittering away in a small laugh that I’ve never heard from her. “So I suppose it must fall upon you to find some way to soothe me… Captain.”

  I reposition my pilot’s cap. “Hmm. Serena might have some appropriate sedatives.”

  “Not quite what I was thinking,” she demurs.

  “The title in front of my name is Captain, not Doctor, Miss Karina. I’m of little use to you when it comes to soothing any of your nerves. Especially your nerves.”

  She sizes me up, surprised by my resistance. “Very well, perhaps what my nerves need is not a soothing, but a jolt. Can you manage that? Shock me into not being afraid of flying anymore.”

  “That goes against airline regulations, I’m afraid,” I shrug.

  “Oh, fuck airline regulations, this is a private jet, I am the airline!”

  I make a face and shake my head. “Afraid not. I am the Captain, remember. Got to play by my rules.”

  My choice of words clearly fail me, because now she’s sitting up excitedly again, facing me at an angle. Playing. Rules. Goddamn it, Jagger.

  “Now, I’m sorry,” I add. “Without being blunt, I know what you’re getting at, Miss Karina. I’m the wrong man for you. Could call in Will, though. He’s very eager.”

  “I don’t want eager. I want strong. I want you.”

  If she had asked me even a day ago, I wouldn’t have reacted like this.

  “Why do you have to insist on being so… stubborn?” my passenger asks. “I know you. I know of your reputation. I know about the others who brag about having been taken by you during a flight. I even know some of the men whose wives you’ve fucked, who secret
ly applaud and bear you no jealousy at all — just envy that you’re a real man.”

  “You make me sound like a goddamn porn star,” I say.

  “That’s what I want. A porn star in a pilot’s uniform. Your reputation, like I said, precedes you.”

  “That reputation is just that, a reputation,” I reject. “If you need anything, I’ll be back in the cockpit.”

  “No!” Karina says. “I want to be in your cockpit.”

  I laugh. “No can do. They’d take my license away.”

  Moving away, I ignore her protests to slide the door open, then shut. Serena sees me and glances at her watch. “That didn’t take long,” she says.

  “There was nothing for anything to take long,” I explain.

  “That pussy must have had a hell of a whip,” she tries to joke, but I’m already walking past her.

  I can feel the eyes of everyone on the flight, from the other stewardesses to Karina’s entourage, watch me awkwardly.

  Back in the cockpit, I exhale. Will’s surprised to see me back.

  “Give it back,” I tell my co-pilot as I slide into my seat. “I’ve just got a great idea to shave half an hour off our flight time.”

  “This is the Captain speaking,” I speak into the in-flight intercom. “Just informing everyone to strap in, because we’re about to hit some turbulence.”

  Will’s mouth has dropped so low I’m afraid I’m going to have to remove it from the floor. “Turbulence?” he mouths.

  I glance ahead, let him see out the window.

  Trust me, I’m not very pleased with myself either. Perfection in a flight is all about avoiding scenes like this. A great pilot doesn’t need to rush a flight, he just needs to nudge everything in the right direction, so that physics takes over for the better.

  Turbulence is carelessness on my part. Or irritation. I’m still processing this, but a part of me acknowledges the possibility of all this being very much by design.

  I sure hope Miss Karina is strapped in.

  “What the hell, Jagger,” Will finally murmurs. “This is the first time I’ve ever seen you fly into storm clouds. This is… historic.”

  “It’s going to save us half an hour,” I tell him.

  “It’s also going to bounce one or two careless passengers of ours against the ceiling and floor, especially if you start flying some fancy Navy test pilot maneuvers to deal with the turbulence,” he tells me.

  “I can do that,” I say. “Plus, serves ’em right for not wearing their seat belts when the seat belt sign’s on.”

  “You okay, Jagger?” Will asks.

  “Captain.”

  “I’m sorry. Are you okay, Captain?”

  “Perfectly fine. Put your headset right back on, I want a minute-to-minute situation report from air traffic control, they’ll be sending instructions to get us around the turbulence,” I order Will.

  He does as he’s told, which is nice for a change, because I really don’t want to hear him keep arguing with me. He relays the instructions given to me from the ATC, but I immediately dismiss all of them. “Waste fuel by circling around? We’ll have to queue up for a spot in the airport with ten big commercial liners, that’s never going to happen.”

  “Jag—Captain,” Will says, looking at me. “I don’t see any other better solution than that. Surely it’s not really that big of a deal.”

  “I’m a better pilot than that, it is a big deal. To me.”

  Ignoring the tower, I ease the plane down and begin to check the flight instruments so I can manually calculate the sort of numbers I need if I compensate for the acceleration by taking a longer final approach.

  Call this a particularly rash flying style, but it works. We’re still in the storm, but we’re out of range for any lightning, which would have been the only actual danger to the plane. Now I’m just dealing with everyone presumably panicking at the way I’ve been flying this thing.

  The cockpit phone rings and I can already tell that it’s Serena hoping someone will explain what the fuck it is I’m doing.

  Well, that’s going to be Will’s job too.

  Goddamn, I’m a great pilot. Everyone’s busy cursing me right now, but I’m handling a private plane this size as if it’s a fighter jet, weaving around the clouds, reducing fuel waste as best I can, while getting us closer and aligned to the destination airport.

  “Hard part’s over,” I tell Will, who’s clenching his teeth still, even as he’s helping me out with flying.

  It’s only five minutes later that we plummet out of the storm, ending our rocky flight through turbulence, and I begin to gracefully arch the plane for our final approach.

  Then, having landed the plane with professional aplomb, I sit back in my captain’s seat, letting Will wordlessly strap out and pack his things.

  Someone’s knocking on the cockpit door furiously. Will moves towards it but I take it instead, unsurprised to see Miss Karina there.

  “You blew it, McCann,” she says, looking angry. “This was your attempt at some petty revenge?”

  “No, this was me saving everyone’s life and shaving thirty minutes off your precious schedule,” I respond.

  “You’re never going to fly for me again. I told you I was nervous about flying! This isn’t the first time you’ve flown for me, so why this absolutely terrible flight?”

  “Look, I can’t make storm clouds just appear or disappear. I’m a pilot, not a god.”

  She glares at me. “Then next time you can just avoid the fucking storm clouds.”

  “Like hell I can,” I respond quietly.

  “You’re fired. You’ll never fly for me again.”

  I’m not surprised by her reaction, but I’m angry enough that it got to this. “Oh, just fuck off already. What’s not to like about being fired by you? At least I’ll get to focus on clients who don’t want me to soothe their nerves.”

  Karina starts shouting at me in French, but members of her entourage come over to calm her down, pulling her away from me.

  Which is just as well, because I was sure for a split second there that she was going to lash out and slap me. Hard.

  “She’s not the only bitch with the money for a private plane, for fuck’s sake,” I grunt, as I watch everyone else deplane.

  Still, it’s only when I step foot on the tarmac that I begin to recognize what this is. It’s not quite burnout. It’s something worse. A total lapse of judgment, entirely because I’ve been distracted, letting myself be affected by things that wouldn’t have done it to me normally.

  I just need to get to Alexa, fuck her senseless, and get this right out of my system.

  Goddamn.

  NINE

  AGGER!” I say, surprised to hear his voice so soon. “Thought you weren’t going to be done for a while longer.”