by Alyse Zaftig
“We can make it work,” I said, surrendering.
Dream Emilio kissed me just as hard as he had when we were leaving Quito. His hard, heavy body came on top of mine, pressing me into the bed.
His smell was intoxicating. It was the mix of masculine musk and dark spice that drove me wild.
And just like that, I realized that I wasn’t dreaming.
I pushed him away. He just rolled to my other side on the bed, his eyes on my face.
“You’re real!”
“Yes, very real.” He put his arm around my waist, drawing me close and wrapping himself around me. “Very real.”
“Being away from you was hell.” He buried his face in my shoulder.
My hand moved of its own volition to stroke his soft hair.
“I missed you.” I was already so honest with him when I had thought that he was a figment of my imagination that it didn’t feel like too much. In for a penny, in for a pound.
“I felt like my heart was empty,” he told me. “But I meant what I said. Come back to Ecuador with me and we’ll find a way for us to be together.”
I desperately wanted what he was offering. With him in my bed, it was difficult to remember why we shouldn’t be together. I was still half-convinced that this was a very strange dream.
“I’ll come with you,” I told him.
His tongue was suddenly in my mouth, my hands over my head, my wrists in his hands.
“I promise that I will try to make you happy every day of my life,” he said. “And there’s a piece of jewelry that you need to wear from now until you die.”
Somehow he was sliding the ring onto my ring finger. I knew that it had been in his hand earlier, but how had he kept hold of it while we were kissing?
I had no clue, but I knew that I would keep the ring this time around.
I’d hurt myself twice as much as I’d hurt him when I sent the ring back.
Going with him to Ecuador was definitely the right thing to do.
Our love would last forever, no matter what we had to do to keep it alive.
Possessive
Naelle
“We’re going back now.”
“Now?” I blinked at him. “But I haven’t packed. I’m in my pajamas.”
“I don’t care.” He looked me over. “You’re fine.”
“I’m a total mess. You have to let me clean up.”
“No. I’m not going to waste a single moment of our time. We’re going back to Ecuador now.”
He pulled me off of the bed, blanket and all.
“It’s cold outside,” he explained. “I have to keep you and the baby safe.”
“Are you going to carry me all the way to Ecuador?” His grip on my body was extremely firm.
“No. My driver will take us to the nearest airport. We’re flying home.”
Outside, there was a black SUV. He put me into the middle seat before climbing in after me and grabbing my hand.
Before, when we held hands, it was a sign of intimacy.
Now it felt like a mark of possession, especially when his thumb stroked my ring.
The drive was quiet. When we got out, we were at an extremely tiny airport with a single runway.
“I didn’t even know that they had an airport here.”
“There are small airports everywhere.”
We got out of the car and walked into the hangar.
It was a sharp contrast with the urban private hangars that we’d been in before. There were small covered planes.
“What are those?”
He wrinkled his nose. “Crop dusters.”
It made sense that the airport mostly dealt with crop dusters, especially since we were in America’s dairyland.
We went up the steps into the jet. But something was different. The seats were gone.
“Where are your seats?”
“I stowed them. We’re sitting on the couch.”
“Couch?” Did he have a secret lounge somewhere?
When we walked to the back of the jet, I saw what he meant. There was a small sideways couch that had two seat belts there.
“Buckle up.”
He let go of my hand for the first time since we’d left the cabin.
I buckled myself up. He slung an arm around my shoulders. It was as if he thought that I would disappear if he wasn’t touching me.
“You can let go,” I teased. “You have me on your jet. It’s not like I’m going to go running off.”
“I’m not taking any chances.” He leaned down and nuzzled my neck. “I’d rather keep you right here with me.”
I kissed the top of his head. He smelled insanely great. I made a mental note to ask what kind of shampoo he used. It made me want to jump on top of him.
“Ready,” he called loudly.
The steps were pulled up. I felt embarrassed to have the crew see our intimacy on the back couch, but they must’ve had orders to basically ignore us, because the pilots just started taxiing down the single runway and getting us into the air.
“Can we get all the way to Ecuador in this jet?”
His arm tightened around me.
“We’re going to stop for fuel in Miami.”
“Okay,” I said, and then I yawned. I rested my cheek on his head, which was still resting on my shoulder.
And I slept more deeply than I had since we were separated.
Miami
Naelle
I woke up when the plane touched down in Miami. I looked out the window and saw the heat haze outside.
Yawning, I covered my mouth with my hand.
“Stay here while we fill out some customs forms, okay? I have your passport.”
I was a little confused. “Why do you have my passport?”
He shifted his weight between his feet. I realized that I was a rumpled, sleepy mess, while he looked perfect and immaculate.
“I grabbed it when we were getting your things out of the cabin.”
“But I didn’t agree until I woke up.”
He had a guilty expression, as if I’d just caught him with his hand in the cookie jar.
“It’s a good thing that I agreed to come along with you, isn’t it?” I smiled. “I know you love me.”
He kissed the top of my head. I could see the tension dissipating.
“Stay here. We’ll be on our way to Ecuador soon.”
I unbuckled my seatbelt and stretched. I loved the jet. It was luxurious and fun, but being stuck in one seat for several hours never would be fun. My face felt all oily and gross, and I needed to wipe it with water.
I had no idea where Emilio had gone. I knew that he had told me to stay in the plane, but I needed to use a real restroom, not the little one that was on the jet.
I walked down the steps. Emilio was still nowhere to be found. I shrugged and headed into the airport.
As soon as I stepped in the door, I saw my dad.
“Dad? What are you doing here?”
“We saw the flight plans. We knew that he had to stop for fuel somewhere, and as soon as we knew that he was heading for Miami, we knew that you would be here.”
“What are you talking about? I’m going back to Ecuador with him.”
“No, you’re not. I was a fool to let you go there the first time. You’re staying right here in the United States.”
“Dad, I’m an adult. You can’t stop me from leaving the United States if I want to go.”
“You’ve been brainwashed. You don’t really want to go.”
“Dad, I…”
I stopped when he produced a set of handcuffs and cuffed my hands behind my back as if I were a criminal and not his daughter.
“Dad! What are you doing?”
“Keeping my daughter safe.”
“Dad, unlock these cuffs right now.”
“No.” He pulled me towards a set of doors. “We have to hurry. He’ll come back any moment.”
I pulled back with all of my bodyweight, but my dad wasn’t having any of it. He pulled me forward l
ike I was 6 and didn’t want to go to soccer practice because I got too dirty.
“Stop it!”
“I’m not going to let him kidnap you. We’ll put you in therapy. It’ll be fine.”
“Dad, stop.” I pulled on my cuffs.
“I’m sorry about this, sweetheart.” And then he took a thick silver pen out of his pocket and jabbed me with the pointy end.
It wasn’t a pen at all. It was some kind of tranquilizer, because all of a sudden I was falling into my father’s arms.
I felt him dragging me through the doors that he’d indicated earlier.
Then I didn’t feel anything.
Therapy Session
Naelle
TWO DAYS LATER
“Dad, for the thousandth time, I’m not brainwashed.” I snorted. “As if he could!”
“Kid, if I thought that you genuinely wanted to be with that thug, I’d institutionalize you. Nobody would want to run away with Emilio. Don’t you know what he’s done?”
I was quiet. We’d had this same conversation over and over. We were beating a dead horse at this point.
“I knew what he’s done,” I told him. “And I want to be with him anyway.”
“And that’s why we have an appointment with a therapist.”
“Fine.”
I looked out the window. We were pulling into a parking lot in a nondescript set of office buildings in a part of town that I’d never been in before. I’d never gone to therapy before.
“We’re here.”
I got out of the car. At least my dad had removed the handcuffs before I woke up inside of a different plane.
Unlike Emilio’s jet, the military jet had been sparse. It was functional, but it wasn’t very pretty.
I hadn’t spoken to my father the entire time that we flew back to DC. He knew how I felt about it. I knew how he felt about it. I knew that he was trying to do the best thing for me, but I also couldn’t believe that my dad had forced me to come home when I’d clearly left of my own volition. Yes, he believed that I had somehow been brainwashed, but I didn’t understand how he thought I’d been indoctrinated. It wasn’t as if Emilio had hypnotized me or anything.
My phone and laptop were on Emilio’s jet. I hoped that he didn’t think that I’d just bailed on him, but I was worried that he did. He told me not to leave the plane, but how was I supposed to know that my dad was lurking and waiting to make me come home?
I closed the car door and followed my dad into the therapist’s office, my arms crossed and a scowl on my face.
I felt like a sulky teenager.
My dad opened the office door for me. It was part of his code.
I just shook my head at him. He believed that women should be honored and protected. I always thought it was a good thing, but it was really a two-edged sword.
I went inside of the therapist’s office.
My dad gave me a half hug.
“I’ll be back in an hour to pick you up, peanut.”
I was too old for him to call me peanut. He knew that I was an adult now. I still smiled. Unlike the bratty teenager I used to be, I cherished my father’s affection.
Unfortunately, his paternal instincts had stolen me away from Emilio. I sighed. I’d had a knee jerk reaction, and I’d repented at leisure. I hadn’t given Emilio a chance to talk to me about his real identity. Yes, he definitely should’ve told me that he was one of the world’s most notorious drug lords, but he must have understood how I’d react.
I pushed open the door. Someone was sitting on a chair in the corner of the room.
“Hello.”
I froze like a deer seeing headlights as I stared at my therapist.
“Emilio?”
Getting into the Car
Naelle
“We don’t have a lot of time.”
“What are you doing here?”
“I promise, we’ll talk in the boat. But we have to go now.”
“Boat?”
“Let’s go out the back door.”
I had no clue what was going on, but I followed Emilio to a door that wasn’t the same that I’d come in.
I felt a little bad about ditching my dad. He really did want the best for me.
But I’d chosen Emilio. I knew that it wasn’t an easy choice, but I loved him.
He’d promised me that we’d find a way. I just needed to trust him.
Outside, there was a simple black Mercedes SUV.
“Is this what we’re taking?” Emilio always had the finest things.
“It’s reliable and unremarkable. Get in.”
I hesitated for a half second right outside of the car.
Could I really do this? I knew that I was turning my back on everything that I was, everything that I had been before.
Emilio turned to look at me. Something inside of me melted.
Yes.
I got into the car.
Soon, we were scrupulously observing the speed limit. We didn’t want to get any attention, while we went straight for the docks.
Car Loving
Emilio
I could see Naelle worrying, so I pulled her into my lap.
I put my hands in her hair and brought her mouth to mine.
She resisted a little bit, pulling back a half inch.
“Your driver can see us,” she hissed.
I quickly hit a button to put up the partition as I pulled her closer.
“Now he can’t,” I murmured, touching our noses together.
I arranged her in my lap so that her thighs were on either side of me. I could feel her warm, soft body pressed against mine, and it was making me crazy.
“I missed you,” I told her.
“I missed you, too,” she whispered before she came in for a kiss.
Reconnecting after we’d been separated felt like coming home.
Later on, I had no clue how I’d gotten inside of her, but her panties were pushed aside while she rocked on top of me, and I knew in that moment that my home would be wherever this wonderful woman went.
I could feel my muscles tensing. I gritted my teeth to keep myself from filling her too early, like a teenager.
Then I felt her clench her inner muscles and all of my control went straight out the door.
My eyes rolled back in my head at the pleasure. I pumped and pumped inside of her soft body, and I could feel her moving on top of me.
I muffled my cries by burying my face in her breasts, but I was sure that our driver knew what we were doing back there.
“I needed you. I need you,” I whispered into her ear.
“I need you, too.”
She was limp on top of me. I held her in my arms and thanked whatever deity was watching that she was with me again.
Too soon, the car rolled to a stop.
“We have to go.”
Potomac
Naelle
The Potomac was smelly and a gross color, but it was easily navigable.
“Put this on.”
I looked at the life vest that he’d tossed at me.
I did the straps and sat on a bench in the small boat built for speed, not for comfort. It wasn’t particularly pleasant, and I felt a bit nauseous.
“How long are we going to be on this boat?”
“Until we can get to the real one. It’s anchored in international waters.”
“Why?”
“Because your father will have a harder time stealing you there.”
I shut up.
I tried to enjoy the ride, but it was bumpy to go at the speed that we were going. I’d never had a problem with seasickness before, but the combination of being in my first trimester and the rough waves made me want to empty my stomach.
“We’ll be at the real boat in half an hour. If you need to, lean over the side of the boat. I’ll keep you safe.”
Just like that, my nausea let up a bit.
We continued speeding along for a half hour. I was expecting my dad to zoom down on us in a helicopter, b
ut nothing was in the sky — not even a single commercial plane.
Finally, we were pulling alongside a large boat, a yacht I’d say.
There was a metal ladder.
“Ladies first.”
Even though Emilio might be checking out my butt from this angle, I also knew that he’d catch me if the boat moved and I fell. I might end up injuring both of us, but at least he’d break my fall.
I made it to the top without incident, and the driver and Emilio scrambled up behind me.
“What about the speedboat?”
“Someone else will take care of it. Our first priority is disappearing.”
Emilio put his arm around me and guided me into the warm inside portion of the boat.
“You’ll be safer in here.”
Explanation
Emilio
I was relieved that Naelle was finally here, in international waters. We were still off the coast of the United States, but they’d have a harder time taking us in while we flew an Ecuadorian flag.
“Come into my quarters.”
Naelle looked at the slender door of my bedroom. She looked doubtfully at it.
“Those are your quarters? It looks like a broom closet.”
I smiled a little bit.
“You’ll see.”
She stepped through. I went in after her. She spun slowly.
“Like it?”
“It’s like a tiny house or something. Just very pretty and compact.”
“Functional,” I said.
She sat on my bed and held out her arms like she wanted a hug. I sat next to her and pulled her into my lap. She didn’t need to get naked right now. She needed to be reassured that she’d made the right choice.
“Tell me about your empire,” she murmured, her head resting against my shoulder while I held her soft body in my arms.
It was time for me to come clean.