by L. B. Dunbar
“Don’t ever leave me, Mouse,” he muttered, his voice lazy and satisfied. The comment gave me thought—ten months remaining might not be enough time.
27
Day 67 – Tack
I woke with her under me, shocked that we hadn’t shifted in our sleep. She amazed me. I didn’t feel her forgiveness, but I felt her letting me in. Slowly. Carefully. Deeply. I was getting under her skin as much as she was getting beneath mine.
“Good morning,” she whispered, her voice husky with sleep.
“Good morning,” I sighed, nibbling at her neck. I didn’t typically spend the full night with a woman, but I’d spent many with Juliet. I liked knowing she was next to me. I’d stopped thinking she was a dream and started accepting her as my reality. We had so much to do, so much to learn, but we were taking steps in the right direction.
“What’s that sound?” she said. I hadn’t heard anything and I chuckled.
“I think it’s my stomach,” I muttered into her sleep-warm skin. “I’m hungry.” I was starving, but more so, I was famished for her. I wanted second helpings of everything. Moments like this. Days spent together. Nights taking things further. I couldn’t say how far we’d get, but we had months to work things out. Neither of us was going anywhere soon, and there was a certain comfort in that thought.
“It sounds like something’s gurgling. Like a fizzing noise.”
I leaned up on my elbow and a finger traced down the middle of her body, between the valley of her breasts, the flatland of her belly and leading to the bush at the top of her legs. Her hand stopped my journey.
“Tack.” I looked down at her. “I’m serious.”
One tent flap was snapping in the wind. We’d fallen asleep with the tent wide open, and surprisingly, we hadn’t had any visitors. Originally, I had no intention of sharing my things with the wildlife, but how different I felt after two months. I stood to close the flap, assuming it was the noise she heard, when I saw a thin wave of water rush up to the fire circle. Watching the water recede, I noticed the tide had come much closer to the dwelling. More importantly, the waves had begun to crest and crash in a more riotous motion against the beach. The sky was gray—solid gray—which is something we hadn’t seen. Most rain clouds filled and passed easily over the island with blue skies leading the path and trailing behind. This was different. This was a tropical storm.
“Shit,” I hissed, turning back to her, still spread naked over my mattress. I wanted nothing more than to open her and take my time to explore again, but we had more pressing matters. “I think a storm is coming. A big one. Could you help me tie stuff down?”
She sat up and an arm crossed her chest as if that would cover her. I stalked back to the bed.
“Let’s hope it’s nothing, but it might be better to pull up my camp and move some things to your place.”
Her eyes opened wide and she nodded. Then she scrambled off the bed and began dressing. I didn’t want to panic her, but the more I listened to the sound of the waves and the increase in the wind, the more the change in weather hinted at something stronger than a storm. We worked diligently. She collected most of my loose items: pots and pans, coffee pot, the hammock, and placed them in one of my four trunks. While my tent was just inside the jungle edge, the trunks were further back for safe keeping. One stored food. Another was my clothing. Two were full of camp supplies. I dismantled the tent as best I could and dumped it in a relatively empty trunk.
“I think it might be best if I try to tie these to a tree or two.” The way the water was climbing the beach, I didn’t know how far it would reach, but I didn’t need my things floating out to sea. I rolled my sleeping bag and tucked it in a backpack along with a random assortment of clothing and the copy of The Little Prince. I threw in a propane tank, matches, and a lantern. I’d once had to fill out a survival guide in high school. Rank the items you’d need to survive. I couldn’t think as a kid, but looking up at Juliet, a strange thought occurred. I decided there wasn’t anything else I’d need but her.
She watched as I tied a fisherman’s knot on the handle of each trunk. Another skill I hadn’t used in a while, despite my previous interest in tying willing women to beds. I hadn’t thought of that possibility, those women, for months, and I looked up again to find Juliet staring at me. Panic set in her eyes, panic I recognized. She was frightened, but I’d do anything to assure her we were safe. My own heart raced, but I swallowed down my fear. I finished quickly and approached her.
“I won’t let anything happen to you,” I said before kissing her forehead. She nodded against my lips. Without words, I didn’t know if she fully trusted me, but I was all she had at the moment, and we were about to face something we hadn’t had to deal with yet: nature and its wrath.
+ +
Inside her tree house, I used binoculars to try to see the ocean. I didn’t have a view of my beach and had no idea how my things were fairing. Besides, the rain was coming sideways again, appearing almost like a white sheet, making visibility impossible.
“The waves are increasing,” I stated. I didn’t like the sound of the wind rustling the trees. The whistling sound was increasing, an extreme sort of white noise, that was grating on my nerves. The subtle crack and snap of smaller limbs around us alerted us to the strength of the gusts. I wasn’t convinced we were safe in her tree house. Water couldn’t get us here, so I didn’t worry as much about flooding, but if the gale force picked up a few levels, we’d be blown out like the leaves.
“I think we should seek higher ground. Maybe sturdier shelter.” I spun to face her. She’d been sitting on the edge of her bed, chewing a nail, which I hadn’t seen her do before. Her violet eyes were too wide and her knee jiggled.
I called her name and her attention snapped up to me. “I think we need to find that cave.”
She nodded but she hadn’t moved. A gust of wind shook the tree limbs over the low roof over our heads and she understood. The roof creaked, a strange strain on the boards, as if something were tugging at them to be free. We couldn’t stay where we were.
“Pack some clothes. Maybe your blanket. I have my sleeping bag.” I scanned her room. “Collect your notes.” I knew she’d been working hard to compose her thoughts each day on the island and I didn’t want her to lose all that work. She digested her feelings much better than me. I’d only worked up to three or four sentences a day in my journaling, while she had filled pages.
She collected her notebooks in a satchel bag and then filled a backpack with her blanket and a few clothes. I filled a second backpack with water bottles and any foods I thought we could survive on for a few days. A tropical storm could last twenty-four hours or longer. On an island as small as ours, I could only hope the clouds would pass quickly but with nothing but the sea around us, the weather could decide to stay and play, spiraling around us instead of moving onward.
The second we opened her door and struggled to lift the hatch for her ladder we were in for a battle. The stairs floated through the harsh air.
“I’ll go first so we’ll climb down together. I know the ropes can’t really hold us both, but I don’t want to lose you. We’ll just work as fast as we can.” She was so lightweight, I feared she’d blow away. “You’ll have to trust me.” Her wide eyes flashed to mine, but her focus was missing. Again, I had that sense that she didn’t have faith in me, but she had to believe I would do what I could to keep us safe.
I stepped down a few rungs and then reached for her. “Trust me.” I sought her eyes to assure her. She turned her body so her back was to me and filled in the limited space above me. My hand came to her hip to guide her descent, reinforcing that I was here for her. As the ladder resisted, attempting to fly sideways, our climb strained the rope linking, but I didn’t want to lose a hold on her. The descent seemed slow and we struggled with each rung as the ladder flung us nearly sideways. I didn’t dare release my hold on her, moving my fingers to her belt. Finally, we hit the ground.
“If we stay
low, and rush through the brush, it might protect us a little.” I didn’t intend for us to crawl, but we had to stay hunched over, protecting our heads from the slapping tree limbs and using them to shield us from the wind. The rain pelted just as fierce, stinging as we slipped over the muddy earth. The upward climb was even more of a struggle than I expected, and at times I felt like I was dragging Juliet. She didn’t complain, but she tugged at me, resisting me. The climb grew steeper. Every moment I thought we were closer, we weren’t. I worried I miscalculated where we found the cave.
“I don’t know where it is,” I yelled, my words carried off in the gusty air. If she heard me, she didn’t answer, just clutched my hand, as if all her trust laid in that connection.
We continued on, with the wind beating our backs and twigs smacking our body. At one point, Juliet released me, and I spun, afraid she wouldn’t still be behind me. With her eyes closed, her hands cupped her forehead. She stepped back, and I feared she’d slide down the steep slope. I reached for the strap of her satchel and pulled her forward.
“What happened?” I shouted.
“My head.” Releasing her hands, a gash across her forehead was all I needed to know. I reached out as if I would pick her up, but she pushed me away. “You can’t carry me. Keep going.”
Her voice filtered through the howling gale, the sound haunting. I pushed her before me and forced her forward with me at her back. If she passed out, at least I could catch her.
Eventually, we broke through the bushes, reaching the flat landing before the cave. As Juliet stepped first, the wind took her sideways. My heart left my body as I envisioned her thrown from the cliff ledge, and I reached for the strap of her bag again. Tugging her down to the moss-covered rocks, we crawled to the cave entrance. I hadn’t given a thought to animals or other critters finding shelter from the weather within the hollow. They would have to share the space because I wasn’t going back down the mountain.
We burst through the entrance and Juliet immediately sat with her back to the rock wall. I passed her, scrambling to stand, as I searched our surroundings as best I could in the dim light. My knees gave way and I began searching for the propane lantern. I couldn’t let it run all night, but we needed to see the inside of the cave and warm up a little bit. Plus, I wanted to inspect Juliet’s forehead. We hadn’t thought to bring a first-aid kit.
“Mouse,” I hollered. The tapping of her crawling behind me told me she followed my command. Shaky fingers struck a match and lit the wick of the propane tank. The cave illuminated, and to my relief, nothing else hid within. The cavern’s walls were the purest black I’d ever seen, slick with a sheen, but brilliant and dry.
“Here.” I walked on my knees and opened my sleeping bag, spreading it wide against the back wall. I directed Juliet to follow. She hadn’t made a sound and I worried she’d gone into shock or had a concussion. “Let me look, Mouse.” She shivered before me, and I noticed her clothing was soaked, as was mine. I didn’t know what was worse—the sting of the rain or the slap of the wind.
“Let me see your head.” Tenderly I caressed over the cut, and she flinched. I reached for my shirt, tugged it over my head and dabbed at the blood. The tree raked over her skin, leaving a gash that didn’t look deep but was long. She still hadn’t made a noise, and her silence frightened me.
Inside the cave, the haunting howl dissipated. Tucked back into a corner, we were protected from the elements. Neither the wind nor the rain could reach us here or so I hoped. Juliet continued to shiver next to me. We were facing a long night trying to survive a hurricane. With no weather warning system, no cell phone, or emergency radio, we had not been prepared, and my anger grew with the thought, especially when I envisioned Juliet blowing off that ledge. Garvey had told me a storm was coming, but this wasn’t what I expected. And there was nothing he could do to help me. Juliet and I had to figure it out, together.
“We need to get out of these wet clothes.” I’d already removed my shirt and began taking off my shorts. Juliet hadn’t moved. “Mouse, take off your wet things.”
She didn’t look up, her body trembling.
“Mouse?” I questioned, reaching for her shirt and slowly unbuttoning it. Her eyes had lost their focus and stared into emptiness, definitely shock of some type. “I need to warm you up.” Though it had been humid, the rain soaked us to the core and my teeth chattered with a chill. She still hadn’t moved, and my patience was thinning. The rush of adrenaline still coursed through my body.
“Mouse, take off your clothes,” I snapped. “We need our body heat to warm each other.” Her head slowly lifted, but she made no attempt to follow my directions. Shaking with the need to be close to her, and the surge of adrenaline, I barked at her again.
“We’re going to play this my way. Blink if you understand me.”
28
The Island Touches Your Heart
Her eyes blinked with the recognition of those fateful words, the ones he spoke in an attempt to protect her. The only words he used to try to get her out of a terrible situation. He was a decent man who had made a bad decision. He hadn’t been cruel, like the other man. In fact, she couldn’t recall him being rough at all. His eyes had struck her. For a moment, he looked repentant. He seemed to be asking her something. Generally, his presence suggested he wasn’t one to ask, but in this instance, he wanted something of her. And then it passed, and he whispered those words over her mouth, gagged and unwilling. His lips covered hers.
His body shielded hers, but she’d turned numb. So cold, she thought. Resigned to a worse fate, she lay there, waiting for the second intrusion, an invasion that never came. He brushed back her hair, and the weight of him rested between her thighs, but he hadn’t entered her. She’d remember if he had, she decided. She’d remember him like that.
Presently, she heard the ripping of buttons off a shirt and warm hands pushing back damp clothing. So wet, she thought. Palms rubbed up and down her cold skin, and her body jostled with the roughness of his touch.
“Mouse,” he whispered harshly and she looked up at him, recalling who he was and who he’d become. He was caring for her once again. He cared about her, she decided. His mouth descended over hers, and the instant it connected, she flared back to life. Her arms wrapped around his neck, and she pulled him to her. They tumbled back onto the makeshift bed.
“Clothes off,” he commanded, and she wrestled with her own shorts and underwear as he removed his. They sighed in unison when they came back together, the heat of skin and the warmth of bodies, igniting the other. Hands explored. Fingers caressed. Mouths melded as one.
“Let me in,” he pleaded. His lips covered her skin over her racing heart. Her thighs opened, allowing him entrance to a foreign land. The tip of him spread her, and he sailed forward. The sensation filled the dark cavern with a collective moan of relief.
He would be gentle with her. He would be patient. He would be kind. He was like a wave, rolling forward, crashing against her shore, and like the wet sand on the beach, she followed each retreat, waiting for the rush to happen again. They continued this pattern of him curling over her and her tumbling under him until the friction became too much. Like the angry sea surrounding the island, the rhythm increased, becoming a collision of crashing ocean and soft sand.
“Mouse,” he struggled, questioning the sensation. Her hands reached for his firm backside, and he lifted her knee, drawing himself deeper, wanting to drown in her.
She dug her fingers into the solid globes of his rear and clenched her thighs at his waist. Her groans murmured off the walls of the cave, where she asked to be tamed and claimed and owned by him. Rushing as she came, the orgasm didn't want to subside as another wave developed, and he rode her faster. He balanced over her, towering up on two hands. She’d become the island, letting the ocean take her and the wind claim her, and his thrusting increased as she climbed upward, chasing another release that would wreck her.
“I love you,” she screamed as the storm of him p
ounded against her. He stilled. The words stunned him, but she didn't think to worry. She was coming again, a river of rushing emotion as her body was wrapped around him, and then the subtle pulse of him inside her, beats of his own release, filled her.
“What did you say?” he asked through clenched teeth. The sound wasn't angry. He was confused, lost in the question. His eyes glistened.
A shaky hand wiped sweat at his brow, bodies still connected as one.
“I love you,” she whispered, one part fearing his wrath, and the other part bold enough to admit the emotion.
She loved him when she once hated him.
“Don't say that,” his voice trembled, liquid threatening to leak from his eyes. “Don't say that unless you mean it.” His eyes closed, shutting off the tunnel to his emotions.
“I love you,” she repeated. “You have tamed me. I am a part of you, and you are a part of me. You make me feel unique and I—”
His mouth crushed hers, at first intense and almost bruising. She thought he wanted to stop her and yet he wanted to draw her in, taste the words and devour them. Like a child with a treat he'd never experienced, he couldn't get enough of her sweetness.
He pulled back almost as abruptly as he claimed her lips. His palm pushed back the sweaty hair on her forehead.
“I didn't know it felt like this,” he said, his voice catching. “I didn't think I could feel like this. You make me wild.” He inhaled as he rolled, flipping her over him. Then he exhaled as he began the slow pleasure of filling her again. He hardened inside her as he lowered and lifted her by her hips. He watched them move in unison, taking his fill of entering her and disappearing deep into her cavern. An intoxicating scent filled the cave, fragranced with the scent of sex and the aroma of love. This was a den of bodily homage, and he worshipped her in his own way. The thrusting increased quickly, her body reacting with jolts and jiggles over his.