Hooked (12 page)

Chapter 12--Morgan

"Ladies, I hope you have a wonderful time at Atlantis." I had safely delivered my cousin and her pals to the lobby of the hotel. My duty done, I was anxious to shove off.

"Aren't you going to have dinner with us?"

"No, Phebes, we're going to get going early in the morning. I don't need to add a hangover and empty pockets to my morning."

"But Morgan, we wanted you to be our lucky charm at the tables tonight. I'm going to lose my shirt." Shelly threw me a sweet little pouty-face that I was supposed to find convincing.

"And I know you'll look great without it." I shot back. My mind wasn't on the girls. It was back on El Lobo. With Lara. Trying to undo the damage I'd done by being an idiot. A jerk. Let's face it a real dick.

I walked back to the boat slowly. The midsummer sun was just dipping toward the horizon when I popped into a waterside bar for a drink. I've always been happiest in the long days of summer. My mother had fewer excuses to keep me out of the sunshine when the hot Florida rays beat down for nearly fifteen hours a day. She could hardly have claimed I'd 'catch a chill' when the air was topping ninety degrees.

I sat down facing the docks and ordered my usual. Richard gave me grief all the time over drinking the expensive vodka. He said it was purely a status symbol and that I couldn't pick out the Grey in a blind taste against the cheapest Polish swill out there. I proved him wrong one night when we both got shit-faced but he claimed it was just dumb luck.

The breeze picked up a little as the sun set. I nursed my drink slowly as I thought about the best approach to take with Lara. She was tougher than I first thought. She was certainly not overwhelmed by the 'hotness' she claimed to see in me, that's for damn sure. Kissing her had been a big mistake. I felt her body stiffen with something like fear. But I wasn't threatening her. And, dammit, I
did
see something in her eyes and I
did
feel something between us. Then I screwed it up and she threw a brick wall right where the something had been.

Midway through my second drink I had made up my mind to break the barrier by letting her know a little bit more about the whole 'rich playboy' act. I'd been playing the game for so long that it seemed I was
too
convincing. The realest part of me was a fisherman and a boat keeper. El Lobo was more of a job than a luxury. She wasn't a big business, but she needed all kinds of care, staff and maintenance and took a lot of time. It was a job I did in exchange for time on the water plus room and board. It was a cop-out; an excuse for not facing the real world challenges of a job. I wasn't proud of it. I wasn't proud of me.

Wandering back to the dock, I made up my mind to leave Lara alone until there were plenty of miles between us, the Bahamas and the memory of my bad behavior. El Lobo had her night lights on and rocked like a pretty girl's firm ass under the new stars. As I got closer, I could see the outline of two people sitting on the lounges of the foredeck.

Richard had told me he was going to spend the night gambling. Apparently another game was more interesting. I could make out the bells of her laughter as they talked. Richard was a charming man. The quintessential nice guy. It took all of my will not to break their little party up before I went to bed.  Richard had been warned and Lara was wary. Nothing much to see . . . move along.

I checked on Mrs. D who gave me a sleepy nod and curled back into her bed as I softly shut the door. I peeled my clothes off and hit the shower. The sheets were cool, my head was hot and the Goose did the job of sending me off to a dreamless sleep.

We were out of sight of land by the time I came out of my stateroom. Mrs. D gave me an earful of chatter for leaving her by herself until late morning. She shot up my body to her perch on my shoulder and bit me gently on the ear.

"Pissed off this morning, Mrs. D?" I stroked her little body and she cooed her forgiveness. "Let's have a little walk-about. Maybe we'll find a den of gummi-bears somewhere." She knew that word alright, and broke into her she-devil smile.

Until Mrs. D came along, I had never had a pet. My mother wouldn't allow anything that produced 'dander' within fifty feet of Clari and me. So I never knew the joy of loving and being loved by an animal. The capuchin was my first experience with unconditional love.

Through the window on the kitchen door I watched Lara as she worked on a huge pile of vegetables. She had impressive skill. My mind couldn't help but take those skilled hands elsewhere--to my body. Would they be work-roughened? Would they be strong or gentle?

"
Shake it off, jerk-wad. It's a new day
," I reminded myself. Donning what I hoped was a sunny and completely non-threatening smile, I pushed through the swinging door.

"Good morning, Lara." The knife slipped from her hand and landed with a jarring clang at her feet.

"Oh . . . you surprised me. Good morning to you."

"I guess I need to announce myself better. I seem to constantly catch you off guard. I wouldn't want to cause an accident."

"I can make you something to eat. I fed the crew a long time ago."

"I slept in."

"Late night?"

"The usual."

"Did you get lucky?"

I answered that with a questioning look. Was she asking me if I got laid?

"I mean," she stammered, "did you score big? No. Oh shit. Did you win at gambling?"

"You turn the most amazing shade of red I've ever seen on a person, did you know that?"

"It's because I'm so pale to begin with." She picked the knife up from the floor and got a new one from the rack.

"A little color does you good. You're cute when you blush." Lara busied herself with a couple of peppers that were nearly the color of her face. "Am I allowed to say that? Cute, I mean. Is that a violation of our agreement--sexual harassment and all that?"

The look she gave me said 'not funny' loud and clear.

"Because, to tell you the truth, I'm not sure what the rules are."

"Give me a break, will ya?" She wouldn't meet my eyes. The peppers that she had been chopping without even looking at them moments before suddenly became worthy of her total focus.

"Seriously. I want to know if telling you that you're cute falls into the 'smexy whorehound' category. I don't want to risk offending you."

"You didn't offend me."

"Funny, you sound like you'd like to use that knife on my balls right now. Of course, at this point in our journey, it would be hard for you to walk away. Unless you are a Guinness record-worthy swimmer . . ."

"I can hold my own in the water. I grew up in Florida, you know."

"In that case, can I talk you into a swim after you get done with lunch?"

"I really don't think I'll have time to swim."

"Bull. It can't possibly take you all afternoon to do dinner."

"Yes, it can."

"Well then, I request a bowl of granola and some yogurt for my dinner. That should shave some time off your prep work."

"The crew . . ."

"Will be satisfied with poison sandwiches for lunch and something equally appalling for dinner."

"I was making fajitas. Grass fed beef, organic veggies, whole wheat tacos. Everything wholesome."

"And I can see you're already done chopping most of what you'll need. I'll have my granola for lunch, then and see you on deck at two. I'll bring the sunscreen." I expected more arguments but she calmly put the knife down and fetched a bowl, a bag of raisin-nut granola and a carton of Greek yogurt from the walk-in.

She poured the bowl full and dumped the yogurt on top. Without a word she went out to the dining table and plopped the bowl at my place at the head of the table. She banged a spoon down beside the mess in the bowl.

"Would you care for some juice? Or maybe something for the monkey?"

Mrs. D had been so silent and still on my shoulder I had forgotten that she was even there. When she heard the word 'monkey' she beamed her monkey charm at Lara and I saw my pretty chef stifle a grin.

"You don't have to take it out on Mrs. D, you know."

"Take what out?"

"Your distaste for me. She's just a monkey. She hasn't got a dime to her name and it isn't her fault I've spoiled her. Cut her some slack."

"I wasn't taking anything out on her."

"She thinks you don't like her."

"How the hell do you know what she thinks?"

"We're buddies. I can tell by how quiet she is that you've hurt her feelings."

"You're lying. I haven't hurt her feelings. She just smiled at me."

"She smiles when she's nervous." I stroked the soft fur on her back sympathetically. Of course I was making it all up, but I had seen Lara's soft spot for the mini-simian the day before. I was ready to use whatever I could to break the ice. And, man, there was a chill in that room.

Lara put out a timid hand toward my shoulder and touched Mrs. D's fuzzy head. "Awww, I'm sorry Mrs. D." My little girlfriend jumped from my shoulder to Lara's in a split second.

"Is there a treat I can give her?"

"She'd sell her soul for a vanilla wafer."

"Will she go to the kitchen with me?"

"Mrs. D is a sugar slut. I'm sure she'd turn me in to the ASPCA for cruelty if I stopped her daily ration of gummi bears."

Lara turned a moonbeam smile at the animal. By the end of the day, by god, I was going to win one of those for myself. There was sugar under all her salt and the more I saw of her, the more I wanted to know that sweetness.

I couldn't forget the taste of her mouth.

Chapter 13--Lara

I
was
being cold. Downright bitchy, really. He made me nervous. No, that's a lie. He terrified me because of the way I felt when I was near him. Every fiber of me strained to connect and intertwine with him and every brain cell in my head screamed "
Don't DO IT
!" There was a war going on inside me. When he was near me, I wanted the animal, the wild, the fuck-it-all side to win. When he was out of sight, the rational me fought back, inch by inch.

I tried to put him in the Asshole Chef box. The box where I kept my irrational mistakes. He could go right in there with the chef and Nathan the Vomit King. I had another place for poor Jake. He was the only occupant of my
rational
mistake box.

It was the immature hormonal response of a horny twenty year old to a man who took the word gorgeous and rewrote the definition. That's all it was. That's what I wanted to believe. But the fantasies wouldn't leave me alone. Over and over I replayed the sight of his naked body bathed in the blue glow of the galley lights. Over and over I watched two gorgeous girls respond to the expert touch of his hands and his mouth. I know faking it. I've done it too many times not to recognize it when I see it. Those two broads had been played like a couple of electric guitars until they wailed out a song of complete and honest rapture. It was the kind of ecstasy I had never known.

I knew what an orgasm felt like. Of course I did. I'd lived over a porn shop for two years. They had more instruments to make my pussy sing that I had ever known existed. Plus, the owners loved us. We got most of our toys as gifts. It was a bonus for them that two young women paraded up and down the side stairs of their store. Worth a few hundred bucks in freebies just to give the customers some eye candy. Not that I considered myself such. But Rachel, for sure. Me . . . I was young and slim. Maybe that was enough to make the single bucks think the place was all that.

But with a man? Never. Not once. I don't even think I came close. Maybe I was one of those women who had to be in
love
to experience orgasm with a man. I wouldn't know until either I'd had casual sex that rocked my world or fell in
love
and had sex that rocked my world.

Was I curious? Damn right I was. I didn't want to go to my grave without experiencing what it felt like to crash into someone in that mighty moment of pleasure and release. I wasn't setting any particular emotion as a pre-requisite, either. Lust would do as long as it eventually resulted in me coming in a mind-blowing flash of the little death.

I sighed out loud and Mrs. D gave a sympathetic little cluck in my ear. I found the vanilla wafers and her interest turned instantly from me to the unopened box. She started clucking and squealing as I walked through the kitchen and got the scissors. The second I gave her the cookie she jumped up on one of the pot racks and started to eat it.

"You've got quite the life, don't you? You're a spoiled little girl that's for damn sure." I could tell that until the last crumb was gone I was getting no more of her attention so I put all my prep work away and sat down on one of the stools to wait for her descent. Morgan was right; I had little to do other than putter around wasting time all afternoon.

I entertained Mrs. D with some measuring spoons and decided I would try to enjoy an afternoon swim on deck with my incredibly edible boss. That's the way I thought of him. Starting with the warm mouth that just asked to be nipped and pulled into my mouth, past the hook tat above a suckable nipple, down the trail fur to tickle my nose to the cock I'd twice seen at attention and twice wanted to take as deep into my mouth as it could go.
That
was a new feeling. I couldn't remember a time when I had a fantasy about giving a blow job.  But I'd seen him. Holy shit I had seen him and the deliciousness of all his parts was unreal.

"Uhmm, uhmm," I said out loud at the mental image. I dangled the spoons in front of the monkey's grasping hands. "Did you get to have wild monkey sex before they took your wild monkey parts, Mrs. D? I'd like to try that sometime."

"Did you have anyone particular in mind?" Morgan asked.

He had once again padded into the kitchen on those weirdly sexy bare feet. So many men have such ugly feet. His could have been on a Reef ad for high dollar flip-flops. I realized I had developed a habit of mocking up advertisements featuring Morgan. Maybe I'd do a collage someday."You know, you've got a terrible habit of sneaking up on me. I wasn't talking to you." How embarrassing. I had to hand it to Morgan, he'd given me more reasons to want to crawl under the nearest rock than anyone I'd ever met, including Chef Asshole.