Love Overboard aka Ivan Takes a Wife

Chapter 4

Stephanie ducked her head back to rinse out the soap and pushed herself away from the yawl. The water was tolerable, now that she was used to it, and she stroked out, enjoying the sensual freedom of swimming naked.

“Don’t swim too far,” Ivan called. “The cold is going to sneak up on you.”

She waved to acknowledge his warning and swam parallel to the ship for a few more minutes before returning to him with chattering teeth. “Is the p-p-person in charge of crowd control also in charge of towels and d-d-dry clothes?”

“I knew I forgot something.” He looked at her hopefully. “You could always air-dry.”

“You know what you are? You’re a p-p-pervert. Turn around while I get into the boat. I’ll put my sweats back on.”

“Sacrilege.” He faced the side of the ship. “It’s a crime against nature to cover that beautiful, clean body in spaghetti-stained sweats- especially the mole.”

Stephanie pulled the shirt over her head and struggled into the pants. “That mole is in a private place!”

“And it’s very pretty,” he said softly.

She didn’t know whether she was pleased or furious. She really should be mad at him, but there was something about the tone of his voice that touched her. It wasn’t lewd or suggestive or even calculating. She couldn’t see his face, but she knew he was smiling. A small, gentle smile, as if his world had suddenly turned beautiful because she had a mole on her backside. “Thank y-y-you,” she said.

“We have to get you warm. Can you make it up the ladder?”

“This is nothing,” she said. “Last February I was thrown into the Hudson River.”

He caught up with her on the deck and whirled her around by her shirtsleeve. “I want to know about it.”

Even in the dark, Stephanie could see that his eyes were hard. His mouth was drawn tight, and a muscle worked in his jaw. She blinked at him in surprise, confused by his emotional reaction. “It was c-c-cold.”

“Damn.” He picked her up and carried her to the galley, where he set her down in front of the stove. He checked the bunks to make sure they were empty and pulled the hatch cover shut. “Get those wet things off.” He grabbed a large towel, a pair of thick socks, and a set of clean sweats from the shelf above her bed and returned to her, obviously disgusted at finding her still fully clothed. He muttered something indiscernible and unceremoniously stripped her sodden shirt over her head.

“Hey!” Before she could get anything else out, Ivan had stuffed her into the clean sweatshirt. He had his hands on the waistband of her pants when she instinctively gave him a knee to the groin and knocked him backward with a follow-up kick to the chest. He rolled over in pain and took several quick gasps of air before he was able to regulate his breathing. Stephanie groaned out loud and rushed to his side. “I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to do that! It was a reflex.”

Ivan closed his eyes, trying to relax. The pain in his groin was subsiding to the point where it wasn’t nearly as bad as the cramp in his ego. He’d just been trashed by a 120-pound woman. When he’d heard she’d gotten dumped in the river, he’d almost gone blind with rage, all his protective instincts for her welling to the surface. And then this poor, defenseless creature had leveled him!

Stephanie dabbed at his damp forehead with the towel. “Are you okay? You aren’t permanently damaged, are you?”

“Do you care?”

“Of course I care!”

“Swell.” He realized he was pouting and burst out laughing. He wasn’t a man with a frail self-image. Now that the pain was reduced to a dull ache, he found more humor than humiliation in the incident. “When I was a kid and I skinned my knee, my mother always kissed it to make it better.”

Stephanie hit him over the head with the towel.

He slowly got to his feet and turned his back to her. “If I were you, I’d hurry up and change while I’m still recovering.”

She did as she was told in record time. “I’m all dressed,” she said, tugging at the socks.

He handed her a cup of hot coffee and waited patiently while she sipped. He took the cup from her and towel-dried her hair until it was just slightly damp and completely unruly. He was standing very close to her, feeling ridiculously tender. She instilled the strangest feelings in him, he thought, feelings that were way beyond what they should be. They were wrapped in a pleasant intimacy that he’d never before experienced with a woman. And that intimacy was fueling a passion that was frightening in its intensity. He was trying to cover it with a flirting, casual attitude, but he didn’t know how much longer he could get away with it. His body was going to betray him if he wasn’t very, very careful.

He added a few logs to the stove to keep the fire burning and was relieved to see the color flooding back into her cheeks. He shouldn’t have allowed her to swim, but he’d been mesmerized by the sight of her gliding through the black water.

Stephanie felt as if she were glowing from head to toe. She’d never experienced anything like her moonlight swim, and she’d never had a man care enough about her to dry her hair. It wasn’t just lust between them, she thought happily. He liked her. And she liked him. She reached for her mug of coffee and stared at the pies sitting on the countertop. She counted them twice. “There’s a pie missing.”

“Are you sure?”

“I could guarantee it. I gave these pies four of the best hours of my life. Man, this is the pits. A pienapper! How low can you go?”

“Maybe we should look on the positive side. At least they’re not afraid to try your cooking.”

She gave him a warning wrinkle of her nose. “You want to elaborate on that?”

Ivan grinned at her. “Not me. I try not to get drop-kicked more than once a day.”

Stephanie grimaced. “I can’t believe I did that.”

“Now I know how you kept your virginity for so long.”

“I was an undercover narcotics cop for eight years, and that’s the first time I’ve ever had to use self-defense to keep my pants on.” Ivan didn’t say anything, but Stephanie suspected he was thinking of more practical methods of removing her clothes. Their gazes held for a long moment, until Stephanie sighed in defeat, acknowledging that she’d only prolonged the inevitable. Sooner or later, he was going to get her naked-or more than likely, she was going to get herself naked. She decided to change the subject and make him a peace offering. “Could I interest you in some pie?”

Ten minutes later they were sitting at the heavy oak table enjoying warm blueberry pie, when someone knocked on the closed hatch cover. “Anybody home?” a female voice called. “Do I smell fresh coffee and hot blueberry pie?”

A second female passenger made her way down the ladder. “Blueberry pie! Yum!”

Mr. and Mrs. Pease joined them along with several other people. Stephanie put another pot of coffee on to drip and brought out more plates.

“You know who would love this?” Mrs. Pease said. “Lena Neilson and her cabin mate, Elsie. Do you think I should go get them?”

“Yes,” Stephanie said, “and you could see if Mr. Kramer and Mr. and Mrs. Dembrowski are awake.” She cut two more pies into wedges, set them on the table, and returned to the stove.

Ivan stood beside her, slouched against the wood cabinet. “You like this, don’t you?”

Stephanie laughed. “It’s hard work being a ship’s cook, but it’s fun.” She wiped her hands on her clean sweats, never thinking about the new blueberry stains she was acquiring. When she spoke she kept her voice low so the conversation didn’t carry past Ivan. “I was a narc for a long time, and my world was really very small. My work environment was frantic. The station house was noisy and chaotic, with a bunch of dedicated, underpaid, overworked cops living on candy bars and coffee. When I wasn’t at the station house, I was in a school that was even noisier and more chaotic. After a while you get to thinking all of it is normal. You wonder if the whole world lives on fast food and works eighteen-hour days.”

“What about your family and friends outside of work? What about those Sunday chicken dinners?”

Stephanie cut another pie while she talked. “I had personal reasons for becoming a cop, but once I started working, the personal reasons weren’t important anymore. It was the kids who were important. I liked them. They needed help. They needed someone to get the pushers far away from them. They needed education. They needed enough confidence in themselves not to succumb to peer pressure. It wasn’t as if I was God and could solve all those problems, but I made a small contribution. Anyway, it was very consuming. I visited my family, but I lived in the high school hallways. Then I woke up one day, looked in the mirror, and realized I was getting too old to pass for a teenager.”

There was a lot more to it than that, but she didn’t feel like relating it. They’d moved her from one school to another, prolonging her career. In the end, she’d almost been killed because she hadn’t been smart enough to quit while she was ahead.

She shrugged away the memory of it. Almost killed didn’t count, she told herself. Everything had worked out okay, and here she was, cutting pie.

“I’ve missed a whole chunk of my life,” she said. “I spent my twenties masquerading as a teenager. I didn’t mind that so much, but I did mind the rat race existence I’d become used to. When I quit the police force and did some long-overdue introspection, I found myself feeling absolutely starved for things that were wholesome. Clean air, healthy food, good people. The one thing I’ve missed at Haben has been the people. I haven’t been able to open for business because of the repairs, and I’ve been lonely.”

She handed him the pie to take to the table. “This is great. This is like a pajama party!”

Loretta Pease and Lena Neilson squeezed down the galley stairs. “We saw her!” Lena shouted. “She was on the deck. She had the knife, and there was blood on it!”

Ivan started toward the stairs, but Lena stopped him. “Don’t bother rushing up there,” she said. “She’s gone.”

He moved aside for the rest of the passengers filing in for blueberry pie. “Where’d she go?”

“Disappeared. Poof,” Lena said.

Mrs. Pease agreed. “It’s true. We came up from Lena’s cabin, and there she was, all dressed in black, just like last time. She was standing at the back of the ship with the knife, and when she saw us, she jumped overboard, but we didn’t hear a splash.” Loretta Pease gave an involuntary shudder. “I got a pretty good look at her this time. She was creepy-looking. Her skin was white as a sheet, and she had lots of hair that was wild and had a blue tint to it. She looked like pictures you see of people who’ve risen from the dead.”

“And when we went to look over the rail, we couldn’t find her,” Lena said.

Stephanie checked the people in the room. Everyone was accounted for, including Ace and the first mate. They’d both come in with Mr. Kramer. No one looked as if they’d been stabbed with a carving knife. “Maybe we should have a look around anyway,” she said to Ivan.

“Okay, who gets pie? Who gets coffee?” Ace asked, taking over.

Stephanie and Ivan slipped away and walked the deck in silence while Ivan played the searchlight over every nook and cranny, along the gunwales, up the tall masts.

“You think Lena and Loretta were into the sherry?” he finally asked. “That part about the wild blue hair doesn’t play.”

“It’s a little bizarre, but Loretta Pease doesn’t strike me as a person who would make up stories.”

Ivan skipped the light across the oak water casks and mahogany planking. “I don’t like having some ghoul running around on my ship. And I like the part about the bloody carving knife even less.”

“I don’t like it either. I think, until we know otherwise, we have to assume she’s dangerous, although my own personal instincts lean more in the direction of it being a prank. Of course, it could always be Aunt Tess. Or maybe it’s a new ghoul? Ghosts in your bedroom, ghouls on your ship. You must be popular when Halloween rolls around.”

“You think it could actually be a ghoul?”

Stephanie looked at him sideways. “Are you serious?”

“Does the thought of having a ghoul on board frighten you? Does it make you want to throw yourself into my strong arms for protection?”

“The thought of you believing in a ghoul frightens me. It makes me want to call the Coast Guard.”

Ivan curled his hand around her neck, stroking the nape with his thumb. “I bet you go to horror movies and never scream. You’re one of those people who sit there and say it’s all done with special effects.”

He had great hands, Stephanie thought. Warm and strong and clever. “It is all done with special effects.”

He pulled her closer. “Hmmm. Do you believe in Santa Claus? The Easter bunny? The tooth fairy? Jaws?”

“Maybe Santa Claus…”

He leaned forward and kissed her. He’d intended the kiss to be light and provoking, but it immediately turned serious, devouring whatever good intentions he’d had up to that point. He set the flashlight aside and pulled her to him, needing to feel the length of her against his body.

Stephanie had wanted to be kissed. Ivan Rasmussen made her feel sexy in a wonderful way, and she wanted to explore that feeling. She liked the way his mouth moved over hers, coaxing, demanding, exciting. He wasn’t stingy with his emotions, and he wasn’t afraid to put himself on the line. She liked that, too. Their tongues touched, and her hands roamed his smooth, muscled back.

She was losing it. Losing control, losing perspective. It happened when you fell in lust, and she knew she was in lust. No big deal, she told herself. People fell in lust all the time, and it was all right as long as you didn’t mistake it for something more serious.

She leaned backward to look at him. “So this is what I’ve been missing all these years.”

“This is nothing. It gets better as you go along.”

She didn’t doubt him for a second. “How far along do you think we should go?”

He studied her for a moment. “I’ll let you decide that.”

“My original plan was to save myself for marriage.”

“Is this a proposal?”

Stephanie laughed. “No. Marriage seems a little drastic. I’m thinking of changing my game plan.”

Her hand strayed to the rope rigging at her side, and her fingers closed around a coil that felt oddly sticky. She brought the hand forward and stared at it. Curiosity was replaced by horror, crawling along her spine and knifing through her stomach. It was blood, she thought. Dark and fresh, staining her palm, seeping between her fingers. “Oh Lord,” she whispered, her voice hoarse with revulsion. “It’s blood.”

Ivan took a closer look and smiled. “No. It’s blueberry.” He put a finger into his mouth and sucked on it. “Yum.”

Stephanie put her hand to her head and closed her eyes until her heartbeat returned to normal.

Ivan stood beside her. “Are you okay?”

“We’ve got to stop kissing like that. It stops the oxygen flow to my brain. I thought it was blood.”

“An easy mistake to make in the dark. Some-body’s been by here with your pie.”

Stephanie looked at him. “How did it get on the rigging?”

Ivan retrieved his flashlight. “I’d say the pie thief was also a slob. Hold on, Watson! I think I’ve got something.” He reached behind the rope and found the carving knife. “The murder weapon,” he said. “I can guarantee that this knife was used to murder your pie. As anyone can see, it’s covered with blueberry blood.”

“Gee, I don’t know if I’m relieved or disappointed. I was sort of hoping it would turn out to be Aunt Tess.”

“The blue-haired woman from hell must have ditched the knife when she jumped overboard.” He flashed the spotlight over the side, sweeping it over the water and the yawl. “Now, that’s an interesting piece of maritime equipment,” he said, shining the beam on Stephanie’s panties, draped across the yawl seat.

Stephanie felt a blush creep up her neck. “I was in a hurry.” She swung a leg over the gunwale and quickly scrambled down to the boat. She’d retrieved the scrap of pink lace and had started up the ladder, when her eye caught a flash of movement through a cabin window. She carefully edged closer to get a better look and found herself staring into two large, black-rimmed eyes in a face framed by blue-and-green spiked hair.

Ivan leaned over the side. “What’s going on?”

“I’ve found the woman from hell, and she’s not dead-she’s just punk. The ladies didn’t hear a splash, because when Ms. Blue Hair jumped, she grabbed hold of the ladder and swung herself through the open cabin window. Was this cabin supposed to be empty?”

Ivan nodded. “We had a last-minute cancellation.”

Stephanie pulled herself up to the deck and looked for a place to stash her panties. “I don’t have any pockets,” she said, examining her sweats.

Ivan took the panties from her and stuffed them into the front pocket of his jeans. “First we’ll go belowdecks to meet our stowaway, then I think we’ll have a talk with Ace.”

“Jeez,” the young woman said when they opened her cabin door, “you scared the bejeebers out of me. What were you doing out there? Don’t you know it’s rude to peep in people’s private windows?”

“Ship’s security,” Stephanie said. “You’re under arrest. You stole my pie. Do you know how long it took me to make that pie?”

“I needed it. You get scurvy when you’re on a ship if you don’t eat pie.”

“What were you doing in Mrs. Pease’s cabin this morning?” Ivan asked her. “And how do you get your hair to look like that?”

“I went up to the ice chest to get some mayo for my sandwich, and when I came back, I accidentally walked into the wrong cabin. Man, can that old lady scream, or what?” She touched her hand to her hair. “You like my hair? I did it with spray paint and starch.”

The stairs creaked, and Ivan turned in time to see a sneakered foot hastily withdrawn. “Ace!”

“Whoops,” Ace said with a guilty smile. “I didn’t want to disturb you.”

Ivan motioned him forward. “Your friend, I assume?”

The girl moved next to Ace. “We’re engaged. Hey, you’re a ship’s captain! You could marry us! Wouldn’t that be great, Ace? We could get married right now.”

Ace took his glasses off and looked at Ivan. “You couldn’t do that, could you?”

Ivan grabbed him by the shirt, marched him down the hallway, then yanked him into the captain’s quarters and closed the door. “You brought that girl on board and promised her you were going to marry her?”

“Not in the beginning. In the beginning I just promised her a sandwich. But then things got… involved, and I needed a better promise. Hell, I couldn’t help it. I’m a hotbed of teenage hormones.”

“How old is she? Do her parents know she’s with you?”

“She’s old. Twenty-three. She plays second guitar in a rock band, but their bus broke down in Rockland, and they had to cancel their tour.”

“You do this again, and I’m going to cancel your tour. I’m going to give you thirty seconds to apologize to that woman, then you’re confined to quarters for the rest of the night. And at the crack of dawn I want her set ashore. And I expect you to provide her with cab fare back to Rockland.”

Ace adjusted his glasses. “Do you think I could have a partial advance on my wages?”

Ivan reached into his pocket and, without thinking, pulled out the panties.

“I didn’t see that,” Ace said, accepting a twenty-dollar bill while Ivan stared at the dainty piece of lingerie dangling from his finger. “I swear, I didn’t see a thing,” he repeated. “And I won’t tell anybody about what I didn’t see. You can count on me,” he said, slipping out the door and gently closing it behind him.