Ghost

Chapter One

“Hey, Mike, how was the fishing?” Sol Shatalin called from the dock.

“Pretty good,” Mike yelled, as he backed the forty-five-foot Bertram up to the pier. “Grab my lines, will ya?”

He’d spent the first month or so pretty much out of sight of land, working on his tan and fishing, using various products to get the scars to look older than they were. By the time he started taking his shirt off in public, they didn’t look fresh except to a very trained eye. Now he fished and SCUBAed in the area of Islamorada, and his “address” was Slip 19-C, Islamorada Yacht Club.

Spending that much time offshore had had another benefit; he caught a lot of fish and learned how to catch them and how to fillet them, which brought more money than whole. Now, he rarely went out without at least making gas money. In fact, since he really lived a pretty Spartan existence, he was living pretty much on money from fishing. Of course, it wouldn’t have covered the payments on the Bertram, but he’d paid for that in cash. All three-quarters of a mil.

He’d recently, though, been considering a developing lackanookie condition. He could fix that easy enough by a run up to Athens, but he’d started to think he might be using the girls, and that was the last thing he wanted to do. He hadn’t been in contact with all of them, just a core of about twelve. And of those twelve, he’d only had sex with three. It had been healing for both sides. And with a few of the others, he’d just slept, and that had been healing, too.

But he didn’t want to get into a habit of just turning up for nookie. He wasn’t planning on spending his life with any of them, for various reasons. And they needed to get on with their lives. For that matter, every trip to Athens meant a possibility of somebody who recognized him from a class putting Mike Harmon, former SEAL and jerk in class, together with one of the “Syria Girls” and getting four. So letting the girls go, slowly, was a good idea.

But it wasn’t helping his lackanookie.

There were, as around any major yacht club, various “boat bunnies.” But they didn’t appeal, either, even the good-looking ones, and they were in short supply. It was a philosophical thing. He didn’t mind paying for sex; he’d done it often enough in various third-world countries. And he didn’t mind having a girlfriend who was “a little hard up.” Christy, his ex, had been a live-in aspiring actress who didn’t make her share of the rent most of the time before they’d gotten married. But boat bunnies lived “on the kindness of strangers” as Mae West would say. It was prostitution, but even hint at that fact and you got one hell of a telling-off and generally a cleared boat. Then there was the issue of “Bluebeard’s Stateroom.”

The boat had five cabins: the “master” cabin forward (with a really nice bathroom, the nicest he’d ever owned) and four “regular” cabins, two with bunk beds and two with doubles. He’d converted one of the doubles cabins into his “team locker.” Besides using his “special” status to buy various interesting weapons, he’d contacted a company that sold gear to the teams and ordered, well, one of everything. He now was as well equipped as anyone on a team: body armor, ammo vest, everything down to boots and wetsuits. He didn’t figure he’d ever need it, but he also hadn’t figured he’d end up in Syria shot to shit.

But he’d really rather not have to explain to a boat bunny why one of his cabins had a weapons’ locker, weight set and various military equipment. The cabin was locked, but some of the boat bunnies wouldn’t have cared. More than one owner had come back to find their boat stripped of everything valuable and their “girlfriend” gone. Which was why he called it “Bluebeard’s Stateroom.” And another reason not to pick up boat bunnies.

He considered what he wanted to do for the evening while running the lackanookie in the background. Fixing dinner and eating alone was getting tiresome but so was going out alone. Finally, he decided to just bite the bullet and go over to Rumrunners II and get dinner. They didn’t cook mahi as well as he did, but he also didn’t have to do the dishes.

As he pulled out of the club in the truck, the air conditioning going at full blast, he considered, again, whether he should get a pussy-mobile. He’d kept the truck even though he could buy any car in the world for some of the same reasons that he didn’t like boat bunnies. If he met a girl, he wanted her to like him for him, not for his money. So far that hadn’t worked very well, so he was considering getting a car that would reflect his… how did Pierson put it that one time… “comfortable” status. A Ferrari would do that but he really liked the look of the Jaguar XK-8. It was just a sweet-looking car. Not as hot as the Ferrari or the Bentley Fantom, but… great lines. Like a woman’s body. And much more of an eye magnet than a five-year-old pickup truck.

There were people sitting outside of Rumrunners, some of them quite pleasantly female. But it meant the place was probably packed. He wandered into the open air front and got in line for the hostess anyway.

“How many in your party?” the cute little blonde asked. Quite shapely, she reminded him of Bambi, same pretty face and curly blonde hair. As he thought that he got hit with a nasty flashback of the blonde bending over to scavenge ammo from the dead, arms and legs covered in blood and lovely blonde bush reflecting in the red flare light. “Are you okay?” the girl asked hurriedly.

“Yeah,” he answered after a second, closing his eyes and telling himself that he was in Islamorada and at Rumrunners. Not back in the bunker. “Sorry, sort of a headache thing,” he continued, taking off his sunglasses to dangle on their lanyard. “One, nonsmoking.”

“We’re pretty busy this afternoon,” the girl said nervously. “It will be about an hour.”

“I’ll wait in the bar,” Mike replied, taking the flashy buzzy pager thing and dropping it in his pocket.

The bar was even more crowded than the front, all the tables taken and no room to even move up to the bar and get a beer. Finally he spotted an open seat next to a curvy brunette and pushed his way through the crowd to it.

“This seat taken?” he asked, groaning to himself. He’d be more than happy to hit on the brunette, who was wearing a light sundress and looked even better from the front than the back, but mostly he was just trying to get to the bar.

“Yes, as a matter of fact it is,” the girl said coldly. “My friend will be back in a minute.”

“Not hitting on you,” Mike said, trying to get the barmaid’s attention. “I was just trying to find a seat.”

The girl turned away and he shrugged. Finally, the barmaid got free and came over to him.

“I’ll take a Fosters,” Mike said. “And please give the young lady and her ‘friend’ a refill so she won’t think I’m a jerk.”

The barmaid glanced at the brunette, who shrugged and nodded.

“I’m sorry I snapped,” the girl said, not turning her head.

“It’s okay,” Mike replied. “You probably do get hit on all the time. I think it would be different for a guy, but for young ladies it probably gets to being a pain in the butt.”

“It is,” she said as a short, well-set-up blonde with short hair and lovely green eyes walked up and looked at Mike. He realized he was enough in the space that she couldn’t sit down.

“Sorry,” Mike said, backing away. “Just trying to get a drink.”

“And buying us one,” the brunette said, with a slight grin. “I’m Pam Shover.”

“Mike Jenkins,” Mike said, holding out his hand over the blonde’s back. “Boat bum.”

“What’s a boat bum?” the blonde asked, interested despite herself.

“Somebody who lives full time on a boat and has no visible means of income,” Mike replied, taking out a card and handing it to “Pam.” “If you ever want to go fishing or cruising or whatever, give me a call. Again, not a hit. I just like to show off my boat.”

“Probably not,” Pam said, tucking the card away. “We’re only down here for a week.”

“Summer break?” Mike asked.

“Yes,” Pam said. “And even with all the other girls in town, I feel like the main character in the song ‘Fins.’ ”

“’Got fins to the left,’ ” Mike sang, chuckling. “Gotcha.” He glanced at his watch and shrugged. “I’ve got about fifty minutes until my table’s ready. So can we talk or should I just crawl under a rock?”

“We can talk,” Pam said, grinning again and looking over the blonde’s shoulder. “So, what does a professional boat bum do?”

“Mostly fish,” Mike admitted.

“I’d wondered what the smell was,” the blonde said, then flinched. “Jesus, I’m sorry, that came out as a real cut and it wasn’t intended.”

“I was catching dolphin this morning and spent a couple of hours filleting them all out,” Mike said. “I showered and scrubbed before I landed. But getting all the smell off is tough.”

“You were catching dolphin?” the blonde said angrily, looking up at him with flashing green eyes.

“Uh, dolphin fish,” Mike said. “You’d probably call it mahi-mahi.”

“People call it dolphin?” the blonde asked, confused.

“Yeah,” Mike replied. “Don’t worry about it, though, everybody gets it confused. But if somebody is talking about fishing for a run of dolphin, they’re talking about mahi-mahi, not Flipper.”

“Okay,” the blonde said, chuckling. “Sorry about that.”

“Like I said, common,” Mike replied. “Anyway, that’s pretty much what I do.”

“And that pays the bills?” Pam said, raising an eyebrow.

“Oh, no,” Mike replied. “Well, not all of them. I’m sort of retired.”

“You’re young to retire,” Pam said, leaning back and looking at him with real interest for the first time.

“Short story or long?” Mike asked, trotting out his standard cover. “I used to run a very small company that sold communications widgets to the military. Classified, very low use, very niche market. Decent income but not rich or anything. Then, well, then 9/11 happened and my particular widget got really popular. The third buyout offer from a major defense contractor was too good to pass up. Now I’m semi-retired. The fishing pays for gas and food and sometimes docking charges. The company paid for the boat,” he finished, grinning.

“Nice,” the blonde said, glancing at him. “What’d you walk away with?”

“Uhmmm…” Mike said, shrugging. “That’s… not classified because it’s business, the term is proprietary. The IRS was really happy, though,” he added sourly.

“So now you just… fish?” the blonde asked.

“Pretty much,” Mike said, shrugging again. “Sometimes I do a little consulting.”

“Classified?” Pam asked.

“Yep,” Mike replied with a grin. “In general it falls into military communications and operational analysis. From my boat I tell guys who are out on the sharp end what they did wrong.”

“The sharp end?” the blonde asked.

“Guys who do fighting,” Pam said. “Like special forces and stuff.”

“And do you know much about that?” the blonde asked, disbelievingly.

“I used commo gadgets before I sold them,” Mike said with a shrug. “Now, I am just a retired widget maker.”

“That’s our table,” Pam said, as their pager started to buzz. “Nice talking to you… Mike?”

“Jenkins,” Mike said, nodding as the two got up. “And, hey, I get a seat!”

“Still warm,” the blonde said, smiling.

“I’ve hot bunked with smelly guys,” Mike replied. “This is much better. Don’t forget your drinks.”

He sipped his Fosters until his pager went off and then had dinner. He wondered why he hadn’t made more of a play for the girls. He could have played the hero card, that’s for damned sure. Lift up his shirt just a bit and the blonde’s disbelief would have gone away like a light. And there was still a certain amount of newly modified patriotic fervor after Aleppo. Young ladies who hadn’t previously were suddenly finding military guys interesting. But… he’d just been willing to pass for some reason. And there was zero chance that they’d want to go fishing; they weren’t the type.

Three days later he was upside down under his starboard engine and cursing the idiot Swede who had thought putting an oil pump in the bottom of an engine was a good idea. To reach the oil pump required a trained gymnast and he was just glad he’d been doing some limbering exercises along with the working out. To get to the pump, he had to lie down on top of the engine and then slide down the side and underneath. Getting back out was on the near order of impossible, but he’d rigged a line that he could pull, over his back, to give him some leverage.

But he’d managed it, finally, and was just cranking down the last of the bolts when he heard a female voice hailing from the pier.

“Hang on!” he yelled, sliding the wrench back where he’d be able to retrieve it and then slipping out from under the engine. He clambered, awkwardly, up onto the top of the engine and then stuck his head out of the hatch to see who it was; he was surprised as hell to see the blonde and brunette from the bar carrying small bags.

“Hey,” he called. “Come aboard. I’d shake your hand, but you don’t want to get within ten feet of me right now.”

“Nice boat,” Pam said, walking across the gangway. “I thought you meant some sort of sailboat or something. What is this?”

“Bertram 45,” Mike replied. “With a God damned Volvo engine designed by an idiot. But it’s fixed now.”

“Rich and a mechanic,” the blonde said wonderingly. “Will wonders never cease?”

“And I cook,” Mike said, grinning and standing up.

“Holy SHIT,” the blonde said, obviously staring even with sunglasses in the way. “You weren’t kidding about having some experience, were you?”

“No,” Mike said, wiping his hands and then slipping on a shirt over his oil-covered torso.

“Sorry,” the blonde said, shaking her head. “What was all that?”

“Bullets and shrapnel,” Mike replied, picking up his tools and cleaning them off. “Shrapnel is little pieces of metal. Those were from a grenade, I think. Must have been; there wasn’t any artillery or mortars incoming.”

“Where’d it happen?” Pam asked, softly. “Or is that…”

“Classified, yeah,” Mike said simply.

“What were you?” the blonde asked. “Or is that…”

“No, I was a SEAL,” Mike replied. “That’s not classified. And I can tell some great training stories that will have you laughing your ass off. But I can’t talk, won’t talk, about missions.”

“Okay,” Pam said. “But… were you in Syria?”

“That was after I was out,” Mike said, not exactly lying. “The team is open source, it was Charlie Three. It was actually the same team and platoon I was in when I was operational. I know a couple of the guys who are still in it, were on the mission. But I wasn’t in the team for that.” He set the cleaned tools in their box and climbed out of the hatch. “Let me show you the boat. I’m really proud of her.”

He led them up to the flying bridge and then down the companionway to the closed bridge and into the lounge.

“Lots of electronics,” the blonde said.

“Yeah, when you’re by yourself you need them,” Mike said. “By the way, your friend is Pam and you are… ?”

“Sorry, we didn’t get introduced, did we?” the blonde said. “Courtney Trays.”

“Mike,” he said. “Let me go get cleaned up and I’ll shake your hand. Drinks in the fridge, two bathrooms down the companionway on either side, liquor cabinet if you’re of a mind.”

“It’s a little early,” Pam said.

“You’re on vacation,” Mike said, grinning. “And the sun’s over the yardarm somewhere.”

He walked down the companionway to the main cabin and into the bathroom. He wasn’t about to scatter oil over the marble countertop, so he pulled off his shirt and bundled it and the shorts he’d been wearing together, then pulled out a can of Go-Jo and worked off most of the grime. After a very quick shower he was mostly clean, as a glance in the mirror proved. He slipped on a pair of swimming trunks and another T-shirt, then went back to the lounge.

“Hi, I’m Mike Jenkins,” he said, holding out his hand to the blonde, who was perched at the bar sipping a Coke.

“Nice to meet you, Mike,” the girl said, grinning.

“I hadn’t, frankly, expected you two to show up,” Mike said, getting out a Gatorade.

“Well, coming down to Islamorada sounded like a great idea after last semester,” Pam said, sipping her drink. “We’re from the University of Missouri in Springfield and it had not only been a bitch of a winter it had been a bitch of a semester. Courtney said: ‘Let’s go to the Keys,’ so we dropped our stuff at the parents and got in the car.”

“Little did we know how much staying here was going to cost,” Courtney said sourly. “We’re not moving in on you, but we’re, frankly, getting tapped except for the money we need to get home. So, since you’d offered to go fishing or something, we decided, what the heck?”

“Did you make a safe call?” Mike asked neutrally.

“Uhm… a what?” Pam asked.

“Oh, Christ,” Mike said, shaking his head. “You must be freshmen or something.”

“And your point?” Courtney asked sharply.

“Safe call,” Mike said. “You don’t know diddly about some guy you’ve met in a bar. So you have somebody you know is home that you call and say: ‘Hey, I met this guy named George Winson, his address is 52 Bonny Lane. If you don’t hear from me by tomorrow morning, call the police.’ ”

“That’s a little…” Courtney said.

“Cold-blooded?” Mike asked. “It’s better than the alternative. And get ID.”

“Okay,” Pam replied. “Uh…”

“Hang on,” Mike said, grinning. He found his wallet and handed over his, entirely fictitious, Florida driver’s license. “I wish I still had my Kinky Single Girl’s Guide to Sex and Dating, but my ex took off with it.”

“Your what?” Courtney asked, aghast.

“One of the funniest books you’ll ever read,” Mike said, taking the ID back from Pam. “Great tips about dating, even if you’re not kinky. Including a great section on safe calls. Got a cell phone?”

“Yes,” Pam said, shaking her head. “Who should I call?”

“Well, youre parents might be a bit much,” Mike said. “But you’re sure to have somebody on your speed dial list. Tell them we’re going out and you’ll call them back around a specified time, even to leave a message. Depending on how far out we go and how long we stay out, you might not have cell coverage. But you decide the time and we’ll work around it. If nothing else, I’ve got a satellite phone.”

“You do?” Courtney said. “Why?”

“Because I’m not always where there’s cell coverage when I need to make a call,” Mike said, shrugging.

“Like on the ‘sharp end’?” Courtney asked, curiously.

“No,” Mike said, shaking his head. “Like in the Bahamas Deeps and I just caught a really nice marlin and I want to call a friend and rub it in.”

“Oh,” Courtney said, grinning.

“I’ll call Stacy,” Pam said, smiling. “She’ll get green with envy.”

“I’ll go topside,” Mike said after a moment’s thought. “Get the bollards in and the gangway up. Come on up when you’re ready to go.”

Chapter Two

He had gotten all the lines in but the stern and was on the flying bridge lifting the gangway when Courtney came up, carrying her Coke and his Gatorade.

“You forgot this,” she said, sitting down on the bench and looking out. “This is so cool.”

“I sometimes forget that,” Mike said, nodding. “It’s better than… some stuff in my life. Lots. I’ll get tired of it after a while and have to go find something interesting to do. But right now… I need the downtime.”

“What are we going to do?” Courtney asked, looking at the instruments. “And how do you read all that stuff?”

“It takes practice,” Mike admitted. “There’s radar, GPS with charts, depth-finder, anchor, winch and gangway controls and various stuff about the boat,” Mike said, pointing to each of the screens and buttons. “The closed bridge below has duplicate instruments and controls as well as more and larger. There’s a tuna tower up there,” he said, pointing overhead. “It’s got most of the same stuff, but in miniature and harder to read. It’s also only got a Bimini top, so I mostly stay here. Except in storms, then I go in the closed bridge.”

“I was right,” Pam said, climbing up onto the flying bridge. “Stacy was just green. Where are we going?”

“I’d say ‘up to you,’ ” Mike replied thoughtfully. “But you don’t know what’s around. The snorkeling in Islamorada is only so-so, but there are a few shallow reefs. Go for that, first?”

“Fine by me,” Pam said, looking at Courtney.

“I’ve never been,” Courtney said.

“It’s not hard,” Mike said, grinning. “And, well, SEALs make Number One life guards.”

“Okay, we’ll try that I guess,” Courtney said, shrugging. “I was just planning on, well, boating and sunning.”

“That too,” Mike said, opening up a glove box and pulling out a foil packet. “You guys know if you’re susceptible to seasickness?”

“No,” Pam said. “I don’t. Courtney?”

“No,” she said, warily, eying the packet.

“Bonine,” Mike said, showing her the printing. “Better than Dramamine, lasts longer, very little in the way of side effects. Not perfect. If you turn out to have real problems, I’ve got scopolamine tablets. They’re prescription in the U.S., but I get mine from Canada where they’re over-the-counter. You probably won’t have any problems, but I recommend taking one before we go out.” He paused and flicked the packet to Courtney. “Sealed.”

“You take this safety stuff seriously, don’t you?” Pam asked, taking the packet from Courtney and pulling out a tablet.

“They’re chewable,” Mike said, starting both engines. “And, yes, I do.”

He climbed down and walked to the stern, throwing the docking lines onto the pier, then scrambling back into position.

“If we do this much, I’ll probably have you guys do that the next time,” he said, engaging the engines and pulling out of the slip, turning hard left with a bit of bow thruster.

“That’s not bad,” Courtney said, washing down a Bonine with her Coke. “You’re strange, Mike. Most guys wouldn’t talk about safe calls and whether a drug is in a sealed packet.”

“Most of the guys you date, maybe,” Mike said, shrugging. “They’re your age and wouldn’t know about it, most of them. Or they’d take it as an insult. ‘What, don’t you trust me?’ ‘Don’t you trust me?’ translates as ‘The check is in the mail’ and ‘I won’t come in your mouth.’ ”

Pam nearly snorted Coke out of her nose at that. “I can’t believe you said that!”

“Why?” Mike said, maneuvering into the narrow channel out of the marina. “You don’t know the list of great lies in history? ‘The DZ is wide enough’ is one that we loved in the teams. Yeah, for one guy to land on at a time,” he added, chuckling. “By the way, you guys want classes in what I’m doing?”

“I’m interested,” Pam said. “But those controls are beyond me.”

“Now,” Mike said, “but I was talking about general navigation. See those posts with signs on them?” he said, pointing to the channel markers.

“Yeah,” Courtney said, frowning. “They’ve got numbers.”

“Thing to remember is color,” Mike said. “Red, Right, Returning. That is, the red one is on your right when you are coming back to port. Which side is it on right now?”

“Left,” Pam said. “We’re going out.”

“Yep,” Mike replied. “But when you’re in some channels, especially in turns, all you’ll have is one channel marker to figure out where the channel is.” He leaned forward and dialed in the GPS to maximum. “See these contour lines? They say what the depth is to either side. This thing draws nearly six feet. See that two? That’s how shallow it can get to either side of the channel. If we drift out of the channel, we’re going aground. That’s why you have to know which side of the channel marker to follow.”

He waved at a passing jet ski and turned to watch as the man jumped his wake.

“That’s what I’d like to do,” Courtney said, watching it recede.

“Hate those things,” Mike replied. “Most of the people who ride them are just fine, but you’ll get some drunk idiot going eighty miles an hour and not realizing he can’t turn in time, and then you’ve got blood on the side of your boat and a hole and a big investigation. But yeah, they’re fun.”

“Well, I’d like to try one,” Courtney said. “Carefully.”

“I shall, as Bill Slim’s logistics chief said, arrange,” Mike replied, grinning.

“I’m going to go up front and sun,” Pam said. “Do you mind?”

“Oh, jeeze,” Mike said. “Break my heart. Beautiful college coed laid out forward. I don’t think I can handle that.”

“You are a tease,” Pam said, getting up and going below.

“Okay, what’s that?” Courtney said, pointing to a screen. “I know that one’s a map or something. But what’s that one?”

“Radar,” Mike said, pointing. “See the red dot?”

“Yes.”

He pointed off to starboard at a boat nearing the end of the channel.

“That’s that dot,” he said, then pointed to a moving blue dot. “That’s an aircraft,” he continued, looking over his shoulder. “Yeah, Coast Guard helicopter.”

“Do you use it much?” Courtney asked, looking around. “I mean, you can see…”

“It’s more useful at night or in storms,” Mike said. “Boats are supposed to have running lights and most do. But this radar is on a computer that can be set to beep if there’s something coming up that looks as if there might be a collision. So, say I’m off coast and I want to go below and get something to eat? I set it for a close point approach of, say, a mile. So when I’m eating and some idiot in a cigarette boat comes barreling in, I have time to get to the bridge and maneuver.”

“Oh.”

“Or, say I’m in a storm, which I have been. I can see what’s around even through the storm. I can see the land forms, the way the islands are laid out,” he added, pointing to the land that was visible on the screen. “Sometimes that gives me a better feel for where I am than the GPS. But mostly I use the GPS to navigate.”

“What’s that one with the fish symbols?” she asked. “Oh, a fish-finder. Stupid.”

“Not stupid, good guess,” Mike said. “It’s that, but it also tells me the depth. I would like to take you guys offshore, if you have time. The water out there…” He paused and shook his head. “Pelagic water has to be seen to be believed. This stuff is what’s called brown water, then you hit green and finally the real blue of the ocean. It’s beautiful.”

“You really like the water,” Courtney said musingly.

“Love it,” Mike replied. “But when I was a SEAL it was almost like it was the enemy. When we trained it was always at night and half the time it was in the northern Pacific, which is mostly zero viz and cold as hell. But this stuff?” he said, waving around. “This is great, brown, green and blue. This is as close as I’ve come to heaven. Great water, good reefs, good fishing and pretty girls,” he finished, grinning at her.

“Have you had a lot of pretty girls on your boat?” Courtney asked archly.

“You’re the first ones,” Mike admitted. “There are ladies who make something of a profession of moving from boat to boat. I prefer not to deal with them, even the pretty ones.” He paused and shook his head. “Crap.”

“What?” Courtney asked as he leaned across her.

“Pam? Can you hear me?”

“Yes,” the girl called from forward.

“There’s a cabin on the right, forward, that’s locked,” he yelled. “Kindly don’t try to find out why. Remember the story of Bluebeard.”

“Now you’ve got me nervous,” Courtney said as he straightened back up and made the next turn in the channel.

“Not like that,” Mike said. “Like I said, sometimes I do classified stuff. That room has some of that stuff in it. That’s why I keep it locked. Also has my weight gear. Do you mind if I take off my shirt?”

“Changing the subject?” Courtney asked, smiling. “Go ahead.”

“The scars make people comment, so I generally keep it on when I’m in dock,” he said, setting the autosteer for a second and stripping out of the T-shirt. “But I like to keep it off when I’m out.”

“Nice bathroom,” Pam said, coming topside. “Wow, you really are scarred up, aren’t you?”

“See?” Mike said, shaking his head. “Yeah.”

“That’s some major damage,” Courtney said, running her finger over a suture mark in his side. “Like, I’m surprised you lived.”

“Nursing student?” Mike asked.

“Pre-med,” Courtney said shortly.

“Well, the doctors told me they spent about ten hours with their hands in various parts of me,” Mike admitted. “And about half of my insides are now plastic. Wonder of modern medicine, that’s me.”

“You want to go sun?” Pam asked Courtney.

“I’m going to sit and talk with Mike. Maybe later.”

“We can actually do both,” Mike said as Pam made her way forward. “Up on the tuna tower. And you can see more.”

“Uh, it’s kind of high,” Courtney said.

“You’ll hardly notice,” Mike replied. “Let me get out of the channel, first, though. And there’s more motion up there.”

“It’s pretty smooth so far,” Courtney said.

“Well,” Mike said, spinning the wheel and engaging the bow thrusters to make the final turn, “that’s because the bar we’re about to go through is breaking the waves. It’s pretty calm today, inshore, which is where we’re going to be most of the time, it’s only a foot. Offshore it’s two feet and glassy. That’s good conditions. Very good. We’ll rock up there,” he said, gesturing up. “But it’s fun.”

They passed through the final turn and he powered up, the nose of the cruiser rising and riding easily across the small swells.

“Now this is more like it,” Courtney said, grinning.

“Look,” Mike said, pointing off to the left. “Dolphin.”

“Where?” Courtney asked, standing up and shading her eyes.

“Look for a fin at about ten o’clock,” Mike said, keeping his eye in the direction and on close boats. “There.”

“Oh, cool,” Courtney said. “Pam! There’s a dolphin off on the left!”

“Port,” Mike automatically corrected.

“What is it with sailors and all this port and starboard stuff?” Courtney asked, watching the dolphins. “There’s three of them.”

“Two females and a juvenile,” Mike said, nodding. “You can tell the young one because its fin is smaller.”

“Can we swim with them?” Courtney asked. “They’re going away.”

“Most dolphins won’t swim with people,” Mike said. “Sometimes you can slide over the side and get them to look you over. But there are very few that actively enjoy swimming with humans. Come on up on the tuna tower,” he said, setting the autosteer. “You’ll enjoy it.”

“I need a bathing suit,” Courtney said, temporizing.

“And sunscreen,” Mike said.

“I’ve got a pretty good tan,” Courtney replied.

“Trust me,” Mike replied. “Up there you’ll want at least fifteen SPF. Twenty-five would be better.”

“Somebody will have to do my back,” she said coyly.

“Twist my arm and we’ll discuss it,” Mike said, grinning.

He made his way up to the tuna tower and checked the controls. The autosteer had been set to run towards a break in the outer reefs, He leaned back and propped up his feet, reclining the chair and trying not to grin from ear to ear. After a second, though, he leaned forward and looked down at Pam.

“Pam!”

The girl sat up and looked around, confused.

“Up here,” Mike said, smiling. “Did you put on sunscreen?”

“I put on tanning oil,” she said, turning around and looking up at him. “Like the view?”

“Love it,” Mike said, grinning. She had an exceptionally nice chest and the legs were outstanding. “I’d strongly advise more than tanning oil. But it’s up to you.”

“I want a tan when I get back,” Pam said, shrugging.

“Okay,” Mike said, sitting down. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you,” he muttered.

“This is cool,” Courtney said, coming up the ladder. “But a bit…”

Mike helped her up the last few feet and into the chair next to his.

“I love it up here,” he said, sitting up. “More dolphins, way off to port, forward. And you see those,” he said, pointing to some circles to the right. “That’s bait fish feeding on the surface.”

“Wow!” Courtney said, pointing forward as a small finny shape jumped out of the water and tail walked off to the left. “Flying fish!”

“They’re pretty rare inshore,” Mike said. “But you see a lot of them out in the Stream.”

“The Gulf Stream,” Courtney said, nodding. “That I’ve heard of.”

“That’s where you get the pelagics,” he said, pointing down to port. “There, you see that flashing. Those are the bait fish.”

“Something just jumped over there,” Courtney said, pointing off to port.

“Probably mullet,” Mike said, shrugging. “They jump a lot. Nobody knows why.”

“Where are we going?” Courtney asked, looking around.

“There’s a shallow reef,” Mike said, pointing at the GPS. “You can’t see it very well on this little bitty screen. It’s not all that shallow, unfortunately, with the current tide you’re talking six or seven feet. But it’s pretty and you can dance to it…”

“What?” Courtney asked.

“What was that show?” Mike asked. “Soul Train? One of the judges was always saying ‘it has a nice beat and you can dance to it.’ I guess it’s a generational thing.”

“Okay,” Courtney said with a laugh. “Whatever.”

“Anyway, we’ll hook up there,” Mike said, “and you can try your hand at snorkeling.”

“Hook up?” Courtney said, raising an eyebrow.

“Yeah, there’s a buoy you hook up to rather than anchor,” Mike said, looking at her. “Why?”

“Uh…” Courtney paused and shrugged. “It’s a generational thing. Hook up is… well it’s one way of saying you’re sort of… dating…”

“Or having sex?” Mike asked, grinning.

“Maybe,” Courtney said, shrugging. “Hooking up just means you’re… together for a while. Maybe sex, maybe just making out, maybe just dating and none of the above. Generally at least making out is involved.”

“Like going steady?” Mike asked.

“Not exactly,” Courtney said, shrugging again. “God, I haven’t heard anyone use that term since high school.”

“Last time I heard it, too,” Mike admitted. “But hooking up is a new one on me. Except for buoys.”

“I wouldn’t have picked you for going both ways,” Courtney said, blank faced. “But, then again, you were a sailor, right?”

“Did you just make a joke?” Mike asked, grinning.

“What? I can’t joke?” Courtney asked, smiling.

“Joke all you want,” Mike said. “As long as they’re not farmer’s-daughter jokes.”

The reef only had one other boat on it, a snorkel trip boat that was already starting to recover its group of dentists from Cleveland or whatever. Mike turned downwind, then lined up on the buoy and leaned over the tuna tower.

“Pam, I need some help,” he called. “On the starboard… the right side, in a holder is a boat hook, could you grab it?”

“Sure,” she called, getting up off her towel and getting the boat hook.

“Okay,” Mike yelled. “There’s a knurled grip in the middle. If you twist it loose, you can extend the boat hook.”

“Got it,” Pam said after a few moments. She extended the hook and clamped it back down.

“Okay, I’m going to pull up to the buoy. You’ll need to pull it up to the boat.” He looked at Courtney and shrugged. “I think two people.”

“Going,” Courtney said, heading for the ladder.

“Courtney’s coming down. If you can pull the buoy up a bit, there’s a rope down there with a clip on it. Clip that to the line on the bottom of the buoy and we’re good.”

“How heavy is it?” Pam asked.

“Pretty heavy,” Mike admitted. “But I don’t think you want to do this end, do you?”

“No,” she said, walking forward.

When Courtney got to the bow, he pulled forward, slowly, until he lost sight of the buoy.

“Missed it,” Pam called. She was bent over the front rail and it was an entirely pleasant sight.

“Coming up again,” Mike called, giving the engine a nudge.

“Got it!” Pam called. She wriggled out from under the rail and hauled on the line. Mike pulled forward a bit more and Courtney got down on the deck with the bowline.

“I got it on!” she yelled. “I got it.”

“Get out of the way and let Pam drop the buoy,” Mike called, putting the engine in neutral.

“There, that wasn’t that bad,” he said when he reached the main deck.

“Not bad,” Pam said. “Good steering.”

“Thanks,” he said, getting out the snorkeling gear. He defogged the masks with baby shampoo, fitted the masks for the girls, then found foot fins that fit them.

“You’ve got a lot of this gear,” Courtney said.

“I’d hoped to have visitors, frankly,” Mike replied. “So I laid in a lot of stuff I don’t have use for. I even… well…” He paused and grinned sheepishly. “I even laid in stuff in case I had female visitors.”

“Tampons and pads?” Pam asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Well, yeah, but they’re for something else,” Mike said. “No, I bought some other stuff. Don’t think I’m a perv or anything. But… well… if a young lady ends up unexpectedly spending time on the boat, she’ll probably be able to find panties and a bra that fit.”

“Really?” Courtney said, laughing. “You’re serious.”

“Really,” Mike said. “Look, I dated a lot when I was younger. A young lady spends time at a gentleman’s apartment or whatever and she gets up in the morning and the one thing you can tell she’s thinking about is: ‘Damn, I’ve got to put on my underwear from yesterday.’ So I laid in supplies.”

“That’s…” Courtney stopped and shrugged. “I guess that makes a lot of sense. If you’re incredibly sensitive and forward thinking.”

“Forward thinking, yes,” Mike said. “Very few people have ever accused me of being sensitive.”

“Okay,” Courtney said, laughing. “It wasn’t intended as an insult.”

“What’s the other thing that tampons and pads are for?” Pam asked, curiously.

“Let’s just say I like being prepared,” Mike answered. “And in that vein,” he said, pulling out a bottle of Bullfrog 45, “I don’t care how much you want a tan when you get home. We go snorkeling for a few hours with your current tan and you’re going to burn to a crisp and not even know it until you’re back onboard.”

“Fine,” Pam sighed, turning around and flipping her hair forward. “Do me.”

“In a heartbeat,” Mike said.

When all three of them were lathered, he swung out the dive ladder. The yacht had a water-level deck for bringing in large fish that the ladder hung down from. He got the girls in their gear then got his own on.

“Just keep the snorkel in your mouth and your body level,” he said, slipping over the side. “Pam first. I’ll support you at first so you get used to it.”

Pam slipped into the water and he held her by the midsection, getting a world-class erection in the process. After a second she pulled her head out of the water and spit out the snorkel.

“That is so cool,” she said, grinning.

“To swim around just kick with your fins,” Mike said, releasing her. “You okay?”

“Great,” she said, putting the snorkel back in and kicking off.

“Me next,” Courtney said. “But I think I can do it myself.”

“Works,” Mike said, kicking backwards and putting on his mask. “After you.”

He followed the two girls towards the reef, listening to their snorkel-muffled oaths and amahs and just enjoying himself immensely. Suddenly there was a muffled shriek and Courtney turned around and made a beeline for the boat. Mike beat her back easily and was in the transom by the time she spit out her snorkel and climbed on board.

“There was this big, nasty-looking fish,” she said nervously.

“Barracuda,” Mike said, nodding. “Not a big deal. They don’t attack snorkelers. Well, to be honest I should say hardly ever. Not if you don’t have any necklaces or shiny stuff; I checked for that. You’re okay.”

“You’re sure?” she asked.

“I’ll go with you,” Mike said, sliding into the water and holding out his hand as Pam closed on the boat, too.

“Did you see it?” Pam asked after she spit out her snorkel.

“It’s okay,” Mike said, shaking his head and trying not to grin. “Three things to remember about barracuda. They’re curious, so they follow you around. Don’t wave your fingers at them, they might think they’re fish. Don’t wear shiny necklaces, they look like lures. Oh, and they’re fun to catch, but don’t eat the big ones.”

“Why?” Courtney said, slipping into the water and checking under her with her mask.

“They build up a toxin in their flesh as they get older,” Mike said when she’d surfaced. “Makes them poisonous. Come on.”

He led both of them by the hand back to the reef and started pointing out particular fish and coral. When the ’cuda cruised back in, he just ignored it, and after a while the ’cuda ignored them.

They snorkeled on the reef for a good hour before Courtney surfaced and spat out her snorkel.

“My shins are killing me,” she admitted. “I’m about done.”

“Me, too,” Pam said.

“Suits,” Mike said, glancing at his watch. “Let’s do lunch.”

Chapter Three

They had sandwiches, sitting at the bar with their suits on.

“Mike, thanks,” Pam said, washing down the sandwich with a swallow of Coke. “This is just loads of fun. But I feel like I’m… I’m eating your food and using your gas and stuff. This should be costing us money. How much would it cost to rent a boat like this to do this? I mean, I just don’t feel right.”

“Look, it’s just enormous fun having you both here, okay?” Mike said, shrugging. “I feel like I ought to be paying you money it’s so much fun.”

“How much?” Courtney said, grinning. “And, admit it, you’re just hoping to get laid.”

“I wouldn’t kick you out of bed,” Mike said, shrugging and grinning back. “Maybe if you were messy eating crackers. But, no, I’m just having fun watching you guys have fun. It’s a real high for a guy to get a girl to smile, and that’s a fact. So don’t sweat what it would cost. Trust me, I can afford it. I’d take you two to the Bahamas if you asked. Hell, I’d cruise you down to the Virgin Islands if you wanted. You’re both very nice young ladies, both in personality and in looks. Consider this boat yours until you have to go home.”

“Well, we’ll have to leave in a couple of days,” Pam said, frowning. “We can’t afford to stay in the hotel beyond then.”

“Uh, I did say the boat is yours,” Mike pointed out diffidently. “There are three open cabins. They’re small, but comfortable. If hotel costs are the only thing making you go home, move in. You can still go back whenever you’d like, in two days if you want. But it’s stupid to pay for the hotel when you can stay on the boat.”

Courtney raised an eyebrow at that and cocked her head.

“No strings?” she asked incredulously.

“I’m not using them,” Mike said, shrugging. “I already said I wouldn’t kick you out of bed, but I’m not going to drag you there, either. Or attach strings. No strings. Okay, a couple. Leave the cabins in the same shape they were when you got here, which is neat. Help with cooking and the dishes. Help wash down the boat.”

“Those aren’t what I’d call strings,” Pam said, frowning. “That’s just being polite.”

“There are lots of people in the world who are extremely impolite,” Mike said, picking up the paper plates and putting them in the trash. “Are you still checked into the hotel?”

“No, we were going to try to find a cheaper one,” Pam said.

“Okay, you decide,” Mike said. “But the cabins are yours if you want them.”

“What do you plan on doing this afternoon?” Courtney asked.

“I’d like to go fishing, frankly,” Mike said.

“I’m not that into fishing,” Courtney replied. “But I can catch a tan.”

“If you hook into a sailfish you’ll never look back,” Mike said, grinning. “But I don’t think we will this time of day. If we run out to the Stream we might be able to find some dolphin. Dolphin fish,” he added. “They’re fun to catch on light tackle. Or we could go after grouper.”

“Is this like big-game fishing?” Pam asked. “In a chair with a big rod? I saw those kind of chairs in the back.”

“Would be with sailfish,” Mike said. “But, like I said, I don’t think we’ll get any of those today. Maybe tomorrow if we start early. Maybe this evening we might scare some up. Or we can snorkel some more.”

“I’m game for fishing,” Courtney said, shrugging.

“Let’s go, then,” Mike said. “We can run out to the Stream and see what we can scare up.” He stopped and touched a control, bringing up a text screen.

“What’s that?” Pam asked.

“Text version of the national weather reports,” Mike said, nodding. “I can read the weather around here pretty well and it didn’t look as if anything was coming up. But I didn’t want you to find out how crazy it can get on the Stream on your first day out.”

“Thanks,” Courtney said dryly.

Mike unhooked, then started up and spun the boat to point out to sea. As soon as they were away from the reef, he pushed the throttles forward to maximum and set the autosteer, climbing up onto the tuna tower.

“This is great,” Courtney said, climbing up the ladder, followed by Pam.

“This is a great view,” Pam said, clutching at the railing as the tower swayed from side to side.

“Sure is,” Mike said, gesturing to the seats to either side of the captain’s chair. “You can see for miles.” He pulled a pair of binoculars out of a case and tracked around the horizon.

“Okay, what are you looking for, now?” Courtney asked.

“Hmmm…” Mike said. “Various things. Certain types of birds, splashes at the surface would be nice, debris, weed lines. Stuff.”

“Okay,” Pam said, then gasped at the sight in the water below. “There’s a big…”

“Hammerhead,” Mike said, lowering the binoculars and looking over her side. “About twelve feet. That’s why I like it up here you can see all sorts of stuff in the water.”

“This is so cool,” Courtney said, then threw her arms around Mike.

“You’re welcome,” Mike said uncomfortably. “What was that for?”

“’Cause it’s so cool,” Courtney said, letting him go. “I was worried you were a jerk when we met in the bar. But you’re… this is so great!”

“Good,” Mike said, smiling. “All that I ask is that you have fun. If there’s something that’s bugging you, or you’ve got a problem, just tell me, okay? And I’ll see what I can do to fix it. But if you want to thank me, have the maximum amount of fun you can have. That’s all the thanks I need.”

“Why?” Pam asked, frowning. “That’s so weird.”

“Because I’m a guy,” Mike said, shrugging. “You want the simple answer that’s been the answer for centuries? Or do you want the modern answer.”

“Both,” Pam said, her brow crinkling.

“Okay,” Mike said, picking up the binoculars again. “The old, short, answer is that when you’re happy, it makes me really happy. There’s some sort of quote about a man will give a kingdom to make a woman smile. The face that launched a thousand ships. The whole bit.”

“So what’s the modern answer?” Courtney asked.

“It takes all the fun, all the soul out of it,” Mike said, lowering the binoculars. “But… males that see any of several expressions on a female face have an endorphin rush from the sight. It’s a form of drug, a high. For that matter, males have an average of forty percent fall-off in long-term decision-making at the sight of a pretty female face. Those are both clinical studies. I could extrapolate from them, but I won’t. However, it’s definitely the reason that there are topless bars all over the place while things like Chippendales are rare. Women don’t have the same reactions. They can be somewhat visual, but they don’t have the same chemical reaction. It’s called ‘thinking with the other head’ but it’s not. It’s just a chemical reaction in the brain. It’s real for all that,” Mike said. “So if you want to pay me back, just smile. It’s worth every moment, every penny.”

“So we’re a drug?” Courtney asked quizzically.

“A strong one,” Mike said, shrugging.

“I can live with that,” Pam said. “But I want to help, too.”

“I can live with that,” Mike replied, and got the expected laugh. “I hereby promote you to deck wench! Your first duty is to see if you can maneuver a beer up here.”

“Aye, aye, Captain!” Pam said, grinning. “Courtney, you want anything?”

“I’ll take a beer,” Courtney said. “If that’s okay?”

“Let me check,” Mike said, leaning forward and shading the GPS. “By the time she gets back it will be.”

“Huh?” Courtney asked.

“Twelve mile limit,” Mike replied, grinning. “Technically, this being an American flagged ship, there’s still some sort of law. But past the twelve mile limit, nobody cares if I let a minor drink. But don’t get hammered.”

“Trust me, I won’t on one beer,” Courtney said.

“Three beers, coming up,” Pam said, sliding down the ladder.

“What’s the deal with the twelve mile limit?” Courtney asked, curiously.

“Past the twelve-mile limit, we’re no longer in U.S. jurisdiction,” Mike said. “The reality is that the U.S. owns these waters. They’ll stop anyone they want in this region. But the law gets really tricky beyond the limit. And the reality is that things like drinking ages, and gambling, go out the window. Past the twelve mile limit, you’re beyond the law. Doesn’t matter for you guys, really, but I don’t have to worry about getting hassled for contributing.”

“Oh,” Courtney said, turning around and looking behind them. “Hey, I can just barely see land!”

“Yep,” Mike said. “And see how the water is changing?” he added, pointing over the side.

“Getting pretty blue,” she said, nodding.

“Not real blue, yet,” Mike said. “You’ll see.”

“Beers,” Pam said. “But getting them up there…”

Courtney retrieved the Fosters and put them in holders.

“All I could find,” Pam said.

“If you’re stuck on something else, we’ll get it when we get back,” Mike said.

“We can at least buy our own beers,” Pam said, frowning.

“Ah, ah,” Mike said. “And take all my fun away?”

“This is good,” Courtney said, taking a swig of the Fosters and rolling the cap in her hand. “Trash?”

Mike took it from her and flicked it over the side.

“Don’t look so shocked,” he said, grinning. “It’ll sink to the bottom and decompose. Little fish will use it for shelter in the meantime. You don’t want to deprive them, do you?”

“I’m just so kneejerk about littering,” Pam said, then tossed hers over the side. “But that felt really fun.”

“Simple guilty pleasures are the most fun,” Mike said, flicking his over the side. “Better than complicated guilty pleasures.”

“What are complicated guilty pleasures?” Courtney asked.

“Think about it,” Mike replied, grinning. “What, you don’t have any complicated guilty pleasures?”

“I’m lost here,” Pam admitted. “Could you explain?”

“Not without getting more graphic than I’d like to,” Mike said. “But I’ll ask a rhetorical question: What do you fantasize about when you masturbate?” He looked from side to side and nodded. “The light dawns. Those can be very complicated guilty pleasures. And don’t ask me, nonrhetorically, please.”

“I won’t,” Courtney said, blushing. “But, you know, complicated guilty pleasures can be fun, too,” she added, wiggling from side to side.

“Don’t tease an old dog,” Mike said. “He might have one bite left.”

“So what are your complicated guilty pleasures, Mike?” Courtney asked coquettishly.

“I told you not to tease,” Mike said, frowning. “Some of my guilty pleasures are really complicated. And really dark. I don’t think we know each other well enough to get into them. But I’ll tell you one: I’ve serviced a few targets in my day, and if I’ve got a regret, it’s that I probably won’t be able to service any more.”

“Serviced targets?” Pam asked carefully.

“Killed bad guys,” Mike answered. “I don’t get any nightmares from serviced targets, even the ones that I’ve had to look at for some time. Screwed-up ops, I flashback on those. I had a bad one in Rumrunners the night I met you two. But targets? No problem.”

That provoked a rather long silence.

“Okay, now I’m having some problems,” Courtney said finally. “I hadn’t really internalized that I was out in a boat with a guy who used to kill people for a living. Has actually killed people, is what I mean.”

“Bad guys,” Mike said. “But, yeah, I told you not to tease an old dog. If you want to turn around I will,” he said, reaching for the wheel.

“No,” Courtney said, leaning forward and touching his hand. “Don’t. It just takes some getting used to. But I’d guess that with what happened to you,” she said, gesturing at the scars, “some of the same things happened to… targets.”

“Quite a few,” Mike said, having a clear image of the stairway. “But there are some very bad people in the world that desperately need servicing.”

“Syria,” Pam said, darkly.

“That was one of those good missions,” Mike admitted. “Very clear cut. But those aren’t the only bad people in the world, ladies.”

Courtney leaned over and laid her hand on his shoulder, then leaned further over to kiss his cheek.

“Thank you for servicing targets,” she said, rubbing his shoulder. “And I won’t tease you about your complicated guilty pleasures. Much.”

“If you do I’ll tease you right back,” Mike said, grinning. “I spent a lot of time in the body and fender shop. And the only thing to read was what the nurses had, which were very very trashy romances. Based on those…”

“Don’t go there,” Courtney said, leaning back and laughing. “I’ll definitely stop teasing.”

“Birds,” Mike said, picking up the binoculars and focusing them in. “Yeah, they’re feeding on a surface shoal.” He put his feet down and touched the wheel, turning the boat to starboard slowly. Even with his care, the tuna tower still leaned to the side.

“Whoa!” Pam said, grasping the rail. “That’s a little…”

“Exciting?” Mike asked, straightening out. “Courtney, think you can take the wheel?”

“Maybe,” she said as he stood up.

“I’ll back off on the speed,” he said, throttling down. “It won’t sway so much. You see those birds,” he added, pointing.

“Yeah?”

“Steer for them,” he said, picking up his beer and going to the ladder.

“Where are you going?” she asked.

“To get out the rods.”

“I’m steering this boat,” Courtney said nervously.

“I know,” Pam replied just as nervously.

“I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“I know,” Pam said, trying to sound supportive. “Just… steer for the birds.”

“They’ve moved,” Courtney said, turning the wheel slightly. The boat turned, and she had to turn back and forth a couple of times to get lined up, the tuna tower swaying, to her, dangerously.

“You’re doing great!” Mike yelled from the deck.

“He’s…” Courtney said and stopped.

“Yeah,” Pam replied. “Is it just me…”

“No,” Courtney said. “And did you see those pecs?”

“Yeah,” Pam said. “And he said women aren’t visual. God, what does he do, work out all day?”

“I know,” Courtney said, steering a touch to port. “It was all I could do to not run my finger over them just to see if they were real.”

“Oh, they’re real, all right,” Pam said. “And you know what gets me?”

“Not a single come-on,” Courtney said. “He’s not gay, I can tell that. But he’s not…”

“I know. It’s like he’s waiting for us to make the first move.”

“I know. It’s weird. And that thing about… servicing targets.”

“He’s actually killed people,” Pam said. “I mean, not just maybe. Has. No muss, no bragging, no bullshit.”

“Which just makes it worse,” Courtney admitted. “When he mentioned romance novels I just about wet my pants.”

“You too?” Pam said, shaking her head. “He said he stocked up for female visitors. I wonder if there’s a vibrator on board.”

“You mean other than the seats?” Courtney said. “Besides, who needs a vibrator. I’ve just been crossing my legs and rocking!”

“Courtney, you are such a slut,” Pam said, closing her eyes and leaning back in the chair. “And he wants to go fishing!”

Chapter Four

“Courtney,” Mike called. “You did great, but I’ve got it from down here. You want to come on down?”

“What’s up?” Courtney asked, sliding down to the flying bridge and looking around. Two heavy rods had been rigged aft, and two more that she pegged as “regular” rods with normal reels were set to one side.

“There’s a school of bait fish under the birds,” Mike said, throttling down. “What I’m going to do is point the boat at them and let out the lines. When we go through we should hook on to whatever is feeding on them, probably dolphin. I’ve got to get you rigged, though.”

He set the throttles to a fast cruise and led the two of them back to the aft.

“This is a fighting rig,” he said, putting a harness on Courtney. “You won’t really need it for dolphin, but it should help. You put the butt of the rod in the holder on your stomach. What happens is that a fish will get hooked. You take the rod out of the holder, set the butt in place and hit the drag. That should hook the fish for sure. These should be chicken tuna, little ones, and that rod is way oversized for them. But what we’ll do is bring one up to the boat and let it stay on the line. That will bring others around. Then we’ll fish for them with the lighter tackle.”

“Okay,” Courtney said, totally confused.

“I’ll walk you through it when we hook on,” Mike said, putting another harness on Pam. After he’d done that he let out the lines, already rigged with ballyhoo. He probably could have just used lures, but the hoo made it more likely they’d get a fish hooked and he wanted the girls to get some fish.

“Courtney, your rod,” Mike said, pointing to starboard. “Pam, that’s yours,” he added, pointing to the port rod. “I’m going up to the bridge.”

He’d set the autosteer to go past the bait pod, but he touched the controls and turned to port, coming around into the Stream to drag the lines past the edge of the pod. He could see the flash of hunting fish at the surface and even some leaping, dolphin for sure. The dolphin school was huge. This was going to be good.

“Mike! Mike!” Courtney suddenly yelled as the reel began to scream.

He went to reverse for a second to take the way off and turned around. “Pick up the rod and put the butt in the holder,” he called, calmly.

By the time Courtney had the rod in place he was next to her. The dolphin had stopped its initial run, and he leaned over and hit the drag just as Pam’s line started to run. When the line went taut the dolphin shook hard against it and Courtney nearly dropped the rod.

“That’s a big fish!” she yelled happily.

“Not all that big,” Mike said, smiling. “Just reel it in; that line’s way strong enough,” he said, going over to Pam.

Pam had gotten the rod in place without asking and was holding on tight when he hit the drag. She, too, grinned as she felt the fish on the end.

“Just reel them up to the boat,” Mike said, going over to the bait well. He had a mess of sardines, most of them still alive, and he scooped out a big netful and tossed them over the side, live chum to bring the dolphin up to the boat. He could see some breaking away from the main school and heading over to the largesse, their bodies flashing silver in the sunlight.

“Mike,” Courtney said, holding her rod up. “It’s nearly up to the boat.”

“That’s fine,” Mike said, taking the rod and looking over the side. He reeled in a bit more and set the rod in a rocket launcher, the line tracking back and forth as the dolphin tried to escape. “The other dolphin will be attracted to it, since it’s excited and they can’t tell the difference between being on a line and feeding. So now we really fish.”

He took one of the open-face rods and hooked a sardine on it by the tail.

“You ever cast before?” Mike asked.

“Yes,” Courtney said, looking at the rod. “Nothing this big, but I can do it.”

“Right out there,” Mike said, pointing towards the bait pod. “When it’s in the water, close the face and then hit this switch,” he said, pointing to the trolling control. “That way when the fish hits it can run with the line at first. Give it three seconds, then flick the switch back and hang on,” he added with a grin.

He went over and more or less repeated the performance with Pam, but he had hardly gotten to the stage of explaining the open-face reel when Courtney shrieked and he looked over to see the rod bending nearly in half.

“Now that’s fighting a fish,” he yelled.

“What do I do?” Courtney asked as the dolphin tracked back and forth.

“Bow to the rod,” Mike said, coming over and readjusting the drag. “When it gives you line, reel in. When it runs, just let the drag handle it. It will tire out.”

He went over and finished explaining the mysteries to Pam, then went back to Courtney, who was reeling in from time to time.

“I think it’s tiring out,” Courtney said. “I know I am.”

“You can use the leaning board,” Mike said. “But you’re going to be doing this a lot. Keep your right arm straight and let your back pull. Bow to the fish, reel in as you do, then lean back and pull it in.”

“That works,” Courtney said, trying it. “I was trying to pull in with my arm. You say these are little fish?”

“Tiny,” Mike said. “Maybe tomorrow we’ll go after sailfish. I’d love to see you pull in a sail.”

He headed back over to Pam who, having watched Courtney, was solidly pulling in her dolphin.

“Doing great,” Mike said.

“You were right,” Pam said. “This is fun.”

“We were lucky,” Mike replied. “You don’t usually get this surface action. It’s very fun when you do.”

“Mike!” Courtney called. “What do I do now?”

“Bring it around to the transom,” he said, pointing to the flush deck. He climbed down there, and when the fish came around he grabbed the leader and flipped it onto the boat, then up onto the fishing deck.

“That’s so pretty,” Courtney said, shaking her head.

“They are,” Mike said. “But they’re awfully plentiful, too.” He went forward and got out a digital camera. “Want a picture?” he asked.

“How?” Courtney asked, looking at the flopping fish.

“Grab the leader, the line, down by its mouth,” Mike said. “Wrap it around your hand — it’s thick mono, it won’t cut — and lift it up.”

Courtney got it up in the air and grinned, cheesily, for the camera.

“Vacation pictures,” Mike said, grabbing the fish and pulling the hook out. Then he grabbed it by the gill and tossed it in the cooler.

“I’ll need to throw some ice in there soon,” he said, rerigging Courtney’s line, then climbing down to the flush deck to land Pam’s fish.

He got ice, moved the boat, landed fish, took pictures, rerigged lines, untangled lines, baited lines, until the girls got tired.

“I’m beat,” Courtney said, rubbing her arm. “Can we quit soon?”

“Have to,” Mike admitted. “There’s a limit on dolphin and we’re getting close to it.”

“I’m done,” Pam said. “But that was lots of fun.”

“That’s the punchline to a really old joke,” Mike said, taking their rods. He took the rigs off, then took them forward to the rod locker and stowed them.

“What about these two?” Courtney asked.

“Just reel them over the side,” Mike said. “We’ll toss them in the cooler, too.”

“What time is it?” Courtney asked, yawning as Mike spun the boat around and headed inshore. “I’m beat. Did you slip something in my beer?” she asked, mock suspiciously.

“No,” Mike said, smiling. “Being out on a small boat tends to wear you out at first. You get used to it after a couple of days.”

“And I’m hungry,” Pam said, coming up to the bridge with three beers.

“That we can assuage,” Mike said. “I can either cook or we can pull into Rumrunners.”

“We were just there the other night,” Pam said, smiling. “Remember?”

“Not that one,” Mike said, shaking his head. “That’s Rumrunners II. The original Rumrunners is by itself on a small key; it was originally a speakeasy where the rumrunners actually brought in their loads. You can only get there by boat. Sometimes I sell my fish there. I think, in deference to you ladies and your fatigue and hunger, I’ll just sell them whole. But I know the cook, and that means we can get his orange mahi for free, fresh from the fish we land.”

“That sounds good,” Pam said. “But I need to wash up.”

“We’ll go park at Rumrunners,” Mike said. “I’ll go dicker for dinner and you two can wash up and get more beautiful, if that’s possible. Then I’ll wash up and we three can go to dinner. They also generally have a great band.”

“I don’t know if I can stay awake to party,” Courtney said, yawning again. “But… you’re on.”

“Hey, Louise,” Mike said, walking in the back door of Rumrunners.

“Hey, Mike,” the cook said, wiping his hands on his apron. “What you got?”

“Mahi,” Mike said. “Fresh and quivering. Whole, though.”

“I take,” the cook said. “You see the docks? Tree boats already bring in dorado, we’re still nearly out.”

“It’s why I parked around back,” Mike admitted. “Get Jose to give me a hand with the cooler?”

When the fish had been weighed Mike held up his hand.

“Louise, got two young ladies with me,” he said. “Can we get three of your delectable orange mahi? From those?” he asked, gesturing at the fish.

“Pick,” Louise said, grinning. “Finally get some girlfriend, huh? ’Bout time.”

“Just friends,” Mike replied, shrugging. “A couple of nice tourist girls who enjoy fishing. And any of them will do.”

“This one really is still twitching,” Louise said, pulling out his fillet knife and prodding one of the mahi. “Tree orange mahi coming up. I’ll get you table.”

“Gimme time to wash up,” Mike said. “And thanks.”

“You have fun,” Louise said, grinning evilly. “Two girls? You tink you’re man enough?”

“They’re just friends,” Mike said, shaking his head on the way out.

“How’d you get us past the line?” Pam asked.

“I have friends in low places,” Mike answered, pulling out her chair. “The cook was really happy to get more mahi; the tourists are eating him out.”

“This is great,” Courtney said, bending her head down. “But I’m still beat. And sunburned all over but my back. You were right.”

“We’ll aloe up when we get to the boat,” Mike said, and waved at the menus. “I already ordered for us; you really need to try Louise’s orange mahi. But if you want an appetizer…”

“God, that was great,” Courtney said, polishing off the last of the mahi with a bite of rice. “And this rice…”

“Fragrant rice,” Mike said. “Not on the usual menu. Like I said, the cook was really glad to have the fish. And we’re friends. He used to be a Navy steward, so we keep an eye on each other.”

“Can I get the check?” Pam asked. “I feel like…”

“We landed over sixty pounds of fish, Pam,” Mike said. “The meal was more or less on the house. Even with the drinks’ cost, there’s a net that will go on the account I run here. Actually, I think I owe you girls some money.”

“Don’t,” Pam said, definitely. “You wouldn’t if you figured gas. Let’s just call it even.”

“I can live with that,” Mike said. “You want some of the key lime pie?”

“I was starved and now I’m stuffed,” Courtney said. “I think I just want to chill. Can we really stay on the boat tonight?”

“You can stay for weeks if you want,” Mike said, getting up. “No dancing?”

“Not tonight,” Courtney said, standing up and then swaying. “Definitely not tonight. Among other things, I feel like a french fry.”

“Then may I take your arm?” Mike asked, offering his to both girls.

“A beautiful lady on either arm?” Pam asked. “Yes, you may.”

“Every man’s dream,” Mike said, leading them out and around the restaurant to the boat. “Aloe first, then we’ll head over to the slip. You ladies can rack out as soon as you’re aloed. I need to move slightly offshore, though; they need the dock space.”

“That’s fine,” Courtney said, yawning as she stepped on board. “Where’s the aloe?”

“All three bathrooms,” Mike said. “Could I suggest that you put your suits back on for aloe? Getting it on past shirts and bras…”

“Will do, Captain,” Pam said, smiling.

“I’ll meet you in the front cabin as soon as I get this thing anchored,” he said, casting off.

By the time Mike got the anchors down, one forward and two aft, and he got to the cabin, only Pam was there.

“Courtney is O-U-T, out,” Pam said, shaking her head. “She got aloe on the worst of it and collapsed.” She had changed back into her bathing suit, a blue-and-red string bikini, and was rubbing aloe on her stomach when he came in.

“Well, your back is okay,” Mike said, sitting next to her on the bed. “But the backs of your legs, I think I should have gotten them.”

“Give me a hand?” Pam asked, diffidently, holding out the bottle of aloe and rolling sideways.

“I know you want a tan,” Mike said, gently smoothing on the thick green after-sun gel. “But you need to take it easy. It took me a month to get this tan after I got down here.”

“That feels good,” Pam said, sighing. “I really am burned.”

“Not too badly,” Mike said, turning her to check her other leg. “Side of the thigh,” he said, leaning across her long, shapely, legs and smoothing on some more of the gel. “Probably reflection from the boat or the water when you were fishing.” He straightened up, looked her in the eye, then leaned forward and kissed her.

Pam had felt ready to explode as he gently rubbed on the aloe and she did explode when he kissed her, a totally unexpected wave of emotion that approached an orgasm and made her moan. She found herself running her hands over his pecs and across his shoulders, humming in pleasure.

“Whoa,” Mike said, pulling back and chuckling throatily. “Let’s make this last awhile,” he continued, lowering her down and sliding his tongue across her throat and then up to her ear, tickling the earlobe. His hands slid up and undid her bikini top, gently sliding it out and away. Then he brought his tongue down to the juncture of her neck and shoulder, probing hard, while one hand played with her nipple.

“Oh, God,” Pam moaned, running her hands over his back and shoulders. “I’ve wanted you to touch me all day.”

“I know.” Mike chuckled. “Well, I knew after a while. That’s why I didn’t. Anticipation and all that.”

“You evil bastard,” she whispered, her eyes closed. “Be evil to me. Please.”

“Do you know what you’re asking?” Mike asked, his face hovering over hers.

“I don’t… I…” Pam said, opening her eyes and looking at him with pleading in them.

“Softly tonight, love,” Mike said, gently brushing one finger up her neck. “Softly. Perhaps another night we’ll talk about what you’re asking.”

“How do you do that?” Pam asked, shuddering. “How do you know just where to stroke?”

“Experience,” Mike said, lowering his mouth to her neck again. He played with her nipples, then slid his mouth down to them, his right hand on her left arm, reading the goosebumps. When the goosebumps were up above her elbow, he knew she was having a good time. It was a trick he’d learned years before, and it stood him in good stead as he slid down from her beautiful breasts, nibbling at her aloe-covered stomach, down lower, the bikini bottom coming off…

Pam bit back a scream when she came, her legs clamping down hard. Mike had both his hands on them, though, holding them open. As soon as she came, he lifted himself up and entered her, filling her and resonating with the orgasm in a way she’d never experienced. She was shouting, but she realized that his hand was over her mouth, muffling her shrieks, his other hand on the back of her head, totally controlling her, and that just made it better, so much better that she went into a continuous stream of orgasms, shaking and moaning, scratching at his back in desperation to escape and so out of her mind she couldn’t begin to think beyond the waves of pleasure…

Chapter Five

When Courtney woke up, her first considered action was to brush her teeth and go to the bathroom. She figured she’d passed out about nine and it was after six. She tended to be an early riser and didn’t usually sleep that much and she really needed to pee.

After that she slipped on her shorts and T-shirt, sans bra and panties. She knew Mike had some around somewhere, but she could survive without either for a bit.

She brushed her hair but didn’t bother with makeup, instead creeping out of her room and trying the door of the cabin Pam had planned on using. Which was empty, the bed unused. Pam’s bag was on the floor, so she didn’t have the wrong room.

She raised an eyebrow and looked at the door to the main cabin, then crept to it and tried the door handle. Unlocked. She slowly twisted it down and slid the door open soundlessly…

Mike had woken up when Courtney opened the door to the bathroom. It wasn’t that he was a particularly light sleeper. He could sleep through a firefight if he wasn’t on duty, but he had a very acute security switch, so when someone started moving around he had to ID it. And he was curious what Courtney would do, so he stayed awake. When she headed for his door, he pulled the sheet up to cover most of Pam and simply waited.

Courtney’s expression was… crestfallen when she looked in the room. Mike wanted to laugh, but instead he shook his head and made a motion for silence and for her to wait. Then he carefully slid his arm out from under Pam’s head, gently replacing it with a pillow, and carefully, grimacing, rolled to the side of the bed. He was totally naked, but he figured Courtney could either hide her eyes or get a good look.

Getting out of bed was, as always, a trial. But he finally managed to snag his shorts and get them on, then crept to the door and past Courtney, quietly closing it behind them.

“Are you okay?” Courtney asked as he limped down the companionway.

“I will be,” he said, straightening slowly until he was fully erect. “God, mornings are bad.”

“You’re in worse shape than it looks,” Courtney said, following him into the lounge.

“Lots,” Mike said, slowly bending and stretching. “I didn’t get medically discharged because of this,” he said, waving at the scars. “I got medically discharged because I’ve got major joint damage, well, all over.” He got out the makings of coffee, as well as an apple, taking a bite. “Apple?”

“So you and Pam… ?” Courtney asked, taking a bite of the apple and then finally getting a good look at his back. “Jesus! You’re bleeding in places,” she muttered around the bite.

“Yes, me and Pam,” Mike said, walking over to take a bite as well. He crunched it up for a bit, then leaned down and kissed her.

The apple fell on the floor as her hand went up behind his head and pulled him in, hard. Suddenly they were on the floor, her hands running over his ruined back.

“What will Pam think?” she asked as they came up for air.

“I dunno,” Mike said, his tongue sliding into the juncture between her neck and shoulder. “Let’s go in and ask her.”

“Oh, God,” she moaned as his hand slid down into her shorts and over her ass. “I wanted you to do that,” she moaned.

“I’ve been wanting to do it,” Mike admitted, pushing her shorts down her legs. He pushed her shirt up and over her head and then down, trapping her arms. “And I’ve been wanting to do that, too,” he said, roughly.

“Oh, God,” she moaned, her head falling back.

Mike ripped the shorts off her legs then balled them up, stuffing them in her mouth. Her eyes flew open but then shut again as his mouth closed on her nipple and his hand went between her legs. She bit down on the cloth, smelling her own scent and getting even more excited as Mike expertly manipulated her, slowly stroking at her pleasure center, his mouth working on her nipple, sucking and blowing and occasionally nipping lightly until she shook her head from side to side and came so hard she thought she was going to stroke out.

Suddenly he was in her, taking her, one hand clamped over her mouth and the other kneading her breast, hard, pulling at the nipples. She was beyond pleasure, beyond thought, totally in the moment and almost unable to breathe for the strength of the ongoing climax until she thought she would just die right there.

Finally it was over, and as he slipped out of her, she made a little moan of sadness and longing.

Mike pulled the shorts from her mouth and kissed her, tenderly.

“Thank you,” he said, laying his forehead on hers. “Thank you, very much. I’m sorry about that.”

“Thank you,” Courtney said, slipping an arm out of her entrapping shirt and her hand over the back of his neck. “How are you feeling?”

“You mean the joints?” Mike asked, backing away from her gently and smiling. “Exercise helps.” He stood up and held out his hand.

“I think I need a Kleenex or something,” Courtney said.

“Your wish, milady,” Mike said, getting a Kleenex and handing it to her.

“I’ll be right back,” Courtney said, taking his hand to stand up, the other hand between her legs. “This is always embarrassing.”

“I don’t think so,” Mike said, running his hand over her back. “I’ll be right here. There is cuddle time I’m missing.”

When she came out he was on the couch in the lounge, nursing a cup of coffee and another by his side. He had slipped on a pair of shorts, but she was still naked.

“I didn’t know how you took it,” Mike said, waving at the coffee.

“Cream and sugar,” she said, picking up her shirt and shorts and shaking her head. “I’m running out of clothes.”

“And you don’t have any short of your car, which is far far away,” Mike said, waggling his eyebrows and leering. “You are so at my mercy!”

“Oh, be merciful kind sir!” Courtney said, dropping to her knees and grasping at his legs in mock horror. “Please don’t force me to be naked and at your mercy!”

“Don’t tease an old dog,” Mike said, holding out the cup. “I have cream and sugar, but how much?”

“Much,” she said. “Where is it?”

“I’ll get,” Mike said. “You rest your lovely bones.”

“I do need to get some clothes,” Courtney said, looking out the window. “Where are we?”

“Still about five hundred yards from Rumrunners,” Mike said, bringing over cream and sugar and a spoon.

“We are going to be allowed to go back to get clothes, right?” Courtney said, coquettishly.

“Do you play those games?” Mike asked. “From some signs, I’d guess you’d enjoy them.”

“What games?” Courtney asked, taking as sip of coffee. It was strong but not bitter, very smooth. “You make good coffee.”

“Thanks,” Mike said. “Bondage and dominance games was what I was talking about.”

“Uhm, no,” Courtney said, her eyes flying wide. “Are you talking about whips?”

“No,” Mike said, taking his own sip. “We really just played one, right there,” he said, pointing to the spot where they’d made love. “I pinned your arms and gagged you. You seemed to enjoy it.”

Courtney closed her eyes and her nipples sprung erect at his words.

“Whoa,” she whispered after a moment. “Uhm, I guess so.”

“It’s a form of bondage,” Mike said, shrugging. “Bondage and discipline are about dominance and submission. There are various ways to play it, master-slave, rapist-rapee, but the thing to keep in mind is that it’s all play. The point is for both parties to have fun.”

“Complicated guilty pleasures,” Courtney said quietly. “That’s what you were talking about.”

“Yep,” Mike said.

“So… what is your complicated guilty pleasure?” Courtney asked, still quietly.

“Shorts stuffed in your mouth?” Mike said, reaching out to stroke one nipple lightly. “Arms pinned? Hand on mouth? Guess. So what do you fantasize about when you’re masturbating, Courtney?”

“God,” she whispered. “Is it obvious? Is there some sort of mark on my forehead?”

“Not particularly,” Mike said. “And at this point I need to be careful…” He looked up and smiled faintly. “This should be interesting.”

Pam appeared in the opening to the companionway and looked at both of them blearily.

“How come you’re still alive?” she asked, shaking her head. “Much less up? Much less…” She looked at Courtney, still sitting on the couch naked, her head down. “Much less… God!”

“Morning, Pam,” Mike said, smiling. “Coffee?”

“How many times last night?” Pam asked, sitting at the table shakily.

“Orgasms?” Mike asked. “You have to keep count. Engagements? Three, I think.”

“What was I?” Courtney snapped. “A quick breakfast snack?”

“No,” Mike said, leaning over and kissing her on the head. “You, my dear, were a truly great wake-up. My joints aren’t even stiff anymore.”

“I need some clothes,” Courtney said, hugging her breasts.

“I’ll arrange,” Mike said, getting up and going to the cabins. He came back with a towel. “Here.”

“Is that all I get?” Courtney asked. “All that you’ll… permit me?”

“For now,” Mike said with a grin. “Pam, when you walked in, we were discussing… guilty pleasures.”

“Like two at a time?” Pam asked, shaking her head. “I’m not sure I’m ready for that.”

“No, actually we were discussion dominance and submission,” Mike answered. “Coffee?”

“Coffee?” Pam said, screwing up her face in confusion. “You just trot that out and ask if I want coffee?”

“Cream and sugar?” Mike asked. “Black?”

“Cream and sugar,” Pam said, shaking her head.

“Dominance and submission is the last love that dare not speak its name,” Mike said, getting her a cup of coffee and carrying the cream and sugar over. “Say when.”

“When.”

“Despite the fact that most studies put it as the most common fantasy,” Mike continued, sitting down by Courtney. “Something like fifty percent of women are willing to admit to submission fantasies. The total is probably higher.”

“I know girls who…” Courtney said, adjusting her towel. “Well, they’re definitely not submissive.”

“I think of it as a bell curve,” Mike said. “Some women are towards the dominance end all the way to full mistresses. Some are so submissive that they’re full masochists. The ‘do anything to me, Master’ types.”

“Do you know any of those?” Pam asked.

“I’ve known a few,” Mike admitted. “Not many. I don’t really travel in the circles, what’s referred to as the ‘scene’ among those that really get into it. But many females, I’d say most, fall somewhere in the middle. They enjoy being dominated, and I’m talking about in agreed to scenes here, not in day-to-day life, but they’re not full-scale masochists. They may even like to be spanked and told they’re bad girls or whatever, but they don’t want to be whipped until they bleed.”

“Pass,” Courtney said hastily.

“But… well…” he said, pausing. “What went on between Pam and me last night was not that far from what went on between Courtney and me.”

The two girls looked at each other for a second and then, almost simultaneously, dropped their heads and shook them.

“Girls,” Mike said, trying not to laugh, “there’s nothing to be ashamed about. You’re both very nice young ladies who have an… interest. Apparently, I might add. You certainly each seemed to have a good time.”

“I did,” Pam admitted, looking up. “But… it’s pretty hard to just talk about it.”

“Talking about it is important,” Mike said. “For a few reasons. One of them is that, well… do you want to continue to play? I mean for more than just today and tomorrow? That’s one thing to talk about. Another is the details of what you’re interested in exploring and, more importantly, what you’re not willing to explore. The term for it is ‘negotiation.’ ”

“I don’t want to be one of those weirdos who goes around town being led on a leash,” Courtney said definitely.

“Agreed,” Mike said. “And now we work out the details. Would you be willing to wear a collar here on the boat? Inside? Outside when we’re out of sight of other boats?”

Courtney writhed for a minute on the couch and took a deep breath.

“I don’t know,” she said, looking at Pam.

“Well,” Pam said, “I don’t know about you, Courtney, but I just got horny again thinking about it.”

“Thank you,” Mike said, nodding at her. “Let me lay some pretty boring groundwork. Dominance and submission, and bondage and discipline, first have to involve trust. You have to trust that the dom, in this case me, will use his intelligence and skill to not push you past the point that you’re comfortable. A scene is something like a scary movie. You go see a scary movie and there’s a bad guy chasing some girl around and killing her. That’s scary, but you know it’s not real. D and S is the same thing. It’s setting up something that in real life would be terrible. Rape. Being owned as a slave. Being forced to submit to a stranger, like a cop, for some reason. All of them, effectively, revolve around rape. But the difference is, the sub is in control. The sub can, at any time, say ‘I’m done’ or ‘time out, we need to talk.’ You can’t say that in real rape.”

“How do you do that?” Pam asked. “I don’t think I could have talked most of last night. I was too…”

“In the moment,” Mike filled in. “When a sub is fully in the moment, they often describe it as flying, like an out-of-body experience. But that moment can get broken very easily. Trust me, you could have if I’d pushed past your boundaries. Do you like anal sex?”

“No,” Pam said definitely.

“Then if I’d rolled you over and gotten out the butter?” Mike asked, grinning.

“You would have had a fight on your hands,” Pam said.

“You definitely would have been out of the moment,” Mike said. “I didn’t push at any real boundaries last night. It was far too soon, for one thing. What you do is you say ‘yellow’ if you need a time out and discussion. You say ‘red’ if you’re done, take me back to shore you asshole! If you’re gagged, and if we do this you’re going to be gagged a lot, you grunt in the gag. What you don’t do is say ‘stop’ or ‘no’ or ‘please.’ Those mean ‘more and harder, master.’ ”

Pam grinned at that and dropped her head, shaking it from side to side.

“I have a hard time with the way that you just trot stuff like that out,” Courtney said, shaking her own head. “I kind of like it, but it’s hard for me to accept how… open you are about it.”

“I’m open in here,” Mike said. “With you two, between us. But I don’t go around in leather bondage gear in public…”

“Do you have leather bondage gear?” Courtney said, involuntarily wriggling again.

“Some,” Mike said, frowning. “Not enough if we’re going to get… complicated. I can fix that in a day or so. The point is, this is ‘behind the bedroom door.’ Even out on the boat, in the middle of the Stream with nobody around to see, would be behind the bedroom door. And you can push it further, a bit, but you have to know when to stop, both as the dom and as the sub. Otherwise you really do get Nine and a Half Weeks.”

“Lost me again,” Pam said, frowning.

“It’s about the only major movie ever made about dom sub games and it was horrible,” Mike said, shrugging. “Basically a dom finds a newbie sub and completely takes over her life. You can do it. I could do it to you, two, probably. Slowly take away your will to resist, break every barrier, turn you into submissive sluts…”

“Are you trying to get me horny again?” Courtney said.

“A bit,” Mike admitted with a grin. “But… I sort of did that, accidentally, once. In the movie, the sub finally ran away from the relationship, broke the mental bond, which is way more important than the physical ones, and ran. That… rarely happens in real life when something like that occurs, and it does. And it didn’t happen in my relationship. I was young and just wanted to get laid and… be able to say ‘bend over’ whenever I wanted. And she… wasn’t quite right when I met her and fell, well, not in love but into total submission. And I used her. I knew I was using her, liked it and didn’t like it at the same time, she knew she was being used, liked it and didn’t like it at the same time. Finally, I broke up with her and told her to hold onto her soul. I couldn’t just… back away. It was too easy to just use her. My resistance, then, wasn’t that high. Young, dumb and full of cum. I had to simply… leave.”

“That must have been tough,” Pam said, frowning. “I mean a guy walking away from… you could do pretty much anything you wanted?”

“Anything,” Mike said, clicking his teeth. “Anytime, anywhere.”

“And you walked away,” Pam said.

“Had to,” Mike said with a shrug. “For her. I won’t say she took it well. But the point is, I can manage that, now. But, if you get into this… scene, it’s something that you have to look out for. There are other guys, like me, who won’t back away. Who won’t… let you go. There are predators in this subsection of the sex world, guys who will gladly hold onto you and break you, knowing what they’re doing and using you instead of…” He shrugged. “Instead of caring for you and wanting to simply have you enjoy yourselves and get their enjoyment as well. The ‘bedroom door’ is tricky. If you stay in the scene, get deeper in it, you might do full scenes, with other people watching…”

“Not on your life,” Courtney said, shaking her head.

“You’d be surprised,” Mike said. “Think about what you fantasize about when you masturbate.”

“Uh…” Courtney said, then paused.

“Yeah,” Mike said, nodding and working his jaw. “Or… hmm… going to a club in a miniskirt and no panties and sort of… sitting on your master’s lap, with his dick out through his zipper and… moving to the beat…”

“Okay,” Pam said, holding up her hand. “I can see what you mean by the bedroom door being tricky.”

“You also have to know when the scene ends,” Mike continued. “Firmly know when you’re… yourself again and the scene is over. Submissive means in sex play, not in ‘real life.’ That’s part of the dom’s job, to make it plain when the scene is over. In a way, I’ve made a mistake by leaving Courtney in nothing but a towel. It’s continuing the scene when we should really be out of scene. But I thought she’d sort of like it. Just a guess.”

“No comment,” Courtney said, pulling at the top of the towel.

“Here’s the question: When do you have to go back to Missouri?”

“That’s a big question,” Pam said carefully. “Not until classes start, I guess.”

“I’ve said it before, you can stay as long as you’d like,” Mike said, just as carefully. “If you’d like, we can just fish and dive — I’m a qualified SCUBA instructor by the way, so I can get you qualified on that if you want. Or we can fish and dive and… play. For as long as you’d like. Or, rather, until it’s time to go back to Missouri. Not forever.”

“Why not forever?” Courtney asked sharply. “Commitment issues?”

“Really complicated ones,” Mike answered, nodding. “Let’s put it this way, for reasons I won’t get into it would be a really bad idea for me to ever get married. Really bad. Having kids is out of the question.”

“Well, I wasn’t talking marriage,” Courtney said, shaking her head.

“Just leave it, if we can,” Mike said, shrugging. “But you can stay for a couple of days, or a week, or until it’s time to go back to Missouri. No strings at all. But. If we’re going to do scenes, we’re going to do it right. Full contract.”

“Contract?” Pam said, raising an eyebrow.

“Contract,” Mike answered, grinning.

“That sounds ominous,” Courtney muttered, pulling at her towel again.

“Not nearly as ominous as the actual contract,” Mike replied, grinning again. “Trust me, you’ll love it. Just doing the contract is a scene.”

Pam looked at Courtney, who shrugged and waggled her head.

“Okay,” Pam said carefully. “We’ll stay for… a bit longer.”

“Works,” Mike said, nodding. “Okay, we are very much out of scene at this point. Courtney, I’ve got a bunch of T-shirts that are going to be long enough to be a dress for you. Why don’t you grab one of those for the time being, or your suit. Maybe your suit under the shirt if you want. I’ll get the anchors in, we’ll head back to the marina and get your gear. Maybe do a little shopping unless you have more suits.”

“I’ve got one more,” Pam said.

“I don’t,” Courtney said. “I never used them for anything except sunning, really. I don’t swim much at home.”

“We’ll be swimming, and sunning, a lot,” Mike said, standing up. “And let me pay for the suits, okay? The proprietary amount I got in the buyout? Just say it was in excess of ten mil. I can afford bathing suits. Even very pretty, very expensive ones.”

“And anything else you’d want!” Courtney said, her eyes wide.

“No,” Mike said, pausing at the opening to the companionway and not turning around. “I can’t buy the very real pleasure I’m getting from your company. I don’t even mean the sex, which, by the way, was incredible in case I didn’t mention it. I mean the real honest pleasure I’m getting from just having the two of you around.”

Chapter Six

“Are we insane?” Pam said quietly, when the cabin door closed.

“If I am,” Courtney said, lying back on the couch and closing her eyes, “I don’t ever want to go back to sanity.”

“I think that’s the trap he was talking about,” Pam said, shaking her head. “I think I know what he means. I think if he told me to do… just about anything, I’d do it.”

“Yeah,” Courtney said, sitting up. “But… I trust him not to really hurt me. Except, maybe, break my heart,” she added sadly.

“He really hit the nail on the head with that one,” Pam admitted. “The M word.”

“I’d marry him in a heartbeat,” Courtney agreed, nodding. “And he says he can cook.”

“I’m a great cook,” Mike said, tossing her a brown T-shirt. “Sorry, I need to do laundry. It was all I had left clean.”

“What is it?” Courtney asked, holding up the light tan shirt with “Alpha Five” stenciled on the front.

“One of my team shirts,” Mike said, shrugging. “It will cover your lovely nakedness, which is a pity. Your gorgeous blonde bush is showing under the towel.”

Courtney stood up and dropped the towel, posing.

“Does this make you think of anything?” she asked coyly.

“Nope,” Mike said, shrugging. “Can’t think of a thing.”

“Take your pants off and prove it,” Courtney said, stretching and arching. “Nothing?”

“You really want me to prove it?” Mike said, raising an eyebrow.

“You’re serious?” Courtney asked, looking at his crotch. “God, you’re serious.”

“One of the requirements of being a good dom is control,” Mike said. “Okay, I’ll prove it,” he added, backing towards the companionway. “Pam, could you take off your suit, please?”

“Uhm…” Pam said, looking from one to the other and then shrugging. “God, I can’t believe I’m doing this,” she muttered, reaching up to untie her top.

When she was naked, Mike shrugged off his shorts and raised an eyebrow.

“You’re not even a little hard,” Courtney said accusingly.

“Nope,” Mike said calmly.

“How ’bout this?” Courtney said, writhing towards him, hands behind her head, hips working.

“Nope,” Mike said, looking over her body disinterestedly.

“He’s serious,” Pam said, shaking her head and looking away.

“That’s… sick,” Courtney said, stopping and looking at him angrily. “It’s insulting! I know you like us!”

“Very much,” Mike said in the same calm tone. “Would you like to see how much?”

“Yes,” Pam said, looking back, her eyes widening as he thickened and lengthened before her eyes. “Jesus!”

Mike reached out quickly and took Courtney’s jaw in a hard one handed grip.

“So do you really want to challenge me?” he growled, looking her hard in the eye.

“No,” Courtney whispered, panting.

“’No, master,’ ” Mike growled.

“No…” Courtney closed her eyes and panted for a second. “No… master.”

“Very good,” Mike said, smiling at her, his eyes hard. He released her and pulled up his shorts, then looked over at her. “Are you okay?” he asked gently.

She just looked at him in confusion and raised a hand that fluttered in the air like a bird.

Mike gently took it and pulled her into his arms, his face in her neck, holding her naked body gently.

“It’s a strange feeling, isn’t it?” he asked quietly. “But it’s okay. I really do care. But if you tease or challenge, well,” he said, pulling back and looking her in the eye, grinning, “this old dog has way more than one bite.”

“Okay,” Courtney said, smiling and rubbing at his chest, still obviously agitated. “I won’t tease.”

“Unless you want to get bit,” Mike said, rubbing at her hair. “That’s part of the play, too.”

“Uh, I’m sort of…”

“Later, unfortunately,” Mike replied. “We have real life to contend with for a while. You probably should get dressed and catch a breather; this is a lot to deal with all of a sudden.”

“Yes,” Pam said, softly, “it is.”

He pulled Courtney back into his arms, then moved to Pam, bringing her into a group hug.

“We’ll have fun,” Mike said gently. “And any time, any time, that you want to stop or just take a breather, you can tell me that and we’ll stop for as long as you want. Permanently, if that’s what you want. I’m not a rapist. I’m not a slave owner. We’re, all three, friends. And we need to stay that way. Okay?”

“Okay,” Pam said, smiling, her face working. “This is just…”

“Scary like a scary movie?” Mike asked, loosening up his hold. “Or scary like… Syria?”

“Truth?” Pam said. “Somewhere in between.”

“Probably about right,” Mike said, shrugging. “The analogy isn’t perfect. There’s no physical touch in a movie. Speaking of which, did you call your friend back?”

“No!” Pam said, her eyes wide.

“Do that while I go get the anchors in and head back to the marina.”

When he was gone on deck, Pam looked down, realized she was naked, and blushed scarlet.

“I think we’re going insane,” she repeated, putting on her suit and heading to her cabin to dig out her cell phone.

“I’m all for it,” Courtney said, picking up the T-shirt and sniffing it. No smell of Mike, more’s the pity.

“You’re a slut, Courtney,” Pam said from the cabin. “Oh, crap.”

“What?” Courtney said, walking to her door.

“There are six messages,” Pam said. “Probably all from Stacey. I hope she didn’t freak out too bad.” She hit the speed dial.

“Pam!” Stacy said, desperately. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Pam said, giggling. “More than okay. Really, really insanely okay, okay?”

“You didn’t call!” Stacey said. “And you didn’t answer your phone. I was going out of my mind! I almost called the police.”

“Sorry, sorry,” Pam said. “Don’t, it’s okay. It’s really, really okay. It’s not just okay, it’s great.”

“Me!” Courtney said, grabbing at the phone. “Me!”

“Courtney wants to talk,” Pam said, handing over the phone.

“Stacey!” Courtney squealed. “You know the tall, dark, and handsome stranger? How about tall, dark, rich, dangerous, handsome stranger?”

“You’re kidding,” Stacey said enviously.

“Did I mention great in bed?” Courtney said, flopping down in the lower bunk and kicking at the top one happily. “Did I?”

“Just you or… ?” Stacey asked incredulously.

“Both!” Courtney squealed. “Pam… well, a bunch of times. Me once. Came twice!”

“Courtney!” Pam said, gritting her teeth.

“I think Pam came…” She looked over and shook her head. “How many?”

“Some.” Pam sighed, shaking her head.

“Like, six?” Courtney asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Six?” Stacey shouted. “You’re joking!”

“More like…” Pam said, shaking her head. “Give me the phone, Courtney.”

“Come on,” Courtney replied. “You can count that high, right? Three, four? Five?”

“Give me the phone,” Pam said, holding out her hand.

“Stacey,” she said carefully, “we’re having a lot of fun. We’re probably going to stay down here for a few more days…”

“Weeks you mean!” Courtney yelled. “Months!”

“Mike’s invited us to stay,” Pam said calmly. “He’d invited us to stay before last night and I think we’ll take him up on his kind invitation.”

“We’re slaves!” Courtney yelled. “Slaves to his desire!”

“Is she out of her mind?” Stacey asked.

“Yes,” Pam replied calmly. “And so am I. Completely round the bend. Head over heels in… lust, I guess.” She shook her head and sighed. “But Courtney’s right. This guy is nice, he’s… pretty handsome, he’s got a body like… Christ you just want to spend you life running your hands over his pecs. Great boat, we went fishing for dolphin fish, that’s mahi-mahi, and we caught a bunch and then took them to this great restaurant he knows and the cook fixed them up great. Then when we got back to the boat Courtney kind of passed out…”

“He didn’t drug her, did he?” Stacey asked, suspiciously.

“No, she was just worn out,” Pam said.

“Exhausted from looking at him,” Courtney said, humming happily.

“It wasn’t drugs,” Pam said. “She went to bed while Mike was reparking the boat, then he was helping me put on aloe and…” She paused and sighed. “Whooo. Great hands. Did I mention great hands? And you know the bondage thing?”

“He didn’t tie you up!” Stacey said.

“Not yet,” Pam sighed. “But he totally took charge. I could barely think. It’s like he reads your mind, it’s just insane. I think we did it about four times last night and I came at least three times, but a couple of them were like one continuous…”

“Me, too!” Courtney caroled.

“Hush,” Pam hissed. “Anyway, we’re going to stay for awhile. We’ll call our parents. And I’ll call you, too. He was the one who told me to call you last night, and he reminded me that I hadn’t called back this morning.”

“Courtney said something about ‘dangerous,’ ” Stacey said cautiously. “I’m still worried about the ‘dangerous.’ ”

“He’s a former SEAL,” Pam said. “And just about covered in scars; he got really shot up somewhere. But… he’s a nice guy. He can be really dominant in a good way, then turn caring in the next second. It’s…”

“It’s making me cum just thinking about it,” Courtney said, her legs in the air, crossed, and rubbing back and forth.

“Courtney, would you quit that?” Pam said, looking away. “Courtney is just… gone. She’s turning into a total whore, I swear.”

“As long as I’m Mike’s ho,” Courtney said, laughing and sitting up. “Me.”

“Here’s Courtney.”

“I really was tired last night,” Courtney said. “It wasn’t drugs, it was being out on the boat and being amazingly horny for hours. It really took it out of me.”

“He’s that great?” Stacey said, disbelieving.

“He’s got a body like a ruined Adonis,” Courtney said. “Great legs, huge thighs, nice calves, stomach’s a bit big, but I think that’s age because it’s strong too. Arms, shoulders, great tan, and these massive scars on his chest and stomach. Like Pam said, he got really shot up, I don’t know how he lived, you know? When I got up I checked Pam’s cabin…”

“You were on the boat last night?” Stacey asked.

“Oh, yeah, it’s a big boat,” Courtney said. “A yacht, I guess. Did I mention he’s rich? Anyway, I checked Pam’s room and she wasn’t therrre…” she caroled, grinning evilly.

“Oh, shut up,” Pam said, shaking her head.

“So I crept up to the main cabin and peeked in and he was awake and Pam was just out like a light. I guess she was worn out,” she added, winking at Pam.

“It had been a long day,” Pam said.

“Long night more like it,” Courtney said. “When he got out of bed it was like watching a Cro-Magnon or something. He’s apparently got a lot of joint damage. And he still looked good. Well, except for the new scars on his back,” she said with a grin, winking at Pam.

“And he started making coffee, moving better by then, and then…” Courtney paused and shook her head. “It got sort of confused. There was this apple and then we were on the floor and he pinned my arms down with my shirt and stuffed my… anyway, he just… took me. He played with me, I mean really played, not just ‘let’s get her wet enough to get it in,’ but just worked me all the way ’til I came and then just… took me.” She stopped, panting.

“Courtney,” Stacey said, a bit breathlessly. “I don’t have a boyfriend right now. Could we cut back a little on the description?”

“Well, let’s just say I know what Pam meant by one continuous cum,” Courtney said, shaking her head. “Mindblowing doesn’t begin to describe it. When Pam came out I was still stark naked and I liked it. He’s into bondage and all that, by the way. We talked about it this morning. But he’s… he keeps talking about safety and making sure we’re clear when we’re not in what he calls ‘scene.’ He’s… just so blunt about some things. But in a good way. It’s almost like taking a class. A really fun class!” she finished.

“I wish I was there,” Stacey sighed. “But I’ve got to work.”

“Come on down,” Courtney said. “Plenty of room. And I’m sure he could wear all three of us out!”

“Won’t fly,” Stacey said. “But I’m glad you’re having fun.”

“We are,” Courtney said. “Lots of fun. Fun fishing, fun snorkeling, fun partying, and lots of fun screwing. God, I want to screw him again. I want him to screw me again. I’m getting wet just thinking about it.”

“I’m getting wet just hearing about it,” Stacey sighed. “Look, call me, okay? Every day you can.”

“Okay,” Courtney said. “Talk later.”

“Girls,” Mike said when Pam and Courtney came up on the flying bridge. “Do either of you have a passport? Barring that, how about a birth certificate?”

“I’ve got a birth certificate,” Pam said, frowning. “But not with me.”

“Me, too,” Courtney said. “But, why?”

“I want to take you to the Bahamas,” Mike said. “It’s just over the Stream. The diving’s better, for one thing. And less boats, for another, once you get away from Bimini. Some good clubs on the islands, too. I was thinking about just going… cruising. Fish some, dive some, play around, do a little clubbing. I don’t dance, but I’d love to watch you two. But you need birth certificates. Getting into the Bahamas is no big deal, but you need one to get back in the States. Technically. Probably we could slip you in to Islamorada, but it would get sticky if we got stopped or if customs found out.”

“Mine’s at home,” Pam said, shrugging. “So’s Courtney’s.”

Mike nodded and sighed. “You’d have to ask your parents to send it down, right?”

“Oh, that would be a great call,” Courtney said, grimacing in panic. “’Hi, Dad, I’ve met this guy who’s into bondage who wants to take me to a foreign country so he can work his will on me.’ Not.”

“Well, we’ve got a couple of days to decide,” Mike said, shrugging. “I need to call a friend to send me some gear, and that will take a day or so to get here.”

“Bondage gear?” Pam asked nervously.

“Very,” Mike replied. “I’ve got a FedEx number. If you can work up the courage, all you have to do is give it to your parents and they can send the paperwork. You’re both eighteen or older, right? I should have asked before, my bad that I didn’t.”

“Yes,” Courtney said. “I’m eighteen, Pam’s nineteen.”

“Well, I’d really like you to call your parents and get the paperwork,” Mike said. “If we can’t, we can’t, and I might just go ahead and go anyway. Like I said, we probably wouldn’t get caught coming back in. And even if we did, well…” He shrugged. “I’ve got some strings I can pull to get it cleared up.” He suddenly stopped and blanched as he imagined the report getting to the President. It probably wouldn’t go higher than Pierson, which would be funny rather than embarrassing. But if it got to the President, or even the NSA…

“What’s wrong?” Pam asked worriedly.

“I was just imagining if the conversation got… as high as it might,” Mike said, shaking his head. “Embarrassing doesn’t begin to cover it. Much as you don’t want your parents getting in on the conversation, you really don’t want it going where it might go otherwise.”

“What do you mean?” Courtney said uncertainly.

“Well…” Mike said, wanting to explain but not knowing how to do so. “Let’s put it this way. From what I did with the Navy, I’ve got some pretty high contacts who would be willing to pull strings to let my two coed… girlfriends, who obviously are American citizens, back into the country. But do you really want your names going across the desk of, say, an undersecretary of defense?” Not to mention Donald Brandeis’s, he thought.

“Oh,” Pam said, blanching.

“So, if you can screw up your courage, call your parents,” Mike said. “The sooner the better. If they can get the certificates out today, it would be best.”

Chapter Seven

“Hi, Mom?” Courtney said brightly.

“Hi, Courtney,” Abigail Trays said. “How are you enjoying the Keys?”

“Uhm… really enjoying them,” Courtney said. “In fact, Pam and I are going to stay down here for a while longer. If that’s okay.”

“You’re an adult now, Courtney,” her mother said sadly. “You can do whatever you want. Are you okay for money?”

“Yeah, we’re… fine,” Courtney said.

“What’s wrong?” Abigail asked. “And don’t say ‘nothing.’ ”

“I need a favor,” Courtney admitted. “And I don’t want you to freak. Or Dad. And I can really see Dad freaking.”

“What’s wrong?” her mother asked. “You are okay?”

“I’m fine,” Courtney said, shaking her head from side to side. “It’s just… I need a favor. Uhm… Pam and I met this really nice guy down here. And… we want to go to the Bahamas with him on his boat…” she said, pausing and wincing. “He really is a nice guy, Mom. And he’s really into making sure we feel safe about it. We went out fishing yesterday for dolphin, the fish not the other, mahi-mahi…”

“I know what dolphin is, dear,” her mother said tightly. “I’m just having a problem with my little baby meeting some guy with a boat… what kind of boat?”

“Well, more of a yacht,” Courtney said. “He’s a SEAL who’s retired and made money selling what he calls widgets to the military. Now he lives down on the boat. Honestly, Mom, he hardly even tried to pick us up. Just asked if we wanted to go fishing and said to give him a call. But… it’s a really nice boat and he’s a nice guy and I’ve never been to the Bahamas…”

“Courtney,” her mother said, sighing. “Yes, okay. But… yes, you’re a grown-up young lady and can make your own decisions but… how old is he?”

“Thirty something,” Courtney said tightly. “I know that’s kind of old, but he’s in…” She paused and sighed. “Really incredible shape, even with all his… anyway, he’s a really nice guy, Mom. And he told us we could stay as long as we liked, as long as we left on time to go back to school.”

“Sounds like he’s got the best of both worlds,” Abigail said. “He gets fun and then when the summer’s over…”

“I guess, maybe,” Courtney said. “But it doesn’t feel like that. I think he really cares, but he said he has some, complicated commitment issues, too. And I’ve learned that when he uses the word ‘complicated’ to be very careful where I tread.”

“That sounds ominous,” Abigail said. “Honey, are you sure about this?”

“Yes,” Courtney said definitely. “It’s not going to interfere with school and I’m having… lots of fun. I really want to do this. Some kids get to go to Europe for the summer. You know I couldn’t do that. I’d like to at least get to the Bahamas. Please, Mom?”

“I think you don’t know what you’re getting yourself into,” Abigail said carefully. “But you are an adult. But, honey… be careful, okay?” She paused for a time and Courtney wasn’t sure what she wanted to say.

“Mom,” Courtney said. “Mike’s all over about safety with us. He’s… he really wants to make sure we’re not only safe, we feel safe. And he’s…” She stopped and sighed. “There’s things I’d like to talk about, but you’re my mother. I don’t think you’d understand.”

“You might be surprised, dear,” Abigail said gently.

“If you do understand, I don’t want to know,” Courtney said, sighing, then paused. “Mom, have you ever heard the… term I guess: scene.”

There was a very long pause.

“Yes,” Abigail said calmly.

“Oh,” Courtney replied, her eyes widening.

“Is he a top or a bottom?” Abigail asked.

“A what?” Courtney asked.

“Is he a dominant or a submissive, then?” her mother asked.

“Mom!”

“Dear, do you know what a spreader bar is?”

“Mom!” Courtney gasped. “No. And I don’t want to know if you do!”

“You know those rosewood planter hangers in your father’s and my bedroom?”

“Mother!”

“Now I’m particularly worried, Courtney,” Abigail said firmly. “Because I know exactly how badly this can go. I don’t think you have any idea…”

“Mike… talked about that a little,” Courtney said. “About… only doing… that behind the bedroom door. But he also said something about… sometimes it’s a bit hard to figure out where the bedroom door is.”

“That’s simple,” Abigail said. “You simply don’t do anything in such a way as mundanes are aware. But he sounds like he kind of has his head on his shoulders. However, safety is important, I don’t think you realize how important. I’ve had a good friend die because her dom didn’t get a gag off in time. And… many people who get far into the scene never have a normal life. It’s a form of arrested development and I’m not sure if it’s a chicken or egg situation, whether they weren’t ever going to get beyond that stage or if getting too far into the scene caused it. I don’t want that happening to you, Courtney, you have too much potential. And what you’re doing, really, is called boat bunnying. Buying your way to a vacation on your back—”

“Mike invited us before we’d… done anything,” Courtney said. “He said he wouldn’t kick us out of bed but there were no strings. I don’t think there are any even now. I think I could say ‘I’d like to just go along for the ride’ and it would be fine. But… I can’t believe I’m having this conversation with my mother!”

“I don’t think you know what truly good is, dear,” Abigail said, trying to get through to her.

“I know Pam came at least three times last night,” Courtney said. “And I don’t know whether to count this morning as one, two or one continuous amazing climax, Mother, if you want me to be blunt.”

“Oh,” Abigail said. “Uhm… What was his name again?”

“Mother!”

“Well, your father and I do swing,” Abigail said.

“Mother!”

“And, I suppose I’m probably too old for him, but some guys do enjoy mother-daughter action…”

“Mother!”

“Sorry, dear, just teasing,” Abigail said, laughing. “You started this.”

“There are things you don’t want to know about your parents!” Courtney said, closing her eyes, tightly. “God!”

“This is a conversation, frankly, that I’ve both wanted to have and dreaded,” Abigail said sadly, “because things like this, I’ve noticed, tend to run in families. Now you know why I’ve tried to get you to act more like a lady. A woman should be a perfect lady in public and a whore when the bedroom door closes. And the bedroom door, dear, is anything that prevents the mundanes from knowing what is going on. I won’t tell you some of the things that I’ve done that would shock you. But they would shock you. And there is a group here, friends of ours. All the times your father and I went out to ‘dinner and a movie’ and left you with a sitter, we weren’t going out to a movie.”

“Do I know any of these people?” Courtney said, her eyes wide.

“Yes,” her mother said. “And I won’t name names. I strongly doubt that you’d guess who most of them are.”

“Mrs. Mathers,” Courtney said definitely. “But…”

“She wouldn’t mind,” Abigail said humorously. “Good guess. But call her Mistress Mathers, if you would. But not in public.”

“God,” Courtney said. “I can’t believe I’m having this conversation.”

“I’m telling you this so you understand that I’m not just some old fogy of your mother,” Abigail said. “I know what you are getting into. And it can be… yes, wonderful. It also has a real element of danger. And I don’t know your master. I would have much preferred that you become involved with a master I knew I could trust. One who wouldn’t… warp you and who will be cautious about… various things. Are you a mas, dear?”

“Mom, you’re getting beyond me, here,” Courtney said, her head reeling.

“Are you a masochist?” Abigail said tightly. “Has he whipped you?”

“No!” Courtney said. “God, Mother.”

“Okay.” Abigail sighed. “We’ll talk about that later.”

“Mom?” Courtney said, her eyes wide. “Are you a… mas?”

“No comment,” Abigail said.

“Mom?”

“Well,” her mother said, “you know how sometimes we’d go to the pool and I’d wear a shirt and long pants?”

“Mom?”

“Choose your own limits, dear,” her mother said tightly. “And allow me to choose mine.”

“What are your limits?” Courtney asked.

“That is for me, and your father, to know,” Abigail said primly. “But I will say that… there is a terrible glory in a good whipping.

“Mother!”

“Don’t let him strike you on the breasts or across the kidneys. He should know that. I don’t suppose I could speak to this young man?”

Courtney’s eyes flew wide in horror at the thought and she shook her head.

“I don’t think…”

“If you’re going out of the country with him, surely I should speak to him,” Abigail said with remorseless logic. “And much more so if you’re going to enter a master-slave relationship.”

“Mother!”

“Clear communication is vital in a relationship like that, dear,” her mother said.

“I’m an adult, mother,” Courtney said, shaking her head.

“And do you want your birth certificate?” Abigail said. “How am I going to get it to you?”

“He gave me his FedEx number,” Courtney said. “He still does some consulting for the military.”

“You’re sure this person isn’t simply…” Abigail said and paused. “There are many people who… talk about having experiences they didn’t have. Up to pathological liars, who are very dangerous people, dear.”

“Well, from his scars, I’d say not,” Courtney answered. “He’s been shot, that’s for sure.”

“Oh,” Abigail said uncertainly. “I really do need to talk to this young man.”

“He’s not exactly young,” Courtney said.

“He’s in his thirties, dear,” her mother said. “I am forty-two. He’s a young man to me.”

“Okay,” Courtney said, sighing. “Hang on.”

She went up on deck where Mike was backing the boat into the dock.

“Courtney, could you grab those…” He started to say, then saw she had the phone clutched to her chest.

“My mom would like to talk to you,” she said desperately.

“I half-expected that,” Mike said. “But I need to get the lines on, first.”

Mike got the boat secured to the rear and decided the rest could wait. He walked over to Courtney and took the phone.

“Mike Jenkins,” he said. “This is Courtney’s mother?”

“Yes,” Abigail said pleasantly. “How do you do, Mr. Jenkins?”

“Fine,” Mike replied, going into the closed bridge and then down to the lounge. He could faintly hear Pam doggedly arguing with someone in her cabin.

“I understand you’d like to go to the Bahamas with my daughter?” Abigail asked.

“If it can be arranged,” Mike answered. “Getting over there is easy, you just point the boat east and go. Getting back, however, requires getting past American customs and immigration. They want to ensure that even your daughter is, in fact, an American citizen. Thus the birth certificate.”

“It’s the going on the trip that interests me,” Abigail said sweetly. “I understand you’re a top?”

Mike paused and his eyebrow raised.

“Have an interesting conversation with Courtney?” Mike asked. “I heard the occasional shouts of ‘Mother!’ from the flying bridge. Yes, I am.”

“Are you a member of the Society?” Abigail asked evenly.

“No,” Mike said. “I’ve never been in the Black Rose. It’s… a bit further out than I care to go. I don’t suppose you were at Disclave?”

“No,” Abigail said tartly. “But I’ve heard the story. I’m very worried about safety.”

“And I know what safety you’re worried about,” Mike said, shrugging. “I was in a monogamous dom-sub relationship for seven years with no problems. The girls are… inexperienced. That is, of course, fun. But I’m being very careful and intend to be very careful with their boundaries and with all standard safety issues, especially gags. I generally prefer ring gags, anyway, which are about as safe as you can get. I order from JR and Discrete in Boston.”

“Oh, do you know Bob Thorson at Discrete?” Abigail asked.

Mike opened his mouth to reply and froze. He did, but not as Mike “Jenkins.” Bob was a former Force Recon Marine and had a Ph.D. in Abnormal Psychology. He was a world expert in B D and S M and had been an adjunct professor at Harvard before quitting to become, in his words, “a professional pervert,” and opening a bondage shop. His favorite part was that he didn’t have to pay for workers; all his assistants were volunteers who got “paid” in testing out the gear he ordered.

“Mr. Jenkins?”

“Mike, please,” he replied. “Ma’am, I do, but not as Mike Jenkins. Due to the work that I do with the government, I have more than one, fully legal, identity. That is not bullshitting and I’d prefer that you not tell the girls.” He closed his eyes and shook his head. “If you want a reference, ask him about Mike Harmon.” Shit, he even knew his damned team name! “But I’d really prefer that you just say some guy named ‘Mike’ who used to be a SEAL.”

“Okay,” Abigail said uncertainly. “That bothers me, but I’ll call Bob and ask him. Did you know him when he was a Marine?”

“No,” Mike said. “That was before my time and the teams and Recon don’t mix much, anyway. I called him to order some stuff and we got to talking, you know how he is. I was pretty inexperienced at the time. I’d been doing B and D and didn’t know what I was doing and I got his book…”

“Roses is a great book,” Abigail said, the grin clear in her voice.

“That it is,” Mike said, grinning right back. “Anyway, we got to talking. I was a SEAL instructor at the time, married. He gave me a great lecture on safety…”

“He’s big on safety,” Abigail said. “I’d hate to say ‘too’ big on safety, but…”

“He’s a pro,” Mike said, shrugging. “Anyway, I know him. But he doesn’t know me as Mike Jenkins. He doesn’t even know that I’m in the Keys, or for that matter out of the teams. I don’t think I’ve talked to him in three or four years. He might not remember me.”

“Well, I think I’ll take you on your word,” Abigail said. “What are you planning on doing for scene with the girls?”

Mike rolled his eyes and shrugged.

“We’ve got the time and luxury to… take our time,” Mike said. “I’d, frankly, planned a rather drawn-out slave-training scene. Captured girls, being taken on a boat to be sold, et cetera. Pseudo Gorian, I suppose.”

“Sounds heavenly,” Abigail said, sighing. “But…”

“I don’t intend to break them,” Mike said. “I want them to be clear about the bedroom door. If they want to expand, later, fine. But… I don’t want the scene to become their life.”

“You’re pretty smart for a SEAL,” Abigail said.

“We’re smarter than you think,” Mike said. “But… I’m a bit unusual even for a team guy, yeah.”

“Well, give me the FedEx number and I’ll get the birth certificate out today,” Abigail said, then sniffed theatrically. “My little girl is growing up and getting her own master. It’s so sad.”

“Mrs. Tray?” Mike said. “And is it Mrs. Tray or Mistress Tray?”

“Oh, it’s Mrs.,” Abigail said.

“Mrs. Tray? You are a nut.”

“Takes one to know one,” Abigail said, laughing. “Be careful with my daughter, please, Mike whoever you are.”

“Harmon,” Mike said quietly.

“You’re not DEA or something, are you?” Abigail asked.

“No,” Mike said, chuckling. “I don’t do the drug thing. I do the other war.”

“Oh. Well, it was good talking to you Mr… Jenkins,” Abigail said after a moment’s thought. “And, well, if you’re ever in Steelville and are interested in training a forty-two-year-old slave, give me a call,” she said with a laugh.

“Hmmm…” Mike said, smiling. “Do you look anything like your daughter?”

“Somewhat older,” Abigail said. “I keep in pretty good shape, though.”

“You tempt me, madam,” Mike said, smiling.

“I’ll let you go to tempt my daughter now,” Abigail said. “Good talking to you.”

“And you,” Mike replied, hitting the disconnect and going up on the flying bridge.

“I need a beer,” Courtney said. “I can’t believe the conversation I just had with my mother.”

“I can’t believe the conversation I just had with your mother,” Mike said, sighing and sitting down next to her. “But I don’t suppose there’s any possibility of mother-daughter…”

“Don’t even go there!” Courtney said, dropping her face into her hands. “Oh, God!”

“Well, she did suggest if I was ever in Steelville I should give her a call,” he said teasingly.

“Oh, God!” Courtney replied, shaking her head. “There are things you don’t want to know about your parents!”

“Well, that wasn’t fun,” Pam said, coming up on deck. “They’re going to ‘think’ about it. My mom’s calling Courtney’s mom to talk to her.”

“Oh,” Courtney said, shaking her head. “That could be bad.”

“Why?” Pam said. “Did she go off on you?”

“No,” Courtney said. “But…”

“Courtney just found out far more about her parent’s love life than she ever wanted to,” Mike said. “So did I.”

“My mom came on to him!” Courtney wailed.

“What?” Pam gasped.

“Her parents are, apparently, in the ‘scene,’ ” Mike said, chuckling. “We had a long talk about bondage safety.”

“Dad whips her,” Courtney gasped. “My mom has always been the boss in the family. This is getting a little hard to take.”

Pam’s phone rang and she looked at it as if it was a snake, then hit Connect.

“Yeah, Mom?” she said, then blinked. “Really? Great. Okaaay.” She held it out to Mike. “She wants to talk to you.”

“Hello?” Mike said, trying not to sigh. This was turning into one hell of a lot of work for a couple of… no, it wasn’t. What in the hell was he thinking?

“Yes, ma’am,” Mike said, taking a breath and definitely not sighing. There was a pause as he listened to Pam’s mother.

“Go ahead,” Mike said, his eyebrows raising.

“Probably ring,” Mike said. “Some ball but only monitored. Possibly cock.”…

“I will be.”…

“I’m still making up my order in my mind,” Mike said. “But leather. Probably locking.”…

“Can’t get it off if there’s a panic attack,” Mike said. “You can cut leather.” He looked over at Pam, who was staring at him, wide-eyed, and shrugged.

“Possibly,” Mike said. “I’m a trained bosun, we are trained to raise multihundred-ton boats. In a storm. If I do, it will probably be my own rig; I don’t like most of the suspension rigs out there.”…

“I’m going to contract and do the best negotiation I can,” Mike said. “I was going to go over that sometime today or tomorrow and no major scene until we do.”…

“Yes,” Mike said. “I was. I’m still scripting the details.”…

“Fine,” he said, nodding. “Good talking to you, too, ma’am. No, I won’t say that in front of the girls. Yes I will. Goodbye.”

“Was that conversation about what I think it was about?” Pam said, staring in horror.

“Yep,” Mike said, shaking his head. “You two have got a couple of kinky moms. I guess the acorn doesn’t fall far from the tree.”

“Oh, God!” Pam wailed. “I did so not want to know that!”

“It was better than having the conversation with her yourself,” Courtney said. “Trust me.” She paused and her brow furrowed. “Oh, God, your parents and my parents have been friends since…”

“We were in grade school,” Pam said, closing her eyes. “I don’t want to think about this!”

“At least your mom didn’t describe to you the pleasure of being whipped,” Courtney said.

“Really?” Mike asked.

“No!” Pam said.

“Yes! It was a… terribly weird conversation,” Courtney said. “She ended up telling Mike to come by if he was ever in Steelville! And don’t you dare say anything about…”

“Mother-daughter action?” Mike asked, grinning. “Never crossed my mind.”

“I so don’t want to think about…” Courtney said, closing her eyes. “You. My mom. Me. Oh, God, I need some brain floss!”

Pam was simply staring, wide-eyed, at the horizon.

“Hello?” Mike said, somewhat seriously. “Earth to Pam.”

“Us,” she whispered. “In a scene. With our parents.”

“Aaaah!” Courtney wailed. “You had to say that! I’ve seen some bondage pictures. I so don’t want to think about that!”

“Your dad’s… kinda cute,” Pam said, still staring at the horizon.

“Noooo!” Courtney said. “Don’t say these things!”

Chapter Eight

There were quite a few things, besides bondage gear, to pick up before they were ready to head out. Most of the food and drinks for the trip they picked up in the Islamorada Wal-Mart, but Mike took them to specialty shops to get bathing suits. He had them pick up some light-weight “sun” shirts as well as broad-brimmed hats. He also had them each get a pair of high-heeled shoes but didn’t shop for any other clothing. He, meanwhile, shopped the tools and hardware section, picking up various items he felt might be useful.

They didn’t sleep together, at Mike’s insistence, while they got ready for the trip. And they didn’t spend all their time on land; he took them out after sailfish, unsuccessfully, the next morning.

The birth certificates arrived, as did several large boxes from “Fourth Level Equipment Company.” Mike stored those in the “Bluebeard” room.

Finally, everything was prepared and they cast off as the sun was setting over the Key, making their way out through the channel with Pam at the wheel and Mike taking control when the going got particularly tricky. He’d asked Courtney to prep some chicken and vegetables while they were headed out.

As soon as they were beyond the last reefs and well away from land, Mike checked the radar and set the autosteer for the Bahamas with the boat moving just fast enough to get it up on plane.

“Okay,” he said, joining the girls in the lounge. “First, I cook dinner.”

“You said you can cook,” Courtney said, waving at the chunked-up chicken breasts. “But so far it’s all talk.”

“O, ye of little faith,” Mike said.

He made chicken paprikash — chicken in paprika and sour cream sauce — and fettuccine Alfredo with fresh parmesan, asparagus on the side. It was a bit of hit.

“God,” Courtney said, sitting down to the table. “I take it back. You can cook. Marry me!”

“No,” Mike said seriously. “Look, there are reasons, okay? But I won’t, can’t, get into them. But we can have a very good time together and then… part as friends, okay? It’s important to me that you understand. We can’t be more than friends and, maybe, occasional lovers. If we can’t work on that basis, we need to just… go have fun in the islands and forget all the rest.”

“I can, Mike,” Courtney said, shrugging. “I think… I think I’ll always remember you. Heck, I know I will. But…” She shrugged again.

“Pam, are you going to be okay with that?” Mike asked.

“Yeah,” she said. “I think so.”

“Let’s talk a bit about what we’re trying to accomplish here,” Mike said. “Like I explained before, when a person gets fully into submission, it’s basically a transcendental state. But some things will push you right out of scene or, sometimes, they’ll push you to an even higher level.”

“Example?” Pam asked, rolling up a string of fettuccine.

“You said you didn’t like anal sex?” Mike asked.

“Not a lot,” Pam said. “It’s…”

“Icky or humiliating or both?” Mike asked.

“Both,” Pam said carefully, then wriggled.

“But the humiliation aspect actually has some attraction from the point of view of submission, right?” Mike asked.

“Yes,” Pam admitted. “But it also hurts.” Then she thought about it and wriggled again.

“Do you want Courtney to be forced to see you taken?” Mike asked.

“God,” Pam said nervously. “I’m not sure. It’s… sort of exciting. I think.”

“Courtney,” Mike said. “Tell me what you think is absolutely not permissible.”

“I don’t want to be whipped,” Courtney said. “And… there’s all that stuff with scat and golden showers. Don’t go there. I don’t want anal sex or for you to cum in my mouth. I don’t like the taste.”

“How about being fitted with a butt plug?” Mike asked.

“Uh…” She paused and thought about that. “Maybe.”

“Exciting?” Mike asked. “Humiliating? Both?”

“Both,” she admitted.

“I will tell you, both, that there will be dual scenes,” Mike said. “Where one of you will be toyed with and the other forced to watch. You will be forced to touch each other, to play with tits at least, and to kiss in places, possibly on the lips but I’ll have to read that. For one thing, with two of you, I can’t do it all myself.”

“I can… live with that,” Courtney said.

“I’m planning on setting up a scene which will be longer than normal,” Mike said. “We have nothing but time. I’m thinking that it will go for a day at least, maybe a couple of days, with you in continuous submission. I’ll try to make sure I read you right, and I’ll call time-outs from time to time to check on your state. If you feel that it’s pushing your limits, edge play, beyond where you want to go, simply call yellow. If you’re gagged, then grunt and I’ll remove the gag. Especially do so if you feel panicked or trapped. I will be in complete control, but you can be free at any time and the play will end if you wish it. I don’t want to drive you away from your current interest by pushing you too hard and too fast. But… the scene will be intense. Can you handle that?”

“I hope so,” Pam said. “I’m getting squirmy just thinking about it.”

“Well, let’s wash up,” Mike said, glancing at the radar and blinking. “Pam, could you go up forward and see if there are any ships out there? There’s an odd blip on the radar.”

“Sure,” she said, walking up to the bridge as Mike and Courtney cleared the dishes.

As soon as she was up on deck, Mike picked up the knife he had been doing the dishes with and clamped his hand over her mouth.

“One sound,” he said, keeping the knife well clear of her throat, “and I’ll cut your throat and throw you to the sharks.”

He dragged her, panting, into her cabin and pulled out a pair of handcuffs he’d slipped under her pillow. He used those to secure her and used her pillowcase to gag her.

“I’ll come get you as soon as I grab the other idiot who thought she was safe,” he said, walking out.

“Where’s Courtney?” Pam asked when she came back in. “And when are we going to start,” she added, smiling.

“We already did,” Mike said, grabbing her wrist and twisting her arm up behind her back then clamping his hand over her mouth. “Now I’m going to go explain the facts of life to you.”

He dragged her into Courtney’s cabin and cuffed her on the floor, gagging her with another pillowcase. Then he went and got the serious gear.

He carefully put a collar on Courtney’s neck, locking it in place, then wrist and ankle restraints, using snap-locks to hold them together and taking off the handcuffs without permitting her any chance to escape. Last he replaced the pillowcase with a ring gag that kept her mouth open in an O but made it impossible to speak. It did, however, give access to the mouth, and he stuck his finger and ran it around, laughing at her.

“You two are so gullible,” Mike said. “And so, I might add, are your parents. Bunch of bondage freaks. I’m not a bondage freak, I’m a damned slaver. Two pretty bitches like you are going to make me a bunch of money.”

“Aaaah ooooh,” Courtney groaned. “Aaah.”

“But you have to be well trained,” he said as he secured the last lock on Pam. She’d struggled to get away when he explained what was going to happen, but it hadn’t mattered. “And I’m going to train you. But first you’re going to be stripped. You won’t need clothes anymore on this trip. Oh, and we’re not going to the Bahamas, we’re going to Morocco. Good slave market in Morocco. I should get, oh, thirty grand for you as a pair. They like pairs in Morocco, so much sweeter.” He paused and pulled Pam’s gag out. “Time out, Pam, you okay?”

“I am now!” Pam said. “God! I thought you were serious!”

“That is half of the point,” Mike said, reinserting the gag. “You will learn to be in total submission to your master. I will train you well. And then, I will sell you two bitches and head back to pick up more.”

Courtney had been stripped and now lay on her bed, spread-eagled, looking at the overhead bunk and flinching at each crack of the whip. Mike had dragged Pam out of the room and now, to tell from the sounds, was whipping her. She wasn’t sure anymore, what was real and what was fantasy. All she knew was that she didn’t want to be whipped and would do anything to avoid it.

“You will learn to like me cuming in your mouth, bitch,” Mike said, cracking the whip just above Pam’s butt and eliciting another moan of fear. He’d touched her, the first time, just with the tip on the ass so she’d know how it felt. Now each time the whip cracked above her butt, she couldn’t be sure it wasn’t real. He knew she was on another plane and was getting worried he was pushing her too far.

He grabbed her hair and pulled her head back, taking out the gag and replacing it with the whip.

“Do you taste that leather, bitch?” Mike growled. “That leather is going to be covered in your blood if you don’t suck me, and suck me hard, do you understand?”

“Yes,” she said around the gag of the whip. “Please…”

“That’s right,” Mike said. “Beg me, bitch. I like begging. Good slaves beg.”

He tied the whip in place, then undid her bonds and shackled her hands behind her back and her feet together.

“Down on your knees, bitch,” Mike said, dragging her off the bed. “You’re going to suck me and suck me well or you’re going to be whipped. And then I’ll cum in your mouth and you’re going to swallow my cum. If you let one drop spill, you’ll be tortured until you beg me to kill you.”

He took her in the mouth, grabbing her hair in his right hand, his left hand wrapped with the whip so he had a short lash.

“Suck it, bitch,” Mike said, pushing her head back and forth, careful not to penetrate too deeply. “Suck it harder,” he growled, popping the lash behind her back.

“Please…” Pam said, pulling back.

“Please… who?” Mike said, whipping her lightly.

“Please, master,” Pam moaned. “Don’t come in my mouth.”

“I’ll do whatever I like to you,” Mike said, stuffing his dick back in her mouth and whipping her again. “You are my slave. You will do my bidding.”

“Base, this is 315, go crypt, over.”

“Base on crypt, go ahead, 315.”

“Be aware, Yacht Winter Born has left territorial waters and appears to be headed for Bahamas waters, over.”

“Roger, 315.”

“315, out.”

Courtney flinched when the door opened, and she turned away when she saw Mike leading Pam in and carrying a black bag in his hand. Pam’s hands were bound behind her and her legs hobbled with a chain so she could only take small steps. Mike smacked her on the ass with the whip to get her to move faster, and she hobbled over to Courtney’s bed, standing with her head bowed.

“I think it’s time for me to take this little bitch,” Mike said. “She can’t give head worth a damn, so I guess I’m going to have to get mine in her pussy. But I didn’t think you should be left out, Blondie, so I brought her over so you could join in the good time.”

Courtney moaned and turned her head away, shaking it.

“First, I think Courtney needs to be properly fitted,” Mike said, laughing harshly and forcing Pam to her knees, then pointed at the bunk. “Stay there, bitch. Try to run and you’ll be whipped until you bleed.”

He reached into the bag and extracted two lengths of chain that he secured to the overhead bunk, then unclipped each of Courtney’s ankles and reclipped them to the chain. When she was restrained, her butt was lifted slightly off the bunk and her legs spread.

“Now for the fun part,” Mike said, reaching into the bag and pulling out a harness that looked something like a leather chastity belt with attachments.

Courtney craned her head around to see it, then closed her eyes and let out a yell.

“Yes, you’re going to have these jammed in your pussy and ass,” Mike said, chuckling evilly. “And it’s going to happen with your stupid little friend watching you be humiliated. But it’s okay; she’s going to get raped right in front of your eyes. You avoid that, for now.”

Mike took out a tube of KY jelly and rubbed it into Courtney’s pussy and ass, liberally covered the plugs on the harness. He gently inserted the butt plug, then the vaginal plug, then buckled the belt in place.

“You like that, bitch?” Mike shouted, grabbing Courtney’s hair and shaking her head back and forth. “You like the feel of that, bitch? Having a plug shoved up your ass? I bet you like it.”

“Now for you, bitch,” Mike said, pulling Pam up by her arm and hair. He pushed her onto the bed then got her kneeling between Courtney’s legs. He unbound Pam’s arms and connected each of the wristbands to the D-rings on either side of Courtney’s collar so that she was supporting her weight on her hands and forced to look right into Courtney’s face. Last, he got a longer length of chain and spread her legs to either side of Courtney’s, running the chain under Courtney’s thighs so that there was no way for Pam to get away. She was left, wide spread, doggy position.

“Ooooo,” Pam moaned, shaking her head.

“Yes, bitch,” Mike said, picking up the whip and flicking it to barely touch her butt. The crack as much as the touch elicited a yelp of pain and she started crying.

“I’m going to take you, now,” Mike said, pulling a box out of the bag and setting it to the side. “I’m going to shove my dick right up your pussy and cum in it. I’m going to fucking rape you, bitch. You’re nothing but my little slave, now, and a slave is all you’ll ever be.” He opened up the box and took out a vibrator, dropping his shorts and lining up on Pam’s opening. “You’re going to be raped, bitch, and raped hard. But I don’t want the other little bitch to feel left out, so…” He reached down to the harness and threw a small switch, engaging the vibrator that was built into Courtney’s vaginal plug.

Courtney let out a moan and her head went back, then shook from side to side as her wrists pulled at the restraints.

As she began to thrash, Mike thrust his fingers into Pam’s opening, twisting them around and making sure she was wet.

“You like that, bitch?” Mike asked to a shaken head. “I’ll give you something you like,” he added, shoving his dick into her pussy. She moaned and shook her head, crying.

“That’s right, bitch, cry,” Mike said. “That’s a good little crying bitch. I’m going to break you, bitch, and make you into a good slave for men to take over and over again.” As he said it, he slid the vibrator up and onto her clit, turning it on. “Men are going to do nothing but fuck you for the rest of your life. You’re both nothing but receptacles for men’s cum, for the rest of your lives.”

Courtney came first, arching against the restraints, and he reached down and shut off the vibrator on the harness, then shut off the other as Pam came only moments later. He pounded her hard for a few seconds, really slamming her and imagining it as real rape, then came himself. All three of them had come in less than thirty seconds.

Pam was barely able to support herself, and he quickly released her and rolled her to the side, picking up a tissue from the box and gently sliding it between her legs, then took the harness off Courtney and released her hands.

“Christ,” Courtney gasped, when she got the gag out of her mouth. “That was…”

“I don’t know how much more of this I can take,” Pam said, still quivering.

“Come into the main cabin,” Mike said. “I think this needs a solid snuggle to complete it.”

When Pam had cleaned up and come into the cabin, her head down and looking ashamed, Mike pulled her and Courtney into his arms and hugged both of them to his chest.

“Do you remember when I told you I got a high just having you around?” Mike asked.

“Yes,” Pam said quietly, ducking her head down.

“That time when we were first going out,” Mike said, “and you were both up on the tuna tower and just… grooving on the experience and having a blast, that was like the biggest high I could ever have. It was almost like being out of body. That is what I’m supposed to try to create in you girls, when we do those scenes. The job of the dom is to engage a series of emotions to cause some sort of a disconnect. You’re almost insane, so into the moment you’re no longer really in your body. That’s what we’re trying to achieve.”

“Got it with me,” Courtney said. “I was half that way before you got in the room from hearing you torturing Pam. I couldn’t believe you were whipping her like that. Still can’t.”

“He wasn’t, really,” Pam said, quietly. “He popped me once, at first, and then slightly a couple of other times. But that first one was so… something, that every time the whip cracked after that I had to scream.”

“I was trying to build the mood,” Mike said. “Big question, did I push anyone out of scene? No, were you in scene?”

“I sure was,” Pam said, shaking her head against his chest. “I couldn’t keep track of reality and fantasy. I just stopped trying. You could have made me do anything and I would have obeyed. It was… scary. I didn’t know there was that much…”

“Submission,” Mike said, nodding.

“Submission in me,” Pam said. “I’m not sure I like it.”

“We’ll work on that,” Mike promised. “Courtney.”

“The harness was…” She shook her head. “It was… fun and it really made me feel submissive, but the butt plug was… that sort of threw me out of scene and into a near panic for a second or two. Then I just sort of… floated. I totally lost it when you put Pam over me. She was drooling…”

“That was so…” Pam said and stopped. “God…”

“Too much?” Mike asked.

“No, it was… so humiliating,” Pam said, nearly crying. “And it felt so good! I just…”

“Okay,” Mike said, pulling her into his arms tighter. “It’s okay. You’re not a bad person for feeling this way. It’s really, really normal; it’s just something that people don’t talk about. We’ll talk about it over the next couple of days. I was going to stay in scene, but I think you guys need some distance to work through the emotions. Remember, it’s all friends. And it’s all about getting that mystic high that comes from really good sex, really mind-blowing sex. If it’s no fun, if there’s no bonding and no… love, then it’s no good.”

“Part of my problem,” Pam said, shaking her head against his chest, “is I feel like such a… a… slut. I got used and abused and I really liked it.”

“It’s okay,” Mike said, stroking her hair. “That’s the point. It’s just that you’re finding out, for the first time, what really good sex, for you, is all about, and finding out how far into zone you can fall and what puts you there. You’re still a good person, a lovely young lady, with emphasis on lady. What goes on beyond the bedroom door doesn’t change that.”

“You’ve got a nice voice, Mike,” Courtney said, snuggling into his chest and yawning. “Aren’t you the one who’s supposed to go to sleep?”

“I will,” Mike said, “in a bit. Coast into the arms of Morpheus,” he said softly, holding them both. “Good dreams.”

“Are you my lover or my father?” Pam asked sleepily.

“I’m your master,” Mike said gently. “Nothing more nor less.”

Chapter Nine

When both of them were well asleep he slipped carefully out of the bed and out of the cabin. He’d been watching a blip on the radar for some time and was worried about it; it looked like a freighter coming up the Stream and they were going to pass close to each other.

He slipped on shorts and a shirt against the cool of the night and headed up to the flying bridge, getting some coffee going as he passed through the lounge. He was tired, from both the exercise and the day, and it was going to be a long night. He couldn’t really assume that there wasn’t anything on his course; he’d been keeping an eye on the radar during the entire scene. And he much preferred to be able to head up to the bridge without worrying about the girls’ safety if he had to maneuver.

He checked all the instruments when he reached the bridge and everything was in the green, so he sped up, pushing the boat to its maximum cruising speed. The freighter was still on course to a close approach and he considered changing to pass astern. He probably would have to soon. But he got a cup of coffee first and considered the approaches. There was a way to calculate it, but he’d pretty much forgotten that particular equation over the years.

As it turned out, he only had to change course slightly to pass astern of the freighter. The wash was pretty heavy, but the yacht rode over it easily enough.

It was a couple of hours before dawn when he pulled into the protected harbor at Palm Key and dropped anchor. He’d considered continuing up the coast to Bimini and the Bahamas Customs Station where he could get his customs flag. That was going to be interesting. The Bahamas had an agreement about American officials carrying arms in the area, but they were generally death on firearms on ships. It was going to be interesting seeing how they reacted to his arms locker.

He got the anchors down, locked the doors against random pilfering, made his way to the cabin, got undressed, and snuggled up to Pam, wrapping an arm around her before falling fast asleep.

“God,” Courtney said over a bowl of cereal, “I am sore in some of the oddest places.”

“Me, too,” Pam said, craning to look at her back. Both of the girls were wearing bikinis. “Are there marks?”

“Not as many as the ones that are still fading on Mike,” Courtney said, grinning.

“They should fade pretty quick,” Mike said. “We need to run up to Bimini to the Customs Station and get our flag.”

“Flag?” Courtney asked.

“When you clear customs you fly a special flag,” Mike said. “After that you can cruise anywhere in the Bahamas and not get stopped. But until we get the flag, if a customs or Coast Guard boat sees us, they’ll stop us. I’ll go weigh anchor and we’ll get under way.”

They cruised fast up the coastline of low-lying keys and shallow shoals, the girls oooing and aaahing in the tuna tower, until they reached Bimini and Mike slowed as they came to the entrance.

“Bimini’s entrance really sucks,” he said. “The Stream and storms can shift it a lot. And the Bahamas government hasn’t dredged it in years.”

“The channel markers are over there,” Pam said, pointing to port.

“Yeah,” Mike said, glancing over. “Only one problem, you can tell that’s a shoal,” he said. “Look at the sand. There it is,” he said, pointing closer to starboard. “See where it’s deeper?”

“Are we going to go aground?” Courtney asked, grabbing the railing.

“Hopefully not,” Mike said, shrugging. The entrance channel had to be entered perpendicular to the Stream, which was a little tricky, and then the deeper water — it couldn’t be characterized as “deep” — turned hard to port. He made the turn with a touch of bow thruster and continued up the channel, which was more or less straight, into the deeper water of the dredged harbor.

When they got to the customs dock, he had the girls help him with the lines and told them to stay on the boat.

“Why?” Pam asked, looking around the harbor.

“Technically, until you’re checked in, you’re illegal in the Bahamas,” Mike said. “I have to go get us checked in.”

He carried his scanty log, well aware that there should be more entries — exited Islamorada harbor, took two slave-girls… no — and headed for the customs shed. There was a small Bahamas Coast Guard cutter tied by the shed and he noticed that the crew seemed unusually alert and sharp for Bahamas troops.

The shed was a small building broken up into a couple of rooms with a counter at the front manned by a bored clerk.

“Yacht Winter Born, U.S., out of Islamorada,” Mike said, handing over his log and passenger list. “Myself and two passengers.” Then he started pulling out credentials.

The clerk took the passenger list and made an entry, then glanced at the log in disinterest and picked up the credentials. When he saw the Federal Marshal certification and weapons cert, his eyes widened.

“Hold on, mon,” he said, getting up. “I gotta get an officer.”

“That’s fine,” Mike said.

Two officers came out of the back with the clerk, one that was clearly the station chief and another, a colonel of the constabulary if Mike remembered his insignia, who was a big, broad man in stiffly starched khakis.

“Mr… Jenkins,” the colonel said, shaking his hand. “Colonel Horatio Montcrief, Constabulary. Glad to have you in Bimini. Business or pleasure?”

“Pleasure,” Mike said. “I have a couple of college coeds with me who have never been to the Bahamas. I hope to show them a very good time.”

“Yes, I’m sure,” the colonel said, grinning as he came around the counter. “May we, perhaps, step outside?”

“Much prefer it,” Mike said, following him out.

The colonel waited until he was outside and then lit a cigar. “Even here in the Islands, the stupid antismoking people reign,” he said, sticking the stogie in his teeth. “Those are interesting credentials. You are not here on business?”

“Not at all,” Mike said. “I’m effectively retired. The materials I carry are purely for reasons of… past experience. I hope to have no future similar experiences.”

“You were DEA?” the colonel asked, tilting his head to the side.

“Bite your tongue,” Mike said. “I don’t do the War on Drugs.”

“There is another war, however, that you don’t mention,” the colonel said, waving his cigar. “No matter. We have no problem with terrorism in the islands.”

“As I said,” Mike repeated doggedly, “I’m here for pleasure, purely.”

“And can I enquire as to the nature of the material?” the colonel asked delicately.

“I could show you a manifest,” Mike said. “But you’d shit a brick. I carry heavy.”

“For defensive purposes?” the colonel asked, one eyebrow raised.

“Sometimes the best defense is a good offense,” Mike said. “Colonel, I’m not planning on using anything here in the islands. They’re in a locker. I’m not planning on opening the locker in the islands. And if I have to, you’ll be the third to know.”

“The third?” the colonel said, interestedly.

“The first will be whoever I use them on,” Mike said. “The second… well, I’m sorry, you don’t have the need to know,” he added with a chuckle.

“Very well,” the colonel said dryly. “Try not to open your locker. Two college coeds, eh? Pretty?”

“Fricking gorgeous.”

“Have a very good time in the islands, then,” the colonel said, smiling. “I do ask one thing. We occasionally have situations which… are difficult to deal with alone. Frequently, we ask the U.S. government, quietly, to assist us in such things. Are you… ?”

“Not at this time,” Mike said. “But if you ask me, and I get an okay, anything for a friend.”

“And are you… formidable?”

“I’m pretty good,” Mike said. “I’ve got a ‘still alive’ track record. My enemies don’t.”

“Very good,” the colonel said, nodding. “I hope to meet you again some time. Hopefully, under equally good circumstances.”

“Agreed,” Mike said, smiling. “Have a good day.”

“All days are good days in the islands,” the colonel said, waving his cigar. “Hadn’t you heard?”

Pam was cleaning up in the lounge when she heard a faint beeping and followed it to something that looked like a small laptop on the closed bridge. It had a phone on it, though, so she picked it up.

“Hello?” she asked.

“Hello,” a man’s voice said. “Who is this?”

“Pam,” she said. “Are you looking for Mike?”

“Yes,” the man answered dryly. “I was a little worried I’d dialed the wrong number.”

“He’s over at the customs shed,” Pam said.

“Okay,” the man said. “When he gets back, ask him to give Bob Pierson a call, would you?”

“Sure,” Pam said.

“I take it you’re a… friend of Mike’s?” the man asked.

“Yeah,” she said, sighing. “I think the term would be ‘very good friend.’ ”

“Ah,” the man said and paused. “Where are you from?”

“Can I ask why you’re asking?” Pam said curiously.

“You sound Midwestern,” the man answered.

“I’m from Missouri,” Pam said. “Why?”

“Just curious,” the man replied. “Please ask Mike to give me a call right away when he gets back.”

“Will do,” Pam said. “Bye.”

“Mike,” Pam said when he got on board. “You’re supposed to call somebody named Person or something like that. I forgot to write it down and he didn’t leave a number.”

“Oh, great,” Mike said, shaking his head.

“Problem?”

“One of my former customers,” Mike said, shrugging. “The sort of people I do contracting for. But I am most definitely on vacation at the moment.”

Mike went down to the sat phone and found Pierson’s number on the speed dial.

“Pierson.”

“Jenkins, what’s up, Bob?”

“Mike, clear the room please and go scramble,” Pierson replied.

Mike frowned and hit the scrambler combination.

“There’s nobody in here at the moment,” he said.

“I guess I should have mentioned that you’re under very casual surveillance,” Pierson said. “And if you go out of the country you need to check in.”

“I wasn’t aware I was under surveillance at all,” Mike said angrily.

“The Coast Guard just has a general ‘keep an eye on’ on you,” Pierson said. “Half protection for you and half because if you go out of the country you’re treading in waters you’re not really familiar with, legally. The Caribbean is no big deal; we own it. But if you go to Europe or something, give me a call first, okay?”

“Sure,” Mike said, sighing. “Just another example of change of life, I guess.”

“That’s what it is,” Pierson said. “The young lady who answered the phone. She’s not from…”

“Nope,” Mike said. “Missouri, University of. And, lord, she’s good looking.”

“Glad to hear it,” Pierson said honestly. “I’d been getting a little worried about you down there doing your Travis McGee imitation.”

“Travis who?” Mike asked, confused.

“Oh,” Pierson said, chuckling. “I’d assumed it was intentional. Look up the Travis McGee books, some time. And have fun in the Bahamas.”

“I will,” Mike replied.

They stayed in Bimini that day and into the night, the girls dancing at one of the clubs, then made their way back to the boat. Mike had reciprocal rights at the Bimini Big Game Club and was docked there. The Game Club had good enough security that he didn’t feel he had to leave an anchor watch. Not that there was much theft in Bimini. The island was so small that if anything turned up missing, everyone knew who had stolen it.

That night they had a pleasant and casual ménage with only occasional, joking, references to master and slave. At one point the girls tried to pin him down and he proved that he could take one of them, more or less against her will, while simultaneously controlling the other. It wasn’t easy, but he could do it. They all were pleasantly exhausted, as well as a little drunk, when they went to sleep.

Mike had the boat moving before dawn, though, slight hangover and all. At the Game Club he’d heard that the sail were moving and he really wanted to have the girls hook into a sailfish. By dawn he was floating in the Stream and rigging the kites.

Courtney came up on deck, and her eyes widened when she saw what he was doing.

“We’re flying kites today?” she asked, looking at the bird-shaped, collapsible, kite he was rigging to fly in the wind.

“It’s a fishing rig,” Mike said. “The shadow of the kite looks like a bird and that attracts game fish. And you can get your bait well away from the boat.”

He rigged a live ballyhoo on each of four lines and floated them out on kites, then went downstairs to get breakfast.

“I’m hunting for sail today,” Mike said. “We might get wahoo or dolphin, but I’m hoping for sail. The lines are rigged for sail. If we get dolphin, just muscle it in. But we should get up on deck pretty soon to watch the lines.”

When the two girls joined him on deck, he looked at them for a moment, the bottle of sunscreen in his hand, and waved.

“Take off the suits,” he ordered.

“Uh,” Pam said, looking at Courtney. Then they both stripped off their bikinis.

“Pam, do my back while I do Courtney’s,” Mike said, getting a handful of Bullfrog on his palm. “Courtney, kneel down, knees together, wrists crossed in front of you and on your thighs.”

Courtney breathed hard for a moment and then complied, turning around so her back was to him.

Mike got down on his knees and spread the sunscreen across her back, liberally. There was, as he intended, plenty left over and he reached around, rubbing it on her breasts and stomach.

“Head up,” Mike ordered. “Chin up. Back straight, little slave.”

“Yes, master,” Courtney said.

Pam was rubbing down his arms, her breasts pressing into his back, as he reached down and spread Courtney’s legs, rubbing the last of the sunscreen onto her inner thighs and then sliding his finger up against her clit. He pulled her arms around her back and crossed her wrists there, then reached back around and gently pulled on one nipple while massaging her clit, running his finger in and out of her opening.

“Stay still, slave,” he ordered, roughly, as she began to squirm and moan. “If you move from that position, you will be punished.”

He continued to stroke her until with a gasp and a clench she came. Then he grabbed Pam and pulled her around, simultaneously twisting Courtney to the deck. He pulled his bathing suit down and then entered Courtney, hard, pulling Pam’s head down to her breast.

“Lick it, bitch,” he ordered Pam, pressing her lips against Courtney’s nipple. “Lick her tit!”

Pam resisted for a moment, then her pink tongue flickered out to touch Courtney’s nipple, eliciting a moan of despair and pleasure from her friend.

“Play with her tits,” Mike ordered, pinning Courtney down and holding himself up, then thrusting into her again, hard.

Courtney came, again, as he pounded her, moaning and crying at the waves of pleasure from his taking her and having Pam play with her at the same time. As her shudders eased, Mike pulled out, to a moan of sadness, and pulled Pam around, roughly, to where her tits were in Courtney’s face.

“Now it’s your turn, little slave,” he said, pushing her back down so that her nipple dangled above Courtney’s lips. “Pleasure this bitch,” he said, grabbing Courtney’s hand and lifting it up to Pam’s pussy.

“Wait,” Courtney said, as Pam flinched.

“You can do it,” Mike said, much more gently. “You know what feels good for you. Do it to her,” he added, pulling her hand into position and manipulating her finger against Pam’s clit. At that Pam whimpered and bucked, but didn’t back away. He rolled Pam down onto her back, keeping Courtney’s hand in place, then put Courtney in position to play with her nipples and pussy.

“Stay together,” he added, sliding his finger into Courtney’s opening and his own mouth to her lovely breast. The position left him with his head on Pam’s stomach, Courtney lying on Pam’s arm and Pam on her back, spread-eagled, pinned by his body and totally in the moment.

They stayed like that until Pam came and then he rolled over to her, entering her and thrusting hard; Courtney backed away, but he pulled her back to continue sucking on Pam’s breasts. He reached over and slid his hand back into Courtney’s vagina, playing with her clitoris as Pam moaned and shrieked into a hard climax. Courtney came at the same time and he followed shortly after.

“Okay,” Courtney said, rolling over to lie on her back, panting. “I’m not too sure about that one. It was fun, but…”

“You don’t want to become a lesbian,” Mike said.

“No,” Pam replied tightly. “And that felt a little…”

“You’re not a lesbian from having a touch of fun with each other,” Mike replied, pulling them both to their feet and setting them in the bridge couch. He sat down between them and gently rested his arms across their shoulders.

“Kleee-nex,” Pam said, desperately, flipping open one of the glove boxes and diving for a tissue.

“You both prefer guys, in general, right?” Mike continued when Pam had the flood under control. He hugged them both to him and then let them up so they could be comfortable.

“Yeah,” Courtney said, looking over at Pam a bit shamefacedly. “But I… sort of enjoyed it. I don’t want to lick Pam, though. Ever.”

“You won’t have to, then,” Mike said, nodding. “A bit of sex play with the same sex is not the same thing as being homosexual, especially when you’re in a threesome like we are. Now, if there were two guys and one girl, it would be different. The sexual wiring is a bit different, for one thing. While women are sensual in various places, most guys are just sensual in their penis. Two guys and one female, it’s the two males, generally, working on the woman…”

“Now that has a certain… something,” Pam said, grinning.

“In a way that was what was going on,” Mike pointed out. “You were, each, helping me to bring pleasure to the other. Maybe you’ll take it further, between you two. I know several girls who take the position of ‘girls for comfort, boys for pleasure.’ It doesn’t make you a lesbian.” He paused and grinned. “Okay, maybe a touch bi.”

“You are evil,” Pam said.

“The very devil,” Mike admitted. “And the one who has to keep his head about him, despite your lovely nipple staring me in the face. We need to finish really putting on sunscreen and then get ready to fish. We’re just lucky we didn’t get a hit while we were in play; it would have really ruined the mood.”

Courtney was sitting on the port fighting chair, sipping a Fosters, when the nearest line unclipped from the kite and began screaming out.

“That’s not sail,” Mike said, hooking the harness on her naked body. “Probably wahoo.”

“Why’s it called wahoo?” Courtney asked, picking up the line and settling it in her holder.

“When I hit the drag, give it a good yank,” Mike said. “Then hang the hell on.”

When the hook hit the wahoo, it took off like a rocket in a three-hundred-yard run, the line screaming out of the reel.

“Waaaaaahoo!” Courtney screamed, fighting the bucking rod.

“Now you know,” Mike said, grinning ear to ear.

Wahoo weren’t sustained fighters, and lighter than most sail, so in twenty minutes it was onboard and pictures taken. They were, however, good eating, and it went in the cooler. The fight hadn’t even disturbed the other kites, so Mike got the whole line rerigged pretty quick.

“Mike, I gotta know,” Courtney said. “What’s in the Bluebeard Room?”

“Get used to disappointment,” Mike said, chuckling. “Okay, I’ll tell you. I have locks of hair from each of my conquests, with date and time, up on the walls. It’s a little bizarre, so I stopped showing them off and now I keep it locked.”

“That I can almost believe,” Pam said. “Are we going to do a scene tonight?”

“How do you feel about it?” Mike asked.

“Nervous as a virgin,” Pam admitted. “Eager as one, too. I’ll admit, I really, really enjoyed the scene the other night. And, okay, what we did this morning.”

“I’ve got one problem with it,” Courtney said, frowning. “I hate to be petty, but you’ve had more… in time with Mike than I have.”

“Pam, do you mind if we adjust that a bit, tonight?” he asked. “It might mean you get a bit shortchanged.”

“I can handle that,” Pam said.

Mike turned to a control and hit a series of keys, and steel guitar started to ring from the speakers.

“What is that?” Courtney asked.

“A one-hit wonder from the ’70s,” Mike said. “It’s off an MP3 collection from my CDs. This piece is called ‘Thunder Island’ by Jay Ferguson. There’s probably a bunch of stuff you won’t recognize. Generational thing, and I’m also into Goth and industrial. On the other hand, there’s also Pink, Enya, Evanescence, stuff like that. I like a lot of modern music.” He looked up as one of the lines dropped loose then nodded. “Fish on. Pam’s side.”

Pam got up and put on the harness and lifted the rod, stepping back and then hitting the drag.

“Holy cow!” she shouted as the fish began its initial run. Suddenly the sail burst out of the water and tail-walked from port to starboard, shaking its head.

“Keep pressure on it,” Mike warned. “Otherwise it will throw the hook.”

“It’s strong,” Pam yelled.

“That’s what the harness is for,” Mike said. “Let your back do the work.”

He got the other lines reeling in with electric motors and halfway back one of them hit.

“Damn,” he said. “Courtney, get it. Try not to cross the lines.”

Fortunately, the two sails stayed well apart and both girls had one hell of a fight on their hands. Pam got hers in in about thirty minutes, bringing it into the transom where Mike pulled it up onto the deck.

“I’d like to make sure we can release it,” Mike said. “Can you get the camera and get down here?”

They took pictures of Pam with her sail in the flooded flush deck and then Mike fed it some raw wash and a ballyhoo and got it back running with a tap on the tail.

By that time Courtney had brought hers alongside and he landed that one and got pictures. All in all it took about an hour to get the two sails to the boat and off, and by that time both girls were elated and exhausted.

Mike got the lines back up and soon after there was a dolphin on board. He climbed up to the tuna tower and noticed that, by luck as much as anything, the kites were dropping by a weed line. Shortly after the dolphin, Courtney hooked up to another tail walker — her first one hadn’t left the water — and she fought it for about three minutes after its first run and then the line went, mostly, slack.

“Probably threw the hook,” Mike said, letting the kites back out. “Put it on the winch and let that reel the line in.”

When the line came alongside it was clear the fish hadn’t thrown the hook. The sail was gone from just behind the head with a big, crescent, bite mark just past its gills.

“Oh, wow,” Courtney said, looking at the head as Mike pulled it over the side.

“Want a picture of this?” Mike asked, grinning and unhooking the head.

“Yeah,” Courtney said. “And you want us to go swimming in this water?”

“Any time you enter the water you’re in the food chain,” Mike said. “But snorkelers and divers hardly ever get unprovoked attacks. It’s safer than driving in Springfield.”

“Maybe,” Courtney said. “But if you’re in a wreck, they don’t eat you.”

They landed a couple more sail and dolphin by noon, then the run pretty much ended.

“Let’s get lunch,” Mike said, reeling in the lines. “They probably won’t start hitting again until this evening.”

Chapter Ten

Mike pulled the wahoo out of the cooler, skinned and gutted it, and cut it into steaks with a machete. Three of those went on the deck grill in a light olive oil marinade. Along with leftover rice and some cut fruit, it made a great lunch.

“If we keep eating this light,” Courtney said, “and getting all this… exercise, I’m liable to lose weight.”

“You don’t have any weight to lose,” Mike said, laughing.

“I could lose some on the hips,” Courtney said, shaking her head.

“You could stand to gain some on the hips,” Mike said. “But, yeah, eating like this is as natural a way to lose weight as you can ask. I actually have to be careful or I start losing muscle mass. I need to do more swimming.”

“How far can you swim?” Pam asked curiously.

“I’ve done twenty miles,” Mike said, shrugging. “But that was when I was younger and in shape for it. Five miles is about right these days. That’s just swimming with goggles. With fins I’m good for ten to fifteen.”

“Damn,” Courtney said. “That’s a long ways.”

“And staying able to do it takes doing it,” Mike said, smiling. “I haven’t been keeping in shape since you girls have been here.”

“Don’t let us stop you,” Pam said. “I’d love to have something wear you out.”

“You wear me out, Pam,” Mike said, grinning. “But, yeah, I think I’ll go swim.”

“Out here?” Courtney said. “What about that sailfish?”

“If I worried about sharks I never would have joined the SEALs,” Mike said. He walked up on deck, picking up a pair of swimming goggles, and went over the side with a splash.

The boat was well out to sea and moving with the different vectors of wind and current. Mike decided that keeping no more than a hundred yards away was prudent. He generally stayed within no more than fifty meters, letting the Stream be his opponent and swimming into it. He was used to swimming in deep water, having done so all over the world. Sometimes fleets would just stop at sea for some down time; it was called “Steel Beach.” SEALs attached to the fleets would generally spend the time doing races from ship to ship, sometimes swimming as much as ten miles.

He got into the rhythm, riding the swells, keeping half an eye on the shadow of the boat, just looking into the deeps. One time he saw a pod of sailfish riding the current northwards to cooler, more productive, waters. They turned to check him out, their sides flashing in bands of color, then turned away, hurrying north. Another time it was a turtle, disinterested in the marine mammal paddling overhead, being carried in the current and headed to wherever turtles head thinking whatever turtles thought. A small bait pod came past, chased by a tiny pod of dolphin. A string of sargassum weed came past and he ducked under it, turning over to look at the small fish on the underside. The weed lines were the only cover in the blue waters and the small fish huddled in their shade, hoping to escape the predators that roamed the big blue. The predators, however, knew that and thus homed in on the weeds, or human trash, or floating tree trunks, whatever floated at the surface. It was the reason to fish along the weed lines.

He noticed that the boat was drifting faster and quickly swam to the side, climbing up onto the flush deck and shaking water out of his hair.

“That was just amazing,” Pam said from the fishing deck. “I’d have run out of energy half an hour ago, max.”

“I didn’t swim long enough,” Mike said, walking up the stairs to the deck. “The wind is picking up a bit.”

“Mike, do we have to fish this afternoon?” Courtney said, coming down from the bridge and handing him a beer in a koozie.

“No,” Mike admitted.

“Good,” she replied, tossing a cushion on the deck and dropping to her knees, head bowed. “Master, can this slave service you on her knees?”

“Over here,” Mike said, walking to the fighting chair and sitting down. It was adjustable vertically and he dropped it to the lowest setting then pointed at Pam.

“Slave, take off your clothes, grab another cushion, and come over here.”

He put Courtney in front of him and Pam to his side, facing Courtney, carefully resting the beer bottle on Pam’s back.

“Stay very still,” he said roughly, “and it won’t fall over. If you spill my beer you will be punished. And watch this training; you will be next.”

He looked at Courtney and pointed to his crotch. “Show me what you can do. I doubt that you know how to truly give a blowjob.”

Courtney’s eyes widened in anger and he held up a finger.

“I checked the repeater,” he said, waving at the small group of instruments on the fishing deck. “There aren’t any boats around. Consider this in scene.”

“I’m still not too sure about being told how to ‘truly give a blowjob,’ ” Courtney said exasperatedly. “Most guys are just glad to get them at all.”

“Well, we can play a different game,” Mike admitted, “or we can find out if you know how to give a really good blowjob. And, if not, I can give you some tips. Your call.”

“If she’s not game, I am,” Pam said, desperately trying to keep the bottle upright. “And she can be the table.”

Mike picked up the bottle and set it on the deck.

“Your call,” Mike repeated.

“What’s involved in a really good blowjob, then?” Courtney asked.

“Well, I haven’t found out if you already know, yet,” Mike admitted, grinning. “Care to test the waters?”

Courtney raised one eyebrow, then pulled his shorts down, trailing her hair over his crotch and using her hand to take him in her mouth. She started fellating him, slowly, sucking moderately hard.

“Okay,” Mike said, “question: Are you trying to make it last or get it over with, quick?”

“Huh?” Courtney said, straightening up.

“Because if you’re trying to get it over with quick, we need to talk,” Mike said, shrugging.

“I was… just doing it,” Courtney said, confused.

“All right, first item to know,” Mike said. “If you go slow, you’re drawing it out. By that I mean head motion. If you want to give a long, slow blow, that’s cool. If you’re trying to drive the guy crazy, it’s very cool. If you’re trying to get it over with, you’d better speed way up and suck harder.”

“I’m always afraid to suck too hard,” Courtney admitted. “I bothered a guy that way one time. He said it hurt.”

“There’s sucking and sucking,” Mike said. “But the way to get a guy off, quick, is to suck very hard, move your head fast and use your hands at the same time. For that matter,” he added, shrugging, “if you want to get him off really quick, you can stick a finger up his rectum and tickle his prostate.”

“That’s gross,” Pam said. “Yick!”

“I’m not saying you should do it,” Mike said. “I, personally, don’t like it. But it’s how to get a guy off really fast.”

Courtney had found herself lightly stroking him and she suddenly stopped, blushing.

“I can’t believe… sometimes I sort of catch myself…” she said, half laughing.

“Same here,” Pam said, moving from her knees to sit cross legged on the deck. “So slow and light for a long blow and hard and fast for a short one?”

“In general,” Mike said. “Some guys get off really fast on them. Some don’t. Some guys, and I think they’re either lying or nuts, say they don’t like them. Me, I love them, good, bad, or indifferent.”

“Hand and head will be tricky,” Courtney said, grasping his member with her hand and lowering her head.

“Try just the forefinger and thumb,” Mike said as she started to get in rhythm. “It’s easier. And you won’t keep slamming the heel of your hand into my balls.”

“Mmmm,” Courtney said, her head starting to move faster.

“Try sucking harder,” Mike said hoarsely. “Like you’re trying to give a hickey… that’s it.” He lay back and groaned. “Yeah… like that.”

“Don’t cum in my mouth,” Courtney said, leaning back for a moment but continuing to stroke.

“Won’t,” Mike promised, his eyes closed.

“This is hard on the neck,” Courtney said, coming up for air again and pulling out a hair.

“Practice makes perfect,” Mike admitted, pulling her hand away. “Pam’s turn.”

“Yes, O master,” Pam said, chuckling. But she scooched over to where Courtney had been as Courtney took her pad.

“You didn’t cum,” Courtney said, frowning.

“I was holding back,” Mike admitted. “Otherwise you would have tasted the fruit of knowledge.”

“That’s one I haven’t heard,” Pam said, taking his member in forefinger and thumb and going down on him.

“You’re going slow on purpose,” Mike said accusingly.

“Yep,” Pam said, coming up with a grin. “I figure it’s payback time.”

“Can I cum in your mouth?” Mike asked.

“Sure,” Pam said, going down on him again. No more than a minute later she felt his member start to pulse and then her mouth was filled with cum.

“That was quick,” she said, swallowing and then picking up his beer to wash the taste out.

“Let’s just say that I was ready,” Mike admitted, grinning. “And I wasn’t about to let you tease me too long.”

“But now the lesson is all over,” Pam said, mock sadly.

“Oh, we haven’t even started,” Mike promised.

Afterwards he led them through the five major positions of dominance, then shackled them together on the lounge floor, forcing them to play with each other while he moved the boat to a protected harbor and got supper ready. When it was prepared, he tied them, facing him, on their knees, and fed them bites from his plate, forcing them to ask for each morsel and each sip of wine. They played on into the night and only stopped near dawn, tumbling into the main cabin bed in an exhausted, happy pile.

Late the next morning, when Mike woke up, he could feel by the rocking of the boat that the weather had changed. Sure enough, when he looked outside, there were high alto-cumulus clouds and a thunderhead building. Crap.

He limped into the lounge and checked the weather radar, which showed that things were definitely building, then went back to the cabin to wake the girls.

“I think we need to cancel the day’s fishing,” he said. “Looks like weather’s coming in.”

“What should I do?” Pam asked nervously.

“Not much,” Mike said. “Maybe rinse down the rods with fresh water, then put them away; we should have done that yesterday, but I got sort of caught up. Then fold the kites and put them away. They go in the locker forward of the rod locker.” He grabbed a shirt and bathing suit, heading for the closed bridge. He first checked the text message system and shook his head.

“What’s going on?” Courtney asked, coming up from below.

“There’s a tropical depression forming,” Mike said, pointing to a weather map. “It’s over in the Gulf, but the storm track is for it to cross the peninsula and come this way.”

“Is it a hurricane?” she asked as Pam came in the bridge.

“No,” Mike said. “It’s a storm, but a small one.” He thought about the different waters around and shrugged. “We can dodge it. But we’ll have to dodge south. We might try to run the Gap over to the Deeps and the Tongue of the Ocean. But I’m not sure about that because the storm might catch us in the Gap and that would be bad. Or we can just run straight south to hook around Andros. I’d rather do that, but we’re still probably going to get some effects.”

“Define effects,” Pam said.

“Rain,” Mike said. “Maybe lots. Some winds. Like a thunderstorm, but going on for a day or so. Nastier in a small boat, and this is a small boat make no mistake, than in a house. You might want to take some scop; we’re liable to pitch a good bit.”

“You want to go south, go south,” Courtney said.

“I’m game,” Pam said. “I could use some help with the rods.”

They headed south at max speed, but Mike pulled into a protected, and empty, harbor just after dusk. After dinner he set up a scene where Pam was tied watching as he played with Courtney and “taught” her. He finally took Courtney after he’d brought her to orgasm and he held back, continuing to screw her much longer than she’d expected. She had gone into a continuous quiver when he entered her, but as he continued to take her she orgasmed again.

Still, he’d held back, and when he left her he started on Pam, spread-eagling her alongside Courtney and playing with both of them until Pam orgasmed and he took her as well, then went back to Courtney.

The storm had caught them at anchor, and as it built up the boat began to rock and the two girls seemed to climb to some other plane. They were blindfolded and gagged and the rocking motion left them both quivering uncontrollably by the time Mike, finally, came into Courtney and called the scene.

They spent the night cuddled up in a ball in the main cabin as the storm raged outside. He got up from time to time to ensure the anchors were holding, then went back to the warm bundle in the bed.

“It’s wild outside,” Courtney said at breakfast, looking out at the sheets of rain running down the windows.

“It is that,” Mike said, looking at the weather instruments. The wind was blowing about thirty knots, steady, with gusts to forty. “This is going to get interesting.”

“Up to you, Mike,” Courtney said. “I trust that you’re not going to drown us.”

“No,” Mike said calmly. “But you might get seasick. Strongly recommend the scop.”

“Where is it?” Pam asked.

“This is cool,” Courtney said, staggering onto the closed bridge and looking out the windows. The rain was so solid there really wasn’t anything to see even with the wipers going full blast. “What are you doing? Driving on GPS?”

“Mostly,” Mike said, gesturing at the instruments. There were even more than on the flying bridge, and larger, giving the closed bridge something of the look of flying a plane. “Keeping an eye on the radar and the sonar, too. Watching the weather map update. I think we’ll probably be out of this by the time we get to Andros.”

“It’s rough,” Courtney said, holding on to a stanchion and then making her way to one of the seats.

“It is that,” Mike said. “Seas are about nine, ten feet. I’m staying to the outside of the islands, rather than trying to run the Gap. We’ll just hook around the south of Andros and head over in the direction of Long Island. I’ll keep going tonight and we’ll be clear by tomorrow morning. But there’s not really anywhere to dock down there, a few outlying keys, but no really good harbors.” He frowned and shrugged. “It’s a bit… lawless in that area. Lots of drug running goes through there. And there are… well, I’d hate to dignify them with the description ‘pirates,’ but there are people that occasionally attack boats.”

“And you’ll do what about that?” Courtney said, her eyes wide. “Throw a whip at them?”

“There is far more than a whip on this boat, Courtney,” Mike said, glancing at the radar. “But I think I’ll be on watch for a couple of days.”

By the next morning they were clear of the wind and rain, but the storm to the north was still kicking up the seas to nearly six feet.

“I managed to make coffee,” Pam said, coming up to the bridge with a travel mug. “I didn’t make a huge mess.”

“Not much fun being battened down, is it?” Mike said, smiling as he took it from her and set it in a holder.

“It’s cleared up at least,” she said, looking around. “Except for the clouds.”

“They’ll clear off by, oh, tomorrow,” Mike replied, shrugging. “I won’t be happy until we’re down to the south of Andros, though.”

“The pirates Courtney was asking about?” Pam said, looking off to port. “There’s clear water over there,” she said, pointing.

“Yep,” Mike said. “And see the breakers between us and that clear water? That’s the great Bahama Banks. You can’t get a cabin cruiser in there. You can’t even get a cigarette boat in most of it. It’s an area where conditions are just right to form calcium carbonate from sea water and carbon dioxide. Major carbon dioxide sink. There’s an old land-form that supports it. And it’s mostly extremely shallow. There are a few channels in it, but they move and nobody tries to chart them. Also a few very small keys. They’re technically uninhabited, but some of them are used as layovers by drug runners and some have the ‘pirates’ on them. Really just criminals with small boats that try to sneak out and pick up… well, the occasional passing yacht like us. They’ve generally got very small boats, though. What you’d probably call a john boat. I doubt even they would try in these conditions. But I’m keeping a close eye on the radar. And an eye out in general — sometimes they don’t show very well on radar.”

“That’s scary,” Pam said.

“I have various methods to convince them we’re not a good target,” Mike said. “Just going up on deck with a fake rifle will usually make them veer off.”

“And do you have a fake rifle?” Pam asked nervously.

“Yes,” Mike replied.

“What about a real one?” Pam asked. “In case they don’t scare off?”

“No comment,” Mike said. “The Bahamas is very down on guns. One of the reasons that criminals find local yachts easy pickings since plenty of guns come in with the drugs.”

“I noticed that the customs guys didn’t actually search the boat,” Pam said.

“They generally don’t,” Mike said. “But they’re very down on guns, nonetheless. Using one to defend yourself is nearly as bad as getting picked off by pirates. Nearly.”

“What do the pirates do with the boat?” she asked, gulping. “And, uhm, the people on board?”

“You don’t want to know,” Mike answered.

“Thought so,” Pam said with a sigh.

Chapter Eleven

Mike allowed Pam and Courtney to spell him in the late morning, as the waves moderated, and caught a few hours of sleep. By the time he got up in the afternoon, things had really started to calm down, but there was still solid overcast. He looked at the tropical satellite update and the general storm tracks. There was another depression forming off Africa, but other than that it looked pretty clear.

He was munching a sandwich for supper, watching the sun go down in the west with Pam sitting next to him, when the sat phone rang. He’d called in to the OSOL last night, giving his location and destination to the duty officer. It was a pain in the ass, but if it was the price of being armed, he was willing to pay it.

“Jenkins,” he said after putting in the optional headset. Nobody but OSOL had the number, so it had to be them.

“Pierson,” the colonel said. “Go scramble.”

Mike punched in the code, watched by a puzzled Pam.

“Go scramble,” he said.

“Mike, what is your position, exactly?”

Mike frowned and glanced at the GPS.

“24, 33, 93 by 78, 46, 21, more or less,” Mike said. “Why?”

“Hang on,” Pierson said, then sighed. “Mike, you have a presidential request to go operational.”

“What?” Mike shouted. “Pam, could you go below?” he said, more calmly. “Hang on, Bob.” When she was gone he said: “What?”

“Mike, we have a fixed location on WMD in movement,” Pierson said tightly. “Specifically a nuke, probably refurbished Russian in origin. It’s located at a key in the outer Great Banks, but it’s going to move by tomorrow morning about four-thirty. We’d forward punched all our teams, trying to intercept it in Europe or the Mideast. We’ve got no spec ops that can deploy to the Bahamas before about 0600 tomorrow. If it moves, we’ll lose it and have to reacquire. You’re in position. It’s less than forty miles from your current position.”

“What’s the threat level?” Mike asked.

“Low,” Pierson said. “Okay, not great for one guy. Seven currently sitting on the device. At four-thirty, more or less, there’s a cigarette boat coming in for it and there should be five more on the cig. But you should be able to get in position and take down the two groups separately.”

“Thanks for the morale boost, buddy,” Mike snorted. “And where is it, by the way?”

Pierson gave him the coordinates and Mike blanched. “That’s inside the Banks, Bob! How the hell am I supposed to get there? Wade?”

“Mike, work the problem,” Pierson said. “They’ve got a way in and out, find it.”

“You’re not Navy, Bob, that’s for sure,” Mike snorted, dialing up his charts, for what they were worth. “Okay, I think I can see what they’re using. There’s a narrow channel that leads up to a cluster of keys. Crap, they’re not even named. And that channel is not very deep or wide. And who knows when this chart was last updated. I could end up stuck on a mud bank in pirate central.”

“I’m looking at the satellite image,” Pierson said. “There are five keys, more or less in a star pattern. On the center one is a small block building. The key is shaped sort of like a kidney, the inside pointed south. The block building is on the southwest side. Our information is that the device is on that key.”

“I see ’em on the chart,” Mike said, shaking his head and spinning the wheel to port to turn the boat northwards. “I’m already past the Gap. And they’ll be able to see me from the horizon if I close inside of ten miles or so.” He thought about it and shrugged. “I’ve got the Zod. It’s marginally doable.”

“You’ll do it?” Pierson asked.

“I’ll do it,” Mike said. “WMD in motion? Of course I’ll do it. I just didn’t think I could actually get there in time.”

“The President also noted that the reward for stopping a WMD attack is five million,” Pierson pointed out.

“I’ve got plenty of money, Bob,” Mike snorted. “But tell the President thank you.”

“Hurry,” Pierson said.

“I already turned around,” Mike said. “Call me if there’s an intel update.”

“Will do,” Pierson said. “The reinforcements are FAST Three, coming out of Rota. I’ll give you a contact frequency. What’s your call sign? I think your usual would be a bad idea.”

Mike thought about that then shrugged. “Use ‘Winter born,’ ” he replied.

Mike looked up at the sky and frowned. Crescent moon tonight. “Please, clouds, hold,” he muttered, then set the autosteer and went below.

“Mike, what’s going on?” Pam asked.

“Something’s come up,” Mike said, thinking about what to do about the girls. This really was pirate central. Be a hell of a thing to go grab the nuke and lose the girls. “Either one of you know how to use a pistol?”

“I do,” Courtney said. “My dad taught me.”

“What kind?” Mike asked.

“Some kind of automatic,” Courtney said.

“Semiautomatic I hope,” Mike said. “Ladies, there’s some sort of U.S. Code that covers what you’re about to see,” he said, pulling out a pair of pantyhose.

“You’re a cross-dresser and it’s covered by U.S. Code?” Courtney giggled.

“No,” Mike said. “I’m about to open Bluebeard’s Stateroom,” he said, humming a tune. “That is what is covered by U.S. Code.”

He got the key and opened up the room and waved for them to look.

“Uniforms?” Courtney asked, stepping inside and sitting on the bed. “You’re still a SEAL?”

“Not exactly,” Mike said, unlocking the weapons locker. While it wasn’t exactly packed full with weapons, it was close, and the gleam of lethal black was a sight to see.

“Holy shit,” Pam whispered.

“There’s something going on nearby,” Mike said. “What it is I can’t specify. I was asked, as a favor, to look into it,” he said, squatting down and pulling out a pair of team shorts, which he laid down beside the panty-hose. “We’re going to have to actually run into the Banks, and then I’ll have to leave for a while. I’ll be back in the morning. But you guys will be sitting ducks while I’m gone,” he added, pulling out a silenced .22-caliber pistol and a .40-caliber Sig. “Which one do you want?”

“I don’t want either one,” Courtney said, her eyes wide. “I don’t want you to go.”

“That’s… not an option,” Mike said.

“Why don’t they send…”

“Real SEALs?” Mike said, slipping a magazine into the Sig and setting it on the floor. “Better the .40. Never get in a gunfight with a weapon that doesn’t start with at least point four. Very good rule. They’re all running around Bosnia and the Middle East kicking doors. The terrorists got inside of our net. I’m in position. I took the contract.”

“You said you were a contractor,” Pam said. “You didn’t exactly say that you were still selling widgets.”

“Well, I lied about selling widgets, frankly,” Mike said, shrugging. “I never sold widgets. The boat, the rest, all came from contracting.”

“That’s a lot of money for a contractor,” Courtney said, her eyes wide.

“You get paid a lot of money for what I do,” Mike said, shrugging and starting to assemble his gear. “If I manage this mission, the vig is five mil. Again, this is all secret. The only reason I’m telling you is that you’re going to have to see some of it and I’ve been wanting to really impress you. This is my big chance. When I get back all shot up, you’ll be less impressed,” he added, looking up. “Pam, could you go get that big case of maxipads and the case of tampons, please?”

“What do you need these for — padding?” Pam asked when she came back in.

“No,” Mike said, taking a handful of each and putting them in gallon Ziploc bags. He sealed them with as little air as possible and set them to the side. “Could you ladies go topside and watch our position? When we get to N24 40.656 W78 46.228 — it’s marked on the GPS — come down and tell me. And, of course, keep an eye out for unfriendly locals.”

Mike continued to assemble what he considered essential gear for the mission until Courtney came down. He’d been pretty sure they were at the entrance to the channel when the boat slowed.

“We’re pretty close,” Courtney said. “There’s breakers off to the east. Close.”

“The edge of the Banks.” Mike sighed, getting up and stretching; his joints ached from the weather change and sitting on the floor. “Now comes the fun part.”

The wind was still blowing pretty steadily from the northeast and it was fairly cool up on the tuna tower. But it was the only place he might be able to see if the channel marked on the map was imaginary or not.

“There it is,” Mike said, pointing to a break in the surf line. He eased the boat over and blanched at the narrowness and depth of the channel. “We’re going to go aground, I just know it.” He pulled up the tide tables for the area and nodded. “Tide’s making, so if we do go aground, we’ll be able to float off. But I’ll need to find a deep hole to set this thing or we’ll be screwed when the tide goes out.” He flipped a switch and the speakers started to boom with heavy bass.

“More Goth?” Courtney asked, sighing.

“I’m going to take you to a Goth concert, someday,” Mike said, grinning. “You’ll have a blast. And I need to get my head into mission mode. And in this debt, a better world is made…” he whispered. “In the fury of this darkest hour, we will be your light. You ask me for this sacrifice and I am Winter born… I hear the angels call my name…”

Mike carefully negotiated his way into the channel, which widened out a bit beyond the entrance, and then began the process of trying to find his way through the maze.

Much of the channel marked on the maps was gone, storms and currents having torn down the walls of the channel and created shoals where clear water had been. But by luck as much as anything he was able to make his way through. He realized after a bit that it must have been dredged once upon a time and wondered why. Possibly for a salt extraction plant, long defunct. Now it was a ruined remnant of civilization in an uncivilized area.

Finally, well after dark, he reached the crop of keys that he’d spotted on the chart. There was a small open area on the northeast side of the islands, well out of sight of the target, and he dropped anchor while watching the area carefully for signs of life. This seemed like a natural spot for the local criminals to use for a base, but when he swept the islands with a thermal imager there weren’t any hot spots. He still intended to circle the keys before he went in.

He’d kept navigational lights off as he approached and had the girls turn off all the interior lights, both so they wouldn’t betray their presence and to let his eyes adjust to the darkness.

Now he slipped below, using a blue lens flashlight to make his way to the weapons room. Pam and Courtney were in the darkness of the lounge and, having run out of things to talk about, were now sitting on the couch and looking nervous.

“When I’m gone,” Mike said, “lock the doors and hunker down. If anyone but me comes to the boat, just tell them to go away. If they don’t, just put a round through the door. If that doesn’t work, get in the Bluebeard Room; it’s got reinforcing that’s not exactly noticeable and the door is armored. They won’t be able to take the boat anywhere, so just let them take whatever they want to take. I can replace anything except you two,” he added with a smile.

“Okay,” Courtney said unhappily. “I don’t suppose going with you would be better.”

“Not hardly.” Mike grinned. He handed the light to Pam, then made his way to the weapons room, turned on the bluelight in there, then picked up his packs, going back out to the fishing deck.

The boat had had a nice center console inflatable for a dinghy when he got it. He’d replaced it with a black Zodiac for reasons that had never been clearly articulated in his mind. Now he knew why and why he’d also gotten an engine silencer installed. He undid the Zodiac, then swung it over the side, bringing it around to the fishing deck to load.

There was another bluelight on the fishing deck and he turned it on, then stripped and put on pantyhose. Over that went a black 3mm wetsuit. He wouldn’t need it for the water, but it was better, he thought, than using fatigues for a combat swim, and the pressure of the neoprene tended to reduce bleeding in minor wounds. Once he had the suit on he camouflaged his face, then loaded all the gear he’d assembled from the weapons room into the Zodiac. Last he got out a Kryton rebreather and dropped that in the Zod. Rebreathers, which were underwater breathing apparatuses that didn’t release bubbles, instead “rebreathing” the diver’s exhalations, were generally considered to be military gear. However, modern rebreathers not only gave very long endurance underwater, up to twenty-four hours, but because there were no bubbles they also made spearfishing much easier. Fish tended to run from the sound of the bubbles with normal SCUBA. He’d picked up the rebreather for sport diving, but it would work just as well for a combat swim.

Once the Zod was fully loaded he climbed in and put on a set of NODs. The night was clearly lit with the goggles on and he started up the Zod, first circling the small string of keys and making sure that there was no sign of life, occasionally switching to a small thermal viewer to look for heat signatures. There didn’t appear to be anything there, so he picked up his GPS, keyed it on, and headed south.

“This really sucks,” Pam said as she heard the tiny sound of the motor fade into the distance. They were sitting in the near darkness of the lounge with only the small bluelight filtering out of the Bluebeard Room.

“I know,” Courtney replied, fingering the pistol. “I really don’t want to think about trying to defend this boat. I’m scared and bored at the same time.”

“And horny,” Pam said. “Is that crazy?”

“I dunno,” Courtney said. “But so am I.”

“I don’t want to stay here,” Pam said, looking around the room. “It’s too spooky. But I don’t want to put on a light, either.”

“There aren’t any windows in the Bluebeard Room,” Courtney pointed out. “And it’s got that reinforcing he was talking about.”

“Right,” Pam said, standing up and making her way into the room.

“Well, now I’m really bored,” Courtney admitted after a minute, setting the pistol on a locker. “And still horny. I wonder when he’ll be back.”

“I wonder if he’ll be back,” Pam said, leaning into her. She paused as she did it and cleared her throat. “Uh, Courtney… ?”

“I was wondering what you were waiting for,” Courtney said, putting her arms around the girl and lying back on the bed.

Chapter Twelve

There was still a wind from the north kicking up a light chop and he used the chop to look for shoals. Small breakers could be seen on the upwind side and the shoals were also marked by flatter water. He steered clear of these while keeping one eye on the GPS and checking around for signs of life.

He saw nothing on the transit to the target area. The water was clear of boats as well as islands. When he neared the target area he bore southeast, swinging in from the east towards the target and using the cover of the small islands northeast of the target, hopefully unsentineled, for cover.

He drove the Zod onto a slip of open beach and donned his gear. He’d loaded most of his weaponry in a waterproof bag, but he donned his armor and combat harness, with a USP .45 for a sidearm and MP-5 SPD on a friction strap. Then he put on his swim gear, including the rebreather, and slipped over the side, dragging the bag behind him.

The water was shallow around the keys but deep enough that, with the weights loaded into the rebreather harness, he could keep below water level. He crab-walked along the bottom, using the contour of the bottom and his compass, to move towards the northeast end of the island. He hit a couple of shoals and had to maneuver around them. He tried to stay eastward, where the map indicated thick mangrove cover.

The Kryton rebreather was good for nearly twenty-four hours and he could have made a much longer swim approach, but getting the yacht into position and all the rest had pushed him for time. It was nearly two AM by the time he started his swim and if the intel was correct — that the pickup was to be at around four — he barely had time to make the short swim from the Zod to the target, recon and do his raid. So he pushed his movement faster than he’d have liked, occasionally surfacing and using the waterproof NODs to check his position.

Finally he got to within a few dozen meters of the mangroves on the northeast side of the island and found a fairly deep channel in which to rerig. He dropped the rebreather, attaching his fins to it, and slowly surfaced, MP-5 in one hand, dive bag in the other, checking his position and looking for threats.

No one was in sight so he kicked towards the mangroves until his dive booties found soft ground. In moments he’d made his way into the outer rank of the mangroves and started making his way deeper into the thicket.

Mangroves were the major nurseries of tropical waters, small trees with complex root systems that acted to form cover for small fish and invertebrates. The roots curved downwards from the trunk and often were covered in oysters. In addition to being a nursery, they captured soil and held it in place, slowly building up land around their roots; many keys in the Caribbean were nothing more than the build-up from mangroves. They dropped their leaves regularly and the decaying leaves both supplied food and added to the material trapped in the roots. The roots prevented erosion from wind and wave, often being the only thing that survived hurricanes and kept the land from being completely swept away. All in all they were something of a miracle plant.

They also were a pain in the ass. The tangled roots constantly tried to trap him as he made his way through the thicket. The microclimates formed in the roots mostly consisted of hot, almost boiling hot it seemed, water that stank to high heaven from decay. Each step raised bubbles of foul-smelling hydrogen sulfide gas, and the oysters and barnacles on the roots tore at his wetsuit, shredding it before he could even get shot.

But they gave him cover as he made his way onto the land, finally passing into a narrow strip of sand where the mangroves ended and the sea grape still hadn’t started. He paused before he entered that strip, sticking his head out of the mangroves and looking around carefully as well as using his ears and nose to check for signs of threats. Since nothing was in sight, he slid out into the open area and considered the situation.

There was a small gap in the mangroves on the north side, a strip of dirty beach about three meters wide. On the south side of the island there was a strip of real beach. The charts indicated truly shallow water near the north opening, so it was unlikely the relief boat would come in that way. However, it was a natural place to put a sentry.

The small island was covered in scattered palms with a heavy undergrowth of sea grape. Sea grape wasn’t thorny or particularly unpleasant, but it was thick, too thick to walk through. However, it had open area under it. He paused and opened up his bag, pulling out equipment and checking it. The main thing he needed from it was the thermal imager. Nobody had ever made a thermal imager that could handle a dive approach, unlike standard NODs. He flipped up the NODs and swept the imager around, looking for hot spots. The immediate area seemed to be clear, so he slid the imager into a pouch on his combat harness, stored the bag in the mangroves and started crawling northeast under the grapes, cautiously probing for sentries.

He found the first one more or less where he expected, sitting on the sand of the north beach, looking out at the water and smoking a cigarette. The wind had shifted around to the south and Mike moved cautiously so as not to give away his position, choosing each placement of his hands and knees with care.

There was a narrow path running generally southeast to northwest and terminating at the water. He slid out into this open area carefully, checking to see that the sentry wasn’t in sight of any of his friends, then slid the MP-5 to burst and put three rounds in his head. The sentry flopped backwards so that he looked like he had simply fallen asleep, except for the twitching of his legs and arms. Mike wasn’t sure exactly why one guy in four was a twitcher, but it was pretty consistent. Make for a great doctoral dissertation some day.

He used the path, cautiously, probing southwest towards the target building, stopping from time to time to check with the thermal for heat. Finally, after a move of about fifty meters, he spotted a heat image and dropped down to crawl cautiously forward.

There was an open area running up from the beach. It was about seventy meters long and about fifty deep, in an irregular oval. The target building, which was lit, was on the north side, the beach on the south, and otherwise it was surrounded by sea grape. There were a few palm trees scattered around, but not many. The ground was sand covered liberally with palm fronds.

There was another sentry standing outside the main door of the small shack. He was looking pretty bored, but reasonably alert. He also was close enough that simply shooting him was likely to trigger the group on the interior.

Mike crawled backwards and into the sea grape, cautiously and silently making his way to the building under cover of the grapes. When he reached the building he found that the thicket came right up to the walls and moving through the thick portion at the edge was hard to do silently. He slowly slid up through the plants, though, until he could get an optical viewer over the edge of an open window and get a look inside the target building.

There were five Middle Eastern males in the room, lounging on cots or seated. At the far end of the room was a large bomb-looking thing on a rolling cart. It didn’t have the shape of a MIRV and his last class in Soviet nuclear weapons was a very faint memory. It more or less had to be the target, though. The light came from a Coleman lantern on a table.

He made his way back down through the sea grape, silently, then low crawled to the front edge of the thicket. He slid slowly out, keeping the MP-5 centered on the chest of the sentry, who was totally oblivious. The wind was from the south, filling the area with the sound of rustling palm trees and sea grape, and that rustling hid the faint noises he was making. It was dark by the sea grape, with shadows cast by the light from the windows; it was unlikely that the sentry would have seen him if he’d looked right at Mike’s position. Which he wasn’t doing, simply looking down towards the sea, clearly hoping that the boats would get here soon.

When Mike was clear of the entangling vegetation he slowly stood up, keeping the sentry targeted, and stepped forward, one step, two, then triggered a burst into the sentry.

The sound of the weapon was masked by the sound of the wind and trees, but the thump of the sentry hitting the ground was noticed by those inside as Mike could tell by the questioning tones in Arabic. He didn’t give them much time to react, though, stepping to the nearest window and tossing a frag through, then up to the door. The building was cast concrete and he stood to the side of the thin wooden door until the frag went off, extinguishing the light, then flipped down his NODs, opened up the door and stepped into the room.

Three of the terrorists were on the ground, screaming in pain from the fragments tossed around the room by the grenade. Another had apparently been right by it when it detonated and he wasn’t going to ever scream again. The fifth was wounded, but trying to get his AK operational. Mike triggered a burst into him and then into each of the surviving terrorists, filling the already blood-soaked room with more spray.

The bomb had apparently been undamaged by the grenade. He hadn’t been worried about it sympathetically detonating. Nukes were hard enough to get to go off at all; it wasn’t going to be detonated by a grenade.

However, he didn’t want the reinforcements snatching it away from him, so he needed to do something with it. He rolled it out the door and to the east, driving it up a small path in the grape until he was well away from the building. Then he carefully lifted the heavy device off the cart, knowing he was probably getting radiation exposure, and rolled it under the sea grape.

After that he rolled the cart back into the building and followed the path to the beach. From there he made his way through the entangling grape to where he’d dropped his swim bag. With that in hand, he made his way back to the edge of the open area and set up.

Mike was more than capable of fighting at close range, but if he could take out the enemy at a distance he much preferred it. And while the MP-5 was great for close, silent work, he preferred something with a bit more range and punch if he had to engage an enemy in open field. Thus he’d packed along both a Mannlicher 7mm sniper rifle and a silenced M-4. The silencer on the M-4 didn’t really make it silent, but it did reduce and modify the sound. It also made it harder to pinpoint.

He put the MP-5 in the bag, switched out magazines and rolled the bag back under the sea grape. Then he set up a good sniper position, including dragging a couple of the cooling bodies over for cover. He got some of the palm fronds for minor camouflage. He was only expecting five, but it never hurt to be safe.

That done he took a pull of water from his camelbak and got out a power bar. The whole mission had been more exercise than he’d been getting lately and he was pretty tired. He also ached, probably due to the weather change, and if he had to sit still for long he was going to lock up.

He’d hydrated and gotten down a couple of power bars when he spotted a faint white mark on the sea a few hundred meters out. He flipped down the NODs and spotted the cigarette boat immediately, moving in slowly, making its way through the shoals. He glanced at his watch and it was right on time. The only problem being that it was followed by four more.

“You said five,” he muttered. “Five targets. Not five boats!”

As the boats got closer he saw that they were also filled with targets. Each seemed to have about four or five. Crap.

He snugged the Mannlicher into his shoulder and tracked them with the thermal scope as they got closer. As the first boat came in sight of the building it slid to a stop, working back and forth at steerage and apparently unsure if it should come in. Mike suddenly realized they were either waiting for a signal or bothered by the building being unlit. He probably should have replaced the broken Coleman with something, although he couldn’t think off the top of his head what.

Finally the boat came forward, cautiously, followed by the other four. They spread out as they approached the beach. When they’d beached, armed men came forward and jumped to the sand, running out anchors, looking around at the darkness under the trees and calling out softly.

Mike scanned the sniper rifle over the target-rich environment until one of the men on the boat climbed onto the bow and started ordering the terrorists on the beach to head for the building and waving at others to land.

Mike laid the crosshairs on the man’s head and gently squeezed the trigger. The target’s head exploded like a melon and he started tracking other targets.

The men on the ground had spread out and gone to ground, most of them firing wildly into the darkness. Mike slid the Mannlicher from one to the next, pumping rounds into them and silencing the panicked fire.

One of the cigarette boats suddenly sprung to life, backing away, dragging its anchor. Mike tried to target the pilot, but the man was hunched down, so he put three rounds into the engine compartment and the boat gave a cough and stopped.

By this time most of the terrorists on the boats had unloaded and were firing in his general direction, some of them coming forward at a run. The area was getting a bit hot, so he dropped the Mannlicher and picked up the M-4. The Mannlicher only had a five-round magazine compared to the thirty-round mag on the assault rifle. He targeted three of the terrorists, spinning them into the sand, then rolled backward into the sea grape.

He wasn’t sure how many terrorists were left, but his main concern was the cigarette boats. He didn’t want them either getting away or, worse, being used to move terrorists around to the sides of the island. So he made his way quickly through the sea grape, pausing only to connect the MP-5’s friction strap, until he was at the edge of the open area by the sea.

The open area was swarming with terrorists by this point so he couldn’t go in there. He made his way southward, then into the mangroves on that side, cautiously making his way down to the waterline. He found a small channel, stinking with rot, and sunk down into the putrid water, cautiously sliding out into the open water and submerging.

It was a short swim to the boats and one that he could make entirely on a lungful of air. He was mainly worried about phosphorescence. Any movement in tropical waters caused flashes of luminescent light from small planktonic creatures in the water. But the terrorists apparently were focusing on the land and ignoring the water. Stupid terrorists, water is for SEALs.

He reached the hull of the nearest cigarette boat and slowly surfaced, letting out his breath silently and getting another lungful. He was shielded from view by the hull of the boat and he paused a moment to consider his next move. Then he lifted his left hand up to the bulwark of the boat and gently lifted himself from the water.

There were two terrorists in the boat, watching the goings-on on the land. He could see more on the other boats. He quietly lifted himself, one-handed, up to the bulwark, lowering his barrel to clear it of water, sliding over on his belly as quietly as he could. When he was in the boat, he triggered a burst into each of the terrorists.

The faint sound of the M-4 apparently didn’t carry to the other boats, or the terrorists couldn’t place it, since they continued to pay more attention to the land than the boat he’d boarded. Mike carefully corrected for the rocking of the boat and targeted the terrorist on the next boat, taking him down as well.

That was noticed by the next boat, but before the terrorists on that one could react, he had hit one. The other dove out of sight with a scream and he took that as indication that his position was compromised. He took a breath and rolled backwards off the boat and into the water.

He swam down the line of boats, keeping his eyes open in the salt water, until he was up to the third boat, again letting himself surface by the hull. Suddenly the boat burst into life and he lifted himself quickly over the side, targeting the terrorist in the boat, who was hunkered down by the controls and yelling to his fellows on the shore.

Fire started to come from the land and Mike dove over the side, chased by fire from the land and boats. He felt a searing pain in his right leg when he hit the water and realized that he must have taken a round on the way out.

He used the boats for cover, breathing in their shadow, and made his way back to the mangroves. Once there he passed through them fast, ignoring the pain in his leg and reloading. The entire engagement on the boats hadn’t used up a full magazine.

He heard shouting from the east end of the island and realized that the terrorists must have found the nuke. That simply wasn’t on, so he made his way back to the edge of the open area and scanned around with the NOD on the M-4.

Three terrorists had gotten the cart from the building and were manhandling it towards the path. He got two, but the third dove into the concealment of the sea grape. However, the bomb was on the other side of the open area and to get to the boats they’d have to pass his line of fire.

Mike suddenly heard a rustle behind him and rolled over, triggering a burst into the terrorist that had been trying to sneak up on him. The guy had a buddy, though, and even on spray and pray at less than five yards it was hard to entirely miss. He felt a familiar punch in his side, like being hit by a baseball bat, and another in his chest. He was pretty sure the one in his chest had been stopped by the armor, but the other one started to sting like hell from the salt water even before he put another burst in the remaining terrorist.

The brief firefight had attracted attention, though, and more were moving across the open area towards his position. He serviced two of those but had to roll deeper into the grape as the scrub around him started to be flailed by bullets. He took another round in the back of his armor, knocking him forward, before he got out of the beaten area.

He circled to the right, crawling under the sea grape as fast as he could, and got another look at the open area. The cart was gone, probably up the path to pick up the bomb, and he decided it was time for serious action. However, he was bleeding like a pig and the pain in his leg was starting to slow him down.

He pulled out the packet of tampons and pads and explored the wound in his leg. That was a through-and-through in the calf that was bleeding freely, but it wasn’t pumping, so no major vessels had been hit. First he pulled out a small foil packet and tore it open, dumping the contents in the wound. The material was a combination of antibiotics and a new blood coagulant made from shrimp shells, of all things. It was supposed to be the cat’s pajamas in stopping hemorrhaging and he could use that at the moment. When he’d gotten the stuff in the wound he plugged it with a tampon, then injected the area with novocaine. The one on his side was a through-and-through as well, basically through his love-handles, as if he didn’t have enough reasons to go on a diet. More shrimp, another tampon, and a shot of novocaine and it was good to go.

He checked the open area and nothing was moving. But he could hear Arabic voices on the far side, presumably wrestling with the bomb. He wasn’t sure how many were left on the boats, but they could wait.

He continued circling right, getting all the way up to the building, before he heard the group struggling with the bomb. From the sound of it they were right by where the path reached the open area. Mike decided that bold was the only course open to him and simply stepped out of the seagrapes and headed for the path.

There were four of the terrorists in the group manhandling the cart down the path. Two were actually handling the cart with another giving orders while the fourth was sweeping his AK around nervously.

The night was dark, still overcast, and the terrorists didn’t have night-vision devices. They were as plain as day to Mike, but apparently they hadn’t seen him. Oh, well. He shot the one with the AK, then the two manhandling the bomb. By the time he’d taken them down, the one giving the orders had fled down the path. The fucker had been armed; Mike had anticipated taking rounds. But usually “martyrdom” meant for the lowly and not the guys giving orders. Nine times out of ten with muj, the leadership ran like rabbits and let the brainwashed teenage muj take the heat.

He suddenly started taking fire from the direction of the boats and cursed. He was getting really tired of those guys. He moved down the path, out of sight of the boats, then crawled under the sea grape to a position where he could keep an eye on the bomb and still be out of sight.

He didn’t know how many terrorists were still on the island. He’d never gotten an accurate count and hadn’t been able to keep up with how many he’d taken down. He figured it was somewhere between three and seven with about three on the boats.

One of the boat drivers called out in a questioning tone. At first there was no answer, then a voice yelled from somewhere nearby, high and fast in Arabic. Mike stayed still, anticipating that the leader would move after yelling. Three men got off of one of the boats and started moving towards the bomb, cautiously, their weapons swinging back and forth. Suddenly, one of them ripped off a whole magazine towards the building and there was a shout of pain in that direction, followed by cursing in Arabic.

Mike took the opportunity to move back into the sea grape, shifting his position towards where the leader had been. It put him out of sight of the bomb, but he wanted to take the leader out while he could.

The sea grape gave way to a narrow path and he figured the leader type had used that. There were no apparent footprints, so he didn’t know if the guy had gone left or right. He slid out of the sea grape cautiously and stepped carefully down the path to the east.

The path terminated behind the building and he paused at the edge, his spidey-sense tingling. There was somebody nearby. He could hear the target getting to the bomb and cursed to himself. Keeping the bomb secure was his primary mission and he needed to get back to it.

He stepped to the side of the building, then paused and threw himself flat as he heard a hissing sound passing through the air. Frickin’ grenade.

Chapter Thirteen

Bakr Majali had been a street child in Jordan until he joined the madrassa. There he was fed and trained in the Word of God. The madrassas were supposed to teach things other than just the Koran, but for most that was enough. He had been filled with the words of Mohammed, living on the sufferance of the good Islamics who contributed to the support of the madrassa, and growing day by day in his hatred of the infidel. He was a Palestinian, one of the millions that made up the bulk of the population of Jordan. And besides the Word of God he was filled with the stories of the suffering of his people, both at the hands of the Jews and at the hands of the Hashemites who ruled Jordan.

He had planted his first bomb when he was barely twelve and had lived his life as a mujahideen, first as a street fighter, then as a leader. Over the years his fervor had died, but he still fought for the only cause he had ever known. He had no other skills than those of a terrorist.

He had been sent on this mission because of his knowledge of English and his loyalty to the cause. And he intended to both survive and succeed, despite this infidel who stood in their way.

The man was very good, as good as an Israeli commando, but he was but one man. And he had never fought the likes of Bakr Majali. Bakr had learned long ago that standing in the middle of the street and firing off a whole magazine, like Rambo in some action movie, was never going to kill the enemies of Allah. Silence was required, and aiming and hiding. But a good grenade never hurt.

He heard the faint movement as the commando neared the house. It was so faint it was nearly lost on the night wind, but it was there, the soft compression of the sand, a crackle of leaf. He quietly pulled the pin on the grenade and then threw it around the corner.

Mike lay flat, taking the impact of the grenade as much as he could on his armor and helmet. Most grenade fragments tended to fly upwards when the device hit the ground, and they did this time. But he could feel some of them ripping into his legs and arms.

It was the latter that caused him to be slow as the figure leaned around the corner, quickly spotting him in the faint starlight and opening fire at the figure on the ground. Mike felt the aimed rounds track across his back, most of them stopped by the armor, and then into his legs. But he stayed in the prone, targeting the figure in return and put a burst into his chest. The figure, though, stayed upright, continuing to fire, and he felt more rounds flail into his legs and a sharp, stabbing, pain in his left arm that caused him to flinch and let go of the weapon with that hand. He pointed the weapon like a pistol and threw three more bursts of 5.56 into the target, sending him staggering backwards to fall on his back.

Allah’s curse on all Westerners and their damned body armor, Bakr thought as he lay on the ground looking at the stars. The bullets had slammed into him like so many punches and while he’d continued to fire, he could feel his life seeping away. Now he could no longer move. He looked at the fading stars and thought of the words of the mullahs in that faraway madrassa. Allah, the Kind, the Beneficent, the Merciful. Allahu Akbar. Allah is Great. There is no God besides Allah. To die in battle…

His left arm was useless; the bullet seemed to have broken the ulnar bone. Mike used his right arm to pull himself forward, trying to get to the open area where he could cover the retreating mujahideen and stop them from departing with the bomb. He couldn’t get to his feet, either, and he was worried that one or more of the bullets might have punched an artery. If so, he might bleed out before he could get back to the battle.

He crawled forward, the pain so great that it was causing an endorphin rush high, dragging his useless legs and arm, each bump making him nearly scream in agony. But he kept his mouth shut until he was at the edge of the sea grape that cloaked the west side of the building.

The remaining mujahideen were wheeling the bomb down to the waterline. He propped himself against a palm tree, compensating for the faint sway, and lined up the one who was doing the most pushing.

Haroun Arif was terrified and elated. Although the apparently lone commando had nearly stopped them from securing the bomb, they were almost to the boats. A few more meters and they would have it in the boat and be gone. Let the Americans try to stop them then. With all the losses the cells had taken, it would be hard to smuggle the weapon all the way into America, but they would persevere. Allah was with them and…

He felt the punch in his back before he processed the faint cracks behind him. Suddenly, his legs were not working as well and his vision was going black. His hands slipped from the handle of the bomb carrier and he slipped to his knees.

“Allah is Merciful,” he whispered. “Great is Allah…”

Mike started to target the other two, but one of them pushed the bomb carrier over on its side and the two crouched behind it. He couldn’t get a clear shot at them from where he was, so he painfully started crawling to the side, keeping one eye on them and the other on the boats.

Assadolah Shaath had been a physics student at Princeton University when he was recruited to the jihad. He had traveled first to Syria and then to the camps in Afghanistan before the invasion by the infidel. There he had tried to use his skills to create such a bomb as he now touched, but it was beyond his ability given the conditions and what he had to work with. But he knew how they worked. As had Jalal Azhiri, one of the Brethren who had waited in the darkness until the American cowboy came and sent him into Allah’s arms.

But, as he had been told, the bomb had already been rigged for destruction. Setting it off in America would be better than here, but just having it go off near America was surely better than losing it entirely. And with only he and Halim Shahid left, it was more than likely that the American would soon recapture it.

However, while he believed in the Great Jihad, he had no interest in martyrdom. He had many skills the jihad needed. So he opened up the arming panel and keyed in a sequence.

“What are you doing?” Halim asked, nervously.

“Setting the bomb to blow,” Assadolah answered. “When I am done, we will run to the boats and drive away. There will be enough time for us to escape, but not enough for the American to disarm it. This will send a message to the world that Allah is Great.”

Mike could see one of the targets crouched behind the weapon but the other was still covered. He lined him up and fired carefully.

Halim let out a grunt and reared up as something thudded into his body. As he lifted himself, there were more thuds, like thunking a melon, and he collapsed. Assadolah reached up and wiped at a wetness on his cheek, the hand coming away black in the faint light.

“Allah is Great,” Assadolah said, keying the last sequence and closing the box. “Let Allah be Merciful.”

The second terrorist suddenly leapt to his feet and ran for the boats. Mike tracked him but couldn’t quite hit the moving target despite two bursts in his direction. The tango darted behind one of the cigarette boats and then Mike could faintly see him tumbling over the side. Suddenly, the engine coughed to life and the boat started backing up, like the first one dragging its anchor.

This time, though, the terr backed straight up, engine at max, the anchor leaping out of the sand and bounding into the water. Mike tried to target the driver, but with only one arm he could barely keep the boat in his sights. He fired some shots but then the bolt locked back on an empty mag.

Changing out the magazine with only one arm, on his stomach, was a pain not only in the ass but in every wound. And his vision was going funny again. He realized he was bleeding out, but he wanted to get this last damned terrorist. However, before he could even get the magazine changed, the terrorist darted forward, cut the anchor rope, spun the boat around and was moving out of range.

Mike crawled towards the bomb painfully, wondering if there were any remaining tangos and not really caring anymore. He was going to do the same thing as the target, set up by the bomb and use it for cover until he either bled out or the FAST guys showed up.

It took him nearly three minutes to crawl across the sand to the bomb and slide around behind it. When he got there, he pulled out his bag of field-expedient bandages and tried to give himself first aid. Most of the rounds, however, were in places he couldn’t reach anymore. He got a tampon in his arm, nearly screaming at the pain, and another in a big hole in his leg. The holes in his legs were filled with sand, as well, and the tampon wasn’t particularly fun to put in.

By the end of getting the bleeding reduced — and he knew it was only reduced, not stopped — he was panting and his vision was going in and out. But he noticed a blue glow from a panel on what would be the top of the bomb. Cautiously, he lifted the panel and then blanched. There was a countdown clock and it was just passing twenty minutes.

He thought about that for a second and then did the only thing he could think of, crawling towards the nearest remaining cigarette boat. He could sort of use his legs, especially the right one, and he used his right arm and that leg to pull himself up with the anchor rope and onto the bow.

He cut the anchor rope and then slid across the front of the boat, around the windscreen and then more or less fell into the driver’s seat, finally crying out at the pain of the impact. There was a dead body on the floor of the cockpit, but he ignored it, taking his weapon off and setting it on the seat beside him.

There was a glowing GPS on the dash with a track on it. Clearly that was the way the boats had taken in and it was, hopefully, a way out.

He started the boat, reversed it, spun it around much more expertly than the muj, and got the hell out of Dodge.

“What is he doing?” Colonel Pierson said, watching the take from the satellite. “I’m pretty sure that’s Winter Born.”

“I don’t know,” the guy in civilian clothes said. He was pretty clearly CIA, but one of the “field” hands, a big, burly, bearded guy who looked out of place in the suit he was wearing. “He’s leaving the device.”

“Is he after the remaining terrorist?” Captain Polumbo wondered. The captain was a SEAL currently working in OSOL like Pierson and had been called in for consultation on the waterborne aspects of the op.

“He looked at the device and then immediately went to the boat,” Pierson said. “We don’t have commo with him, yet, do we?”

“Negative,” the technician manning the console replied. “The FAST team is inbound by helicopter,” he added, pointing to an overhead map. “They’re seven minutes out. The range on those radios is only about ten klicks, though. I’m not sure they’re ever going to be in range.”

Pierson thought about Mike’s actions, then blanched. He picked up a phone at his place at the table and punched a button.

“General,” he said. “Request that the FAST divert to close with Agent Winter Born. The nuke may repeat may be armed at this time.”

Mike could barely keep conscious. He was driving in a pool of blood and his vision kept creeping in and out. But he kept his eye on the GPS and kept driving, going as fast as he could given his condition.

The track was not constant, since it wove in and out of the shoals in the banks. But he was reaching the edge of the Banks now, and as soon as he hit open water he was going to push this thing up to full speed and put his ass to the blast.

He was just reaching the edge of the Banks when his radio crackled to life.

“Winter Born, Winter Born,” the voice said. “FAST Three. What is your situation?”

Mike slowed the boat for a moment and propped the wheel with his still mostly functional right leg.

“The nuke is armed,” Mike said. “Get clear. I read it as about five minutes to detonation.” With that he dropped the radio, put the boat back up to power and headed for the edge of the Banks.

“Holy crap,” the pilot of Seahawk 412 said, turning the helicopter to the side and going to max power, nose down and hauling.

“FAST, this is SOCOM Six,” the sat radio said. “Copy weapon armed. Abort, abort, abort. Move towards Agent Winter Born’s position. After detonation, recover if possible. Navy surface support is inbound. If you have to ditch, they have your location.”

“Roger,” Captain Talbot said, keying his mike and nodding. “We need to get clear, ASAP.” He turned to the team and waved. “Mission is ay-bort! Weapon is armed. Say, again, weapon is armed. Prepared for ditching maneuvers!”

Mike had strapped himself into the seat and the boat was now on autopilot, slamming southeast as fast as it could go. He couldn’t really see anymore, his vision going gray and red at the impacts of the speedboat over the waves that remained from the storm. He wasn’t sure if the thing was going to go airborne first or if he was going to bleed out or the bomb was going to detonate. When it did, it would send a tsunami in every direction. The girls were probably going to be fine. The Banks weren’t going to allow for a major wave and they were not only ten miles away but shielded by the small islands. He, however, was still less than five, with nothing between him and the bomb but open water.

The boat hit a particularly bad wave, going airborne, its engine screaming, as the world suddenly went white. He saw that, but it was really the last thing he remembered.

“Oh shit,” the Seahawk’s pilot said, quietly, as a new sun erupted to her northeast. Captain Kacey Bathlick was a short-coupled brunette with moderate breasts and shapely legs who had wanted to be a pilot since she had read her first Dragonriders of Pern book. She had considered all three services before opting for the Marines. She’d joined the Marines because she considered herself just as much of a warrior as the “cargo” in the back, and over the years she had handled more than a few midair emergencies. But, as her stick and all her instruments went dead from the nearby EMP, she admitted to herself that she’d much rather have been fighting Thread on Pern. “BRACE! BRACE! BRACE!” she shouted in a throaty contralto as she prepared to autorotate.

“EVAC!” Captain Talbot yelled, yanking open the troop door. He grabbed the FAST Marine next to him as the trooper dropped his armor and tossed him out the door, then followed, yanking the quick releases on his armor in midair.

The technique the Marines used was called helocast. It was a fast water entry method that could also be used for just such emergencies. Talbot rotated his body in midair to turn his back into the motion of the helicopter. By holding his nose and putting the body in a “half-pike” position it was possible to enter the water from rather high and rather fast.

But normally not quite as high as they were, and not as fast. And then there was the fact that the helicopter was falling towards them. The last thing Talbot saw before his feet hit the water was the rotating blades of the chopper above him coming down.

As his feet hit, his body was tumbled backwards so that it hit on the legs and then butt, breaking into the water in a V formation with a tremendous splash, the speed of the impact actually causing him to tumble in the water. The impact drove the air out of his lungs, but he automatically hit the inflator on his buoyancy vest and bobbed back to the surface just as the chopper hit, with a tremendous splash, less than thirty meters from his position, one of the still-rotating blades slapping the water not far from his nose and then sinking out of sight as the helicopter rolled over…

Autorotation was, conceptually, simple. As a helicopter fell, its blades tended to pick up the spin of the air running across them. By occasionally reversing the pitch of the blades, it was possible to use their momentum to get momentary lift.

However, it worked much better at, say, a thousand feet, than at two hundred. The props continued to spin for a moment, giving her a smidgeon of lift, then stopped and reversed. She was an expert pilot and had practiced autorotation hundreds of times. And she knew damned well there was not nearly enough rotation going to slow them as she reversed. But they were going in, no question, and any lift was better than no lift as the helicopter plunged towards the tossing sea.

“Oh, well,” her left seat said. “At least the water will be warm.”

“I’m just hoping to survive the impact,” Kacey snapped, reversing the blades at the last moment possible. There was a smidgeon of lift again and then they hit the water’s surface. Hard.

Mike came to lolling on the sea, boat engine dead. There was a new sun just dying to the northeast and in the light of it he could see a helicopter pinwheeling into the ocean to his northwest. It hit with one hell of a splash, then immediately turned over and began to sink, fast.

The engine had cut, but he managed to nurse it to life and turned the boat northwest, breathing ragged and the pain getting to be unimaginable. Spray had covered him, the salt like fire in his wounds.

As he was running northwest he glanced towards the direction of the dying fireball and, in the luminance of lightning crackling across its surface, saw one hell of a wave headed for his position. He turned into it, the boat lifting into the air again, and crashed to the water on the far side. He nearly passed out from the wave of pain and let out a shriek.

“Crap, that hurt,” he muttered. “This had better be worth it.”

The impact had been bad, but Kacey had gotten enough lift at the last moment that the water had only come up to cover the windows for a second. Then the Seahawk rolled over and started to sink. Choppers have, effectively, no buoyancy so the multiton aircraft went under like a stone.

“Everybody out!” she shouted, taking a last gulp of breath as the water in the cabin rose up to her chest level.

The water was already over the fast-sinking chopper, but she’d trained for this eventuality. She found her chest and waist and removed her harness. Then she moved her right knee to the door and used it to find the door handle. She opened the door handle, grabbed the edges of the door, and headed out into open water. Her side was down so she had to pull herself around the chopper into the open water. She had her eyes open so she could vaguely see the rotor of the chopper going past, windmilling, and it was a sight she hoped she’d never see again in her life. Assuming her life lasted more than a few seconds.

As lack of air got to her, causing a sudden panic reaction, she remembered the other thing she was supposed to be doing and reached for her Helicopter Emergency Egress Device. This was a small tank of air, generally kept on one or the other leg, that could be used for just such a situation. She yanked the HEEDs off her right leg, put it in her mouth and blew out, clearing the regulator, then sucked in a glorious lungful of air. That problem covered, she started kicking for the surface, breathing in and out as trained.

When she got there she did a quick head count. The wind was blowing like a son-of-a-bitch and it was hard to count bobbing heads. But she got a glimpse of her co and crew chief and that was all she really cared about. Her responsibility for cargo ended when she got them on the ground, or in the water as the case might be. She hit the release on her Personal Flotation Device, called a Mae West by all and sundry, and rolled up to the surface of the water.

“Hey,” her co called. “Nice landing. Any one you can walk away from… or float as it may be…”

“Oh, shut up, Tammy,” Kacey snapped.

“Form up!” Captain Talbot yelled, grabbing Private Gowey as he passed. “Get in a group! Don’t get separated!”

Gunny Hilton came crawling over dragging Sergeant Goweda, who seemed to have taken a hit on the head and was mildly incoherent. They’d managed to hang onto their Mae Wests on the exit, at least.

“Where’s Pawlick?” the Gunny said, looking around the group.

“I think we lost him, Gunny,” Sergeant Klip said. “I don’t think he made it out of the bird.”

“Fuck,” Hilton muttered. “Sir, all of the team is present and accounted for except Lance Corporal Pawlick.”

“Thank you, Gunny,” the captain said. Everybody had their Mae Wests inflated and he could see the pilots and their crew chief moving towards the group. “The good news is that we were being watched as we went down. The bad news is that our locator beacons probably took a hit from the EMP just like the chopper. So I hope they find us fast.”

“I hope they find us, period, sir,” Klip said, looking around. “There’s lots of sharks in these waters.”

“Hey,” Captain Bathlick said as she backstroked over and hooked into the group. “Sorry about that. The EMP took out all my controls.”

“Figured as much,” Captain Talbot replied.

“Anybody got any shark repellent?” Klip said. “I got followed by one of those bastards on an op and I don’t care for them at all.”

“Got it,” the crew chief said, lifting out a canister and dumping it in the water. It quickly spread and dyed the waters bright yellow. “There’s supposed to be a frigate out there somewhere. Hopefully they’ll find us soon.”

“I dunno,” Talbot said, looking towards the dwindling mushroom cloud. “We’re drifting pretty fast. And there’s going to be worries about fallout. We’d better be prepared to spend some time in the drink.”

“Great,” Bathlick said, grinning. “Know any good dirty jokes? I’ve got a million of ’em.”

“Sir,” Private Gowey said, kicking upwards. “I think I just saw a boat.” He pointed southwards and kicked up again.

“Sure is,” Gunny Hilton said. The sun was starting to rise and it was just possible to glimpse a cigarette boat inbound on a snaking course. “But I’m not sure if that’s good or bad. There’s lots of cigarette boats in these waters we don’t want to meet.”

“And whoever is driving that doesn’t look as if he knows what he’s doing,” Captain Bathlick observed.

The cigarette boat seemed to spot them and came forward, occasionally crabbing on the waves. It stopped just short of their position and started drifting to the south in the north wind.

“Gowey,” Talbot snapped. “Dump your Mae West and try like hell to catch that thing.”

Gowey slid out of his vest and down under the group, surfacing to the south and crawling fast towards the boat. He’d dropped his boots earlier and was a very strong swimmer, but by the time he got to the boat it was nearly a hundred meters away.

It was drifting away nose forward and he managed to snag the dive platform at the rear, dragging himself into the boat. The first thing he saw was a body on the floor of the cockpit, but he ignored it. There was another person, in armor, behind the wheel, slumped to one side and only held up by the four-point restraints for the driver.

He wasn’t sure if the guy was alive or dead, but he had other things on his mind. He undid the restraints, dumping the driver unceremoniously to the side, and keyed the boat to life. Then, inexpertly, he turned it towards the group.

“There’s a guy on here I think’s the agent we were supposed to reinforce,” he shouted, as he neared the gaggle of drifting Marines. “He’s in pretty bad shape.”

Chapter Fourteen

“I’m getting really tired of waking up in this same damned hospital,” Mike said as Pierson walked through the door.

“Be glad you woke up at all,” Pierson replied. “Exsanguinated doesn’t begin to cover it. And it took FAST quite a while to find the frigate that was in support. All they could do was plug the holes with the stuff you had on you. Good tip on the tampons, by the way. FAST’s carrying them, now. They ran out, but one of the pilots from the helicopter had some spares with her.”

“I hope they kept my damned cigarette boat,” Mike said.

“Your cigarette boat?” Pierson said, grinning. “You were practically dead when they got to it. I think that counts as salvage. Surely it’s the FAST’s boat.”

“I wasn’t all dead,” Mike replied. “Salvage only counts if you’re all dead. And you’d better not have lost it. I captured it fair and square.”

“We kept the cigarette boat,” Pierson said, relenting. “I take it you want to keep it?”

“Yep,” Mike said. “Gonna paint it silver and black. Call it the Too Late.”

“Well, you stopped the nuke from getting to the U.S. or any other major populated area,” Pierson pointed out. “And the fallout fell in open ocean. It was pretty nasty, too. That’s what ground-level nukes do with water: very, very nasty fallout. The fishing in the area will be somewhat hazardous for a while.”

“I’m not planning on going fishing anytime soon,” Mike said, leaning back and closing his eyes. “I hope somebody remembered my girls.”

“That we did,” Pierson said. “FAST and a Navy team dropped on your boat and picked it up. One of the FASTs nearly got shot, but everything’s kosher. I’m sorry to tell you the girls decided that, all things considered, they wanted to go home. So… nobody waiting for you on your little Caribbean idyll.”

“I think the Caribbean is getting a bit too hot for me, anyway,” Mike replied, shrugging with his one good shoulder. “I think I’ll go down for a while, just to rest up. But then I’m going traveling.”

“Well, you’re entitled to a rest,” Pierson said. “And the Finding decided that you still were owed for the mission. So you’ll have plenty of money to rest with.”

“Money, shmoney,” Mike said, closing his eyes. “I’m going to miss Pam and Courtney, though. They were good for an old soldier’s soul.”

Mike slid the Maker’s Mark around in a puddle of condensation as he waited for his table.

He’d been in the body and fender shop for over a month, long enough to be fully capable of getting around on his own, and then headed back to Islamorada. When he got there there was a cigarette boat tied up next to the Winter Born. It was black and silver with the legend “Too Late” already painted on the rear.

He’d taken it out a time or two, but mostly he’d stayed on the yacht. The explosion in the Andros was the talk of the town but nobody seemed to connect him to it, which was fine by him.

So he’d been doing his usual, hanging out, fishing, generally getting his head back together, working on his tan and new set of scars. But that meant he was back in the same lackanookie situation he’d been in before the girls showed up in his life. And he was pretty sure it was almost time to travel. It had been a while since he’d seen Europe and he’d never been to Eastern Europe. He was looking forward to traveling — among other things the hookers in Eastern Europe were supposed to be the finest on earth — but something had kept him around. A nagging sense of something left unfinished.

He’d just glanced at his pager, wondering when his table was going to be ready, when a soft voice spoke behind him.

“Excuse me,” the familiar voice said, “is this seat taken?”

Mike looked over his shoulder at Pam and Courtney and shrugged, grinning slightly.

“I dunno,” he said. “I was waiting for some friends to show up. But it looks like they just did.”