“Hello, anybody home?” She snapped her fingers in front of his disoriented eyes. “Where were you, your happy place?”
Nodding, he flashed an easy grin, gazed at her with half-lidded eyes. “Something like that.” With a few days stubble and the early morning disheveled appearance, Michael looked dangerous. Sexy.
“What do you do, rise with the birds?”
“When you do what I do, you tend to be a light sleeper and wake at the first sign of sun or noise.”
“What exactly do you do? I mean I know you’re a spy, but what does a spy do? Who or what do you spy on?”
“Worms.”
At her grumbling, he gave a description. “I investigate people’s activities, gather intelligence, and when circumstances call for it, help resolve unwanted situations. Let’s go for a jog.”
“Hmm. That’s as clear as mud.” His answer was a little too succinct without any real details, but the set of his jaw line told her he wouldn’t elaborate. She’d have to let it go for now. Like so many other topics. No wonder he didn’t have a relationship, the guy was a clam. He wouldn’t open up.
“You said I was in good shape. Why do we have to run again?”
“Correction, I said you were in pretty good shape. And we’re going running because I said so. Because I want to make sure you maintain that physique.”
Hand covering her mouth, she laughed. “I’m glad you’re worried about my body.”
He laughed with her, then grabbed her wrist and pulled her behind him. “Shut up and let’s go.”
This morning they started with the beach run first. By the time they hit the pavement for the roundtrip back to the house, her thighs ached from the effort of trying to keep up with his leisurely pace. She realized he lengthened the run this morning and wondered if he did it out of necessity or spite. Ruby eyed him with suspicion and bet the latter.
Ignoring the muscles that screamed from the torture they endured, she pushed herself even harder. When they reached the house, she stopped at the driveway and walked while Michael kept his nice pace and looked like he hadn’t broke a sweat. When she made it to the door, he opened it and let her in.
She headed straight for the sofa, flopped down on it, and never wanted to move again. Much to her dislike, Michael had other ideas. “If you lie down your muscles will tense up and you’ll be in more pain later.”
“I don’t want to budge,” she sighed, covering her eyes with her arms crossed over her face. “You did that on purpose to see how far you could push me.”
“If it’s too much you can always quit.”
Her arms flung away from her face, her eyes squinting. “No,” Ruby said, shaking her head for emphasis. “Uh-uh. You can’t make me quit. Whatever little tricks you have in mind won’t work. I can be very tenacious.” Annoyed, she overlapped her arms across her chest and glowered at her tormentor.
“Like I don’t know you’re stubborn,” he huffed with grumpiness. “You could give a mule lessons.”
With both hands, he grabbed hers and hauled her to her feet. “Oh, come on, you big baby. You need to stretch out those muscles or you won’t be able to do anything else.” With his hand on her back, he lowered her to the beige plush carpeted floor, and flipped her to her stomach with effortless strength.
Starting at her feet, he used his thumbs to rub her arches. He moved to her calves, kneading and squeezing. His hands continued to stroke up her legs, his thumbs trailed to the inside of her thighs, but didn’t linger too long.
He moved up to straddle her, slid his hands under her shirt and started on her lower back, gently stretching the muscles. Michael’s fingers, strong and talented, smoothed out all the kinks. Heat radiated from his hands as they made their way up her back to her shoulder blades and then her neck. His hands traveled back down her shoulders to her upper back where his fingers brushed the sides of her breasts.
The light brush was a jolt, a rivulet of pure ice running all the way up her spine. The massage was a sensual ache bordering on the painful as Ruby tried to keep her mind on the muscles and on breathing normal. But she was aroused. Why didn’t he just take her?
“Mmm. You have amazing hands.”
He had difficulty keeping his mind focused on a muscle massage. Her grunts and groans, the skin-to-skin contact, were very disturbing and more than a little arousing. If he bent too far forward his desire would be obvious.
“Do you do this for all your trainees?”
Her soft whimpers of pleasure nearly drove him insane. If he didn’t stop he wasn’t sure he would be able to. Rock hard now, he envisioned himself driving into her, thrusting into her until she screamed his name.
Michael jumped to his feet. “No, not all my trainees. Now, let’s get to work.”
He wanted to offer her a hand in getting to her feet. Afraid to touch her until he had himself under control, Michael shoved his hands in the pocket of his loose shorts.
“If you’re a good little girl and don’t whine maybe I’ll give you a surprise at the end of the week.”
“I don’t whine. What’s my surprise?”
“Nope. It’s not a surprise if I tell you. You do and will whine.”
A quick step forward, he swept her legs out from under her, and watched as she hit the ground, her mouth agape. He moved toward her. She recovered, rolled over and seized his ankle giving it a hard enough tug to throw him off balance. Before he recovered, Ruby jumped to her feet only to have Michael grab her foot, yank it, and pull her back down.
They sparred and attacked. Pretty soon she was breathless but she kept pushing to assault him. Finally, Ruby stood there, breasts rising and falling with every breath. “I give up.”
“Whiner.” He tossed her a towel and wiped his own face with another. “Let’s hit the showers then have breakfast. Next we can go to the shooting range and later you can spend most of the afternoon working on Illusion.”
* * * *
That set the pattern for the week that followed. Michael taught her hand-to-hand combat and firearm techniques. When she wasn’t training she worked on Illusion. They jogged and swam a lot. Her body never felt so trained to perform, so alive, so touched by male hands, and so ready for sex, yet so deprived.
The smell of coffee woke Ruby. Her eyes popped open. She darted a glance toward the clock. It was after eight in the morning. Her alarm hadn’t gone off. She shot out of bed like a bullet, struggled to get some clothes on in a hurry. The last thing she wanted was to hear Michael explain how she couldn’t cut this kind of work. One more time. She’d heard it enough over the past week and fully intended to prove him wrong.
In the kitchen, she found Michael seated, reading a newspaper, sipping from a mug. She caught the slightest twinkle in his eyes and his lips curved as he eyed her over his coffee cup. The bastard wanted to see her scramble.
“What’s up?” he asked with casualness that was far too sweet for her taste. Ugh! She would wipe that smug smirk off his face—one of these days.
“Aren’t we going for our jog or did I wear you out?”
“Not hardly.” He set the newspaper aside. “But, I decided to give you your surprise today since you haven’t whined, too badly.”
“Goody. What is it?” She leapt into his lap like a kid asking Santa for Christmas presents.
“Since we’re going to be in Hawaii and part of the plan will include scuba diving, I thought it would be an excellent idea to get in a few dives.”
Ruby grinned and gave him a loud smacking kiss on the lips then jumped out of his arms. “Great. When and where are we going?”
“As soon as you get your gear together and the boat snacks packed. I made us a private charter with ‘It’s a Dive’, my favorite dive shop in the Keys. You’ll love them. They have the only boats that aren’t ‘cattle boats’ in Key Largo and they’ll guide you to whatever you want to see in underwater life.”
Ruby noticed Michael already dressed in his swim trunks, T-shirt, and flip-flops. His gear sat at the fr
ont door.
Off like a rocket, she changed into her bikini and T-shirt, a pair of cotton shorts, and slipped her bare feet into a pair of flip-flops. Her gear was stored outside on the pool shower deck where she grabbed it, pulled it over her shoulder, and hefted it to the front door to sit with Michael’s.
As she set the dive bag down, her mind flicked to another time, another scuba trip, her first visit to Jupiter, Florida. A spur of the moment suggestion by Michael, they packed up and headed south from Orlando to make a shore dive and see a sunken boat. By the time they arrived the water had gotten churned up which made her nervous. But she convinced herself to go for it anyway. She didn’t want to disappoint Michael.
When they were at the point of giving the okay symbol and ready to drop down something smacked her leg. At first, she brushed it off. When she had just dropped below the surface it happened again. This time, Ruby clung to Michael for dear life. Her eyes wide with fright, her breathing rapid, she wanted to get away from the sea monster that attacked her.
Michael got her to the surface, ripped the mouth piece from between her teeth and asked, “What is it? What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
An iron grip on his wrist, Ruby gasped desperate for air. Between pants of breath, she answered, “Something...something is on my leg.”
His mask back in place, Michael went to see what it was. When he resurfaced, he smiled and told her she didn’t have to worry, it was truly good and dead. The thought of something dead hadn’t made her feel any better, but then he brought it to the surface.
It had been her bright pink goodie bag. Tied to her waist, it brushed up against her leg in the current. She felt like a complete idiot, but she blamed him. If he hadn’t tied the bag to her then she wouldn’t have acted so ‘girly’.
Her excuse amused him and he laughed.
They never did dive that wreck. By the time Michael had finished laughing at her expense, he decided it was best they forego the trip. “If it ain’t fun, it ain’t worth it,” he’d said.
Instead of a dive, they ended up going to Cocoa Beach. They shopped at a famous surf store called Ron Jons, found a small place for burgers, and watched the sun set before they made the trip back to her parents’ house. Overall, it turned out to be a fantabulous day. And today would be better.
In the kitchen, Ruby scrambled to pull out the small cooler, filled it with ice packs, soda, water, fruit, and Fig Newtons. Fig Newtons are a must as every diver’s snack. Of course, Ruby only liked the raspberry ones, not the standard flavor. She was fond of anything raspberry.
Michael hadn’t seen her move this fast in a long time, he mused. He got the biggest kick watching her scurry around, like observing a kid in a candy store.
The snacks packed, she put it by the front door with the rest of the gear. Scampering into the kitchen, she stood in front of him, hands on hips. Michael leaned against the counter with his coffee in an exaggerated pose. Taking the cup from his hand, she took a sip and dumped the rest down the sink.
“Hey! I wasn’t finished.”
Grabbing his hand, she tugged at him. “You are now. Let’s go.”
“Where’s the fire? We have plenty of time. I paid for a whole day of diving. We should get in three dives and can do more, unless we poop out.” Knowing how happy she was, and that he was responsible, Michael grinned ear-to-ear. There’s not a lot of ocean access in New Hampshire and she was never fond of cold water diving.
“Good. Then I’m ready now.”
“Just like a woman,” he laughed. He wouldn’t have it any other way.
They picked up their equipment, locked the house, and stowed the bags in the trunk of the Mercedes. The top down, Michael enjoyed the salt air, the smell of honeysuckle, the songs of the Beach Boys, and his favorite blonde in the passenger seat on the drive to the dive shop.
* * * *
At the shop, they signed in and met their dive captain for the day. He delighted in Ruby’s obvious eagerness as he watched her with amusement outline what three dives they were going to take, without any consultation from Michael.
“We’re going to Key Largo Dry Rocks, home to Christ of the Abyss, the French Reef, and the Elbow,” she told Michael with animated features and the enthusiasm of a giddy school girl. Her excitement was contagious.
“Come on, Cat.”
Stepping onto the bright yellow ‘Seastar’, a forty-five foot catamaran that seated twelve divers, powered by twin 225Hp outboards, he turned back to help Ruby on board.
He took Ruby’s hand. “Ready for some fun in the sun?”
“Oh, yeah,” she exclaimed, her smile as brilliant as the shining sun.
Once underway, he watched as Ruby stripped down to her swimsuit and was somewhat disappointed she hadn’t worn a thong bikini. Sitting on one of the benches, he pulled Ruby to sit between his legs, snuggled her against his chest, wrapping his arms around her midriff. He’d wanted to touch her all week. “This is perfect.”
“Mmm. I couldn’t agree more. I miss this.”
Did she refer to the scuba diving or how he enfolded her in his arms?
They sat silent for a long time enjoying the the boat cruising past the palm trees, sounds of squawking seagulls and rushing water, and the tranquil smell of the ocean. Then the captain, who apparently had good taste in music, played some old Jimmy Buffett tunes on his portable CD player.
Thirty minutes later, they arrived at their first dive spot, Key Largo Dry Rocks. The boat slowed, getting ready to stop at the site and weigh anchor. While the captain made sure the anchor avoided any coral, they dressed for the dive.
Buoyancy Compensators, also known as BCs, hooked to the tanks and connected with regulators. Weightbelts secured to their waists prohibited them from floating to the surface. Booties and flippers on their feet, their BCs pulled on and hooked, almost ready. To prevent fogging up during the dive, Michael spit into his mask and situated it on his face. Ruby followed suit. He noted she didn’t use any of that girly ‘no fog’ solution like most divers did.
Reaching behind her, he opened the airflow for her tank and she did the same for him.
One hand holding her mask, Ruby plunged in feet first, signaled she was okay, and he stepped overboard into thirty feet of gorgeous crystal blue ocean water. When he joined her and gave his okay hand signal, Michael took her pink gloved hand in his and started their descent.
Reaching the bottom, Ruby’s eyes widened. She drew in a breath as she took in the sight of the famous “Christ of the Abyss” Statue donated to the Underwater Society of America by an Italian diving group dedicated to marine life. Ruby stared in awe. It stood eleven feet to the hands spread to the heavens and twenty-two feet to its base, lying in an area of spectacular coral formations.
This was one of Ruby’s favorite dive sites. People got married in the Keys. I wonder what it would be like to get married underwater next to Christ of the Abyss?
The colors and underwater life drew her into scuba diving. Beautiful schools of electric blue and bright yellow Queen Angel fish swam around the statue and the nearby coral. Her hand reached out, tried to touch, and watched the Angel fish with gray polka dotted bodies and tips of yellow with white lips scatter. The fan corals in shades of purple moved gracefully in the easy current while orange staghorn coral stood rock steady.
Climbing into the boat, Ruby told Captain Jess what she’d seen. “But I really want to see a green Moray eel. Can we? Can you make that happen?”
The Captain eyed her and then Michael, who shrugged and nodded.
“Okay. If that’s what the lady wants, that’s what she gets.”
* * * *
French Reef, another beautiful reef system consisted of a dramatic maze of underwater canyons, cliffs, and gullies. Its coral arches and swim-through caves provided shelter for many large fish, with grouper and green morays a common sight.
Ruby swam through one of the cavern’s short swim-throughs when she saw what looked to be this film of silver blocking their exit.
When she drew closer it was even more amazing. It was a wall of silver minnows at the exit to the cavern.
The captain told them if they found this cavern they’d find a green moray protecting it. Sure enough, as she waited for Michael to make it through the minnows she caught a glimpse of movement to her right. Turning her head in that direction, Ruby saw it. A huge green moray.
Standing on her vibrant pink fins, Ruby swayed with the current, holding her breath as the moray’s body, less than two feet in front of her, took the shape of an ‘S’, and stared back. Its head was bigger than Michael’s. Bubbles escaped from her mouth-piece in her excitement. She looked over at Michael, made sure he saw the beautiful underwater creature.
Surfacing at the end of the dive, Ruby could hardly contain herself as she shouted, “Did you see that moray and the size of that grouper? They were gigantic.”
As the Captain took her fins and helped her up the dive ladder, she told him, “I love morays. What a great dive. Thanks.”
Floating behind her, Michael retorted, “She’s a sucker for slimy things.”
“Oh, ha-ha.”
Captain stared at her then burst into laughter. Michael, having pulled himself onto the boat walked up to her dripping wet, his grin irresistible and dazzling against his tan skin. She broke into a wide smile, brought her hand up to stifle her giggles.
“You’re impossible.” Her hands pressed against his bare, wet chest. She leaned in and gave him a loud, smacking kiss on the lips.
“Yeah, and I’m slimy too,” Michael replied. He shot her a knowing grin. “You a sucker for me too?”
After the last dive, they docked, and Captain Jess helped Michael pack their gear in the trunk while Ruby threw on her clothes over her swimsuit. Thanking the Captain, Michael gave him a hefty tip, then bundled Ruby into the car.
Before putting the car in reverse, he gazed at her. They both knew the next stop. “Food,” they said in unison.
“One of the effects of diving is that it gives me a big appetite,” Ruby said.
The other effect was a big sexual appetite, but Michael didn’t think it was a good idea to mention that fact.
It Happens in Threes Page 12
