“ ’Morning, Cassie,” said the driver, holding open the door.
“Good morning,” I said, trying not to sound too accustomed to being picked up by a long black limousine in the middle of Marigny.
“You won’t be needing that where I’m taking you,” he said, nodding towards my little umbrella. “We’re leaving this gray weather behind.”
How exciting, I thought. The traffic was sparse that morning, and if there was any, it seemed to be heading away from the lake we were driving towards. Near Pontchartrain Beach we kept right and drove past South Shore Harbor, hugging the violent shore, which, from time to time, I could make out between construction gaps on the dam. The water was choppy and angry, even though not a drop of rain had fallen. At Paris Road, the driver stayed left, moving along the bumpy gravel road and keeping the lagoon on our right. Five minutes later, we made another right down yet another gravel road. I clutched the leather seat, fear creeping up on me. We came to a clearing in the brush, where the propeller of a dark-blue helicopter was making slow, ominous circles before speeding up.
“Um. Is that a helicopter?” A stupid question, the better one being: Do you expect me to go up in that thing? But the second question was lodged in my throat.
“You’re going on a very special trip.”
Am I? He clearly didn’t know me very well. The idea of my getting into a helicopter was ludicrous, no matter what promises lay beyond the ride. The limo came to a full stop twenty feet from the helipad. This was not good at all. The driver stepped out and opened my door. I sat frozen in my seat, the word no emanating from every pore of my body.
“Cassie, there is nothing to be afraid of,” the driver yelled over the loud wind and the even louder propeller. “Please follow that young man! He will take very good care of you! I promise!”
It was then that I noticed the pilot, who was holding his cap and running towards the limo. As he got closer, he combed back his sun-bleached blond hair with his fingers and placed the cap on his head, giving me the impression he rarely wore it otherwise. He saluted me in a sweetly awkward way.
“Cassie, I’m Captain Archer. I’m meant take you to your destination. Please come with me!” He must have seen me hesitate. “It’s going to be fine.”
What choice did I have? I suppose a few, including one to remain welded to the seat and demand that the driver take me home. Instead I launched myself out of the limo before my brain could convince me to do otherwise. Captain Archer clasped my wrist with a big tanned hand and we made a run for it, ducking under the speedy propeller.
In the helicopter, that same hand reached across my lap, brushing my thighs while he secured me in the back seat. It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay, I kept telling myself over and over again. There’s nothing to be afraid of. I felt the lash of stray hairs on my cheek and was grateful for my kerchief. As he carefully placed large headphones over my ears, I could smell mint gum on his breath. Then he looked at me with eyes that were deep gray and intense.
“Can you hear me?” he asked, his voice now buzzing directly in my ears through his microphone. Was that an Australian accent?
I nodded.
“I’ve got you, Cassie, don’t worry. You’re safe. Relax and enjoy the ride.”
I did find it a little unnerving that S.E.C.R.E.T. participants all seemed to know my name. This is my life, I thought kind of headily. A limo picks me up. No big thing. Makes its way to a waiting helicopter. Whatever. And an impossibly handsome pilot whisks me away to parts unknown.
We lifted off and once we were above the ominous dark clouds, the day looked completely different, like one in a tropical paradise. Captain Archer caught me staring down at the clouds as we left the bad weather below us and angled towards the sunrise.
“That’s a big storm brewing. But where we’re going it won’t touch us.”
“Where are we going?”
“You’ll see,” he said, his eyes smiling, lingering on mine.
My butterflies were still there, but they were becoming more manageable, and the fear, something I could push through. That I would willingly head off in a helicopter when a storm was brewing, flying above it to who knows where, to do who knows what with who knows who, would have been impossible to imagine five months ago. But today, beneath the natural fear was a feeling I recognized as sheer excitement.
Once we had stabilized above the clouds, the helicopter sped towards the vivid blue Gulf. I alternated between watching the water below and watching the pilot’s sculpted hands flicking this and that button with efficiency and ease. His forearms were tanned and lightly furred with pale blond hair. Was he going to be the one? Was he part of my fantasy? If so, we were off to a solid start.
“Where are we going?” I yelled, pulling off my scarf and letting my hair cascade. I was flirting. For the first time in my life, it seemed to come naturally.
“You’ll see. It won’t be long now!” he said with a wink.
I held his gaze, this time letting him be the one to break it first. I’d never done that before and it was a little intoxicating, flirting through my fear.
A few minutes later, I felt the helicopter begin to descend. Panic crept in. I couldn’t see directly below us, so from my back-seat vantage point we looked to be landing directly in the blue Gulf waters. When the helicopter skids hit something solid, I realized we’d landed on a boat. It was a very big boat. In fact, a yacht.
The pilot hopped down and opened my door, offering me a hand.
I leapt onto the polished landing deck, shielding my eyes from the now-blinding sun and thinking how quickly weather can change.
“This is unbelievable,” I said.
“It is,” said the pilot, giving me the impression he might not have been referring to the boat. “I have been instructed to bring you here, and now I must leave.”
“That’s too bad,” I said, meaning it. From the upper deck, I could look around. It was a yacht, indeed, and one of the most beautiful vehicles of any kind I’d ever seen in my life. The deck was gleaming, polished wood, the hull and the walls a vivid white. “Can you stay for a drink? Just one?”
What was I doing? The fantasies usually unfolded before me, and now I was interfering with whatever was planned for me. But the helicopter trip had energized me, and I wanted to continue the flirtation.
“I supposed one drink wouldn’t hurt,” he said. “Join me in the pool?”
Pool? My breath stopped when I leaned around the bow and saw the oval-shaped pool, on a yacht, circling the deck in front. White lounge chairs lined both sides, red-and-white striped towels casually folded over their backs. For me? Was this all for me? Whatever happens to me here doesn’t matter, I thought, so long as I get to swim, in a pool, on a yacht! And though the waters were starting to get a bit choppy, the boat was huge and felt rock-solid, even with a small helicopter perched on top. It dawned on me that a bathing suit wasn’t among the clothes provided, but the pilot was already making his way to the pool, dropping pieces of his clothing before turning the corner and disappearing from sight.
I waited a beat, then followed him. No one else seemed to be aboard the boat, the windows to the pilot’s bay so darkly tinted you couldn’t see the crew inside, if they were there. By the time I reached him poolside, the pilot was submerged, and by the look of the pile of clothes he’d left behind, he was naked.
“Get in. It’s warm.”
“Will you get in trouble?” I asked, feeling shy.
“Not unless you protest my being here.”
“I won’t do that,” I said. “But … would you mind turning around?”
“I don’t mind at all,” he said, facing the other way. He was tanned all over, though I could see that his butt below the surface of the water was shining white. I hesitated for a moment, and then shook off the remnants of fear. I was in charge of this fantasy, it seemed, and no one was stopping me. I slipped out of my clothes, then carefully laid them across a lounge chair. I eased into the water, which felt war
mer because there was a slight chill in the air, the kind of chill storms bring. The sun still shone hot, but there were dark clouds on the horizon and a feeling of electricity in the atmosphere.
“Okay, you can turn around now,” I said, keeping my arms across my breasts, which were below the water. Why was I so shy? I also realized he hadn’t asked me to accept the Step, which had become almost Pavlovian to me. After uttering those words, I slipped into a kind of trance that allowed me to go along with a fantasy. This time, I was the one propelling things forward with a man not already earmarked, though he should have been. I had never been one for blonds, but he was so masculine, his brown arms reaching for me, pulling me towards him through the water’s resistance.
“Your skin feels amazing in the water,” he said, running his hands down my back, lifting me onto his lap. I felt him stiffen. He bent to take one of my nipples boldly into his mouth, and his hand squeezed my naked buttocks. Our bodies splashed against each other as the pool water got choppier and choppier with our movements. At least that’s what I thought was making the waves. I opened my eyes to the sky again and this time it cast a very different glow, a more malevolent one. The sun was obscured by indigo clouds, the kind that caused Captain Archer to stop nibbling at my shoulder.
“Oh jeez, that’s a bad, bad sky,” he said, standing up, toppling me from his lap. “I have to get that helicopter off the boat or it’ll get tossed into the Gulf. You, my dear, are going below deck and you’re not to move until someone comes to get you, do you hear me? This was really not in the plans. I’m sorry for that. I’ll radio for some backup.”
He was out of the pool in a second. There was no time for vanity. He held up a towel that swallowed me whole and placed my clothes in my hand. The wind whipped up a frenzy, nearly taking us both over the side. He grabbed me and pressed me against the wall of the bow, plucking a lifejacket off a hook above me.
“Go below, change, and put this jacket on!”
“Can’t I go with you?” I said, fear gathering in my gut again. I clutched the towel under my chin and padded after him, dripping the whole way to the helipad.
“Too dangerous, Cassie. You’re better off on this boat. It moves fast. It’ll take you from the storm. Go below now and don’t leave until someone comes to get you. And don’t fret,” he said, pressing a kiss to my forehead.
“But does anyone know I’m here?”
“Don’t worry, all is well, my dear!”
I pulled the towel tighter around me as he fired up the propellers. When the helicopter lifted off the landing pad a few feet, a gust of wind took it for a little spin. I ducked into the cabin and watched in amazement and horror as he expertly navigated through the turmoil, grateful I wasn’t aboard to throw up on his shoes. I heard the yacht’s motor starting up, the vibrations traveling up through my feet, setting my teeth chattering, or maybe that was the terror. Then it died just as quickly. Where was everyone? If a crew was piloting the yacht, where were they? Inside the cabin I threw my clothes on, crossed the bar area and made my way to the stairs leading up, presumably to the captain’s bridge. When I opened the deck door, I heard the downpour, the harsh rain slapping the wood with loud echoes.
I saw the black sky above me.
“Not good,” I muttered, shutting the door. The portholes were blurry with rain. But I needed to find someone from the crew, to tell them I was here and to find out the plan, if there was one. I punched the door open again, and braced against the rain, now streaking sideways and pricking my skin. I was about to head to the bridge, when I heard a voice. I thought it was coming from a speaker on the yacht, but it was actually coming from the deck of a Coast Guard tugboat that had pulled up next to the yacht. From the deck, a tall man in a white T-shirt and jeans yelled my name through a megaphone.
“Cassie! My name is Jake! You must disembark now! We need you off this boat, right away, before this storm gets any worse. Come here and I’ll grab your hand. I’ve been sent to rescue you.”
Rescue me? Were it not for the very real weather, causing very real panic, I would have assumed this was, indeed, my rescue fantasy. But there was a storm to survive, and this man’s tight expression made it clear to me that this wasn’t part of the fantasy at all. I was in danger. I clutched a rail, my tunic soaked to my skin. Was it really safer in that tiny little boat than on the enormous solid yacht? Nothing was making sense.
“Cassie! Come closer and grab my hand!”
I stepped out onto the deck and saw the churning sea around me. Wave after wave smashed high over the deck, slapping my legs, sending gallons more water over the polished wood and into the blue pool. Another wave hit, this time sweeping me off my feet and onto my hip with a bang. I sat there, legs splayed, frozen, as I do in times of abject panic. I could no longer hear Jake’s voice, just the sound of the angry, black sea. I grabbed onto a lower rail, afraid to stand up. I had the doomed sense that if I let go, I’d be washed over the side of the heaving boat. Before I knew what was happening, an arm like a tree trunk grabbed me around my middle and lifted me off the ground.
“We have to get off this boat, now!” Jake bellowed.
“Okay, then!”
What can I say? I flailed like a scared, wet cat in the driving rain. I clutched where I could, but his T-shirt was slippery and I couldn’t get a grip. I went over the side of the boat, felt the sharp sting of the water. For a second I went under and could see only the churning above my head. I screamed underwater, soundlessly, and felt my body buffeted by the swells until at last my head emerged and the scream pierced my own ears. I pulled in a fast breath and had just a second to see that if the boats moved any closer to each other, I would be crushed. Before I could figure out what to do, I saw Jake struggling through the waves to reach me.
“Cassie! Calm down!” Jake yelled, splashing towards me. “You’re gonna be okay, but you have to relax.”
I tried to listen, tried to remember that I could in fact swim. I helped us move towards the side of the rescue boat and from there he secured my hands around a lower rung on the ladder, climbed ahead a few steps, then reached down and pulled me aboard like I was a wet rag doll. I dropped onto the deck, breathless. He shook out his hair, knocking the sea water from his ears, then took my face in his hands and said, “Good going, Cassie.”
“What do you mean?” I asked. “I nearly killed us both! I panicked!”
“But then you calmed down and you helped us swim to the boat. And we’re okay now. We’re going to be okay.” He moved strands of dripping hair away from my face. “Let’s get you below deck.”
I finally got a good look at the man who had saved me, as he stood up. He was enormous, at least six-foot-five, with a shock of black wavy hair and black eyes. He had the profile of a Greek statue. He caught me looking at his torso and then it struck me. He knows my name!
“Are you one of the men from …”
“I am,” he said, yanking me to my feet. He threw a thick wool blanket around my shoulders and added, “Now that we’re here and you’re safe, maybe we should get back to the plan. What do you think? Do you accept the Step?”
“I … guess so, yes. I do.”
“Well, either way, I still have to get us out of here. I am a certified diver and lifeguard, just in case you were wondering.”
He placed his firm hands on my trembling shoulders and ushered me below to a much smaller room, cozier than any I had seen on the yacht, but much less steady. The waves were slapping at the portholes. I made a beeline for a space heater in the corner and used the blanket to cup the warm air on either side of me. I looked around, trying to keep my balance as the storm tossed the boat. The room was dimly lit with gaslight sconces, oak walls and quilted pillows strewn about a high bed. I noticed a quaint kitchenette with an old-fashioned stove and a ceramic sink. It looked like the captain’s quarters.
“I’m sorry I panicked. I thought we were moving away from the storm. Next thing you know, I was in the storm.” I started to sniffle, the ev
ents of the last half hour finally catching up to me.
“Shhh … it’s okay,” Jake said. He swiftly crossed the room and took me in his arms. “You’re safe now. But I have to leave you here to steer us away from the hurricane.”
“Hurricane!”
“Well, initially it was a tropical storm. It turned very quickly. Wait here. And get those wet clothes off. It won’t be long until we’re safely away,” he said, his muscled torso apparent through this wet white T-shirt. This man was romance-cover-model perfect. And though I didn’t want to be alone again, he had an authority to his voice that was hard to ignore.
“Get under those covers and warm up. I’ll join you soon.”
He went to leave, then pivoted and made his way over to where I was standing in front of the heater. When he bent to kiss me, I almost laughed at the image of us, me a naked woman under a blanket being kissed by a giant, shirtless god, one with wet curls and the thickest eyelashes I’ve ever seen on a man. He placed his lips on mine and pressed, parting them easily, his warm tongue prodding, tentatively at first. He folded over me, his massive hand cradling my head like it was no bigger than a peach. When he pulled away from me it was only reluctantly, I could feel it.
“I won’t be long,” he said.
“Hurry back.” Hurry back? I might as well have said that in a Southern accent! We were in real danger and I was swooning like a schoolgirl.
Dropping the damp blanket to the floor, I looked around the room. I opened the small galley closet and found a few blue work shirts hanging there. I peeled off my wet clothes and carefully strung them over a chair in front of the space heater. I threw on one of the flannel shirts. It was so big, he was so big, it hung to my knees. I crawled on top of the big bed, feeling the waves. With every passing minute, the Gulf waters seemed calmer and calmer. I thought about the cute pilot and hoped he had reached shore safely. I made a mental note to ask Jake to check for me. There must be some number, some central call-in place where members and participants could reach someone from S.E.C.R.E.T.
S.E.C.R.E.T.: An Erotic Novel Page 12
