by Hawke, Jessa
Edgar said nothing, instead stomping away a fair distance as suggested. Sarah and Harrison set off to the left of Montgomery. In softer tones, Harrison addressed Sarah.
“I would set your mind at ease in this matter, Miss Sarah. I have, unfortunately, been forced to search for men whose courage failed them and who attempted to leave his Majesty’s service. This is not new to me.”
They spread out as suggested, so that Sarah could only see Harrison in the visible distance. She felt herself shaking with fear for her sister. The snow all along the way she travelled seemed too pure; nothing had been by other than small animals. Finally alone with no one to see her, she allowed tears to flow. Aggressively, she wiped them away. She needed to see clearly, to not miss a thing as she scanned the ground.
Then she spied it. “Captain! Captain, I see something here!” A small bit of light blue lace was lying on the ground beside snow that had been shifted. A small group must have walked through this way, and she recognized the lace from Beth’s dress.
Harrison shouted to the others and ran down to her. He spotted the tracks immediately. “Wait, wait.” She almost began to sprint in that direction, but he stepped in her path. “There may be many of them. Give Woods and Mr. Jackson a moment.
The others joined them and the moment Edgar arrived, they began to hurry along the clear path left by the abductors. After a long, stumbling trek with their lanterns into the depths of the woods, they came across a rise in the forest. In the distance, Sarah thought she heard laughter.
Harrison must have heard it too, for he motioned for the party to stop. “Cover your lanterns. We mustn’t be seen.” They did as he suggested. “Sarah, be so good as to wait here with Edgar. We’re going ahead to determine the danger.”
The two sailors proceeded up the hill as quietly as they could, leaving Edgar and Sarah alone together. He cleared his throat.
“I’m sure she’s fine,” he suggested. When she said nothing, he continued to fill the silence between them. “Look, I know I lost my temper a touch. You must admit you were being difficult. If you’ll be so good as to think about my feelings-”
“I couldn’t care less about that.” She replied icily. “Or about how you feel.”
“Very well. If that’s how you feel, perhaps we should call off the engagement.” He folded his arms, sniffing. “I prefer a virtuous bride, at any rate.”
She slowly, coldly turned to face him. “Edgar, I forgive you for that comment. I forgive you all you have said and done. Is that better? Is that what you need to hear?”
He shrugged. “You have your brave captain, your champion. I’ll leave you to rescue your sister. You clearly don’t need me.”
“Wait!” she called as loudly as she dared, clutching at his arm. “Please. Don’t do this. Let us part as friends. I need your help in this.”
He pulled her hand off him. “I wish you luck. I didn’t really want to confront hardened thieves anyway. Without my paying their ransom, I expect they’ll kill you all. Here- you may need this.” He laughed morosely and shoved his pistol into her hand. With that, he turned and left her alone in the dark.
It wasn’t many minutes before Harrison and Montgomery returned. “Five men. Beth is all right. If we surprise them - what is this?” Harrison saw the pistol in her hand and saw she was shivering and horrified. “Where is Mr. Jackson?”
She handed him the gun. “I can’t use this. I don’t know how, or I’d have shot the coward myself. Please, sir, can we still take them?”
He considered it and pressed it back into her hand. “Yes. But we’ll need to use subterfuge.” Quickly, he showed her how to fire the gun and explained his plan.
“You’re quite sure you can do this?”
“Yes. You may trust I’ll do my part, Commander.”
“Please- you must call me Harrison, ma’am.” He turned to Montgomery. “Ready?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then we’ll take our positions.”
Minutes passed and Sarah found herself standing alone at a new position near the top of another hill. She could see the small camp in a hollow below, where Beth was lying a little outside of the light of a fire. The men were busy roasting potatoes and meats, food that had been stolen from their coach for the return to the farm. Beth appeared to be either asleep or unconscious. It was only by the word of Harrison that she knew that she was alive, for he’d seen her turn over in her rest.
As the men ate and chatted, a shot rang out. One of the men fell over, dead. A second shot came from another hill opposite the camp, wounding another man in the arm. Harrison leapt up from the top of the far hill where he’d been hidden. He pointed his pistol menacingly at the group who were frantically trying to gather up their weapons.
“Stand! We have you surrounded!”
One of the survivors scoffed. “I counted two shots.”
Taking that as her cue, Sarah pointed her pistol into the air and fired. The men appeared startled.
“That was a warning. You will all four of you leave this place at once, or my men will be charged with burying you. That camp will be your grave. Go!”
The men considered the situation briefly, and then took his advice, fleeing through a break in the hills. When they were sure they were all clear, Harrison, Montgomery, and Sarah scurried down from their respective positions and found Beth. She looked up at them and winked.
“I was playing dead. Did I do good, Sarah?”
Sarah threw her arms around her and wept tears of joy. “You did so well, little sister. I’m so proud of you, so very proud.”
Chapter 8: Australia-Bound
The Indian Ocean
April 20, 1817
Sarah woke with a start in the middle of the night, darkness all about her. The Duke rocked gently beneath her, a feeling she’d sensation she’d come to welcome after the first long month of mal-de-mer had finally gone away.
“Harry. Harry.” She shook her husband awake. He was laying in the hammock next to her. It had been an uncomfortable arrangement at first, one he had promised they’d remedy with a proper bed once they reached Perth.
“Hmm? Oh, dear. It’s quite late,” Commander Harrison Hargrove coughed.
“I know. Harry, I can’t sleep.”
He turned over slowly and embraced Sarah. “You’re thinking about Sarah and Jane again, aren’t you?”
“Sarah, Jane, even Aunt Mary. I will miss them so terribly.”
He nodded. She could barely make out his features in the cabin with the moonlight streaming through. “It was the right thing to do, though. Australia will suit us better, I should think.”
“You don’t mind resigning your commission? I can scarcely imagine you no longer being a sea captain.” She’d asked him this many times to be sure of his mind, but he only laughed gently.
“Not at all. It’s time for change. There are excellent opportunities to be had in mining, ranching, any manner of trades. Monty and I agreed we’d do something along these lines one day. With whatever money we make, we shall travel as I promised. We’ll even return to England if you like. It’s really not so bad, is it my dear? Louisa is coming with us, after all.”
“I know. I just worry. I can’t help it. So much has changed in the past few months, my head practically spins.”
He caressed her cheek. “We haven’t changed, have we?”
“No. That will never change. I promise.”
He began to kiss her gently, reassuringly. As they kissed, she felt excitement rising within her. He thought to pull away, but she held him close, their passion growing in their warm embrace. Instead, she guided his head down to an exposed breast. His lips and tongue found her and she smiled, her lips parting with pleasure.
There was little bedclothing between them. She draped a leg over him, pressing close and feeling him hard against her as they lay on their sides. Whatever modesty and resistance there had been within him melted. Though Sarah did want a bed and at times felt overheated by snuggling into a ham
mock with her husband, she couldn’t deny that these shared circumstances had encouraged passion between them on many of these near honeymoon nights. Tonight, she wanted the reassurance of his love.
Their kissing and touching shifted over the midnight minutes to soft gasps and groans. Moving together, she guided his hips and thrusts hungrily. She smiled and leaned down to kiss his neck as she ran her hands along his strong back muscles. He was deep inside, lost within her.
Their sex reached an intensity and friction that distracted her beyond thought. She no longer noticed the heat of the cabin, the lurching of the big ship on the waves, the snores from the adjoining rooms. In the darkness, she felt her hips and leg muscles tighten as she neared climax.
“More. More, Harry!” she whispered frantically. He drove into her and she forgot to be quiet, crying out with release.
After, she couldn’t help but laugh. “I’m so sorry, dear. I didn’t mean to be that loud. The whole ship might have heard.”
He snickered. “Ah well. Let them be jealous of us, I say. We’re nearly to Perth. I’ll buy us a house as we discussed and you can be as loud as you like.”
“How many bedrooms Harry?” He had been generously rewarded by the admiralty for his capture of the two pirate ships.
He thought. “At least three. I’d like to have one for a study and Louisa shall need one, of course.”
She ran her fingers through his hair and smiled at him. “It would be better if it were at least four.”
“Oh. You wish a room for yourself? Of course my sweet.”
“Not quite.” She gently took his hand and placed it on her belly. “I was thinking we might need it for our first child.”
He nodded. “Of course.” Then as the understanding grew, he stammered. “You mean- wait, do you mean you’re with child?”
“Harrison Hargrove, meet your child. I’ve been pregnant for perhaps a month.”
He shifted down to kiss her stomach. “Very well. Our lives and our family begin in Australia.”
Sarah sighed and gazed into the darkness. “Yes. At last, all of our dreams shall be fulfilled.”
THE END
The Billionaires' Offer
Fran was a hard working journalist who wanted more than anything to cover video games as her “beat,” as a focus is called in journalism. Fran had grown up playing video games of all kinds: Role Playing Games, Real Time Strategy, First Person Shooters, Action Adventure, and so many other weird niches of the industry. Video games were the kind of thing that let her escape from reality. Not that Fran's reality was that bad. She kept her long, silky black hair tied in a tight pony tail because she thought it made her look more business-like, but she knew it was hard for anyone to miss her busty hourglass figure, especially when she wore a plunging neckline.
oday was one of those days she wore a plunging neckline. She needed to make some headway on figuring out when Figure Four would release the new game in the Radioactive series. The series so far was two installments, but the third promised to be the best yet. It was like most games set in a post-apocalyptic future where the main character had to scrounge about the first third of the game, trying to find weak enemies and easy quests to level up while trying to scavenge better gear and horde ammunition. The thing that made the third installment different from the rest of the series, and the rest of the genre, was that in the third the player would be able to change the waste into whatever kind of utopia desired.
This event was said to supposed to happen early in the game—about a third of the way through. So right when the player's character was getting on its feet everything would change and the player would have to adapt to the new environment. But there was said to be a lot more to it. In the first two games there had been a really good plot with plenty of twists and turns, but the developers had said they'd been forced to keep the kiddie gloves on most of the time since their investors wanted to have, over everything else, a successful series. But now that the first two had been smash hits it was all right for them to play around a little bit and they knew it. Fran needed to find out what exactly the plan was, and how they were going to achieve it. The rest of the video game media industry had decided to simply wait and see what would transpire.
Fran wanted to be the best video game reporter out there, though. So she couldn't afford to do what everyone else did. She didn't want to sit around and wait to see what might happen in the future. She wanted to find out from the horses' mouths what was going to happen. That way she could weave the information into a compelling and informative news article that would boost her reputation and hopefully help her move up in the world of video game reportage.
Fran stepped out of the cab she'd been riding in, alone with her thoughts and the driver. It was raining out, a slight mist, the kind of thing that people in Seattle grew to know too well. But it still bothered her, though. Fran hailed from Denver, the city with the most days of sunshine in the country. And she missed dearly the beautiful summer days that were most of the year. What she didn't miss was the volatile weather that could turn a peaceful mountain range a place where people ran for their lives to the nearest shelter. Seattle didn't have weather quite that crazy, but it could get pretty intense during the spring squalls that came in off the Pacific.
The building she was headed into was the place where all of the magic of the Radioactive series was taking place. She planned on spending the day with two men: Brad and Chad. Fran couldn't help but smirk at how their names rhymed. She liked little things like that that could almost make a person wonder if there wasn't something high up in the sky that was much more intent on doing funny things with peoples' names then trying to cure cancer or end world hunger.
As Fran moved into the revolving door and shuffled along with it as it slowly rotated she wondered if the rumors she'd heard about the duo was true. Word on the internet was that both of the brilliant game designers liked to party as hard as they worked. And from some of the pictures she'd seen Fran had no doubt this was true. That wasn't what had these thoughts on her mind, though. What made her think of it was how the last female reporter that had tried to cover a story like Fran was trying to cover ended up putting the duo on blast, posting on internet forums about how she had been sexually harassed, and how both men had said that until she got naked and started playing with their cocks there was pretty much no way that they were going to give her any of the information she wanted.
Fran wasn't sure what to believe, since the woman that this had happened to had then used the ensuing media coverage to bolster her career, so it seemed just a little too convenient that the woman had someone ended up with what she'd wanted even without the initial information she'd said she needed to make a story. But what if the woman hadn't been lying? Fran thought about it as she made her way through security, was x-rayed, then got on an elevator headed to the top floor. If the men came on to her she'd have to cross that bridge when she got there, because, she couldn't lie to herself, the men were extremely attractive. Often times they were confused for brothers because they both looked like they belonged on the cover of dime store romance novels, with their broad shoulders and flowing blonde hair. It was their piercing blue eyes and square chins that made people wonder if the two men were related; and it was lucky that they had slightly different shades of brown hair or no one would be able to tell them apart!
The elevator chimed softly as it reached the top floor. Fran stepped off expecting to find herself standing in some kind of hallway that she saw on the first floor, but instead the entire top floor was one big room. Mostly it was empty, but it had a giant flat screen television of some kind taking up a small part of one of the walls. The rest of the walls that didn't have the television were mostly glass, so that it seemed like she was in some kind of glass bubble in the sky. It was still raining slightly out, and the sky's overcast had saturated more completely, to even include some lightning. But it all seemed so muted and distant through the glass. Fran walked up to one of the glass walls and put her h
and against it, forgetting for a moment that it would probably leave smudge marks. When she put her fingers against the glass she could see the reflection of her hand on a pane of glass behind it. Her face got close to the glass as she tried to figure out how many panes of glass there were.
“They won't tell us how many panes of glass there are,” a voice from behind her said.
Fran whirled around to find both Brad and Chad sitting at a bar in the middle of the room, a little behind the elevator that looked like an old phone booth.
“How does the elevator not connect to anything at the top?” Fran said. “I mean, how is something not pulling it up?”
“I'm Chad,” the one with slightly darker brown hair said. “And this is Chad.”
The other took a bow.
“And the elevator works because we paid a bunch of money to have smarter people figure out how to do it. I think it has something to do with the elevator being passed up the shaft smoothly from cog to cog. I guess it's the only one like it in the world. Kind of like our glass ceiling.”
His arm swept up and out to gesture at the bubble of glass.
“Pretty fucking cool, right? Well, like I was saying, the architecture firm that we hired to create this little feat of glass and air insulation won't tell us how many panes of glass there are, but we think there are something like fifteen and that they're very thin.”
Brad threw back the rest of his drink and let the tumbler slide across the granite bar top toward the sink.
“Not only are there a bunch of panes,” Brad said. “But we think that the insulation between them is void. As in a vacuum.”
Fran looked around her in wonder. The glass ceiling high above her was clear as crystal, and it wasn't until her eyes reached the corners of the glass top that the outside world distorted. Outside the small shower was whipping itself up into a regular thunderstorm, and she couldn't hear it or feel the booms of thunder, even though lightening flashed outside as hail pelted the glass briefly. Fran couldn't help but take a step back as she watched the clouds boil and seethe.
