He watched her. She had surprised hell out of him, but his biggest surprise had come with his own emotions. It was one thing to want to fuck a woman, quite another to feel a need to protect her and to want to share things with her.
When he turned his attention back to the Jolly Rogue, Liz Hunt… a lewd expression on her face was spread-eagled on the deck and being finger-fucked by the man. The brunette and Ed Hunt had disappeared below decks. The only evidence that they had ever been on deck was a scanty blue handkerchief lying next to the galley door… the bottom part of the girl’s bikini.
CHAPTER FIVE
The Anchor Bay Restaurant sits out near the end of the Santa Barbara wharf, most of it hangs out like an aircraft carrier’s forward deck over the water. The view is of the Yacht Club and the opening to the breakwater. If the Table Captain thinks you look important enough and you’re prepared to wait a bit after tipping, you get a window table where you can watch the lights dancing across the water, the sun setting behind the blue-gray shrouded Channel Islands, and at certain times of the year… the moon rising like a ripe pumpkin over the Santa Ynez mountains.
Friday night is the worst evening to get reservations; Saturdays are almost as bad. To walk in on one of these nights with no reservations at all is tantamount to dropping in unexpectedly for a chat, tea and tiffin with the Pope.
Shelton and Sylvia arrived without reservations. One look at Tod’s expensive suit and Sylvia’s obviously original Pucci silk crepe mini, and the Table Captain put a small “w” in front of Shelton’s name. A ten dollar bill surreptitiously pressed into his hand resulted in a large black asterisk following the name… this denoting a big spender. They were seated within three minutes… at a table that had been set only moments before for a party of six who had been waiting for almost two hours in the bar and were rapidly reaching a state of non compos mentis.
The Tanqueray arrived in a frosted glass. The waiter asked, “Will there be anything else at the moment, sir?”
“Thank you, no.”
Then Tod was left alone with Sylvia, with only the soft hum of other conversations in the background. She looked very female, very beautiful, he thought and then told her so. She smiled softly in answer. Her hair looked like a golden waterfall frozen in mid-flight. Her face seemed softer, her lips fuller, her eyes a deeper haze. There was just the faintest suggestion of color high on each of her lovely cheekbones. That, he was pretty sure, had come from his beard stubble during their second round of lovemaking after Sylvia had awakened. Her inner thighs would be the same color… for the same reason.
Sylvia, watching the candlelight dance on his face, thought he was the most handsome man she had ever known. She told him so; he grinned in reply. She really couldn’t get over how contented she was, how very secure and very complete she felt around him. She lifted her glass in a toast, “What shall we drink to?”
Tod pursed his lips, then shrugged his shoulders, “To drinking?”
“No, silly. To… to… “she closed her eyes, unable to force herself to say it. She wanted to say, “To us!” but that would sound possessive.
Tod saved her. “To the rest of the weekend. May it be as pleasurable as its beginning.”
She nodded, touched his glass, then drank. She sat back in her chair, completely relaxed, and let the sensations wash over her. Every single pore of her body was alive and singing. God, she felt so alive! She could spend the rest of her life just sitting here, feeling this way. How much of it was due to sex and how much of it due to being with Shelton, she couldn’t say. She was pretty sure, though, that they were inseparable. She had never come close to feeling this content with Bruce. Not once. Never!
“Penny?” Tod asked.
“What?”
“A penny for your thoughts,” he said. “You looked so bloody serious.”
“If I told you, I’d embarrass you… and myself”
“Try me and see.”
She paused then said, “All right. Light me a cigarette, buy me another drink, and I’ll tell you my life’s story. A little sad piano music, if you please, Hoagy.” She grinned impishly at her own joke.
She gazed toward the window, studying her reflection in the glass. She pointed at her image, “See that woman. I sometimes think that is the real me… something seen dimly, infrequently.” She squinted and blew smoke at the reflection. “Sometimes I don’t see her for months. Sometimes she won’t go away, like now. Look at her, staring at me. She’s accusing me.” “Oh? Have you done something you shouldn’t have?”
Sylvia ground out her half-smoked cigarette. “No, it’s the other way around. I haven’t done a lot of things that I should have. When I was very, very young… say about four, I knew what I wanted to do; I wanted to be a doctor and help people. Then my father he and I were very close… died when I was six, and the doctors couldn’t help him. I hated doctors then. When I was in junior high school, I was sure I would be a famous movie actress; that lasted until I was about fourteen when I decided I would rather become an Olympic swimmer. That lasted about four days; the coach took one look at my form and said no dice. Then I thought I’d be a famous writer or artist. No talent. When I got out of school, I thought about joining the Peace Corps or something like that. But I knew I just couldn’t spend time in some dirty-floored hovel trying to make someone do something they really didn’t want to do… or holding someone else’s sick child. I was in my third year at Scripps College and had changed my major six times in the three years when I suddenly realized I really didn’t give a damn about school either. I came back home. Mother took me with her on a round the world tour on the Caronia, she hoped I would meet some nice eligible male who had acceptable social qualifications.” She snorted and there was a touch of bitterness in her voice. “We’re very social and very rich, you know.”
“No, I didn’t know,” Shelton said softly.
“Oh my, yes.” She mimicked the words, “Terribly rich!” Then she became serious again. “My maiden name was Mayfair.”
Tod cocked one eyebrow and was impressed in spite of himself “Stephen Mayfair? Mayfair Aircraft? Mayfair Boats?”
“The same. Daddy’s.” She fell silent as the waiter brought the second round of drinks. When he left she raised her glass again. This time she paused only a second before saying, “To us!”
Shelton nodded his approval and touched glasses with her.
“Where was I?” Sylvia asked then answered her own question.
“Oh, yes! Aboard the Caronia, eighty beautiful days, forty exotic ports, eighty romantic nights!!’ “ She knew her bitterness and sarcasm were showing, but she didn’t care. “I couldn’t get interested in any of the males; they bored me stiff Mother kept pushing me off on Bruce; she even had his table changed from the Second Officer’s to the Captain’s where we sat. He gave me the creeps. Mother nearly exploded when I told her he looked like the crooked banker in a Western movie.” She grinned as she saw Tod’s appreciative smile.
Sylvia held her glass up to the candle and inspected its contents, deliberatingly whether she should continue or not. She mentally shrugged and went on. “I… ah… began to think there was something wrong with me. There I was, twenty-one years old and still a virgin and not the least bit interested in any male I had ever met. Except one I met when I was fifteen. He was fifteen, too. And I would have given in to him if he’d known what to do. He didn’t. His name was Ron. He was tall and blond and skinny and was going to be a poet. He used to read poems to me that he’d written, and some of them were so sad and beautiful that I used to cry, you know.” She paused and stared out the window at a fishing boat plowing its way into the harbor. “I saw him again a couple of years ago. Already bald at thirty, working as assistant manager in a chain shoe store, married, five kids, no longer writing poetry… or anything.” She looked up, grimacing. “Jesus, this is getting depressing. Sure you want to hear the rest?”