"What?"
"The sail!"
"I don't know what you're talking about."
He paused. The wind ripped around them, pulling his hair from his forehead, then casting it back down again. "Come on, Alexi--"
"I don't know what you're talking about. I've never been out on a sailboat in my life." "You were born a rich kid!"
"And I play tennis and golf, and I've even been on a polo field or two, but I've never been on a sailboat!"
Rex stared at her for a long moment. "Damn!" he murmured. Then he ordered curtly, "Come over here." She shook her head. "I don't know how to steer, either." "Just keep both your hands on her and don't move!" he bellowed. "Alexi--"
There was something so dangerous about the way he growled her name that she decided to comply. She slid next to him on the hollowed-out seat and set her hands on the long tiller. "Don't move it!" he warned her.
He jumped up, leaving her to watch as he nimbly maneuvered around the boat. Barefoot, in cutoffs, he seemed every inch the bronzed seaman. He quickly brought the sail under control. Red-white-and-black canvas filled with wind. Alexi had to admit that it was beautiful. She lifted a hand to shield her eyes from the sun and stared out at the horizon. It seemed endless. If she looked to her right, though, she could see the coast, not so very far away.
Rex jumped down beside her. He slipped his brown hands over hers. "Thank you," he said curtly.
"Aye, aye, sir!" she said mockingly. She stood, glad she'd left her sandals below so that she could present a facsimile of coordination when she climbed forward, holding on to the mainmast, to look out at the day. With her fingers tightly clenched around the mast, she closed her eyes and inhaled and decided that the air was wonderful. The wind, alive and brisk, felt so good against her face. If only she weren't at such odds with the captain at the moment.
She decided that for the time being, no action was her best action. She went back below, and for almost an hour she immersed herself in Eugenia's diary. She was amazed to discover that Eugenia's plight could actually make her forget her own.
But she hadn't really forgotten. She set the book down pensively. She would finish it later, maybe that night. Rex hadn't tried to talk to her. Alexi realized ruefully that she was more concerned with her own life than Eugenia's.
Alexi went back topside. She pretended to ignore Rex and sat on the fiberglass decking and leaned her head against the mast. The sun beat down upon her while the breeze, salty and fresh, swept around her. Talk to me, Rex, she thought. She closed her eyes and enjoyed the warmth.
She must have dozed there, for when she opened her eyes again, the sails were down and the boat was still except for a slight rocking motion. Twisting around, she could see that the anchor had been thrown and that they were just about twenty or thirty feet off a little tree-shrouded island.
Rex was sitting at the bow, a can of beer in his hand, wearing mirrored sunglasses, his skin and hair wet from an apparent dive into the sea.
Alexi stood and stretched and hopped down to the scooped-out tiller area and then down to the ladder. She was sure he heard her, but he didn't turn. She went on into the galley and opened the pint-sized refrigerator to find a can of beer. She smiled, popped the top and crawled up the ladder again.
Perching just a few feet behind Rex, she watched his back. He turned around, arching a brow to her, but she couldn't begin to read his thoughts in the reflections of herself mirrored in his sunglasses.
She smiled sweetly and raised her beer can to him. "Cheers."
"Cheers." Solemnly he lifted his own. He looked out to sea again, then stood and took a long swallow of the beer. Alexi set her can down and rose, too, slowly coming up behind him. She pressed her lips against the flesh at his nape, then followed along his spine... slowly. She slipped her arms around his waist and grazed her teeth against his shoulders. He tasted of salt and sun and everything wonderfully male.
"I thought you were angry," he said gruffly. "I am. Furious." She got up on tiptoe to catch his ear-lobe between her teeth. "Alexi--"
"You had no right to drag me out here. None at all." "I had every right! You don't use your common sense. You're a little fool. You need protection now, and I'm it." "I am not a fool!" She nipped his shoulder lightly, then laved the spot with her tongue. "Alexi--"
"Will you please shut up?"
"Alexi--" He tried to turn and take her into his arms. Alexi pushed away from him, smiling.
She reached for the hem of her shirt and pulled it over her head, then neatly shimmied out of her shorts. "Want to go skinny-dipping?" she asked him, casually slipping from her bra and panties. She offered him one sweet smile, then posed for a fraction of a second and dived into the sea.
She swam with long, clean strokes toward the island, then paused, panting slightly and treading water as she looked back toward the Tatiana. Rex was nowhere in sight.
She gasped, nearly slipping beneath the surface, when she felt a tug upon her foot. Then he was with her, sliding up from beneath the surface, his body--all of it--rubbing against hers. Next to the chill of the sea, he was vibrant warmth, his arms coming around her, his legs twining with hers, his desire hot and potent and arousingly full against her thighs. She saw his eyes then for a moment, dark and glittering with the reflections of the sun. Then she saw them no more. His mouth came to hers, sealing them together in a deep, erotic kiss that sent them sinking far below, into the depths. So wonderfully hot...his tongue raked her mouth with that fire while his fingers moved over her in the exotic world of the sea. She would die... in seconds she would smother. But his touch in the watery world was already a taste of heaven.
Rex gave a powerful kick, sending them both shooting back toward the surface, still entwined. As they broke the surface, Alexi cast her head back, gasping for breath and laughing. She had barely inhaled when his lips were there again, against hers. He alternately rimmed her lips with his tongues, then whispered things to her. She and Rex did not sink, for he held her tight against him, treading water. She swallowed, weak and dizzied, as he moved his hands in concord with the warning of his whispers, teasing her breasts, working along her lower abdomen, stroking her thighs, taunting her implicitly.
"Oh..." she whispered.
"Alexi."
She leaned her head against him, closing her eyes, unable to reason against the sensations. She would sink again. Sink forever in the swirling realm of bliss where she floundered now.
"We've got to get back to the boat."
"Yes."
"Alexi."
"Yes."
"Now," he laughed, "or I won't have the strength left to do us justice."
"Oh!" Lost in the sensations of his loving, she realized that he had been doing all this while keeping them both afloat. "Oh!" she repeated, slightly embarrassed. She kicked away from him, hard, and began to swim. He caught her at the rope ladder by the motor at the back of the Tatiana. He raised her to the deck, then curled his leg around the ladder himself for balance. Alexi tried to rise. He stopped her, caught her foot and stroked the arch while he kissed her ankle.
"Rex!"
"What?" Tenderly he moved his mouth up along her calf.
"The sun is out and shining. We're in broad daylight. There's nothing to shield us--"
"And there isn't another boat around for miles," he assured her. Her kneecap received his ministrations next.
She thought that she had died. Where he did not touch her, the breeze moved erotically over her wet body. And there, in pagan splendor beneath the captivating rays of the sun, he made very thorough love to her. He treated the length of each leg with the same exotic care as he did the juncture between them, with incredible, exotic savoir faire--so sweetly that she was nearly numbed, consumed again by tiny explosions of delight. She could scarcely move...but then agility came to her and she reached for him, eager--desperate--to love him as he had loved her.