THE DEAL: Novel (21 page)

He smiled and went to see the roast and it was ready to serve it. She tries it out, they were hungry and it was very good.

Who made all that food and left it in the fridge was a very good cook or chef.

Today she felt comfortable enough to tease him and she decides to say to him joking:

"This is very good, you are a great cook"

"Yes! I am"

"Sold"

He pretended to be offended and she hit him with her napkin on his arm just to tease him. They continued to eat talking and laughing, when they finished they cleaned everything up. They were a good cleaning team.

When they left the cabin to go outside it was already night. He challenged her to a walk along the beach, with the full moon as witness, she accepts. While walking along the beach, looking at the moon and stars he grabs her hand, she tries to take her hand out, but he insists they walked in the moonlight listening to the sound of the waves reaching the beach, hand in hand.

"We are here on this island, it's like being in a bubble, and everything looks perfect with you. It was so good if the reality out there could be the same way, why isn’t life as easy as it is on this island?"

Questioning himself saying the words aloud, as JP admired the intense glow of the moon bathed in the water.

"But unfortunately the reality isn’t living in a bubble"

Carolina said, giving him the answer he already knew. They continued the walk to admire now together the blue neon effect that the sea had at night, it was a magical sight and they could both enjoy tonight and together hand in hand. Unable to control her will of repeating to get in the water and get her feet wet with the blue neon plankton, she gets her feet wet, making JP nervous because he didn’t know if the plankton was dangerous or venous and tried to get her out of the water.

“Don’t worry silly I did this the other night while I was alone, it tickles a little, nothing much”

He convinced her to get of the water anyway even having only her feet wet. Going out of the water because she saw how concerned he looked, she didn’t need any additional stress, leaving while she was walking along the beach with JP a trail of blue neon footprints. They spoke one time serious, sometimes joking with each other, other times in an attempt to challenge and provoke each other while walking. As they returned to the cabin, Carolina goes to the bathroom, takes a shower, dress up and goes to the beach bed to sleep, she was tired. He goes after her.

"You don’t have to sleep here and you know that, don’t you? You can sleep inside with me, I promise that I will behave as a gentleman, bloody hell I am serious."

"I'd rather sleep here, I like to sleep here, and honestly I do"

She told him.

"Can I stay here with you?"

"I'd rather be here alone"

"Okay. Goodnight"

He grabs her shoulders with her hands, coming near her, giving her a kiss on the forehead.

"Good night my dear"

Day 6

The next day they woke up at the same time, they took breakfast together, after breakfast they sat on the porch bored with nothing to do all stretched up.

"I have an idea"

She said very enthusiastic with her idea.

"What is your idea?!"

"Can you fishing?"

"I never tried"

"It doesn’t matter I teach you"

He looks at her suspiciously.

"Do you know by any chance how to fish?!"

"Yes I do! Come on, let’s go. Getting up pulling him by the hand for him to stand up too, he rose slightly annoyed stretching his arms in the air.

"But we don’t have any fishing bait"

He says trying to convince her to give up the crazy idea of going fishing.

"Yes, we do"

She smiles and goes quickly into the kitchen, pulls out a few frozen shrimps, get a small bucket, put the shrimps inside and returned to the balcony. Then she goes to the storage room, and brought two fishing rods with a box of fishing tackle.

"Please help me carrying some stuff to the beach and can you please help me with the two beach chairs so we can sit by the water?"

She asks.

"Yes ma'am captain and bluestocking"

Laughing at her, full of curiosity how she will fish something with that old paraphernalia from the storage room. He puts the chairs side by side along the water, she gives him a fishing rod, and he holds it curious as to see what follows. She takes a shrimp from the bucket and explains him how to thread the shrimp on the hook and make fun of him telling:

"Imagine that the shrimp is a condom and the hook is your erection, just stick with knack and is ready to go"

Both laugh at the result. He gives her a pat on her ass shaking his head, amazed at the same time with her technique when she just put the bait on the hook, she throws the bait to the water, pulling the carriage with line to be stretched, handing the cane and repeating the same process for her.

"Now we just need to wait for some hungry fish to snatches the bait"

She explains to him.

"As I would like to be the bait and you a hungry fish"

JP teased Carolina with joy. She gives him a glare, and he makes a stop sign with his hand, meaning he wouldn’t repeat the same joke again.

Side by side looking at the sea, she said:

"Did you ever saw a boat coming by?"

"I saw passing over there a few, but didn’t bother to make smoke signals, I'm very happy to be here..."

He told her looking sideways, wanting to continue and finish the sentence with ...
you
, but felt it was better to stay in silence. She looks at him and gives him a lightly pat on the arm.

"And if anyone doesn’t come tomorrow to pick us up? Have you thought about it?"

"If they don’t come, I have to practice on my fishing skills to live here forever with you"

He told her as he stared at her with joy.

"Come on, I'm serious"

"So do I"

And they continue laughing.

They spent more than one hour without feeling a fish bite as he was already all stretched in the chair, almost to languish hassle, he had no fishing skills, nor patience for fishing. She checks the baits that had however disappeared, chooses to put artificial lures they had found in the box with fishing tackle. Another hour goes by and suddenly when it seemed there was no longer hope to catch a fish, she sees his line moving, she jump from her chair in one impulse grabs his cane, dropping hers and begins to pull the line with the reel catching one fish. Surprised by her determination and agility to know what she was doing, JP was impressed.

He was astounded when she grabs the fish still living and squirming behind the head avoiding the spikes and takes it off from the hook. The fish was big enough for a meal for two, Carolina was sure it was a grouper. She was sure it wasn’t a poisonous fish, she was afraid to be wrong, but she had seen many times grouper and bought often fresh slices of grouper to grill before.

"What will you do with the fish? Are you gonna throw it back to the water?"

JP questioned.

"I was thinking a fire and roast it here on the beach. What do you think? "

"Do you know how to do it?"

"I Know"

She smiled.

"I'm impressed with you, seriously I am"

He told her truthfully.

"I think I can stay here with you forever because I know I will not starve"

"You’d die of boredom here with me, and we have to return to know what happened to us and whether there is a real marriage or not"

"I know"

He said containing no disappointment in the voice of having to return back to reality.

They took the fish to the kitchen to be protected from the sun until they had hunger for cooking.

They went swimming enjoying snorkling together to see the colourful fishes that walked around, that they found along a little farther coral reef at the other side of the island taking time to explore together. Then played with rackets again and had sunbathing. When they finally felt hungry, Carolina made a pit in the sand, and with dry branches and palm bits she made a small fire, letting the fire get only embers and preparing a green banana leaf to wrap the fish after it was washed and cleaned with salt inside a silver foil and put it on the fathoms. About 20 minutes later, they were both on the beach eating directly from banana leaf with a fork and cold white wine.

A perfect afternoon

Both thought without admitting to each other.

"This is very good, sometimes we you think that we need to have good dinners, we need to go to a sophisticated restaurant with the most exotic food there, and then when we eat a fresh fish grilled only with salt, it tastes as the best delicacies"

He admitted giving her congratulations.

"Thank you"

Said Carolina proud about her skills and because he was impressed with her, it make her feel good about herself. They raised their wine glasses and toasted to the simple but excellent meal they just had together. Now that Carolina didn’t think much about him, about a relationship with him, because they were always together, she saw him differently, he wasn’t as intimidated as he was before, although she continued to feel that tingle when he touched her, and had always the desire to have him. She loved to have him always around her and the feeling that we cared about her a little bit, it made her feel comfortable and safe. But she learned now to control her desire for him and to appreciate herself rather than be carried away by emotions and carnal desires for him. They were able to be construed as friends, at least the days passed in a more pleasant and even fun way.

Getting stuck on that island with him was the best thing that could have happened to both, she realized that he was a normal man like any other, taking him out of the pedestal that she had placed since she meet him. And best of all is that if they were starting to understand each other in a way that she had already given up hope. If they had continued in London, he was still distracted by other women, and on the island he had to focus only on her, she liked that feeling of power over him. To be the only woman he could enjoy during those days. They continued on the beach the night away, falling asleep on the beach towels next to the fire.

During the night she woke up, feeling uncomfortable to be sleeping in the sand that seemed too hard now, she got up and went lying on the beach bed. He felt her going up, got up too and went to his bed in the cabin. When he reached his bed, he couldn’t sleep, just thinking of her, about both alone on that island, he wanted her so dearly, but now not only felt that carnal desire for her, he was worried about her, about her feelings, didn’t want her to suffer for him, but also he didn’t want to make any blunder to pull her away from him. So he had to strive to fulfil his word and behave always as a gentleman, it’s was the only way not to lose her. If she wanted to be with him again, it needed to be her choice, she was the one who needed to take the first step, and he would wait for her. He couldn’t understand why he was behaving that way was he scared of by starting having feelings for her.

Unable to sleep, he got up and left the cabin. In silence he went to watch her sleep, when he arrived next to her, she was still fast asleep, sat on the floor beside the bed, put his arms at the bedside and stood there just watching her sleep. Carolina still asleep, turned in bed to the other side, uncovering her body, he gets up and covered her very carefully and touching with his lips her shoulder, and returned to the cabin. What JP didn’t know was that she felt his kiss on the shoulder and his concern to cover her. She understood that he was starting to change, but didn’t want to believe it, she thought that he was doing the effort of change just to convince her to have sex with him again and then he would do the same thing as before. But she was still decided not to give it away this time. Not anymore. She was happy to return the next day to London.

Doubting they would continue to see each other in London because he would be overwhelmed with all women in his life again and would quickly forgets Carolina. They would only see each other during the annulment of their marriage situation and then her life would keep going on her before and so would he keep on living his glamorous bachelor life.

Everything will be as it always was.

He told her over and over again that he didn’t want her for more than sex, and he said that more than once and now they can be just friends.

Well he will forget me as soon he lands in London, with all the other women around him, he will have a few on queue already waiting at the door to have some fun and I will be history in no time.

The days of friendship and spending time together were coming to an end and it made her sad. After all they end up spending some good time together, they had awesome sex, and they got to know each other on the island.

Day 7

The 7th day is reached, they felt both sad to leave that place where they were happy and got to know each other. But now they had to return to the real world, they couldn’t live in that bubble a lifetime for how much tempting it could be. Carolina was in the bedroom she didn’t know whether to pack or not, after all, all those clothes weren’t hers, they didn’t belong to her. Today she was wearing a 3 tones orange beach dress and flat sandals. Checking just if she had all her personal belongings inside her handbag, she couldn’t avoid feeling nostalgic already.

It seemed she had all she needed to return to London, she had the wallet, passport and her mobile phone off of battery by now. She takes another look to all clothes she still had and didn’t used it when she glanced the wedding dress the one that she awakened on the island on the first day. She took it from the closet placing it on the bed, admiring it for a mere moment because the dress was just so beautiful. She was astonished, when she remembered that the exact dress was in a website that she had saved a long time ago in her laptop, she had it bookmarked because the dresses from that website were simple and sophisticated at the same time, in hope if one day she married again, she would buy ones of those. And this was one of those dresses, it was white, trumpet-shaped, it had the waist in various textures, it was transparent with delicate lace, open back surrounded with delicate lace, bypassing the chest doing a deep, sexy cleavage, the sleeves were transparent and long, cut waist with a golden belt leaving the satin in a long fall into a stylish cut.

How was it possible to have a dress like that, if I never spoke of the dresses to anyone?
–

She questioned how that could be possible.

She sat on the bed, close her eyes, trying once again to remember anything about the wedding, did it really happen? She couldn’t believe that she could be married and couldn’t remember her own wedding and she tried harder and harder but nothing.

It was so frustrating this entire marriage thing.

Then she remembered that JP had left the rings on the table bedside when she removed it to show them to JP on the first day they arrived and never thought about the rings anymore. Carolina looked to where they could be, but they were no longer there, yet she searched for a little bit for the rings and she didn’t found them.

Most likely JP has put them elsewhere for sure -
She thought.

As they intended to unveil if they had married or not, anyway they would annul the marriage or get the divorce, so it made no sense to stay with the rings even if they are so beautiful. She just wanted to have the rings to remember of JP, because she would probably never see him again, but she would remember the wonderful days they had spent together on the island, she knew as soon they leave the island each will go his own way and probably they will never see each other again. She has is emotional involved with the rings, she wanted them to remember him and part of her would like to leave the island with a memorable object as a memory.

Everything was perfect with him on the island, but she knew it was only temporary and illusory, there was no future and thinking of it, saddened her. She didn’t dare asking JP if he had saved the rings but there was no point at all. She forgot the idea of the rings immediately after those thoughts. They didn’t know what time they would be picked up, to ease the time Carolina needed to be distracted so she decided to put everything in order inside the cabin, there was no need to leave everything everywhere and something like this would get her head out off thinking about the sorrow she felt to split up from JP soon.

The hours passed and no rescue came, Carolina began to get worried and went to see again the note they had left with the instructions, just to make sure if there was something written that they couldn’t had seen at the first time. But no, there was nothing overseen, the instructions were very clear as it said that in the end of the seven days they would come and pick them up as instructed. She left the cabin, looked around she realized that the sun had disappeared, looked at the sky and saw the first dark overcast, threatening to start raining at any time. JP entered the cabin that moment with an expression of concern and told her:

"I think we will have a tropical storm, its better if we close the windows with the protections I found out there in the storage room.

If I'm not mistaken, when there are tropical storms the rain and the wind are very intense, so it’s always better to prevent anything to happen."

"Let me help you"

She offered immediately, Carolina knew it was true what he was saying, they could feel the storm forming by the second to grow stronger. The two began to fit the wooden protections on the big windows, so even if there will be strong winds and strong rain they would be protected inside the cabin. The storm was coming near, they felt the wind turn stronger and rain was starting threatened at any time. While they were making their work, Carolina asked JP:

"Do you think they will come to pick us today with this weather?"

"Very honestly I doubt it, whatever transport they are using to pick us, they can’t risk coming in the middle of a storm."

Carolina was visible disappointed, she knew he was right. JP realizing her sadness he tried to comfort her by placing a hand on her shoulder, but she pulled slightly away from him, making him aware he shouldn’t touch her. He didn’t insist. She wasn’t disappointed that they didn’t come to rescue them, she enjoyed being there with JP, but her concern was if anyone would really come to pick them up as stated in the note. When they finally finish putting all the protection on the windows they returned inside.

The rain had just begun, the drops were large and spaced out, the wind was already very strong, and they could feel the intensity increasing every minute and the entrance door was closed but without protection, if the storm became too violent they could fit protection on the door quickly from inside, drops turned rapidly into a heavy rain, lightning and very strong wind. The tropical storm had begun.

Carolina decides to make dinner, since they had to stay there, at least they should eat a decent meal. Preparing the dinner helped her to distract from the thunderstorm, and she hated thunders. While she was making dinner they decided to put the protection on the door, because it was night already and it is certain that no one would pick them up with that storm and most important the storm was already to strong and would be always to be better safe than sorry. JP set the table and chose the wine to drink with the baked chicken breasts and vegetables which Carolina had prepared, Carolina served dinner and JP poured a glass of wine each. Each time a thunder blow up in the sky, Carolina closed her eyes from the fear, shuddering slightly.

JP quickly understood she should be afraid of a thunderstorm, but he didn’t comment nor did any joke of it, he respected her fear. He preferred to remain in silent and said nothing in relation to thunder instead he tried to distract her with questions about other thing trying to distract her from the storm. He asked her what kind of movies she liked to see, what kind of music she liked to hear, and gradually Carolina was calming up as she was answering making him also a few questions to see what he likes too. He was able to abstract her with success and she seemed a little bit more relaxed from what was happening outside as they continue conversation.

Outside, the rain and the wind were now so intense, making a deafening noise, they could hear the hum of the wind in the palm trees and while it passed on the cabin whistled violently. They weren’t feeling very optimistic that the cabin would stand that storm as the wind increased much more, but they couldn’t admit that out laugh. JP continued to talk to her, making her questions about her family, but she wanted to avoid talking about her personal life, especially about her childhood it had been quite painful but so differently from JP's life and she didn’t wanted to talk about something that still made her so sad. To prevent him to go the road of questions she didn’t wanted to answer she tried small talk on a topic that she loved, history.

"Did you know that about 350 years ago in England you had a king named Charles II, who had a large debt and the only way to solve his problem was marrying a rich princess?"

"I don’t know much about history, I must confess. But please continue. I am curious"

He said, to keep her busy with talk and to forget a little about the storm outside, he thought it was funny letting Carolina giving him a history lesson.

"He ended up marrying a very rich Portuguese princess, her name was Catherine of Braganza, she came up with the dowry to give the king Mumbai in India and Tangier in northern Africa, which at the time were Portuguese colonies for exploration."

"What a selfish and smart king he was"

Laughing and blinking his eye at her.

She continued:

"And did you know that she had become the queen of England, Ireland and Scotland after the death of the king.

She was the one who introduced the fashion of drinking tea among the British aristocracy and royal court. The tea at the time was very expensive and exoticism, coming from the Portuguese colonies at the time"

He laughed without contain genuinely his surprise saying:

"And everyone thinks that drinking tea is very British"

He was truly interested in what Carolina had to tell, even after dinner they remained entertained at the table talking. Each passing day JP admired her more and more, found her intelligent, friendly and reliable. He always thought of her as sexy but never wanted to admit to himself that she could be more and now he was madly attracted to her sexually and psychologically. Carolina still visibly scared of the thunderstorm and JP thought maybe another type of distraction could help her relax more.

He had an idea.

He got up, went to the living room space for what he had in mind, put a CD into the CD player and turned the volume up to the maximum, managing to stifle a little bit the noise coming from outside. Carolina shook her head laughing at him:

"Now we have disco?!"

He smiled, walked over to her side, took her hand with the intention to dance, but she refused, he insisted and she went somewhat contradicted by his hand to the living room area, where he had already made space for dancing. They started to hear Enigma what did Carolina burst out laughing, she had no idea that JP liked this genre of music.

"I must tell you that I hear any kind of music, I'm not weird but all the other CD's options which are there aren’t much better than this in order to dance"

Carolina was not big Enigma fan she didn’t knew anything about that group. The music itself was stirred, it had a highly danceable beat, the song was strong and steady, and it was sung in several languages. He begun the dancing and took her by the hand to him, making her starting to move with the beat. She puts her hand to her mouth laughing seeing him dancing, it was humorous, but he danced very well, she didn’t expected to see him dancing. Finally Carolina gives in, she begun to feel the beat of the music to surround her body as if it was an invisible force, making her to move to the sound.

They danced without touching each other until the song was over. When the song ends, another begins, this also had a powerful strike, it was peaceful and romantic, and the sound was almost mystical. Carolina had never heard it, but it was beautiful and powerful.

"This song is beautiful, never heard it, and is this also from Enigma?!"

He nodded his head, taking the opportunity grabs her and pulls her to him.

"Do you like the music? It’s called
Gravity of love
. The previous song was called
Sadness
. I know the work of Michael Cretu, music is my passion and I know him personally"

Carolina looked at him with a suspiciously face.

He continued:

"It’s true, in my work line I know many famous artists. Just to let you know Enigma is not a group but a musical project."

He said near her to hear making his voice overlap the music.

"I don’t doubt that you may know him"

She said smiling at him.

His hand began without warning to navigate blindly on her back, making her shiver, he felt her reaction and pulls her to him touching her body against his, putting his arm behind her back to let her know that she is safe with him from the storm. Carolina felt his hard erection against her, realizing immediately where everything would stop again, she couldn’t let it happen, she didn’t want to go back again to the starting point with him. She had to be strong, not for him, but for her. Carolina walked away trying to set her free from him, she needed to get a quick excuse to get rid of the certain near future that awaited her this night in the cabin with him. She said:

"I need to go to the bathroom now"

Carolina moved away from JP without giving him time to protest. When she got finally inside the bathroom, she closed the door behind her as she continues hearing the music coming from the living room and the thunderstorm outside. Taking a deep breath, she did what had to do and waited more than necessary, allowing time for JP to calm down. She stayed in the bathroom convincing her that she needed to be strong and not succumb to him. Trying to calm down about her confusion of emotions, she tried to control her best and not to give in to the temptation having sex with him tonight, their last night.