Page 74 of His Talisman

Not very, I mused, not anymore. And why was that? Was I being stupid?

I wandered down the track that led to the beach and found them at the pebbled foreshore with surf rods in hand, despite the lack of real surf.

The sun was already high. I sat in the shade on a sun lounge, not wanting to get toasted to beetroot color, and more into studying these guys when they weren’t looking at me. I had a book from the lower library calledGormenghast,and I was ready to either read it, watch the men play at fishing, or sleep with it on my face. Okay maybe not on my face—it was a little too fat a book for that. The ridiculous part of all of this was how much this day resembled a holiday at a resort in Spain or somewhere else delightfully touristy. The staff had laid out a bikini on the bed. Earlier, I’d eaten chef-made granola muesli with fruit puree and some yummy Greek yoghurt for breakfast. If I had a jet ski zooming past and a masseuse…I would be very confused about my situation.

Instead…instead I had these two somewhat cruel men who were fun to be with, who could make me come like there was no tomorrow. I was beginning to think if given the choice of a resort or being here, that I would choose here.

I lay back and watched the pair of them throw out their fishing lines, reel them in, put bait on the line, discuss something—the waves, the wind? Who knew. The square-jawed, muscular, dark-haired doctor versus the blond, slightly less muscular Cassius, and both were barefoot and in shorts and T-shirt. They were opposites, in several ways. Although, with his shirt off, the doctor’s shoulders were shocking and giantlike boulder formations. One could run a rollercoaster on the man.

Nevertheless, one man was introspective, thoughtful, and rich—I mustn’t forget the rich part. The other was unpredictably, if rarely, aggressive, more impulsive, less inclined to be a rebel, and less a deep thinker? I tsked at myself. I was assuming greatly. I still wasn’t sure of either man’s depths.

The only thing I was sure of? That I was strangely happy, and how effed up was that?

To stave off the sleepiness caused by being soothed by palms and pine trees waving above me, by the whiffling breeze and the vast ocean rolling in beneath a sky plagued by wheeling seagulls…I roused myself from the sun lounge. I stood, stretched, then strolled down to the men and pretended to be interested in fishing.

They were bantering about the lack of fish.

“Caught anything?” I asked Cassius as he reeled in an empty hook.

He walked sideways, grabbed my ass, then squeezed it as he brought me close for a kiss. The hardness at his groin brought back the recent memories of sex. The kiss…mmm…nirvana. When he drew away, I kissed him again, up on my tiptoes.

“I caught you,” he murmured.

“For now,” I whispered back, tempted into teasing him.

“Wait until I get you tied down again and screaming, little brat.”

I smirked then wriggled from his embrace. With my rear end deliberately swaying, I went to the doctor and observed him silently. He, too, ended up bringing me in for a squeezing hug and a kiss. Wordless, he released me. I stayed there, keeping him company for a few more minutes. It reminded me of how I felt with close friends—there was no need for words when you enjoyed being with someone.

Could this island ever be my version of utopia?

I walked along the rocky shoreline a little way, wetting my feet and ankles in the small waves and wondering about my future, before I returned to the lounge.

Gormenghastproved to be too serious and dense a book for my mood. It made for a good stomach weight, and I fell asleep with it there. The doctor being a vigilante and hunting down murderers was one of my last thoughts before I sank into dreams.

The days slinked by, in the alarming yet wonderful way of this island, with great helpings of sex of the most delicious kind: casual morning sex; forced sex where I would wriggle and wrestle with them before being pinned to the bed, wall or floor; and sex that was a tied-up fuck where I had things done to me that were shocking, but they still made me come like a turbo-charged train. And there were the gourmet meals, the reading, the translating of that page in three different ways, and me constantly wondering what sort of perverted chick I was to enjoy being here.

I had lost track of Emme entirely, I realized to my dismay, while breakfasting one softly sunlit morning in thesunroom. It was the morning the doctor was due to leave again, with Cassius.

Roland entered and informed us the chopper had arrived.

I pushed away my plate of buttery scrambled eggs and croissant, drew a deep breath, and looked around at the perfect normality of this room. “Is Emme being treated this well, doctor? Can you find out, please?” I looked up as he pushed back his chair and stood.

The doctor brushed away hair that had drifted across my eye, then idly played with the strands. “I will do so. The last time I inquired, she was still happy. Perhaps, one day, I can arrange for you to see her.”

My heart flip-flopped, and I frowned in a pleading way. “Yes. Please. If you could.”

“I will try my utmost. Say goodbye to Cassius too. If his employer demands his job here is done, he might not come back.”

Then he kissed me softly for a man with his tastes, but that was how he rolled. He was human and was never dull. “Have you found any new slant on the wordintemerataand its modern meaning?”

Except for this. This was repetitive. This word was somehow supremely important. “No.”

“I want you to make a list of every possible interpretation of the word, including a modern slant on what it might mean. For me.” He kissed the top of my head then twisted his fist in a handful of my hair at the nape. I squeaked at the abrupt pain. He smiled. “No masturbating without us this time.”

“I won’t. And I will make that list. Cross my heart.” This might kill me.

Cassius laughed. “Not crossing your clit is the thing.” He arrived on the other side of my chair, brought me to my feet, then swung me backward in his arms to kiss me like some latter-day, melodramatic, Hollywood star. When he released me, I was staggering and giggling.

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