“Must have been brutal working here,” Dar mused, touching grooves worn in the wooden sinks from countless wrists resting on them as they washed the cane.

“Mm,” Kerry agreed, imagining the sweltering summer heat.

“Maybe we should bring the staff over here when they start complaining about the vending machine selection.”

Dar chuckled. “Just take lots of pictures,” she advised. “Wow, 96 Melissa Good did you see that?”

Kerry examined the huge wheels curiously. “What is it?”

“Grinding stone,” Dar explained. “They put the cane between that and ground it up to get out the sugar syrup.”

Kerry leaned over and sniffed the stone. “Just smells like mildew now,” she said. “It’s hard to believe that a place like this, as full of misery as it must have been, produced something so many people regard as a treat.”

“Yeah,” Dar agreed. “Speaking of which, want to stop and have our sandwiches?”

After Dar spent a moment making sure they weren’t about to sit on any snakes or scorpions, they picked a spot on the edge of the coral foundation. Kerry opened the pack Dar had been carrying and removed a Thermos bottle and two neatly wrapped packages.

She set down the Thermos and unwrapped the sandwiches, crusty French bread wrapped around spicy shrimp salad.

“Wow.” Kerry handed Dar hers. “This looks great. All this hiking has made me hungry.”

“Mmph.” Dar had already taken a bite. She uncapped the Thermos and poured out a capful of its contents, took a sip, and passed it over to Kerry. “Coconut and passion fruit. Interesting.”

Kerry washed down her mouthful and took another. “Very.”

She kicked her heels against the foundation and looked around, enjoying the food, the view, and the utter freedom of being in an unknown place with the person she loved best in the world.

“They’ve got horseback trails,” Dar commented hopefully.

“Interested?”

Kerry glanced at her knowingly. “Make a deal with you,” she bargained adroitly. “Horseback riding one day, windsailing the next?” She didn’t quite have the enthusiasm for horses that Dar did, but then Dar didn’t quite share her love of wild water sports.

However, compromise was good. It was a learning process, like everything else, and slowly they’d worked out a way to balance their differences. Mostly, Kerry acknowledged wryly. There were still some things they were working on. “Deal?”

“Okay.” Dar wiped her mouth with a paper napkin. She leaned back against the ruined wall and relaxed while Kerry finished up her lunch, the blonde woman resting an elbow on Dar’s knee. “A lot of people come out here and camp in the park.”

Kerry watched an ant the size of a Jeep walk by. “Good for them,” she said. “I admire their courage and fortitude.”

Dar watched the ant, almost jumping when the tiny animal was suddenly attacked by an almost invisible lizard, whose tongue whipped out and tethered the ant before the insect could even twitch an antenna. The lizard sucked the ant in and casually chewed it, rotating an eye to peer up at Dar with benign disinterest.


Terrors of the High Seas 97

“Ah.” Kerry blinked. “Mother Nature in all her gory glory.”

She held a hand out toward the lizard, and it reciprocated by opening its jaws wide, displaying bits of dismembered ant as well as a double ridge of tiny razor teeth. “Yikes,” she exclaimed.

“Makes you feel really insignificant, doesn’t it?”

Dar reached over lazily and, with a quick motion, captured the lizard. It struggled wildly as she brought it back over to her face.

“Listen, buddy,” she growled at it, “don’t threaten my girl or I’ll make lizard burgers out of you, got me?”

Kerry had to laugh at the bug-eyed look on the lizard’s face.

“I don’t care how many rhino-sized ants you suck up, you don’t scare me,” Dar warned, as the lizard stuck its tongue out at her. “So, beat it.” She opened her hand and released the animal. It leaped off her hand and onto her shirt, then scampered up over her shoulder and onto the nearest bit of wall.

Kerry leaned against Dar’s knee and gazed adoringly at her.

Dar smirked and managed a self-deprecating chuckle.

“Hey, Dar?”

“Yeah?” Dar let her head rest against the wall.

“Anyone ever tell you you’re a lot of fun?”

Dar considered. “No, no one’s ever said that,” she replied matter-of-factly. “I have been told I’m like being in a phone booth with a dozen porcupines in heat, though.”

Kerry kissed Dar’s knee, then laid her cheek against it. “My question to whoever said that would be, of course, ‘how do you know?’”

“It was Eleanor.”

“Ah. That explains a lot.” Kerry grinned and gave Dar’s leg a squeeze. “Well, you are a lot of fun, and I’m so totally enjoying this vacation.”

Dar grinned back at her wholeheartedly. “Me, too,” she agreed.

“Even with the pirates.” She leaned over and kissed Kerry gently.

“I’m glad you’re having as much fun as I am.”

They rested a few minutes longer in the old cane mill, then resumed their hike. Dar shouldered the pack and cinched down the straps, and they started off up a path that was now getting noticeably steeper. “Hey,” Dar observed, “it’s a hill.”

“Sure you can handle it, Dixiecup?” Kerry teased.

“Wanna find out?” Dar grinned. “Let’s race.” She broke into a jog.

“Pooters.” Kerry sighed. “Someday I’ll learn.” She shook her head and chased after Dar, hoping it wouldn’t be a really, really big hill.


98 Melissa Good

”URGH.” KERRY STEPPED under the pounding shower and scrubbed her body with a piece of natural sponge. She’d finished up their hike sweaty, covered in dirt, and with leaves stuffed down her shirt, courtesy of her lover, and the water felt heavenly as it washed away the grime. Kerry washed a smear of green off her shoulder and thought of how it had gotten there. They’d had so much fun.

After she’d chased Dar up the hill, they’d rolled down the other side, across a short swath of rich green undergrowth, and into a muddy embankment over a small creek. With a thumbful of mud, she’d painted tiger stripes across Dar’s cheekbones, and they’d ended up going headfirst into the creek as they wrestled playfully.

Kerry soaped up her hair, which the mirror had reflected as closer to brown than blonde from the mud. She watched as the dirt rinsed away down the drain and her locks returned to their normal color. “Uck.” She turned off the water and stepped out of the shower, toweling her body briskly before donning one of the thick, comfortable robes the resort helpfully provided.

Still ruffling her hair dry, Kerry opened the door and walked into their room. Dar was standing near the window talking on her cell phone, clad in nothing but a brief, though fluffy, towel that just barely covered her long torso from armpit to thigh. Her damp hair was slicked back, and it was all Kerry could do to keep from just walking over and removing the towel.

Instead, she merely sidled up to her partner and waited until Dar made eye contact with her. ‘You look gorgeous when you’re wet,’ she mouthed, causing Dar to stop in mid-word and blink.

“Uh…” Dar paused, her train of thought completely derailed.

“Sorry, what was that, Mark?” She reached out and tweaked Kerry’s nose. “I got distracted.”

“No problem, Dar,” Mark said with a stifled yawn. “Anyway, the long run came up with a ton of crap. I think you’d better take a look at it.”

“What is it?”

There was a long silence before Mark answered. “I think you’d better look at it. Maybe you can make more sense of it than I could.”

“Hm.” Dar glanced at the sun, which was painting the sky as it began its descent into the water’s edge. “All right. Go ahead and bundle it and send it down. I’ll pick it up when I get back from dinner.”

“Gotcha,” Mark said. “Hey, everyone says hi. Maria says to tell you everything’s under control.”

Dar gave Kerry a pointed look. “Good to hear,” she commented. “Thanks, Mark.”

“No problem,” the MIS chief assured her. “Take it easy, Dar.”

Dar closed her phone, then focused her attention on the robed Terrors of the High Seas 99

figure in front of her. “You, Kerrison, are a little troublemaker.”

Kerry grinned unrepentantly. “I learned from the best.” She poked Dar in the belly. “Did Mark find something?”

“Yeah.” Dar nodded. “Apparently he did, but he didn’t want to discuss it on the cell.”

“Uh oh.”

“Yeah.” Dar remained cheerful, however. “But I’d rather know what the hell I’m dealing with.” She leaned on the window and gazed out. “Can I interest you in joining me at the Equator?”

“Is that the restaurant in the old mill?”

Dar nodded. “Seeing as you were so interested in the ruins, I figured maybe you’d enjoy eating in one.” She picked up the colorful, cotton island shifts they’d purchased in the market. “And it’ll give us an excuse to wear these outside our living room.”

Kerry held one of them—in a flame red, green, and bright yellow pattern—up against Dar. “Oh yeah.” She grinned impishly.

“I want to see you in this, for sure.”

Dar plucked wryly at the garish garment. “Only for you would I do this,” she informed her lover. “I hope you realize that.”

“I do.” Suddenly overwhelmed by a wave of emotion, Kerry threw her arms around Dar in an unexpected hug. She squeezed Dar hard, scarcely able to breathe for a moment.

“Hey,” Dar murmured, returning the hug despite her confusion.

“Dear Lord,” Kerry was surprised to feel the sting of tears,