“Good God. Ifthisis what happens to you when you haven’t been laid in a year and a half, we need to get you some chuckytoutdesuite.” Bran was still covering his eyes. “It’s already too late for me. I’ve seen too much. I’ll have nightmares forweeks. But at least we can spare the others.”
“How the hell would you know whether I have or haven’t been laid in a year and half? Are you markin’ your calendar or somethin’?”
“These things just have a way of making themselves apparent.” Bran peeked from between his fingers, then said, “Ah, goddamnit. Why is it still there? You think I’m pretty or something?”
“Or somethin’.” Leo frowned down at his erection, which hadn’t wilted one bit since Olivia’s exit.
“Well, you better jump in the john and tug the pug before you come upstairs,” Bran grumbled, heading up the stairwell. “Otherwise, you’re liable to put someone’s eye out.”
Tug the pug? Wax his ax? Wobble his knob? “Did you guys hold a Who Can Come Up with the Worst Euphemism contest at some point and not invite me?” he called up to Bran’s retreating back.
“Wouldn’t you like to know? And, now, in the legendary words of Larry the Cable Guy”—Bran turned at the top of the stairwell—“‘Git ’er done!’”
Christ.
Although…thatdidseem the best course of action, considering Leo couldn’t head up to the pilothouse looking likethis. But as opposed to resorting to middle-school tactics, he figured he should first give that old trick he’d learned when puberty hit and his damn dick grew a mind of its own, springing to attention at the most inopportune times. He pictured his gap-toothed, moley-foreheaded, muumuu-wearing third-grade music teacher, Ms. Meyer. He’d once heard his father remark to his uncle after parent-teacher conferences, “That woman’s uglier than a mud fence and mean as a mama wasp.” Two characteristics guaran-damn-teed to shrink up a pubescent boy’s hard-on in no time flat.
Would it still work on a grown man’s? He aimed to find out. But just as he was conjuring up the image of the three thick hairs that’d grown out of Ms. Meyer’s biggest mole, the one above her lazy left eye, his mutinous mind snapped back to the memory of Olivia arched like an offering against him, her gorgeous nipple just begging for his kiss.
Sonofa—
Okay, there was nothing to be done for it. With a hobbling, shuffling walk—the fabric of his swim trunks chafed in the most unimaginable way—he made his way out of the galley, past the crew’s quarters, and into one of the ship’s two small bathrooms. Unrolling a wad of TP, he stood over the toilet, braced a hand above the tank to steady himself against the subtle dip and sway of the ship, and pulled down his swim trunks.
His erection sprang free, all red and angry and with so much enthusiasm he wouldn’t have been surprised to hear a resoundingboing!
“Sixteen motherfrickin’ years old,” he grumbled as he took hold of himself, letting his mind drift back to the galley, to Olivia’s fingers kneading his shoulders, to her warm breath tickling his lips, anddefinitelyto her plump ass filling his hand while the grip of her pistol rested against his wrist. Tough, yet tender. Hard as nails, yet soft as sin. That was Olivia.
It didn’t take long. After eighteen months he’d gotten pretty good at this, at jacking himself off while imagining it was her hand on him, her mouth around him, her tongue laving over his heated head… And now that he actuallyknewthe shape of her? The taste of her? Well, he might’ve just set some sort of world record. In a matter of seconds, his shaft pulsed in his fist, his balls going all tight and tingly. And then he was clenching his jaw against the deep groan rumbling at the back of his throat while he poured his unquenched desire for Olivia into the waiting clump of toilet paper.
Afterward, he stood there, his lungs working like bellows, his brain buzzing, the remnants of his orgasm making him shiver. When he managed to regain some control, he cleaned himself up and took a nice, long gander at his reflection in the mirror above the sink. “Christ, man. You’re way too old to be doin’ this.”
As he pushed out of the head to make his way upstairs, he knew no truer words had ever been spoken. But Olivia made him feel young again. Like everything was new and exciting and fresh. Like the world was his oyster, and he was poised on the brink of discovering…something. Something precious and rare. Something…
Comeon, now!he chided himself as he took the stairs two at a time.Nextthingyouknow, you’ll be writing poetry about her!
She walks in beauty like the night
Of terrorist-laden climes and mortar-filled skies…
Yessir, Lord Byron had nothing on him.
* * *
1:21 p.m.…
Bran dropped the binoculars he’d been using to glass the seas in front of them when he heard Leo’s heavy footsteps pounding up the metal stairs. Turning, he had to suppress a grin when Leo joined them, his best friend’s expression allThere! Are you happy now?
Bran winked at his former commanding officer because he knew it would piss him off. And, sure as shit, right on cue, Leo flipped him the bird.
He rolled in his lips, turning back to listen to Olivia’s end of the conversation. It seemed she and her supervisor were debating their options on what to do now that the contractors appeared to be delayed for God only knew how long.
Clusterfuck.That’s what this was turning out to be. Although, without a doubt, it would all be worth it if Leo got the opportunity to finish what he started with Olivia down in that galley. Even though Bran wasn’t totally in agreement with Wolf’s assessment that all Leo needed in order to pull a Father Karras and exorcize Olivia from his system was a nice, long fuck-a-thon, he figured it was best if Leo at least gave it the ol’ college try.
“Okay. I’ll call you back after I talk to the guys, and let you know what we decide,” Olivia said, signing off with her boss and turning her back on the bay of windows that made up three sides of the pilothouse. Bran knew the instant she realized Leo had joined them, because she flushed prettily and unconsciously caught her bottom lip between her teeth.
Huh. Would you look at that?If he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes, he wouldn’t have believed it, but Olivia Mortier looked…well…coy. And when he turned to see Leosmolderingat the woman—there was really no other word for it—he didn’t even attempt to suppress the urge to roll his eyes.
The way those two were mooning over each other reminded him of when he was six years old and his mother took him to the rundown movie theater in the South Ward to watch a re-showing of the classic Disney filmBambi—one of the few times he could remember his father allowing her out of the house. Besides the fact that he had bawled his eyes out when Bambi’s mother died, the only other thing Bran distinctly remembered from the film was when the old owl explained to Bambi, Thumper, and Flower why the animals acted so funny in the springtime. “Twitterpated,” the condition was called. And he figured that summed up Leo and Olivia in one succinct word.
