Faking It(3)
And last night had been one of those nights, involving far too much rum and tequila. As the last clouds of drowsiness finally disappeared from my brain, my head began to bang. I drank down a glass of water and struggled to recall the night’s shenanigans. Brett, I thought I could remember, had made out with Sarah, our normally very professional chief steward, who was still an astonishingly attractive redhead despite being over a decade older than most of the rest of the crew. Sarah was normally a little aloof and austere when she was sober but she could certainly party when the mood took her.
Toward the end of the night, I did recollect, a bunch of the younger guys and girls had skinny-dipped off the side of the yacht, leaping laughing and naked into the black Caribbean waters, but that was pretty par for the course on those off-nights.
As for myself, I remembered flirting a little with a guy in the bar we were at, and gradually began to recall responding when Adam, the very sexy ship’s engineer, began to compliment and flirt with me. Oh, God! That was all I needed. Adam was fit, certainly. A little shorter and not quite the Adonis that most deckhands, like Brett, turned into after a length of time at sea, but he made up for it with a really smart sense of humor and a quiet vulnerability. I just wasn’t looking for anything serious. Not right now.
Remembering his interest in me, and the enthusiastic look in his eye as we flirted, my self-confidence began to return a little. I put on some makeup, brushed my hair, and, slowly the face in the mirror returned to someone I finally recognized. A little highlighting around my eyes, a little gloss on my lips, and I started to feel attractive again. And, thanks to getting up at five every morning and running around the boat for ninety minutes with Brett and Tanya, no matter what the weather or how much we’d imbibed the night before, all the tacos, nachos, and binge drinking had only a negligible effect on my body. Thanks to the work I put in, I managed to maintain my flat stomach, firm butt, slim legs, and high bust.
Don’t get me wrong, I was no buff gym-goddess, like Tanya. But Adam still called me a knockout last night, which was always nice to hear. God, I hoped things were not going to be weird between us now, though. It’s seldom a bad thing to have a more senior colleague a little sweet on you, so long as he knows it’s never going to get serious, but I needed to keep my focus for the tasks I had ahead, and the secret plans I could never tell my crewmates about.
After we ran, Tanya, Brett, and I went back to our quarters and showered for the crew breakfast-meeting. Around the table in the galley was a long, L-shaped couch built into the walls, and we three most junior crew members, along with Adam, were the first to arrive. First deckhand Mike, who displayed his usual early morning bad mood, and Azure, looking typically frumpy in her second deckhand uniform, were next to appear.
It always amazed me just how Azure, short, pretty, and olive-skinned, could fly silently and almost unnoticed about the boat during a charter but, off-duty, she could quickly throw on some heels, a backless dress, and transform into a sultry, hard-partying princess with enough cleavage to get us behind almost any velvet rope. Maybe it was because she was only about five feet tall with no shoes on at work, which was the rule aboard Aphrodite for both crew and guests alike.
The door opened and in walked Captain Harper, all white hair and bushy beard, with Keith, the newly appointed bosun. Tarquin, a Cordon Bleu chef from London, followed them, pristine in his sharp white jacket, and as gay as can be, along with Sarah, who carefully and subtly managed to sit at the bolted down table as far from Brett as possible. They’d clearly just come from their senior crew meeting.
“Good morning, everyone,” Captain Harper’s English accent was crisp as he took a chair at the head of the table “I hope you all had fun last night.” Adam and I exchanged glances, and I saw Brett’s eyes flit over to where Sarah was sitting, although she didn’t flinch. “However, today is a work day, and here’s our charter.”
Keith handed round sheets of paper that had a head-shot and some details printed underneath. When the first sheet circled around to me, it showed a big, African-American guy with a scar on his left cheek and gold where his front teeth should have been. Charming.
“D Cash,” began Keith. Unaccustomed to public speaking, he stopped and cleared his throat before continuing, “as you probably all know, is a multi-million selling rap and hip-hop artist who loves his bling.” I passed the sheet on and took the next one. This was a handsome, clean-looking chap, in his early thirties, who looked incredibly fit but that could have been just the photo. “Paul Richards,” announced Keith, “another billionaire and a motorcycle racer who currently competes at world level in the Moto-GP championship.”
I felt my hands shaking as the third paper was handed over to me. I felt the breath catch in my throat as I looked at the picture. “Tyler Harcourt,” said Keith. “Our primary charter.”
Finally, I thought to myself, the one I’ve been waiting for.
“A billionaire playboy type that does actually take his work seriously,” Keith read from his notes. “As always, don’t forget that the primary is the guy who’s paying. He’s our boss for the next few days and the one that’s going to tip you all.”
I accidentally scoffed to myself but, luckily, no one noticed. Just as no one noticed as I held on to the paper and stared at his picture. Look at him, I thought, rich, handsome, arrogant bastard. My eyes began to stare through the photograph, my mind flashing back eight years, almost to the day.