Chapter 3: The Last Dance
Tomas watched the water bead on Stacy's skin, tracing a slow path down her collarbone and between her breasts before disappearing into the shadow of her ribs. She was still catching her breath, her chest rising and falling in the dim light, and she'd stopped bothering to pull her hair over her tits. What was the point? Hugo had already seen everything, touched everything, taken everything. The gesture felt like closing the barn door after the horse had not just bolted but come back for a second helping.
"Hey," she said, tilting her head back against the pole. "You're staring."
"You're naked."
"Topless. There's a difference. My panties are just..." She looked down at her bare hip, where the torn elastic of her ruined underwear had left a red mark. "Gone. Yeah, okay, fully naked below the waist. But I still have my socks."
"You don't have socks."
"Then I have nothing," she said, grinning despite everything. "But I have my dignity, Tomas. My dignity and my razor wit. Both are intact."
He laughed, a dry, hollow sound that echoed off the rusted metal of the bilge. The cuffs bit into his wrists as he shifted, and the chain rattled against the pole. They'd been positioned facing each other, close enough that their knees almost touched, close enough that he could count the freckles scattered across her shoulders.
"Stacy," he said, and his voice came out rougher than he intended.
She looked at him, and for once she didn't have a joke ready. The silence stretched between them, filled only by the groan of the hull and the distant lap of water against the ship's sides.
"I always wanted to tell you something," he said.
"Let me guess. You wanted to say my taste in treasure is impeccable but my taste in men is questionable."
"Your taste in men," he repeated. "Stacy, I've been your partner for three years. I've watched you dive into wrecks that should have killed you, talk your way out of situations that should have ended with us both dead, and laugh through all of it. And every single night I've lain in my bunk thinking about you." He swallowed. "About your hips. About the way you smile when you've just pulled off something impossible."
She blinked at him. The playfulness drained from her face, replaced by something raw and uncertain. "Tomas, are you saying you're attracted to me?"
"More than attracted. I'm..." He shook his head. "I've been in love with you since the day we found that Spanish doubloon off the coast of Galicia. You were standing in the shallows, holding it up to the sun, and your shirt was wet and clinging to you, and I thought, that's it. That's the woman."
"Tomas."
"I know. Terrible timing. We're handcuffed to a pole in the bilge of a pirate ship, you've just been raped by a crewman, and I'm confessing my feelings. I should have said this years ago, in a bar, over drinks, with my dignity intact. But we might not get out of here, Stacy. And I refuse to die without telling you."
She was quiet for a long moment. Then she slid down the pole, her bare ass scraping against the cold rusted metal as she sank to the deck. The handcuffs forced her to keep her arms above her head, wrists pinned to the iron, so she sat in a position that pushed her breasts up and her hips forward. The pose was obscene and she knew it, and she used it deliberately.
"Slide down," she said. "Come here."
He looked at her, confusion flickering across his sharp features. "What?"
"Slide down the pole. Face me. I want you close."
He obeyed, his own briefs riding up as he sank to the deck, the chain between their cuffs pulling taut. Now they sat knee to knee, barely a foot of space between them, the heat of their bodies mingling in the damp air.
"Stacy," he started, but she cut him off.
"Do you want me?"
"I just said I did. I said I've loved you for years."
"Then prove it." She leaned forward, her bare breasts brushing against his chest as she pressed her forehead to his. "Because right now, I need something. I need to feel something that isn't that bastard's hands on me. I need to remember what it's like to be wanted, truly wanted, by someone who actually gives a shit about me."
His breath hitched. "You're serious."
"Tomas, I've just been fucked like a deck mop by a man who smells like fish and bad decisions. I need you to remind me I'm worth more than that. I need you to fuck me like I'm the last woman on earth, and then I need you to help me figure out how we're going to sweet-talk our way out of this mess."
He didn't need to be told twice. He shifted forward, his briefs already tenting, and she reached out with her cuffed hands, clumsily hooking her fingers under the waistband. He helped as much as he could, shoving the cotton down his thighs, kicking them off as far as the chain allowed. His cock sprang free, already hard and slick at the tip, and she looked down at it with a grin.
"Well, well," she said. "I always wondered. That's a very nice cock, Tomas."
"Thank you. I've been keeping it in reserve."
"For a special occasion?"
"For you."
She laughed, and the sound was bright and genuine, cutting through the gloom of the bilge. "Get on top of me, you idiot. I can't spread my legs properly with my hands up here, so you're going to have to do the work."
He moved over her, positioning himself between her thighs. She was already wet, her pussy slick and swollen, and not just from Hugo. A trickle of his come still leaked from her, and Tomas looked at it for a moment, his jaw tightening.
"Don't," she said softly. "Don't think about him. Think about me. Think about how long you've wanted this."
He pressed the head of his cock against her entrance, and she gasped as he pushed in. Her hands were still locked above her head, pulling her breasts up, and she arched her back as he sank deeper, inch by inch, her tightness gripping him.
"Oh, fuck," she breathed. "Oh, Tomas, yes."
He braced himself on his elbows, unable to use his hands to support his weight, so he drove into her with desperate, grinding thrusts. Her breasts bounced with each impact, her nipples hardening in the damp air, and she cried out his name against the rusted metal of the pole.
"Faster," she demanded. "Harder. Fuck me like you mean it."
He gave her what she wanted, slamming into her with a rhythm that had both of them sweating, the slick sound of their bodies echoing in the bilge. She wrapped her legs around his waist as best she could with her arms chained above her head, and she bit her lip to muffle her moans.
"I love you," he gasped into her ear. "I love you, Stacy."
"I know," she said, breathless. "I've always known, you stupid Bastard. I just needed you to say it."
She came first, her body convulsing around him, her cunt clenching so tight he nearly lost it. Then he came, a sudden, desperate flood of heat that made him groan her name against her throat. They stayed there, tangled together, panting, the chain clinking softly as their bound hands trembled.
Stacy rested her forehead against his. "Okay," she said finally, a grin spreading across her face. "That was better than Hugo."
"Low bar."
"Very low. But still, you've set the standard now. If we ever get out of this, you're going to have to maintain it."
He laughed, and she joined him, two naked, handcuffed prisoners laughing together in the dark of the ship's hold. The hull groaned around them, and somewhere above, footsteps crossed the deck, a reminder that their respite was temporary.
She pushed herself up on her knees, the chain clinking as she reached for the ruined scrap of fabric that had once been her panties. The thing looked like a murder victim, a torn band of elastic with a sad fringe of floral cotton hanging off it.
"Oh no," she said, holding it up to the dim light. "Hugo's a lot of things, but he's apparently also a textile annihilator."
She wrestled the wreckage over one hip, then the other, her chained hands making the task hilariously awkward. The fabric gaped open at the crotch, exposing everything it was meant to cover. She patted the torn hole with a flat palm.
"Sexy?" she asked.
"Very," Tomas said, stepping into his briefs and hauling them up his thighs. "Strategic ventilation."
"Exactly. A man of taste." She wiggled her hips, the shredded cotton flapping loosely against her ass. "He tore the crotch out, but the flowers survived. That's a metaphor if I've ever seen one."
She let the ruined fabric snap back against her hip with a wet slap and settled onto the deck, arranging herself so the gap in the crotch faced Tomas at an angle she clearly considered strategic. Above them, somewhere on the main deck, a pair of boots crossed toward the hatch and then away again. The crew was still moving, still restless, and Stacy's grin faded a degree when she thought about what that meant.
"So," she said, tracing a finger through the dust on the floor. "Fourteen men. That's what Hugo said. Fourteen."
"Fourteen," Tomas repeated. "You're really going to do it."
"I'm really going to do it. Sweet-talk the captain, charm the crew, walk out with our gear and half the salvage rights." She paused. "The sweet-talking might involve some very heavy petting."
"I noticed."
"Don't be jealous."
"I'm not jealous. I'm practical." He looked at her with genuine, if bemused, concern. "Stacy, you negotiated for a nine-pocket jacket out of this. You had a captive audience, you could have asked for anything, and you asked for outerwear."
"The jacket matters. It's got reinforced stitching."
"The jacket is not going to protect what Hugo and his friends are planning to do to that pussy. You should have negotiated for lube."
She snorted, a wet, undignified sound that bounced off the rusted bulkheads. "Lube. That's your negotiation priority. Not a weapon, not the exit code to the armory, not a map of the sunken galleon. Lube."
"I'm a practical man."
"You're a man who just came inside me, so forgive me if I don't take your practicality seriously." She wiggled her hips, the shredded panties flopping pathetically. "Besides, Hugo did all the prep work. In a way, he was like a crude, salmon-scented foreplay specialist."
"I hate that you're making that sound like a compliment."
"It's not. It's a euphemism for 'at least he didn't leave me dry.'" She grinned, stretching her chained arms above her head with a theatrical groan. "Now, about that interrogation. I'm thinking I lead with a compliment about the captain's beard, pivot to my legendary skills at opening stubborn jars, and then we're practically partners."