“You are incorrigible,” she said to Tara. Paul also received a kiss, then he and Tara locked lips.
“I’d love to stay, but I have to get up way early in the morning,” Paul said grumpily. He liked waking up with these two women.
“I’m sorry,” Tara said, giving him a hug. Then they kissed again as Tara slid her hands down and grabbed his ass. “And we didn’t even get to play with this,” she said, giving his butt another squeeze. “Maybe tomorrow!”
“Incorrigible,” he said with a grin as he got dress, watching Keira and Tara curl up on the bed.
———— ————
A week later . . .
———— ————
It had been a great week. Work had been pretty easy going, and Captain Cooper and Nick Mason had been hanging out with them all week. Some of the time, they had discussed business and the rest of the time they just bullshitted. William and Nick had a lot of stories to tell. Sunny, Keira and Tara had all begun flirted a bit with both men, and it soon turned into a contest. Keira wore cleavage-revealing outfits all the time and spent a lot of time leaning forward when listening. Sunny was the California hard-body, so she wore midriff-revealing outfits and tube-tops. Tara went with skintight, hip-hugger blue jeans with the sides of her thong poking out the sides, as well as snug baby-doll tee-shirts. Tara one-upped her friends the other night. The Captain and Nick had been sitting at the bar, and she had gone over to tell them that the gang had arrived. She looked over at the bartender.
“Matt, I’m just going to get some nuts, okay?” Without even waiting for a response, she bent over the bar and reached for the bags of cashews she knew the bartender kept there. In the meantime, her cute behind was put on prominent display for the two men, to the point that her ass crack briefly came into view. She grabbed her snack and started to move away. She had looked back at the two men and asked, “Are you coming?” She noticed that both men took a moment to “compose” themselves before they joined their young comrades. Keira had laughed about that later on.
But the cruise wasn’t to be without a blemish. Late one night, Tara was walking back alone to her room. She had eaten some shrimp earlier that day that just didn’t seem to be agreeing with her. Paul had looked worried and had offered to walk her back to her room, but she had told him she’d be fine. The Captain and Nick hadn’t been able to join them that night due to some meeting, so she didn’t think she’d be losing out on any good flirting time. Then coming down the hall was Carlos.
He was still as physically alluring as always. But Tara knew the kind of slime-bucket he really was. She moved to the side of the hallway. He was grinning as he approached, and moved directly in front of her. She glared at him and tried to step the other way, but he moved in front of her again.
“What’s the hurry?” he asked with a deliberate drawl. “I’ve already had some fun with those bitch friends of yours.” He grabbed the sizeable bulge in his shorts. “I’ll bet you’d like to have a go to. From what I here, you’ll fuck anything that moves. Why not have a shot at the best before you get put out to the ‘little-whore’ pasture like those bitches you hang out with?”
Tara was amazed by the hatred that was barely disguised in his voice. Keira had dumped him, and it was eating him alive. Now standing in front of him was the reason he had been dumped. Suddenly he pushed her up against the wall and placed his hands on the wall to either side of her head.
“If you want,” he hissed, “I’ll let you suck my dick right here, but only if you beg me for it. Just make sure to swallow. I don’t want any stains on my shorts.”
Tara was actually becoming a bit afraid. She was alone and not feeling good to begin with. And the proximity of Carlos’s body was actually making her skin crawl. The very idea that she had once lusted after this . . . thing . . . disgusted her.
“Get away from me,” she growled. “I’d rather never have sex again than ever touch you!” She probably should have just tried slipping away, but she had something else she really wanted to say. “You really think you’re all that? Keira dumped you like a bad habit. You were almost a pity-fuck to her. And Sunny was over you in a couple of hours. You think you’ve got all this power, but you’re just a brain-dead dancing-queen with delusions of . . .”
Carlos lifted his hands and then slammed them down next to her head again. “Don’t you talk to me like that you little slut! I’m the one with the power here. I got to fuck Keira whenever I wanted! I don’t know what you said to her, but she should be with me, not you!”
Tara was afraid, but she wasn’t going to back down. “The only reason she ever touched you was to keep you away from me. She was just distracting you. You meant NOTHING to her. That’s why it was so EASY to dump you. Because she knew that I would NEVER want to fuck a pig like you!”
Carlos’s hatred was no longer even partially concealed. It was plainly visible on his normally attractive face. “Well, she isn’t here to protect you now, is she?”
“Is there a problem here?” came a familiar voice from down the hall. Carlos instantly moved away, even before Nick Mason came into view. He had finished his late meeting and had been on the way to the lounge to meet with the gang.
“No problem,” Carlos said and started to back away. He shot Tara what was supposed to be a menacing glance.
Tara moved until she was just behind Nick. “He was threatening me,” she whispered.
“I was not!” Carlos said defensively. “I was just trying to get some answers about some things and the conversation got a little out of control, that’s all.” Carlos was using the same voice he used when trying to seduce women. But Nick Mason wasn’t buying it.
“Maybe you should cool off in the brig then,” Nick said. Tara noticed that the HR rep was actually trembling. He was mad!
“What, is she fucking you too? That little bitch has had it in for me since the moment she came on board!” Carlos took a step forward, pointing his finger angrily at Tara’s face. That would turn out to be a big mistake.
Tara barely even saw what happened, but Carlos found himself pressed face-first against the wall with his arm twisted behind his back.
“Tara, there’s an emergency phone just down the hall. Go use it to call security down here,” Nick said with an almost eerie sense of calm. Tara moved quickly to do as he asked. The way he had moved and the way he was containing Carlos made her realize that there was more to him than met the eye.
A few minutes later, ship security showed up and took Carlos away. The young man was at least smart enough to stop yelling and struggling, both of which would have made his situation worse. The chief of security asked Tara some questions. She was thankful than Nick stayed nearby the entire time, but didn’t interfere. Then he offered to walk her the rest of the way back to her room, but she declined the offer, choosing the company of the security chief. Between her already upset stomach and the fearful situation she had just been in, she knew she was going to vomit as soon as she got back to her room. Sure enough, as soon as she was safely back in her own space, she thanked the security chief, locked the door behind her and headed to the bathroom.
———– —————–
Ten minutes later . . .
———– —————–
Tara had just crawled into bed after expunging most of her dinner when Keira almost busted down the door as she stormed into the room. Paul and the rest of the gang were right behind her.
“Nick told us what happened,” Keira said, angry tears in her eyes. “Are you okay? I can’t BELIEVE that son of a bitch did that!”
“Fucking coward,” Paul growled as he sat next to Tara and took her hand. “You notice how much of a man he is when your friends aren’t around.”
Tara curled up with her head in Keira’s lap and her hand still grasping Paul’s. “I’m just glad Nick was there. I don’t know . . . I think Carlos would’ve actually hurt me. Or worse.”
“It’s okay now,” Sunny said, bending over and stroking Tara’s hair. “We won’t let him get to you again.”
The guys in the group obviously wanted to wring Carlos’s neck. Paul, Jeff, Jared and Thomas were all just short of forming a lynch mob, but Tara asked them to drop it.
“At the VERY least, he’s going to get fired,” Keira pointed out. “I don’t know what kind of criminal charges might be pressed . . .”
“Nick said he’d talk to me about it when I was feeling better. Right now, I just want to rest,” Tara said softly. “Okay guys?”
The rest of the gang wandered out. Keira grabbed Paul’s hand and held it for a moment. He wanted to stay, but seemed to realize that his friend needed her space. Keira reminded him not to do anything rash and squeezed his hand. She knew how he felt about Tara. Before the door even closed behind Paul, Tara had fallen asleep in Keira’s lap.
————- ——————-
The next morning . . .
————- ——————-
Tara awoke feeling a little refreshed. She looked up and noticed that Keira’s back was against the wall. Her friend had stayed the entire night in a seated position. Tara removed herself from Keira’s lap and laid the older woman down. Keira must have been exhausted since she didn’t wake up when she was being woman-handled. Shortly, she heard a rapping on the door. She went and checked the spy-hole. It was Nick Mason.
She opened the door and slipped outside. “Sorry, Keira’s asleep.”
“That’s okay. I actually wanted to tell you that I spoke with your supervisor, and I want you to take the day off. Keira too. Go spend some time in the sun . . . play some shuffleboard. Come by my office this afternoon so we can discuss what you want to do.”
Tara felt a little guilty that someone else would have to pick up her slack, but she felt she could offer to make it up on one of her regular days off. “Thank you. Thank you for being there last night.” She hugged him quickly. Then she went back into her room.