Dagger in the Sea by Cat Porter

Author:Cat Porter [Porter, Cat]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Wildflower Ink, LLC
Published: 2018-06-04T16:00:00+00:00

29

Turo

Two minutes down the cobblestone road, we were at the end of the peninsula that was Chóra. Her mother’s family name was everywhere—in the tiny church a few steps from the house where she’d lit several thin tapers and kissed an icon, doing the sign of the cross, and in the small Naval Museum, another neoclassical mansion that was the very last building in town right on the water.

We wandered around the small, crowded galleries of the museum. Models of the family’s first carriers and tankers, sailors’ diaries, old compasses and knotted ropes, certificates and maps all documenting the rise of shipping in Andros. The views of the blue sea through each of the paneled windows on the second floor of the museum were nothing short of magnificent. A huge stone terrace spread out below with a large bronze statue at its center, a memorial honoring lost sailors.

“Our original house used to be just behind this one, but both were ruined by the Nazi bombings. This one was rebuilt and donated for the museum by another shipping family.”

“And that’s what’s left of the Venetian castle?” I pointed towards the stone ruins set on a high rock which jutted out into the churning sea. The only way to reach it was over a single high and very round-arched stone bridge that remained.

“Yes, that’s all that’s left of it. We’ll swim just below.”

We left the museum, passed the grand terrace with the huge statue of the lost sailor, and trekked down steps chiseled from the rock to the small lagoon where waves splashed on slabs of that unusual mica stone glittering in the sunlight. An elderly man and a young boy swam there under the shadow of the arched medieval stone bridge which led to a high promontory of red rock—an islet actually—where the castle ruins towered above us.

Adri greeted the old man and his grandson, I presumed, as they got out of the water, and he smiled and chatted with her. He was pleased to see her. The man dried off the little boy and himself with a towel, put on their flip-flops, and holding the boy’s hand, they climbed the stone steps, leaving us all alone in this lagoon of shimmering rock and choppy blue green sea.

Adri dropped her colorful canvas tote bag with our towels and water bottles, stripped off her short, burnt orange tunic as her long hair was swept up by the wind. A strapless, one piece, lime colored swimsuit with big gold hoops at each hip was tightly fastened over her long, curvy body.

I wanted my hands and mouth fastened on her just as tightly as that lucky lycra over her flesh. Images of the bound women from the Russian ship flashed in front of my eyes. Adri’s body bound and waiting for me. Anticipating my touch. Needing my—

Dionysus, you’re fucking killing me.

Don’t let up, you bastard.

Adri’s phone rang and she picked it up and read her screen. She texted back quickly and tucked the phone in the tote bag.

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