“Just as long as you don’t take off your bloody bottoms.” He opened the big ice box and retrieved a green bottle of beer. He twisted off the cap and flicked it into the ocean.
Missy frowned. “I don’t think you’re allowed to do that, honey.”
“Huh?” Karlo said, distracted. He looked at her, then at her tits.
“I think it’s illegal to litter in the ocean.”
He scowled. “What?”
“A turtle might try to eat the bottle cap. It could get stuck in the poor thing’s throat.”
“Fuck turtles! I haven’t seen one all bloody morning. Besides, do you know how much trash humans dump in the ocean every year? How much plastic is down there?”
“That’s the point, pookie. You shouldn’t be adding to it.”
“It’s a bloody bottle cap!”
Karlo stomped back over to his fishing rod and slumped into the fighting chair. Missy watched him sulk in silence, wondering if this was what she’d signed up for the next forty years of her life.
More like twenty, she thought optimistically, given that Karlo, with all his drinking and cigar smoking, likely didn’t have the greatest life expectancy. Maybe I’ll get lucky and he’ll croak in ten. Wouldn’t that be something? Ten years of domestic doldrums for a multi-million-dollar payout. Who wouldn’t take that deal?
A kilometer south of the boat, an island sporting an aquamarine reef rose out of the ocean. Featuring steep, jagged hills covered with emerald-green tropical vegetation, it reminded Missy of something out of Jurassic Park, a lost world home to giant lizards or other nightmarish creatures.
It gave her the creeps.
“What do you think about sleeping over there tonight?” Karlo asked out of the blue. He was also looking at the island.
Missy shook her head vehemently, even though Karlo couldn’t see her. “No way, babe. No fucking way.”
“Why not? It would save us the trip back to the mainland and—”
“No fucking way,” she repeated, thinking again about the chilled champagne and Jacuzzi and air-conditioned suite awaiting her at the hotel.
Tilting his head, Karlo finished his beer in one long gulp and didn’t say anything more.
∆∆∆
Ten minutes later Karlo’s line went heavy and the reel spun and screamed. Something had taken the pitch bait to the left of the teasers.
Karlo grabbed the rod with both hands and shouted excitedly, telling Missy to join him. She hurried over, stuffing her breasts back into her bikini top.
“What do you think it is?” she asked, pressing up against him.
“Give me some bloody room, will you?” he said, shoving her aside. “I have to reel in the bastard. Chan!”
“I’m here, sir,” the skipper said, appearing next to him. “Loosen the drag and let it run.”
“I knew you’d come through, mate! I knew it!”
∆∆∆
Whatever was on the other end of line, it was putting up one hell of a fight. After twenty minutes of hard hauling, Karlo had only managed to get half the line in.