A Time of Changes

As she slipped her arm through his he smiled at her and led her out of the bungalow and toward the main hall. They passed the pool where the other guests were as well as several staff that were serving them, and the two of them turned every head there on their way past. They had the restaurant to themselves and they were seated near the windows facing the west side of the island. The view of the sea was beautiful and she could see the sun was soon to set. It was idyllic and peaceful. A water feature nearby provided a soothing sound and the quiet atmosphere was very intimate. They had soup and salad and sipped at wine as they waited for the entrée and they talked of little nothings. Neither of them brought up relationships or sex, neither of them talked about their past or the future. It was pleasant and relaxing and they ate and talked and finished a second bottle of wine. She couldn't wait to get him back to her bungalow, couldn't wait to get him into her bed and get that suit off of him just enough to get at the part of him she wanted most.

To her, it was a tryst. She was staying until March and Pen was a pleasing distraction while she was there. He was an impulse, an itch that she had to scratch and when she had to return to New York in the spring she would leave him behind, but she would miss him as well. She had a few qualms about it, as it wasn't really her nature to do things like this. But at the same time she knew that many men did exactly the same thing with young women; convenient sex with an attractive partner that was easily left behind when the time came. And if men could do that all the time, why should it be so bad that she do the same thing?

She saw no reason not to, and she had the added bonus that he was sufficiently intellectual and interesting to talk to. But in the end their relationship was purely sexual, a relationship of convenience for her and she figured that for him it was much the same. A few months bedding a wealthy woman on her post-divorce sabbatical and no strings attached... What luck for them both. It simply never occurred to her to ask his thoughts on the matter, she had no real reason to.

They finished their meal and sat sipping amaretto and coffee together in the small lounge on the patio, listening to the sea wash against the rocks below. Candice was feeling a pleasant buzz and she leaned in close to him, feeling his firm body beside hers and the soft touch of his hand on her leg. He wasn't possessive, but the open affection was enjoyable and she smiled as she sipped at her amaretto.

A staff member dressed in formal attire came over with a small tray and she could see the telephone on it. She felt a bit annoyed, she had asked not to be disturbed, but the young man bowed slightly at the waist.

"Your pardon, mademoiselle, it is your mère, and she says that it is an emergency." He said as he offered the tray.

Candice sat up at the words and took the phone anxiously, wondering what the problem was. Her mother knew that she was purposely placing herself out of touch, so it had to be something serious.

"Mom?" She was anxious as she listened, but Pen could see the anxiety bleed out of her and she turned cold and hard, her eyes losing their lustre of pleasant intoxication and growing hard with some other emotion. Fury, if he had to guess.

"I see." She said finally. "When they call again, tell them that this will not be tolerated. I'll be contacting my lawyer in the morning and filing a harassment suit against Gavin and his lawyers. Then hang up on them. They can't keep doing this, it's evil."

She said that last word with such spite that he was glad it wasn't directed at him. Candice exchanged a few other words with her mother before she hung up and passed the phone back to the staff member. When the young man left she drank the last of her amaretto in a single drink and set the glass down. She stared out to sea for a while in stony silence before she stood up abruptly. Pen stood with her and she glanced at him with a rueful smile.

"I need something stronger than amaretto. Care to join me?" She asked and he nodded and followed as she walked back out to the pool area and the all-night cabana bar next to the pool. She sat down on a stool at the bar and the bartender came over to take her order.

"Vodka, two fingers straight up and something with vodka in it please and thank you." She said curtly.

The man behind the bar placed a whiskey glass in front of her and filled it halfway with vodka before he started on mixing a gimlet. Candice picked up the vodka and drank it so quickly that Pen was afraid she would pass out or throw up. She set the glass back down on the bar and gasped for breath, her face a study in anger and self destruction.

"Aren't you going to drink?" She asked in a low voice and Pen was a bit shocked.

She wasn't drinking casually, as they had been over dinner. Now she was drinking to get drunk. He had seen guys in the navy drink like that and nearly die from it. This was drinking with a purpose and her entire being had changed since the phone call. She wasn't being flirty or playful she was angry and it showed. He ordered up a whisky sour and nursed it as she did her best to murder a bottle of vodka. She sipped at the gimlet as the bartender poured another glass of vodka, and then another before she looked over at him and he could see that the anger and the drinking was all a mask. She looked small and afraid and so very sad that it hurt to see.

"The lawyer for my wonderful ex-husband contacted me a few days ago." She said in a low voice. "Gavin wants the wedding set he gave me back. They're antiques and belonged to his grandmother. He wants them to give to this year's model. I told his lawyer that Gavin had to contact me directly if he wanted them and there might have been something in there about fucking himself in a pit of broken glass in hell or something." She waved that away with an annoyed expression and a sigh. "Anyhow, instead of Gavin calling me, his lawyer has been harassing my mother several times a day. So tomorrow I need to contact my lawyer and file a harassment suit against Gavin and his little friend. You'd think that the ten million he got from me in the divorce would have been enough." She said into her cup and then she drained it in a single gulp.

Pen didn't know what to think of it all, but he didn't want to take her ex-husband's side against her, he did know that.

"So why not just give him the rings back? I mean, do you have any attachments to them?" He asked and she snorted as she waited for the bartender to refill her poison of choice.

"I think at this point even if I had them I wouldn't return them out of sheer spite." She said as she swirled the glass around. "The day I got here I threw them out into the ocean. Just after you brought me the umbrella. They're gone forever now and good riddance."

She said it with such spite he immediately knew that if she still had them they would be worse than thrown away. He sighed and drained his drink as she finished yet another vodka. She was taking them fast and he knew that if she didn't pace herself she would be in worse shape than he could handle.

"Listen, I know you're hurting..." He said and she laughed as she set the glass down and waved the bartender over again.

"If anyone understands this it's you." She said huskily.

"...but if you keep drinking like this..." He went on after she had spoken.

"So what." She almost snarled. "I want to be anything but sober right now." She said then she laughed into her glass before she drained it and waited for it to get refilled. "I know why." She said as she looked at him, then she reached over and grabbed his crotch. He recoiled, sliding back off of the stool and knocking her hand away. She laughed at that and turned back to her drink.

"Let's be honest with each other, Pen. You and I are nothing but conquests for each other. If you want to fuck, we'll fuck if not, I'm sure you can find plenty of other women who enjoy a good hard pounding." She was hurting and taking it out on him, she knew that but she had had enough alcohol in her now that she didn't care. She waited for his answer, but when she turned to glance back, he was gone. She shook her head and felt a pang of guilt. But instead of seeking him out and apologizing, she turned back to the bar and tossed it on the pile of other feelings she was trying to drown with the alcohol.

————14————

Candice woke up the next day with a terrible headache and that made the feelings she had tried to hide that much worse. She ordered in a bottle of something strong to her bungalow and stayed inside all day with the windows closed as she drank and tried to forget. Then she found the bottle of vodka she had asked for days before, before Pen had given her something better to take the anger away, and she drank that too. She wanted to forget the feelings she had for Gavin, the hope and the joy of their marriage, the plans they had been making to have children, the house they had bought and all of the other things that were too hurtful to remember. She wanted to forget how she had felt the day she had been served with divorce papers, when all of the bitchy whores had hidden their smiles behind hands as they watched it all, as they had looked at her with amused eyes, their little 'I knew it would happen eventually' attitudes and the gossip and rumours that had started the instant it had happened. She wanted to forget the betrayal she had felt when she learned about Gavin's mistress and the hurt that went with his complete change of interest.

Wasn't she good enough? Didn't he love her? He had professed his unending love just the day before and then he had dumped her like she was trash. It had hurt so badly that she had wanted to die and then the hurt had turned to bitterness and she had directed that bitterness at the wrong person. The fact that Gavin and his lawyer would stoop to harassing her mother had been the straw that broke the camel's back and Candice wanted to drown her sorrows and herself in alcohol until nothing ever hurt again. But mostly she wanted to forget the look on Pen's face when she had grabbed his crotch and said what she had so hurtfully.

She placed several long distance calls to her lawyer, called her mother and called the New York City police department among a few others, but she was hardly in a condition by then to do much more than just make her wishes known to them. When she was done she ordered in another bottle and she passed out somewhere in the middle of the afternoon. She woke up later to vomit messily into her toilet and then cry herself to sleep in her bed, curled tightly in a ball and shivering with the chill despite the heat of the island paradise.

————15————

For four days Pen watched her bungalow when he was on the island. He had his regular duties to attend and a few new guests had arrived, a younger couple there to take advantage of the nearly deserted island. They booked a catamaran tour of the reef and a dolphin excursion and he was kept busy. But he still had some free time and he got a snorkel and flippers out of the cabana on the beach and swam out into the surf. He dove down deep into the water and swam among the coral and the fishes, searching for something that he had no chance of finding. Again and again he dove down deep, swimming as far out as the drop-off and back again, fighting the tidal pull of the water. He was exhausted when he finally gave up at the end of each day and he sat on the sand looking not out at the sea, but up the beach at the closely shuttered bungalow.

He wanted to go and talk to her, but he had no business with her, not after what she had said and done. He was hurt by her words, stung by them in a way that he hadn't really thought he could be. Part of the hurt came from her attitude, that she had taken her frustrations out on him. But another part, a part he hadn't even realized, was from the accuracy of her words. She was a conquest, the wealthy woman alone, recovering from a divorce and vulnerable. He had taken advantage of that vulnerability to get into her bed. The fact that she had been willing, more than willing really, was no excuse. For four days he had spent his nights inside of her room, in her bed, and she had been very willing and eager for their lovemaking. But there really was nothing more to it than the desire to bed an attractive woman.

Or so he had thought.

Her words had hurt him, her actions and the way she had said what she did had hurt far worse. It was dismissive, and that was humiliating in a way that he was very familiar with. With a sigh he stood and went back to his apartments. He had an early start tomorrow with a flight into Barbados and then back in the evening with the owner and eight of his personal guests, all of whom would be remaining on the island for the next several days. He carried the flippers and snorkel back to the cabana and walked up to his three spare rooms. He had gotten used to living in a small space with few belongings when he was in the navy and the setting here was little different. He had a few pictures of his parents and his sister, one of his wedding day which he couldn't bear to throw away, and a few personal items. But there wasn't much, and he didn't really mind. There was a lot to do on the island in his spare time and he took full advantage of that. He had some books and his laptop, but he rarely had the inclination to isolate himself and read the way some of the staff did when they had free time.

He stripped off his trunks and pulled on some loose pants before he gathered up his laundry to carry down to the wash. The ripe stink of something told him that he had let things linger for too long. He sighed and carried his things down to the laundry room and started sorting through it all. At the bottom he found the rancid remains of the outfit he had been wearing when he had rescued Candice from the storm. He clenched his jaw and tossed them into the washer and he heard something clink against the drum. With a furrowed brow he fished the stinking garment back out again and untangled them. He found some change in the pockets of the shorts, which he was forever forgetting and washing, and some sodden ruined papers. Then something heavy fell onto the top of the washer as he worked at unwadding the shirt with a heavy metallic 'Thud' that he couldn't ignore. It was a pin or brooch of some sort.

He set it down and finished sorting his laundry into three different machines, getting it all going before he picked the brooch up again. It was heavy, the silver feeling cool as he turned it over in his hands. There was sand clinging to it and he brushed it off with his fingers as he looked at the settings. The silver was carved like a bird of paradise, beautifully done and clearly very expensive. The eyes were set with emeralds and the crest was shimmering with diamond chips. It was a gorgeous piece and he whistled at the weight of it and the clear value. Then he turned it over and saw the inscription on the back. He read it and froze, the heat draining from his body as he stared. Then he read it again, and again as he got angrier and angrier. He tucked it into his pocket and left, returning to his room to turn on his computer. He brought up a search engine and tapped at the keys.

'Gavin Michael MacLeod' He tapped into the search bar and hit enter.

————16————

Candice woke up feeling like she had been hit by a truck. Her entire body ached and she was laying on the floor of her bungalow. The place stank of sour sweat and vomit and she was immediately sick again, barely making it to the toilet this time. She knelt there on the floor feeling horrible and hollow and sick and she realized that she had to stop. She had been drinking to excess for days now and she had had very little to eat.

She forced herself to her feet and into the shower. The water almost thundered as she turned it on and she groaned at the sound and the feel. She stripped her clothes off with agonizing slowness and washed her body. The dress she had worn out with Pen, the one she had loved so much, was ruined, she could tell. She had been wearing it the entire time and it was stained and torn and beyond salvage. The nice lingerie she had bought in St. Lucia just to entice him was also destroyed and she wept at that. She had felt good when she wore it, sexy and fun. She huddled in on herself as the water blasted her, her skin raw and red from scrubbing and from the water being too hot, but she didn't care, didn't get out. The pain was something she felt that was other than what she wanted to feel and she accepted it as her due.

She wept again as she sank down to squat in the center of the shower, her face in her hands and her body trembling in the sort of exhaustion that came after a binge like she had just had. She hadn't really slept since she had gotten the call from her mother, she had just passed out drunk and came to and started drinking again. She was sick to her stomach and starving for some real food, but too nauseated to even consider eating. She retched a few times and spat bile down the drain, then finally had the willpower to shut the water off and she only didn't crawl to her bed through an effort of supreme willpower. She forced herself, dizzy and disoriented, to walk to the bed as water dripped off of her. But the smell of the sheets was rank and she felt more bile stirring in her stomach as she moved away from the bed and down the staircase very carefully. There was a moment when she was sure she was going to fall and break her damn fool neck, but she caught herself and made it the rest of the way down and made it to the lounger she normally read on.

She lay down gingerly, aching all over, and coughed as she felt the bile burning in the back of her throat once more. She cast around and found the catch for the shutters and pushed one of them open enough that some cool night breeze blew in through the opening and she felt immediately better. She lay there waiting to fall asleep or die, and she saw something sitting on the little table at her side. Her book was there, as well as several others that she had read or planned to read, but it was something else that caught her eye. It was small and round, barely as large as the tip of her little finger. She touched it and as it rolled she realized what it was; the pearl from the oyster that Pen had given her. At that the tears returned, hot and heavy and silent, washing down her cheeks and dripping onto her shoulders and neck and chest. She felt worse than ever as she grasped the pearl in her hand and wept herself to sleep.

————17————

Pen got back later than he thought. Much later. The friends of the owner had found the casino on Barbados and had insisted on staying well into the night, gambling away more money on one spin of the roulette wheel than Pen had ever made in a year in his life. It was obscene watching it pass back and forth so quickly and easily and he hid his disgust behind a veil of professional detachment. It was nearly ten P.M. when they were all loaded onto the Maria and ready to fly to the resort. Stephan Marcasos, the owner of the resort, rode up in the cockpit with Pen and it was clear to Pen, who had known him for years that Stephan had already grown tired of their company. They were all younger, in their mid twenties and early thirties, they were already drunk and still drinking and the constant brainlessness of them was wearing thin.

They all thought themselves famous because they had famous or wealthy parents and they expected to be treated like celebrities. Stephan only associated with them because they generated word of his resort and it was the best sort of advertising. But he detested them more than even Pen did. The two of them had relative silence in the cockpit with the door shut and locked and they chatted back and forth in French through the headphones.