Jessamy Beech Ch. 13: Newlyn

Jiff pulled back, squinting at her, "Jissamy?"

Jessamy nodded, "Jessamy. Jessamy Beech. You can call me Jess if you like."

Jiff sat back wearing a puzzled frown, "D-do you know a black w-woman with dreadlocks?"

Suddenly sober, an icy chill of foreboding made Jessamy shiver, "Why?"

"Last thing that Nemesis woman asked me was if I knew s-someone called Jissamy Beech and a b-black woman she hangs around with."

Shit. Satisfying her craving would have to wait. Jessamy stood and quickly pulled on her jeans.

"Was it something I said?" asked Jiff, looking confused.

"Nemesis is a hired killer. I don't know who the fuck she is but she's come looking for me and my friend Lupita. I have to go."

Jiff laughed, "You're just a girl. Wh-what're you gonna do against some bloody ninja assass ..."

He fell silent as the barrel of Jessamy's Glock hovered an inch from his eye, "Believe me I'm capable. Now. Please, stay the fuck out of my way while I get dressed."

. . .

TAKATAKATAK!

Mpenzi wrenched the front door of the cottage wide open with her foot, then fired a three shot burst out through the kitchen window before forward rolling out into the yard.

The tinkling sound of falling glass and a dog barking way off in the distance were the only things marring a perfectly still summer's evening. Across the road the village hall stood securely locked, no sign of movement in any of the windows.

Whoever was shooting at them was well hidden.

Conserve your ammunition Lupita, she told herself. When all the NATO standard 5.56 mil was used up, every SA80 in the world would be of no more use than a door stop.

BLAM!

A terracotta planter next to Mpenzi exploded, showering her with big shards of pottery, but giving her a rough indication where the shooter was. She had two choices - dive for cover and get pinned down indefinitely, or ...

TAKATAKATAK!

... come up shooting. Her rounds tore through the evergreen hedge surrounding the abandoned vicarage.

A quickly stifled squeal of pain was the only sign she'd hit something.

"YOU BETTER RUN IF YOU STILL CAN," Mpenzi hollered, "COS IF I CATCH YOU, YOU'RE FUCKIN' DEAD!"

. . .

"How much further?" Jiff panted as he slipped and slid in the mud yards behind. He was physically strong but unused to running uphill through dark, muddy fields.

Jessamy had pleaded with him and even threatened him not to come with her, but after giving the assassin a lift on his boat the kiwi skipper felt justifiably responsible.

She'd raced down the stairs at Eleanor's, holding her leather jacket closed over her near nakedness as she hadn't bothered to dress properly. Jiff tossed the old woman a few pieces of cheap gold jewellery as payment for the room as the other customers gawped.

If the assassin was here she could easily find where Jessamy lived. John Beech and the other villagers from Madron regularly sold or bartered produce and ironmongery at Newlyn's market so he was well known. Jessamy racked her brain as she jogged up the hill away from the fishing port with Jiff wheezing along behind her.

Who would send an assassin? Someone who bore enough of a grudge to want her and Mpenzi dead. Rab, the Reiver chieftain? No, Mpenzi hadn't been with her when they'd met and sneaking around wouldn't be his style. She'd made no other significant enemies on the journey here so who the fuck could it be?

Jack Aubrey.

"Whoa!" Jiff yelled as he almost ran into her. Jessamy had stopped dead on the footpath as realisation dawned. She'd embarrassed Aubrey and made him look weak in front of his people when they'd escaped Plymouth. He was the only one with the resources, knowledge and contacts to send a mercenary into Cornwall after her. Jessamy swallowed back bile and sped up, terrified what she'd find back home.

. . .

"Anything?" Mpenzi called down the lane. Madron's meagre defence force had mobilised and were searching the entire village by torchlight. Back gardens, sheds, ruins, anywhere that could be used as a temporary hiding place.

By the time Mpenzi had crawled into the old vicarage's dense rhodedendron bushes, the sniper was long gone. A few splatters of blood revealed that at least one of her shots had hit but there wasn't enough to indicate the wound was serious.

What really grabbed her attention was the Accuracy International L115A3 sniper rifle lying discarded in the mud. A lethal piece of kit in the right hands. Mpenzi assumed that she'd scored a hit in an arm or hand and the would be assassin had been unable to carry the weight while applying pressure to a bleeding gunshot wound. She shouldered the weapon.

A light drizzle started, that would effectively wash away any more of the blood trail, not improving her mood one bit.

"FREEZE! STATE YOUR BUSINESS!"

Mpenzi spun around towards the church car park a few yards away as one of the defence force shouted a challenge.

"Don't shoot! It's me, Jess Beech!"

Well thank fuck for that, thought Mpenzi, at least Jess is safe.

As Jessamy jogged towards her, Mpenzi couldn't help but notice she already had her Glock drawn as if expecting trouble. She also couldn't help noticing the tall, muscular man following a few paces behind, his wet t-shirt plastered across one of the most impressive physiques she'd laid eyes on.

"What's happened?" Jessamy gasped.

The villagers spread out, scanning undergrowth and hedges.

"Jess. Thank fuck you're okay. Jake Pengelly's dead. Sniper shot him in your dad's kitchen. I returned fire, got a hit. Nobody else is injured. I ... I think he was after me Jess," Mpenzi studied Jessamy, wondering why she was only wearing a bra under her jacket.

"She."

"What d'you mean, 'she'?" Mpenzi asked.

"Long story. This is Jiff. He's ... skipper of the trawler that brought the sniper down from Looe. He's not involved though. The assassin IS a woman. She ... calls herself Nemesis and she's definitely after us Lupita."

Mpenzi's eyes widened, "Fuck! Listen ... I think whoever it is, she's had firearms training but she's not a professional."

"How come?"

Mpenzi smirked, "Really? A shot of less than fifty yards? If she was a pro, I wouldn't have a head right now."

"Point taken. I've been thinking about who the hell could've sent her ... and there's only one person it could possibly be. Someone who would benefit from Ox and Morwenna's deaths and has a beef with us ... Jack Aubrey."

"Son of a fuckin' bitch ..."

. . .

Three days later there had been no further trouble in the village or in the surrounding area. The faceless assassin had apparently vanished into thin air but the locals stayed on high alert, going about their daily business warily and with weapons close to hand.

Jake Pengelly was given a simple burial in the churchyard, his few belongings divided up between people who'd known him the best.

Jiff had slept that night at the Beech house on the sofa downstairs and had left soon after breakfast the following morning, apologising over and over again for unwittingly bringing such strife down on them. He'd been just another innocent party and Jessamy doubted if she'd ever see him again.

The incident had made Jessamy all the more determined to return to Plymouth and deal with the threat of Aubrey and his HMS Poseidon once and for all.

. . .

"So," said Mpenzi brightly, "you two gonna see each other again?"

"Mwuh?" Jessamy looked up from cleaning her handgun at the kitchen table. A pale pink stain marked the wall beside them where Jake Pengelly had died. Even scrubbing as hard as they could, they couldn't quite restore the plaster to its original state.

"You and the hunk. The kiwi. You'd be bloody stupid not to," she was attempting to dismantle the sniper's L115A3 rifle. If the weapon was to be of any use, they had to know how to take it apart and clean it, "bastard thing. Give me an SA80 any day o' the week."

Jessamy blushed, averting her eyes, "I s'pose he is nice."

"Did you two actually do the deed?"

Jessamy shook her head, "No. No we didn't."

But a little internal voice at the back of her mind added, 'but I wish we had.'

Mpenzi wiped gun oil from her fingers onto a cloth, "You should go see him."

Jessamy looked her friend in the eye, "But what about you? What about us Lupita?"

"Jess, it's one thing having a bit of fun with another lady, but you're still young. You might want to have kids eventually, and ... like I said I might want to get back home to Jo'burg one day. The way the world is, you need to grab every bit of happiness you can, when you can. If you like him, go. Go, with my blessing."

Jessamy leaned across the table and hugged her friend.

. . .

Weeks passed. Jessamy and Lupita's relationship continued, though there was now a more serious tone to it. There was still love and affection, but also a note of looming finality as if each of them expected every passionate coupling to be the last. They made good and frequent use of Mpenzi's birthday gift, taking each other to orgasmic heights neither of them would have believed possible.

But in the back of both their minds they realised regrettably that it just couldn't last.

"Jess?" Mpenzi rolled over in bed and propped herself up on one elbow. The morning outside was overcast and chill through the cracked window.

"Yes, what do you want you lovely lady?" Jessamy stretched drowsily, naked and sated after an hour of Mpenzi's undivided attention. Her whole body tingled deliciously as if she were lying not in her bed, but in a hot bath.

"You ... you know I said I was fine with you chasing that Jiff guy?"

Jessamy opened her eyes, aware of the slight tremor in her friend's voice, "Why?"

Mpenzi rolled her eyes, looking around the room searching for the right words, "I ... um, I've got my eye on someone else too."

Jessamy was immediately wide awake. She'd delayed contacting The Demelza's skipper for fear of abandoning Mpenzi and leaving her feeling alone and unloved. But if she'd found someone else all her worries were unfounded, "That's great news! Who is it Lupita? Anyone I know?"

Mpenzi squirmed uncomfortably under Jessamy's direct gaze.

"Cummon, spill," Jessamy urged.

Mpenzi sat up, drawing their duvet up to cover her nakedness, "Please don't be angry with me Jess. We didn't mean it to happen. It just ... happened."

"Who?" Jessamy insisted.

"Your dad."

. . .

Jessamy shrugged her rucksack higher on her back as she strode angrily down the hill into Newlyn. Her thoughts were a turmoil of conflicting emotions.

On the one hand Lupita Mpenzi and her father had found love. They were desperately happy and relieved that their secret was at last out in the open, leaving Jessamy to follow her own path.

On the other hand one of Jessamy's dearest friends had lied and cheated behind her back for months, having a sexual relationship with her dad of all people! Growing up on a remote island had left her naive about a great many things but surely she should have picked up on it!

Jessamy searched her memory, reviewing every shared smile, every lingering touch between Lupita and her father since they'd arrived in Madron, battered and bruised seven months earlier. All the clues had been there if only she'd seen them with the right eyes.

"Why am I so fucking stupid?" Jessamy yelled out loud, startling a scrawny looking Fresian cow picking over a muddy scrap of land beside the road.

If they ever married, Lupita would be her stepmother! Jessamy wondered if she'd ever share details of their sex life with her new lover. Or if indeed her father would ask.

Jessamy had stormed out of the house with a mumbled excuse about going to the market soon after hearing Mpenzi's news. She needed space, time to think. With no gold and nothing to barter she bypassed the dozen or so stalls and let her feet carry her along the worn granite quay to where the fishing boats moored.

. . .

Jiff sang softly to himself as he stacked empty plastic fish boxes in The Demelza's hold. It had been a disastrous trip and even though they'd been at sea for the best part of a week, they'd caught almost nothing. The price their catch was likely to fetch in the market would barely cover food, let alone diesel - which was getting scarcer every year, and more badly needed spare parts.

"Shit!" he swore as he pinched his gloved hand painfully between two stacks of ice filled crates. How long would it take, he wondered, to load up The Demelza with all the fuel he could lay his hands on and sail home? All the way back to New Zealand?

He had an almost seaworthy boat, a half decent crew and there was nothing keeping him here in this godforsaken country. Britain had suffered badly when Thanatos began raining fiery hell down from orbit twelve years earlier. Apart from the cannibals, crazies and tinpot warlords like General Chinnor and that lunatic Trevithick guy, most of the infrastructure was gone, the military had been decimated and most of the big cities wiped out.

What was stopping him from upping sticks and leaving?

"Hello?"

Now what? Jiff glanced up to see a shapely pair of legs in scuffed Craghoppers descending the steep ladder from the main deck. He recognised the voice instantly. The pretty blonde girl he'd mistaken for a prostitute at Eleanor's. Jessica or something.

"Hi," said Jessamy, "your engineer, the bald guy told me you were down here."

Jiff blushed furiously. Without the supporting crutch of a few beers to relax him he still got painfully tongue tied around women. Remembering how he'd met this one only made him feel worse, "Uh ... h-hi."

"I was hoping I'd get chance to talk. You're not busy are you?"

Jiff pulled off his filthy, fish smelling rigger's gloves, "Wh-who, me? No, I'm n-not busy."

Jessamy took a deep breath. She couldn't let Jiff see how nervous she was as it would only make him worse, "My name is Jessamy Beech but you can call me Jess if you like. I'm twenty years old and I used to have an older brother called Ross but he was killed by Reivers in the Lake District. I've just found out that my best friend Lupita, who's South African is shagging my dad and there's an assassin hired by a crazy ex convict I met in Plymouth on the way down here who hates my guts 'cos I made him look like a twat. I'm sorry we got off on the wrong foot the first time we met but I think you're a really nice guy and if it's okay with you I'd like to carry on where we left off."

Jiff regarded her thoughtfully, "You f-finished?"

Jessamy nodded, chewing her bottom lip.

Shouts echoed around the harbour walls outside as the rest of what was left of the world went about its business. Seagulls squawked, wavelets lapped against the boat's hull. And Jiff hesitantly took a step forward ...

"Jiff Wisely," he said, extending a hand, "pleased to finally meet you properly Jessamy Beech."

. . .

Going back to Eleanor's to rent a room for a couple of hours was out of the question and Jessamy needed some time away from Mpenzi and her father until she'd calmed down and come to terms with their revelation. So they couldn't go back to Madron either.

Jiff practically threw beer money at his crew mates to ensure their absence then dragged Jessamy unresisting by the hand into his cabin on the boat.

"I don't make a habit of this Jiff," Jessamy assured him. She perched on the narrow bed as he knelt down beside her and unhurriedly reached for the buttons on her shirt. As he unfastened them he brushed his fingers very gently across the points of her nipples, standing up through the cotton of her practical sports bra as hard as corks. Jessamy sighed.

The garment parted and Jiff pushed it gently away, revealing her slender body, "B-beautiful. Absolutely fucking beautiful," he whispered. He put his hands on her shoulders and ran them down to her breasts, taking their soft, round weight in his palms, pushing them together, eager and proud.

Jessamy looked him directly in the eyes as she tugged off her bra.

"Think I've died and g-gone to heaven," Jiff gasped. He lowered his lips and took her right nipple into his mouth. He lapped at it, sucked it until it swelled even further. Jessamy cried out at the sudden rush of pleasure from the caress of his lips.

Jiff lifted his head and smiled at her, "Am I d-doin' okay?"

Jessamy smiled and reached down to unfasten her Craghoppers, "I'll let you know."

"Y-you want me to slow down?"

"No."

Jiff kissed the skin between her breasts as between them they removed her trousers and boots. Then Jessamy shuddered as his lips travelled slowly down her body. His open mouth pressed to her ribs, her abdomen, the tautness of her belly. Behind his lips his tongue moved, swirling delicately over her smooth skin.

Jessamy sat up, pressed her palms flat against the mattress and parted her thighs, groaning with delicious anticipation, offering herself to Jiff's searching kisses. Gently he nuzzled the curls of her pubic hair, then laid his cheek against her belly. She waited for a tense moment, then let out a little moan of impatience.

"Wh-what's the rush?"

"You know only too well what the rush is. I've wanted to fuck you since I first set eyes on you at Eleanor's. Now get on with it," Jessamy tried to push his head further down with her hand.

"Only if you pr-promise me this won't be a one off."

"That depends on how well you do."

Jiff kissed her navel lightly, a moth's kiss, "Promise me."

"Okay, okay," Jessamy squealed, "please Jiff, I want you now."

Moving with sudden decision, Jiff pulled off his clothes and dropped them in an untidy heap on the cabin floor. Then he climbed naked onto the bed beside her facing her feet.

Jessamy was confused, "Wh ...?"

Jiff lay down and caught hold of her hip, pullin it towards him. Jessamy opened her eyes, startled, and found herself lying on her side with his beautiful cock directly before her face.

"Only if y-you want to Jiss," Jiff murmured.

"Oh I want to," Jessamy let out a breath and reached out for him at once. Her mouth opened wide to allow the swollen glans to slip between her lips. She folded her arms around his loins as the taste of him filled her mouth.

Jessamy sucked at it greedily, and with her fingers teased and caressed the delicate skin of his testicles. Jiff groaned and she felt his nose and lips nuzzling at her closed thighs. His arms encircled Jessamy's hips as he slid his hand between her legs and pressed her thighs apart.

Jiff's warm breath kissed her sex and she moaned. Then at last, she felt his face on her. She cried out and folded her thighs around him, holding him there, and sucked harder.

Her body clung desperately to his as he opened his mouth and drew her folds in. Jessamy's body tightened against him as he began to lick and suck gently and steadily at her swollen clitoris.

They played each other's bodies like musical instruments. When Jessamy wished to be sucked hard and roughly, she clasped Jiff's glistening cock strongly in her hand and moved her lips rapidly up and down. When Jiff wanted to slow the tempo, he withdrew a little and teased her labia with the most delicate strokes of his tongue.

They hugged each other, hands sliding over the skin of thighs and buttocks. As their pleasure increased, their bodies tensed. Jessamy's hands clutched and clung, spasming helplessly as she lost control. Jiff parted her buttocks, easing one finger gently into her ass.

How had he known she liked that? The extra stimulation was almost more than Jessamy could bear. She felt her orgasm boiling up inside her, and she wanted Jiff to cum with her. She moaned and thrust her hips towards his face, letting her lips glide faster up and down the slippery length of his twitching cock.

Jiff lapped harder at her clitoris and thrust his finger in deeper. Jessamy sucked furiously at his cock, moaning with pleasure to feel him thrusting between her lips as if he was fucking her. Jessamy's orgasm flooded over her. Her hands clenched and grabbed at Jiff's thighs, pulling him towards her, taking him so deep between her wet lips that the jerking head touched the back of her throat.