Blow Me Down (13 page)

“No. We can’t look for help from outside the game. The answer is something here, in this world.”

I closed my eyes, figuring I’d give my poor overstimulated brain a little break. Corbin could deal with the situation for a few minutes. I would just sit there and . . . man, he was warm. And he smelled good. I turned my head slightly, searching for the elusive scent that was his. I caught it again—leather and a faint lemon essence, and something vaguely musky that appealed to me despite the fact that I disliked musk.

“Hey!” I said, a couple of minutes later, the sound of my voice disturbing the rhythmic sound of waves slapping against the hull of the ship, and the oddly pleasing creak of wood as the ship gently rolled with the current. I opened my eyes and frowned at Corbin. “Does this brain thing mean that when you and I were . . . er . . .”

“Necking?” he asked with a grin.

“Breasting is more apropos,” I said with a warm feeling of pleasure in my belly. “Does this mean that it was all in my mind?”

“Well . . . it was in my mind, too,” he said, a touch of leer hitting his grin. “But I know what you mean, and yes, it didn’t really happen. Your brain reacted to a stimulus that it knew, making you feel as if you and I had physically been together.”

“I hardly know you at all,” I said, a bit outraged. Did he think I was cheap to allow things to go so far so fast?

“You reacted to what I represent, not what I actually did,” he said, his grin slipping a couple of notches. “Sexual stimulation is a learned experience, like all others. Your mind responded the way it had learned.”

“Oh.” Somehow, I felt cheated. “It sure felt real. Although I wasn’t sexually stimulated. It was just . . . pleasant.”

“You weren’t?” he asked. “So if I do this, it doesn’t turn you on?”

Without any warning whatsoever his hand slipped into my bodice, his thumb gently flicking over my nipple.

“Holy cats!” I screeched, stiffing up at the amazing feeling of his fingers on my breast. I tried to remind myself that it wasn’t real but had absolutely no luck. So far as my brain was concerned, my breast was about to go up in flames of pure desire.

I’d die before I told him that, though. “No, I mean, it’s nice and all, but it takes more than a little groping to get my motor running.”

“Really? How about if I . . .” His free hand slid under my skirt, up my bare thigh.

“No!” I yelled, slapping my hand down on his. “All right, I admit it, you’re doing something to me, but just a little. Stop that! And take your hand out of my bodice. My boob is not bread to be kneaded.”

He chuckled as he withdrew both hands. I pushed my skirt down and rearranged my breasts in my bodice (fluffing them up a bit when he wasn’t looking—this might not be real, but I wasn’t a fool). I couldn’t help but sneak what I hoped was a covert glance at his groin.

“Yes, I’m as aroused as you are,” he said, causing me to blush a little. Damn. I’d have to work on my covert glancing.

“I was just checking to make sure that you’re playing fair.”

“Women are such contrary creatures when it comes to sex. You parade around like scantily clad vixens but blush when you’re caught staring at the erections you cause.”

“I didn’t stare; I glanced! There’s a big difference. Besides, you’re the one who created the clothes here, Mr. Pirate Expert.”

“Actually, Holder did, but your point is taken. Now, if you’re done trying to make me explode out of my breeches”—he ignored my outraged squawk of protest—“let me tell you what I think happened.”

I pinched his leg but told him to go on.

“I told you I had a partner in the company, right?” he asked, absently rubbing his leg.

“Yeah. You said he left.”

“His name was Paul Samuels. He was in charge of the VR unit and did most of the work on programming the glasses. In other words, I provided the data and program that the Internet version had created, and he translated it into VR.”

“And you think he messed up somehow?”

“No,” he said, turning his head so he could look into my eyes. “I think this was deliberate. I think he set up a sort of virtual virus to trap players here.”

“For what purpose?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know that yet. But I do know that, unlike me, Paul must have had the foresight to program in a back door he could use to access the game, because we changed all the security codes after he left us. He couldn’t access it by normal means, which means he must have another way in.”

“If he has a way in, can we use it to get out?”

“I don’t know. I doubt it, though,” he said.

Frustration mingled with panic deep within me, leaving me with a sick feeling in my stomach. “So, what are we going to do?”

His eyes, normally so warm, suddenly went chilly. “We’re going to find Paul.”

“Find him?” My jaw dropped a little before I realized what it was doing. “You think he’s in the game? Right now? Who is he? Where is he?”

“I’m positive he’s here, although I don’t know who his character is, or where he’s hiding,” Corbin said, his voice as grim as his eyes.

“And after we find him? What then? How do we make him stop the virus or whatever it is that’s keeping us here?”

He slid off the bed, strapping the rapier to his hips. “The only way to stop a virus is to kill it.”

“So?” I asked, jumping to my feet to grab my own foil. Even though I knew this was all a virtual world, it made me feel much better to have the cold steel next to me.

He paused in the doorway of the cabin, throwing me a dark look. “We kill Paul, we kill the virus. It’s as simple as that.”

Simple, my butt!

—Ibid, Act II

“What’s going on?” I asked, bolting up the narrow stairs to the deck as the ship took on the gentle rolling motion that instantly had my stomach protesting.

“We’re leaving,” Corbin answered, his back to me as he directed his crew. I watched for a moment, envious at the precision with which the six crewmates performed their duties. My crew always had to be nagged into doing anything.

“Leaving? As in, leaving the island? Sailing?”

“Since I didn’t write in a teleportation function, yes, leaving in this instance means sailing. We’re heading for Mongoose, the island we port at.”

“But that means we’ll be heading out into the open sea,” I said, watching as we approached the silvery black rocks that guarded the harbor like dark, foreboding sentinels. The moon was waxing full, the night skies a dark, velvety indigo sprinkled with glittering stars. I tried reminding myself that none of it was real, that the night sky, beautiful and serene, wasn’t really there, but ended up deciding with a mental shrug that so long as I was there, I’d enjoy the beauty of the surroundings. Corbin and Holder had clearly gone to an enormous amount of work creating the visual aspects of the world. Who was I to discount them?

“Aye. Do you have a problem with that?”

“Several, the most pressing of which at the moment is that I get seasick,” I told him. He turned to cock a questioning brow at me. “Really seasick. Like ralphing my guts up the entire time.”

“Ah.” He frowned for a second, then whipped off the navy blue bandana that had been carelessly knotted around his neck. He slapped the pockets on his jerkin a few times, pulling out a small black object, which he held up to show me.

“Is that a pearl?”

“Aye. Black pearl. Very rare. Don’t lose it, please.”

“Huh?”

Before I could ask what he thought I was going to do with a rare pearl, he tied his bandana around my wrist, tightly, but not tightly enough to hurt or cut off circulation.

“Have you ever heard of seasick bands?”

“Nope, not unless you’re talking about musicians on board an ocean liner.”

“Not quite. Seasick bands use acupressure to stimulate the Nei-Kuan pressure point on your wrist,” he said, slipping the pearl between the bandana and my flesh. “It stops nausea.”

“A pearl strapped to my wrist is going to keep me from being seasick?” I asked, more than a little disbelief rife in my voice.

He grinned. “It works, I swear. I was sick as a dog the first few trips I tried until Holder suggested seasick bands. What were your other issues?”

“Well, for one, it’s this whole kidnapping thing. You’ve been reading one too many pirate novels, Corbin. I don’t want to be swept away with you to your island paradise. I’m right in the middle of learning how to sail my sloop well, not to mention the wonderful retirement fund I’ve started for the ladies at Renata’s house—honestly, you would not believe the lax sort of record keeping that goes on there, and the wasted profits, oh, God, the wasted profits!—and then there’s Bas. I think I have Renata and her ladies close to set, but I’ve got to get Bas situated so that when we do find a way out of here, he’s taken care of. I’m thinking some sort of a trust fund might be in order if I can round up a couple of responsible administrators and a guardian . . .”

Corbin laughed and sat down beside me on an overturned bucket. I had hoisted myself onto the capstan, a large vertical cyndrical winch, and sat with my feet dangling. Despite the situation I found myself in, I was enjoying the soft tropical evening breeze as the ship slid slowly out of the sheltered harbor. “Have you always arranged people’s lives like that?”

“Like what?” I asked, bristling a little.

“Like what you’re doing—taking over their lives and arranging things for them. You know, organizing them.”

“You say organizing like it’s a bad thing,” I said slowly, frowning down at him. He’d taken off his captain’s hat, the moonlight doing wonderful things to the planes of his face that left me wanting to grab his head and kiss the smile right off his lips.

“Of course it’s not; not when it’s kept in control. But you seem to be bent on organizing everything and everyone within your reach. This is a game, Amy. You’re supposed to relax and enjoy yourself.”

The urge to kiss him didn’t dissipate, as I imagined it would under such an attack, but it was joined with the mild desire to throttle him.

“I am enjoying myself. So I like organizing things, so what? Everyone benefits, so I don’t see where the problem lies.”

His hand slid up the bare calf of my leg in an act so startlingly intimate that I was left momentarily speechless. “The problem is that you’re supposed to be a pirate—carefree, wild, and heedless, not organizing people’s lives and setting up eighteenth-century versions of 401(k) plans.”

“Renata and her ladies are going to be rich within a few months, just you wait and see,” I predicted. “I have an investment plan going with my daughter’s weavery and a tailor shop that should have them off their backs and onto their feet in next to no time.”

He laughed again and shook his head, his hand warm on my flesh as he stroked my calf. “You’re bringing too much real life to the game, Amy. This is your opportunity to let all those cares and worries go and indulge in your wildest fantasies.” He gave me a quick leer. “And I do mean
all
your wildest fantasies.”

“You need brain shampoo,” I joked, unable to stop myself from reaching out and twining one of his chocolatey brown curls around my finger. “Why do I get the idea that you play all day and never work?”

“All work and no play makes Corbin a very dull boy. As it is, I have the best of both worlds—my work is play. But you . . . you’re a different animal altogether. Where’s the dashing, wild pirate I know you have inside you, Amy? Where’s your sense of adventure? What happened to your inner child?”

“I think she left me a long time ago,” I said slowly, mulling over his lightly spoken words. Sitting there on the capstan, Corbin at my side, the wind rustling past us as the ship creaked and muttered a distant song that was starting to seep deep into my bones, I took a good long look at what he was saying and felt a sense of profound sadness when I realized what was lacking in me. “And as for Dread Pirate Amy . . . I don’t know that she’ll ever exist. I just don’t think I’m cut out for the wild, dashing life. I enjoyed beating that merchant in a sword fight, but I just don’t think I’m going to be a successful pirate.”

“Sure you are,” Corbin said, standing up and hauling me to my feet. “You just need a few lessons on how to let go of your . . . er . . . rigidity.”

My hackles rose a little at that. “I’m not rigid; I’m organized. There’s a difference. In fact, I’m positively flexible, I’m so nonrigid. Flexibly organized, that’s me.”

“You’re not rigid, eh?” he asked. “Prove it.”

“What?”

Corbin stood with his feet spread wide, his body swaying with the motion of the ship as we hit open water. I waited for the wave of nausea to hit me, but miraculously, the seasick band seemed to be working.

“I said prove that you’re not rigid. Look, even the way you’re standing is rigid. Loosen up. Move with the ship; don’t fight her roll. Loosen your knees and hips a little, and go with, rather than against, the rhythm of the ship.”

I mimicked his pose, adding a hands-on-my-hips touch that I hoped would speak volumes. “See? I’m
so
not rigid.”

“You’ve still to prove it,” he said with a grin.

“I don’t have to prove anything.” I glared at him for a moment or two, then added, “How exactly am I supposed to prove it?”

His grin got bigger. “Kiss me.”

My jaw dropped open a little as I gawked at him. “You’re out of your mind.”

“You like me, don’t you?”

“Yes, but—”

“You liked it when we kissed before.”

“Yes, but—”

“And you liked the other things, too. I could tell you did.”

“That has nothing to do with—”

“You said you wanted to date me.”

“That could easily change,” I growled, tired of being interrupted.