Authors: Lonaire Drummond
“Put me down. What’s wrong with you,” she yelled.
A plump grounds keeper stopped to observe the spectacle Ambrogio and Adele made.
“We’re newlyweds.”
“We’re not newlyweds,” she yelled.
“We just had our first argument as a married couple,” Ambrogio said.
“The best part about fighting is the make-up sex afterwards,” the grounds keeper said before returning to his hedge clippings.
“Ambrogio, put me down. Blood is rushing to my head.”
“Will you come on the island tour with me?”
“Nooooooooooo.”
“Then I’m not going to put you down.”
“You win. I’ll go.”
“See that wasn’t so difficult.” Ambrogio placed her down on solid ground.
“Asshole.” Adele landed a punch straight to Ambrogio’s gut, an assault he barely seemed to notice. Adele hadn’t fared so well. Her right hand throbbed.
“I can kiss it and make it better?”
They boarded a tour bus outfitted with leather reclining seats and a fully stocked bar. Each seat came with its own mini plasma screen TV. Basil, Adele and Ambrogio’s very own personal tour guide, greeted them after they sat down.
“Good Morning, I will be the first person to congratulate you on your choice of tour guides. I’m the best tour guide on this island and possibly the world,” Basil said.
He wore a headful of dreads and a long goatee decorated with beads. Dressed for battle in fatigues and an oddly matched yellow Hootie and the Blowfish t-shirt, Basil painted a very strange picture.
“He’s very eccentric,” Adele said to Ambrogio, who insisted on sitting next to her. Adele acquiesced to save herself from a fruitless argument, realizing the word no was not a word he heard often.
“I have three people on my roster. Where’s Feli…..How do you say this name?” Basil asked.
“It’s like the Philly in Philly Cheese Steak and Cheetah, like the cat. Felicità isn’t here,” Adele said.
“Who are you, Miss Lady?” The guide said as he made his way up the aisle.
“I’m Adele.” She gave him her hand in greeting.
“Nice to meet you, Adele.” When he spoke the beads in his beard shook.
Basil’s blatant flirtation with Adele continued with a wink. The gesture sent Ambrogio’s anger into a frenzy. He coughed and sputtered like an overheated engine.
“Cazzo!
Is the show over? Get behind the wheel and start this damn tour before I turn old and gray,” Ambrogio said.
“Sure thing, boss,” Basil said.
Ambrogio showed his horns sending the other man back to the front of the bus. Adele grinned at Ambrogio’s colorful use of his native language. She found both their antics amusing.
The tour began with a stop at a church where Ambrogio said a prayer for his grandmother. An old courthouse transformed into a restaurant served as Ambrogio and Adele’s introduction to Creole bread. They devoured the sweet bread in record time. The Creole bread almost made a second appearance after Adele became nauseous during the Ruby Estates visit. The property was famous for the only waterwheel driven mill in the Caribbean, as well as, a colony of nesting bats.
“What do you do for a living?” Adele asked between tour stops.
“I’m a corporate raider. I buy failing businesses and restore or sell them for a profit.”
“Were you ever in the newspaper.” Adele remembered gawking at a beautiful man in the newspaper, the man was Ambrogio.
“I’m in the papers all the time. It’s an job hazard.” He made it seem like gracing the newspaper was the equivalent to taking a piss.
“If you have to sell the businesses for a profit, what happens to the employees?”
She asked although she already knew the answer.
“They want to name their first born child after me, or they wish to end my life with a bullet to the head.” he said.
“I wouldn’t want to be responsible for people losing their livelihoods.”
“I’m not. Their employers are the ones to blame. I just clean up the mess. What do you do?”
“I am…..was an executive assistant. Have you ever heard of Corentini Inc, more specifically, Corentini toilet paper.”
“What happened?”
“I quit. My boss didn’t appreciate me. I let my job destroy me.”
“And you came here to celebrate?”
“Not quite. St. Lucia chose me.” she said just as Basil stopped at the botanical gardens.
“The botanical gardens boasts a large variety of trees on its property such as coconut, cocoa, mahogany, and cedar trees. There are flowers and shrubs from around the tropical world planted here for your enjoyment,” Basil said.
Adele felt as if she was looking through a kaleidoscope. There were rows upon rows of Bougainvilleas, but the violet flowers were Adele’s favorites. The yellow and red Heliconia’s resembled tiny fire balls. St. Lucia’s national flowers, La Rose and the La Marguerite, both captured the spirit of the island. The red of the rose symbolized the hot Caribbean sun and the Marguerite, signified St. Lucia’s resiliency.
“There’s so much beauty here,” Adele said.
“I agree,” Ambrogio said.
Adele hoped he was referring to her instead of flowers. They ate some conch fritters and sampled coconut water at a roadside snack shack and then headed off to the mineral baths.
“The mineral baths have healing powers,” Basil said.
“I wanted to bring Felicità to the baths,” Ambrogio said.
“You believe in old wive’s tales?” Adele asked.
“The folklore cultivates hope. I believe she will get well.”
The tour ended at a restaurant named Martha’s Tables, the best food on the island, according to Basil. Family owned and situated in front of the family residence, it’s electric green décor and burgundy plastic patio tables gave the establishment a rustic down home appeal.
“I always come here when I’m in St. Lucia for business. It reminds me of Trattorie in Italy. The people are warm and the food is benissimo.” Ambrogio held his fingers together and planted a kiss on them.
Ambrogio, Adele, and even Basil had no qualms about participating in the sinful food orgy on display at Martha’s Tables. They dined on spicy jerk pork, fish in Creole sauce, fish cakes, lobster, cod, pasta and rice. Adele balanced a mountainous formation of food on her plate, shocking Ambrogio.
“The lady likes to eat,” he said.
“I like a lot of things.”
“Are you offering something?”
“When I offer something of interest to you, you’ll know.” She picked up her fork and mined into her plate.
Chapter 10
Ambrogio and Adele returned to their hotel tired and stuffed tighter than a turkey on Thanksgiving. It had taken a sizable tip for Basil to leave without Adele’s number, a price Ambrogio was more than willing to pay.
“I have one last surprise,” he said.
“What’s up those tailored sleeves of yours?”
“It’s in my room.”
“There’s a surprise for me…in your room? Come to my room, we’ll only watch a movie is guy code for I’m gonna try to nail you,” Adele said.
“If I wanted to make love to you, I would just say so. Come.” Ambrogio extended his arm.
“Fine.”
They climbed several flights of stairs and then negotiated a path leading to Ambrogio’s cottage. It was on the highest point in the property at one thousand feet above sea level. Face to face with the grandiosity of Ambrogio’s cottage, Adele thought the term “mini mansion” more accurately described the property.
Mere wood floors gave way to rock and marble where the cottage would be exposed to the elements. The cottage’s fourth wall, the ocean, clapped and bowed as the sun answered its final curtain call for the day. Ambrogio helped Adele climb into a swing hanging over his infinity pool. They sipped spiced pear punch while the darkness chased the rest of the sun away from the sky.
“This is your cottage? Adele asked, astonished by the view.
“Gorgeous, isn’t it. Every time I come here, the hotel takes considerable pains to decorate it differently, hence the nautical beach theme.”
“Who do you have to know to get a cottage with a view like this?”
“You know me.”
“Thanks for making me go on the tour. It was amazing.”
Left to her own devices, Adele would have just fallen asleep on the beach while reading a trashy romance novel.
“You’re welcome.”
An awkward silence settled in between them.
“I should be going now,” she said.
She rose quickly, intent on following through on her words only to be greeted by dizziness, courtesy of the potent rum punch.
“Why are you so abrupt?”
“My old boss was the mayor of Abrupt Town. I guess it has rubbed off on me.”
“Stay a little longer.”
“Why?” Adele asked.
“Why not?”
“Don’t answer my question with another question,” she said.
“Are you scared of me, Adele?”
She looked at him for a long time before she responded. The chains on the swing creaked in anticipation of her answer.
“You intimidate me.”
“What’s intimidating about me?” Ambrogio asked.
“Your general way of being, I guess. You have no respect for my personal space or boundaries. You say whatever is on your mind, damn the consequences. You’re confident and just plain sexy. I’m waiting for a mean girl to peak her head around a corner and tell me there is no way someone like you could be interested in me,” she said.
“Come here.”
“I’m leaving.” She dismounted the swing clumsily and headed for an exit.
“Stop running.” Ambrogio reached out for her.
He followed Adele into the kitchen and grabbed her body from behind. Once she stopped squirming, he turned her around and pulled her into the hard plains of his body. The ice clattered when he took her glass out of her hands.
“Don’t,” Adele said.
His touch felt like running under the fire hydrant on a steamy summer day, it refreshed and left a chill running throughout her body. They stood nose to nose, breathing in time with each other’s desire. Then Ambrogio did the unthinkable: he devoured Adele’s mouth. Her resistance prompted him to grab the back of her neck, stopping her
movements entirely.
He sucked on her bottom lip for a few beats and then let go, but the assault on her senses had just begun. His second method of attack, light kisses dusted against her face, gave him an unfair advantage. He grabbed a handful of her hair and pulled her in for another kiss. This new position had Adele balancing on her tip-toes in an effort to gain more access to his mouth. Never in her life, had she been kissed so deeply.
Still connected to Ambrogio’s lips, Adele walked backwards until she felt the edge of the kitchen counter graze her back. A fuse lit by Ambrogio’s mouth traveled down to her hardened nipples, before the fire settled in her stomach, turning it upside down. Her drink still in his hand, Ambrogio wreaked more havoc on her with his skillful tongue, the fuse finally ignited in her core, a pair of wet panties the casualty of his ruthless attack.
Ambrogio broke the kiss long enough to discard the drink and grab her by the waist. In one effortless motion, he hoisted her onto the countertop and stepped inside the inviting space between her legs. For round two of his attack, he latched onto her neck, suckling and biting until she palmed his head.
“I want more.” Adele felt the length of his erection rub against her leg.
He nodded and reached for her thighs. His touch was deliberate but gentle. Adele whimpered into his mouth to demonstrate her eagerness. He massaged her inner thigh. Adele wasn’t ready when Ambrogio grasped her mons through her underwear.
Her hips undulated against his touch when he moved her panties to the side, tracing the outline of her lips before a thick digit plunged into her flesh. She gasped and opened her eyes to find him studying her. The emerald in them had returned from this morning, but with a darker edge.
“I want to lick you here.” His ministrations inside her warmth continued.
When he inserted another finger, Adele groaned from a mixture of pleasure and pain. Without warning, he removed his fingers from her and pulled at her lace panties until they ripped. The torn remnants tossed aside. Exposure to the cool marble on the counter temporarily cooled the fire raging between her legs.
“Ambrogio.”
“No talking, Cara,”
She never liked receiving orders, yet at his command her wetness leaked onto the countertop. To her surprise licked her arousal off the counter.
“I never let anything go to waste,” Ambrogio said when he was done.
Not done tormenting Adele, he rolled his tongue leisurely over her clitoris. Adele bucked and moan against the sensation. He then licked a figure eight into her center several times. The torturous way he avoided her clit during each pass drove Adele crazy.