Read Online Girl Trade - full length erotic adventure novel (Xcite Erotic Romance Novels) by Chloe Thurlow - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Chloe Thurlow
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watched the people climbing into the boats. The Zodiacs were built for eight, ten at a pinch, and 27 people squeezed into those patched vessels with their baskets and bags, the pregnant women, the man with the suit and tie, the man with his teenage son, the woman with nothing who had given me the sarong.
As the boats got heavier the Arabs, gripping the handles, moved forward to allow the sea to take the weight. The man in the black turban glanced at me with what I thought was a look of complicity as he lifted the two cords containing the keys over his head. He turned over the first motor. It fired immediately, and he showed the men on board how to lower the propeller and work the accelerator.
He moved to the other boat, inserted the key and connected the link on the flexible cord to the hasp on the side of the motor. He paused, to say a prayer, I assumed, and the engine he had been working on earlier in the day fired briefly, spluttered, then stopped. The people grew tense as he turned it over again. It didn’t sound as if the motor was going to catch, but then it started to run smoothly and the people on the second boat let out a sigh of relief. There was no common language among those people and again, like the masons on Babel, using gestures and signs he explained how to work the craft, the men on board watching with concentrated expressions.
A half moon had appeared over the horizon and its silvery light made a path on the sea. The Arabs eased the Zodiacs further from shore, the man designated as helmsman on each boat lowered the propellers, and the people looked back as they set off across the black waves to Europe.
We stood there, six men in turbans and me in my St Christopher necklace and blue sarong. No one spoke. We watched as the rubber boats got smaller, the sound of the motors faded and the two small vessels vanished into the night.
The calm that descended was total. The sheikh finally spoke and, with a slight wave of his fingers, the other men made their way back up the beach to the fishing shed where the last of the food remained in the iron pots.
He turned to me, his dark eyes flashing, difficult to read. He looked as if he was coming to a decision and it seemed at that moment as if my very life depended on that decision. The sheikh would have seen the ten red welts on my backside and must have known who placed them there. The beachcomber would have told him that he found me washed up on the shore like a conch shell that belonged to whoever found it first; although, I was certain if that were the case among these men in turbans, I now belonged to the sheikh. He looked into my eyes as if he were trying to look inside me, at my soul.
When he smiled, I followed automatically as he made his way around the ribbon of sand, back the way I had come from the lighthouse. We wove a path through the dry sandbanks. He paused a couple of times, but continued until he found what he was looking for. He stepped down into the deep hollow of a dune. He stretched out his arm and I climbed down to join him.
The sheikh held my shoulders. He stared once more into my eyes, a look that was long and intense, and, whatever it was he was looking for, if my eyes were the mirrors of my soul, I prayed that in me he saw no ill will, that I was worth the risk I might represent from having seen his smuggling operation first hand.
There were no words I could say. No words he would understand. Like the sheikh, I remained quiet and studied him as he studied me. His eyes were black, shiny as opals, the moon reflected on the surface in two semi-circles, the stars above casting a ghostly glow over the landscape. He drew the fold of material from where it was tucked in the sarong and the garment fell to our feet. He had already seen me naked, everyone on the beach that night had seen me naked, but still there was something sensual, even poignant in the way that he did this. My breath caught in my throat. My heart beat faster.
Like a sculptor
As the boats got heavier the Arabs, gripping the handles, moved forward to allow the sea to take the weight. The man in the black turban glanced at me with what I thought was a look of complicity as he lifted the two cords containing the keys over his head. He turned over the first motor. It fired immediately, and he showed the men on board how to lower the propeller and work the accelerator.
He moved to the other boat, inserted the key and connected the link on the flexible cord to the hasp on the side of the motor. He paused, to say a prayer, I assumed, and the engine he had been working on earlier in the day fired briefly, spluttered, then stopped. The people grew tense as he turned it over again. It didn’t sound as if the motor was going to catch, but then it started to run smoothly and the people on the second boat let out a sigh of relief. There was no common language among those people and again, like the masons on Babel, using gestures and signs he explained how to work the craft, the men on board watching with concentrated expressions.
A half moon had appeared over the horizon and its silvery light made a path on the sea. The Arabs eased the Zodiacs further from shore, the man designated as helmsman on each boat lowered the propellers, and the people looked back as they set off across the black waves to Europe.
We stood there, six men in turbans and me in my St Christopher necklace and blue sarong. No one spoke. We watched as the rubber boats got smaller, the sound of the motors faded and the two small vessels vanished into the night.
The calm that descended was total. The sheikh finally spoke and, with a slight wave of his fingers, the other men made their way back up the beach to the fishing shed where the last of the food remained in the iron pots.
He turned to me, his dark eyes flashing, difficult to read. He looked as if he was coming to a decision and it seemed at that moment as if my very life depended on that decision. The sheikh would have seen the ten red welts on my backside and must have known who placed them there. The beachcomber would have told him that he found me washed up on the shore like a conch shell that belonged to whoever found it first; although, I was certain if that were the case among these men in turbans, I now belonged to the sheikh. He looked into my eyes as if he were trying to look inside me, at my soul.
When he smiled, I followed automatically as he made his way around the ribbon of sand, back the way I had come from the lighthouse. We wove a path through the dry sandbanks. He paused a couple of times, but continued until he found what he was looking for. He stepped down into the deep hollow of a dune. He stretched out his arm and I climbed down to join him.
The sheikh held my shoulders. He stared once more into my eyes, a look that was long and intense, and, whatever it was he was looking for, if my eyes were the mirrors of my soul, I prayed that in me he saw no ill will, that I was worth the risk I might represent from having seen his smuggling operation first hand.
There were no words I could say. No words he would understand. Like the sheikh, I remained quiet and studied him as he studied me. His eyes were black, shiny as opals, the moon reflected on the surface in two semi-circles, the stars above casting a ghostly glow over the landscape. He drew the fold of material from where it was tucked in the sarong and the garment fell to our feet. He had already seen me naked, everyone on the beach that night had seen me naked, but still there was something sensual, even poignant in the way that he did this. My breath caught in my throat. My heart beat faster.
Like a sculptor
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