Chapter 12
Jennifer was angry with herself for not speaking then, when the opportunity was given her. But he probably got the message. Her response had been brusque enough. She almost turned back, ready to tell him there would be no more casual lovemaking in her cabin. She hesitated. It could mean a scene. Not that Bruce seemed the type likely to make a scene.
However, even the suggestion of a quarrel in so public a spot, so soon after the scene between her and Carol, would certainly have its repercussions, and Carol would think she had scored a point. Also, it could very well focus Carol's spite on Bruce.
Later, Jennifer decided, would be ample time to tell Bruce the lovemaking was ended.
She worked out a very nice, calm speech as she slid into the bikini-and realized this one exposed entirely too much of her scratched and Merthiolated derriere. She added a matching play skirt and went up by the pool.
There were others there, some of whom had already started to tan and a few who were peeling unprettily. All the outfits, even the men's, were sketchy enough so that she could get a very good basic idea of figures and their potential.
Only-now that she attempted to apply criteria-she found she knew almost nothing of what really constituted a potential. Did those over-large breasts, oozing out of a bikini halter, mean the girl was a good companion in bed? Did the size and width of the buttocks indicate anything specific?
The girl with the over-large breasts obviously thought they were an asset, and displayed them accordingly. But then, so did the girl with the large buttocks. She even shook them from time to time to call attention to this sumptuous padding.
Jennifer considered her own figure. It really wasn't very lush. She had nice breasts, firm and well rounded, with amber-pink nipples rising from small coppery discs. Her stomach was flat. Was that uninteresting? Or intriguing? And her behind, now suffering from minor scars and major application of Merthiolate, wasn't exactly generous. Nice, rather tight, firm little buttocks.
Her legs, she thought, were good. They tapered out of that waist down to very nice calves and small ankles. Feet? Were they ever really pretty? Utilitarian and, if not misshapen, then attractive. However, she couldn't quite conceive of a man falling in love with a foot.
And then she was furious with herself for even thinking these things. I just came up here to be seen, so Carol couldn't say she had driven me to hiding in my cabin. She shut her mind to the bodies around her, to the body she herself occupied. She refused to feel-anything. So she was startled to feel a hand on her back. A soft, soothing hand. She turned, opening one eye, peering up at the strawberry blonde.
"Noxema. You'd have been getting a bad burn in a minute."
Jennifer struggled to sit up but the hand became firm, pushing her back.
"Small favor. In return for handing me back Jerry."
Jennifer subsided under the gently massaging hand. "He looked lost. In a small-boy way. And I had an idea you might be, too. A little lost, that is." Jennifer smiled, eyeing the attractive, almost lush figure. "But not in a small-boy way."
"He came back at just the psychological moment-between the time when I was ready to cut his throat or mine, and the time I'd have gotten maudlin. The weepy stage, you know. Men can't stand it. If you must weep, weep alone, unseen."
"I'm glad he made it on schedule. That seasickness story on this millpond just didn't ring true. I think he knew it. Just saying it convinced him. I had almost nothing to do with it."
"Roll over... Hey, you've got very nice ones. No wonder he noticed you. He's a teat man-and a rump man and a stomach man and a leg man... He goes for girls, if you know what I mean. And I think you did have something to do with it. He wouldn't have needed much encouragement right then to switch allegiance." The girl swabbed Jennifer's stomach with cream and rubbed gently, grinning down at Jennifer. "Now I've got him hooked. I'll invite you to the wedding when he gets around to proposing. I'm counting on the Southern Cross-and my lower berth-to work a little conversion."
Jennifer grinned back. "He's standing right behind you, listening. Now that he knows your technique, maybe..."
The strawberry blonde wrinkled her nose at Jennifer and then up at Jerry. "Of course he was listening. How else could I get a point across? Men don't think of little things like weddings until you shove it right on their plates. Hey, tow-head!"
"Hi, redhead!" Jerry reached down and tousled the strawberry blonde's elaborate hairdo, wrecking it.
Jennifer held her breath, waiting for an explosion. None came, so maybe the strawberry blonde was really smart. Now she yanked at pins and let her auburn hair fall around her shoulders, as if that was what she had meant to do all the time.
Jerry squatted down beside the girls, keeping his eyes on the strawberry blonde. "Are we thinking about getting married?"
The strawberry blonde ducked her head and began a vigorous massaging of Jennifer's stomach. "Not that hard, really. It was a passing thought. Merely a passing thought. Mostly because I have six girl friends I want to make pea-green jealous. By inviting them to be bridesmaids."
"Very poor excuse. I thought maybe it was because you love me. Like I cabled Mom this noon that maybe I'd bring home a bride if she'd have me."
"Jerry!" The strawberry blonde straightened, flinging Jennifer's jar of Noxema across the deck and into the Pacific and toppling both Jerry and herself into the pool in a splash that soaked Jennifer and thoroughly wet a number of other poolside loungers.
The wetting and the loss of the jar of cream was small enough sacrifice for the happiness of the strawberry blonde, who popped a seal-wet head above the rim of the pool and grinned at Jennifer. "He really did. Cable his mother." She held up a soaked and thoroughly illegible piece of paper. "It was in the pocket of his trunks. When he told me, I practically ripped 'em off him getting it. He's treading water, making emergency repairs. Jennifer! It's for real. We're getting married."
Her head disappeared abruptly and a loud gurgling came out of the pool. Jerry Brandon substituted his own wet head, also grinning.
"Contrary to all evidence, I am not standing on her in eight feet of water. If she drowns it'll be from talking under water."
The strawberry blonde's head popped up beside Jerry's. "He ducked me. Of course, it was just an excuse to cop a feel! Hi, monster." And the strawberry blonde splashed him liberally.
The two of them crawled out of the pool and ran across the deck, hand in hand, Jerry with long, straight strides and the blonde in light offside kicks and double-time action to keep up with him, the way small girls have to run to keep up with long, tall men.
Jennifer watched them disappear down the salon stairs, headed, no doubt, for the blonde's cabin, where they would have a delightful time drying each other off-and then a still more delightful time getting each other all rumpled and sweaty and needing a shower, which would...
Jennifer stopped her mental motion picture. It was becoming too painfully real, too intense in her own body. She lay back, turning her rear up, since that, at least, the blonde had completed before she flung the jar away.
So they were going to be married!
That seemed the strawberry blonde's dream -a wedding with six bridesmaids, preferably all envious. That, of course, was only the trimmings. The real thing was the marriage.
Marriage! That was what Elsie was seeking, what Anna wanted. For the prospect they scrimped and saved all year long and then spent a large portion of their income on things like this cruise, the ski runs, the ranch resorts. Why? To catch a man. In marriage. Because marriage seemed important to them--just the fact of it.
Marriage! Not whether they'd be happy in it. That didn't seem to count. Or at least not very much. Even sex seemed secondary, a sort of bait for the trap.
And what do I want? When I started this wild, impulsive idea, I wanted a man. Physically. I didn't expect love. I don't know that I could handle love. I'm not even sure I know what it is. Certainly Mother Dear never gave me any.
So I've had my man. It was wild, exciting, wonderful in its tray. But that was just my body answering its own physical needs. Responding to the physical attributes of a man.
Jennifer felt herself flush, knowing that she had responded all too readily. As I did. As I am ashamed of, letting this animalistic body betray me that way. As it will never happen again. I mustn't let it happen again. I must be resolute.
I don't hate Bruce for taking me. Why should I? I practically flung myself at him. Just because he happened to be there. It might have been Cass, if I hadn't kicked him. If he had played with me, built me up to that overwhelming climax, I might have come back to him and never gone on this idiotic cruise. I just haven't had enough experience in just- living -to know. Or know what I want.
But I do know what I don't want. I don't want a series of casual lovemaking episodes in a cruise cabin, just because I'm convenient and female and not repulsive. And I absolutely refuse to have even one more...
"Are you trying to batter your way through the deck? There are hatchways." Bruce's voice, light and chiding, called her attention to the fact that her small fists were beating a slow tattoo on the deck, counterpoint to the argument with herself.
And now he towered above her, smiling down, his lean strong body bare to the waist, bronzed as she had known it, and his pelvis encased in brief red trunks.
Her eyes focused on the trunks, on the crotch, where the bulge of his penis was noticeable, and swung away, lest staring become too obvious.
He flopped on the deck beside her, arms locked around his knees, his eyes staring past her at some distant inward view.
Now was the time to tell him. Or was it? He was so absorbed in some inner world he might not really hear her. Or comprehend. No, she decided. Wait till they were alone-and then tell him.
At the very idea of being alone with Bruce her pelvis became suddenly warm, her breasts swelled, and her nipples hardened. Jennifer repressed them firmly. No more of that.