Edge of Disaster by A. M. Hargrove

boat wasn’t like anything I’d imagined.  You could live on this thing.  It was beautiful.  Soft colors, comfortable furnishings, modern kitchen appliances. There were two staterooms, but the master bedroom was huge.
    Pearce put all the food away and Jack readied the boat for  departure.  I sat on the upper deck and watched. We headed out into the Charleston harbor and made our way past the jetties. It was a beautiful day, warm with clear blue skies and the breeze was gentle so the seas were calm.
    We finally passed the C2 buoy, which was the final marking of the passage into Charleston. We’d been in open water and I stood out on the deck next to Pearce and he had his arm around my waist. It was a great feeling of freedom and the boat skimmed across the sea. The sea birds soared in the air above and in the distance, every now and then, you could see some kind of fish jump.
    “Are you hungry?”
    “Starved. We forgot about breakfast.”
    “No, we didn’t.  I had you for breakfast.”
    My face heated up in remembrance of our early morning love making session.
    “Alexia, I love saying things that make you blush.”
    I opened my mouth to respond but was met with his lips as he quickly kissed me. I turned in his arms and kissed him back. He moaned into my mouth and I entwined my fingers in his hair.
    He pulled back and asked, “Are you trying to distract me because you’re doing a damn fine job of it?”
    I just laughed and said, “You deserve it after that remark.”
    “Come on, let’s eat. I can’t have you starving on me.”
    We went below and he started pulling out all sorts of food. Cheeses, crusty breads, some she crab soup, fruit and benne seed wafers.
    He heated up the soup in the microwave and served everything else.
    “Wine, San Pellegrino, water?”
    “Wine and San Pellegrino please.”
    He poured our drinks and he put everything on a tray and we took it all back up top so we could enjoy the view and the lovely day.
    As we ate, we talked. I asked about his family and he told me he had two brothers and a sister. He was second to the oldest and his sister was the youngest.  That’s who he was with the night I saw him in Camellia’s.  She was spoiled rotten and could be a pain in the ass, but he thought we’d get along great. He adored his family; it was easy to see.
    I told him about mine. How they pretty much dumped me after Peter’s death. Blamed me for it all.  Didn’t want to know anything about what happened.  They just knew I was driving and we’d been fighting and that was enough for them. I told him even my sister dumped me. That was why I moved out of Virginia.
    He wanted to know how I ended up in Charleston. I told him it was because of Terri.  We were college roommates at the University of Virginia. She was from here and always claimed she would move back to Charleston after she graduated.  She did. So when Peter died, she was the only one who stuck by me.  She ended up persuading me to move here. 
    I looked at him and smiled.  “You know, it took me a while, but now I know it was the best decision I ever made.”
    He tucked a piece of fly away hair behind my ear and kissed me there. Then he whispered, “I couldn’t agree with you more.”
    We ate some more but he noticed I hadn’t touched my soup.
    He dipped his spoon in his and held it out and said, “Open up.”
    I did as he ordered and he slipped the spoon in my mouth and I thought I’d died and gone to heaven.
    “Oh shit. Oh fuck, that is un-fucking-believable.”
    He roared.  “Haven’t you ever had she crab soup?”
    “No! I didn’t know what the hell it was but was too embarrassed to ask.”
    He slipped another spoonful into my mouth.
    “Oh my God.  Holy fuck.  This is orgasmic.”
    He threw back his head and started laughing so hard, I thought he was going to bust the table. He pounded it with his fist. 
    “Give me that damn bowl and spoon.”  I grabbed it from him and wolfed the rest of the soup