River Bound Seacret Swept Read online

  River Bound SeaCret Swept

  Amy I. Ramdass

  Copyright © 2019 Amy I. Ramdass

  ISBN: 9781689843683

  This is a work of fiction. All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. All incidents and scenes in this book are pure invention of the author.

  Cover Design: By Muhammad Asad

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Acknowledgement

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  Dedication

  To my very own larger-than-life hero,

  Durjan Ray Ramdass.

  Acknowledgement

  I love my writer’s journey. It’s an enchanting adventure. However, I simply couldn’t embark upon it without the understanding people in my life who sweetly granted me the space and time to write in peace.

  So thank you my darling family, relatives and friends for your love, your support, your inspiration and for putting up with someone like me who lives in her own head as if it’s paradise, found.

  “When your ship has passed the Islands

  and the blue sea turns to brown,

  And the leadsman calls ‘Five Fathoms’

  When he casts the lead-line down,

  And you see a long flat coastland

  and a smokeless wooden town,

  You can reckon you are nearing Demerara,

  Demerara, Demerara, you can reckon

  You are nearing Demerara.” ~R.C.G. Potter

  Susannah’s Rust

  As she drifted upstream in her little boat

  Her thoughts too began to float

  Her mind swam, back to the past

  Her sea of accomplishment, indeed vast

  Yet nothing of merit here or of value there

  Nothing to be written, nothing to be revered

  And alas, her health had started to fray

  Sick, hot and tired, her doctor, miles away

  She felt weak, all alone in this wilderness

  Nowhere to rest for a damsel in distress

  And as the tide began to turn on her canoe

  Her desperate gaze found a startling view

  A haven at the edge of the forest no doubt

  Where ferny things spread their sprouts

  This mystical clearing of lush peace

  Was surrounded by cokerite trees

  The cool shade offered by this retreat…

  promised to banish Susannah’s defeat.

  She moored her boat and crawled ashore

  Her heaving bosom merged with nature’s floor

  With a sigh, she returned to her thoughts

  And found her worries down to naught

  I have made it home; tis been planned

  Her mindset for eternal slumber land

  They found the body of Susannah, eons later

  And what they did next couldn’t be greater

  They buried her beneath the glade

  Where the lofty Sun seek out the shades

  They wrote “Rust” in Dutch, meaning “rest”

  On the tombstone of our river Goddess

  A mystical harbor of the blessed

  A sanctuary … fit for the distressed!

  “I—I’ll spend the night with you...but...only if afterwards, you—um...we both agree to go our separate ways.”

  Suzy grimaced wryly.

  She had picked a fine seat for an ultimatum, spread wide across Adrian’s thighs, her naked sex acutely aware of his erection expanding and lengthening through his jeans.

  His lips curved in amusement.

  “Only one night?” He stilled her index finger and brought it to his delectable mouth.

  His eyes holding hers, he licked the vulnerable tip, slowly and expertly. “How come, baby?”

  She bit back a moan. “I’m no longer free to—”

  “Darling...” His total bad-boy grin gave her an instant sex rush. “You’re in no position to call the shots.”

  He continued to make ruthless love to her sensitized fingers. “I intend to take as many nights as we both need before we go our separate ways. You copy?”

  Chapter 1

  Susannah Samundar chased after Raju Jaldev, breathless and carefree, unsuspecting the smooth tide of her life was about to turn viciously on her.

  “Gotcha!” she squealed in triumph as she seized Raju by the scruff of his frayed t-shirt. “Now, unless you—you need water or tall, dark and handsome—which you already are, don’t move an inch. Got?”

  “Grrrr,” growled the dogs.

  “Arrrrgh, I don’t need water or the menacing two-cents of your minions,” Raju vented. “I want a rematch! Got?”

  “Nay, no…nada,” Suzy gurgled breathlessly above the gentle sounds of water lapping against the moored boats. “Rematches are impossible. Ask for mercy.”

  “Arrrrgh,” protested Raju.

  “Start begging. You’ve a whole minute.” Suzy dropped to her knees on the wooden floating pier. “In the meanwhile, Team Samundar, let’s drink.”

  With her cupped palms, Suzy dipped into the sparkling brown water.

  It was refreshingly cool. She gulped thirstily and reached for more of the sweet liquid.

  The lapping tongues of her drooling apprentices told her they lived for this delicious water too.

  She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and rose to her feet. “Now, teamsters, it’s time to blindfold our too-proud-for-his-own-good landlubber.”

  The sudden blare of a faraway horn startled her as she turned to face Raju. “What say you, my mutinous victim, are you ready to walk the plank?”

  “Nay, no…nada,” Raju declared. “I demand a rematch, sans Canis Major and Canis Minor! Got?”

  “Such brattitude...” Suzy huffed as she patted the pocket of Raju’s worn-out corduroy pants.

  “Stay still, you artful dodger,” she admonished, “...or I’ll call in my big guns.”

  She winked at the dogs. “Right, guys?”

  They yapped against Raju’s legs with wagging tails.

  “Got it,” Suzy declared as she fished a skull-patterned bandana out of Raju’s pocket.

  She smiled wryly. Here she was, almost twenty years old and acting like a kid. And why not? She was free and she was home, at Susannah’s Rust on the Demerara River! It was the kind of Eden that never failed to bring out the wild child in her.

  Breathing in the river air, a mixt
ure of pine-tarts and wild blossoms, she sighed with longing. “I’ll really miss you guys, this river, Pegasus and—”

  “Then don’t leave,” said Raju as if it was that simple.

  “Uh…I have to…” Suzy shifted her gaze to the moon-lit water rippling around the pier.

  The tide was ebbing fast.

  Legend had it, the name Demerara was derived from the Arawak’s Dumaruni meaning letter-wood. It was noted as ‘Rio de Mirara’ signifying behold (obviously with wonder) river by the Spaniards who sailed past Guyana’s coast to seek El Dorado. It was also christened ‘De Mirar’ by Dutch colonists.

  Indeed, De-merara was not only wonderful to behold, it had the magnetic pull of a mirror. Two hundred miles long, it began in the rainforest of central Guyana and flowed northward to the Atlantic Ocean.

  And Susannah’s Rust was midway between Demerara’s two towns, Linden, the bauxite mining town and Georgetown, Guyana’s capital city and largest seaport.

  In reality, Susannah’s Rust was a riverain district and home to over fifty families who dwelled in wooden houses on the banks of the Demerara River and its many creeks and tributaries.

  But to Suzy, Susannah’s Rust was mystical and magical, an isolated water kingdom of secret streams and alluring trails danced upon by a golden spun sun and silver moonlight.

  And tonight hosted the brightest moon ever—

  “You don’t have to,” Raju pleaded.

  “I do, I do, I really do.” On tiptoe, Suzy applied Raju’s blindfold and secured it with a knot. “All done.”

  “Shiver me timbers.” Raju staggered and swayed as if shackled by tyranny. “I’ve been unfairly cornered.”

  Suzy stepped back to appraise her catch. He was brimming with zest, his body wafting...petrichor, his widened stance set to take on the world. Earlier, he looked like a Lost Boy from Neverland whose parasympathetic system was being ransomed by Captain Hook.

  If Suzy hadn’t engaged him in the spirit of water play, he would still be brooding and on the lookout for something threatening.

  It had something to do with her intent to move to Canada, her birth country, in six weeks.

  She despaired until she remembered Raju was also in collusion with Grandma’s evil plan.

  Suzy and Raju attended college in the city but came home to Susannah’s Rust on most weekends, holidays and semester breaks.

  A month ago however, Raju dropped out completely after a fight with Suzy’s aunt Charry whose place they stayed at in Queenstown, Georgetown.

  And now it was Suzy’s turn to quit but only because she had to leave Guyana, for many reasons.

  1. The main reason had a name. It was Adrian T. Jaldev,

  one of America’s greatest naval architect, marine

  engineer and shipping tycoon and the owner of an

  impressive vacation structure beside Grandpa’s estate.

  2. Aunt Charry was convinced Suzy was in danger and

  would be far safer in Canada. In Aunt Charry’s

  paranoid mind, a man lived to take Suzy’s head off

  daily because her aunt failed to return his money

  (from a past life?) to him.

  3. Momma also insisted it was time Suzy returned home

  to Canada.

  4. Suzy needed to further her psychological studies. It

  was one of her passions, to study intriguing mindsets

  (Adrian’s mind mostly) and to help turbulent ones

  (Aunt Charry’s mind mainly) stay calm amidst the

  metaphoric storm raging all around.

  5. The last reason was a stomach-churning one. And

  if the first reason knew about it, he would have this

  particular reason shot on sight, dragged over rough

  terrain, hanged, quartered, drawn, blood-eagled and

  knotted. And not only that, he’d make Suzy live

  permanently in a barf-colored burqa to protect her

  from creepy eyes.

  Even though the latter reason was a cause for major concern, Suzy just couldn’t up and leave so here she was, spending time with all those she loved including Pegasus, Isis and Ravana.

  “Any last word, my dashing booty?”

  “Aye, Captain Boss Lady,” Raju saluted her. “The wise hook their catch and reel them in for a rainy day but everyone else and their dogs,” Raju’s breathless voice betrayed his mirth, “…who have no clue they are dogs, live to make their catch walk the bloody plank.”

  The dogs growled but he ignored them to wax dramatically, “oh, the humanity of this fishy Cosmos!” His mouth dangled opened as a suspicious thought seized him. “Am I some kind of secret offering to the water goddess for a bigger catch?”

  “Guyana has a water goddess?” Suzy acted all agog and agape even though he couldn’t see her. “Since when?”

  “Since...uh like forever.” Raju tweaked Suzy’s nose. “She doesn’t know it but she speaks volumes with her eyes and face.” He made a mock scowl. “But in her ditzy mind, she’s having tea with Poseidon even though she’s here with me.”

  “I’ve news for he who sees too much beneath his blindfold.” Suzy gave an infectious giggle. “Just before Her Divine Ditzyness sailed off to have tea with Poseidon, her trident decreed that random landlubbers would face her wrath if they don’t act all joyous at the prospect of being shark bait.”

  “How fair is this unheard of water creature I just made up?” Raju howled at the Moon who was busy gazing in her liquid mirror below. “Ahoy up there, O Illuminated One! I’m outnumbered, outfoxed and out of shape.” He gesticulated wildly in Suzy’s direction. “She has Cerberus and his First Mate on her team.”

  “They are the best swashbuckling mateys ever…” Suzy surveyed the scene. Her dogs, Yin and Yang, not quite two, had their teeth buried in the hem of Raju’s pants.

  Yin was all black with a patch of white on her ear and Yang was totally white saved for a black patch on his right eye. They were of mixed heritage with the characteristics and looks of hound, retriever, pariah and God knows what else.

  “They arrrgh the real scurvy dogs if you ask me.”

  The scurvy dogs, cuteness puppified, snarled in unison.

  “Avast ye!” Suzy whispered but Raju, incorrigible to the hilt, not only bent to steal a whiff off Suzy’s hair, he added to his plight by incanting like a deranged wizard.

  “Avast, hold still, belay, heave ho

  Romancing the plank, we go.

  Hold high the Flag of skull and bones

  And hurrah for Davy Jones!”

  As if that wasn’t enough, he conjured up an imaginary cutlass and made slashing sounds as he vanquished his nonexistent foe, uncaring the dogs would construe his performance as threatening.

  “Any more stalling rituals?” Suzy bristled indulgently at the tall, dashing and saluting Raju.

  Raju bowed gallantly. “Aye aye, Queen of all the...muddy waters, I, thy willing captive is ready for the plank life.”

  “Arrrrgh, finally!” Suzy suppressed her laughter and marched him to the end of the pier, the dogs attached to his hem. “Before we send thee to thy watery grave, let me read you…you your Miranda rights,” she managed through paroxysms of giggles. “One. You have the right to remain silent. Two—”

  “What?” Raju interjected. “I’m not even American.” He lifted his sparsely bearded chin to peer down his blindfold at her. “Surely, you got the memo by way of your very own Flotsam and Jetsam I’m half-fish, half pirate, all Guyanese?”

  “Hmm.” Suzy pulled an illusory scroll from the water and peered at it in bewilderment. “It says here you’re half-American, serial hottie, all caveman.”

  “I like the caveman bit.” Raju’s ear-to-ear smile revealed his most attractive feature, a set of adorable dimples he no doubt received from the same gene pool as his cousin, Adrian.

  Even though they were both handsome in their own square-jawed way, when it came down to allure, one was the actual sky and the other a mere ref
lection of the sky—in muddy water.

  “Huh?” Suzy blinked.

  “Duh. My cave, my rules, no bloody rules!”

  Gosh, he was adorable, the cute mutineer. Suzy loved his company. He was like a Peter Pan who came to listen to all her ‘highly made-up’ stories.

  If only he hadn’t fallen for her, hook, line and sinker.

  Through his eyes, she was flawless except when Adrian was in the same frame. This could make Raju scowl for days and it was a completely different scowl from the open-mouthed one he acquired each time she fed him marmite for his own health.

  She had to counter him. “Rules are a necessary—”

  “Suzy! Raj! It’s bedtime!” Grandpa’s voice drifted over their racket and brought them back to reality.

  Startled, Suzy glanced in the direction of her Grandpa’s voice. He was on the verandah which was just a few yards away from the wharf. “What time is it, Grandpa?”

  “It’s almost ten,” he responded. “Make haste.”

  “Give us a minute, Mahesh!” Raju bellowed.

  “Shhh,” Suzy hushed him. Her gaze settled on her river home. The softly-lit, two-storey forest haven was an enchanting sight. “Papa designed this house with me in mind, you know?”

  “Who told you so?” Raju scowled at Suzy for having the balls...err...nerves to bring up a taboo subject.

  Suzy gave him a cutting glance. Such balls! He was the reason why Grandma outlawed the subject.

  “Aunt Charry told me—everything. We’re a year older than this house. The old one burned down the exact day I was born.”

  “That exact day a witch was born too,” Raju teased.

  “A good thing or you would still be eating cornflakes with roaches, water-frogs and salempentas in it.”

  Raju fought his grin and lost.