Free Miss Adventure by Geralyn Corcillo Page A

choice but to follow him. Back to the kitchen. Back to the duffle of doom. He starts unloading the bag. A small yellow box, flippers.
    “It increases the chances that ice cold water can seep in,” he continues. “And guess what, Lisa?” He turns to meet my eyes. “It won’t seep back out again. You’ll just freeze your ass off until you become a medical risk. Then I’ll bring you back.”
    The mean bastard turns his attention back to unloading the duffle. Is that a bulletproof vest? What the hell kind of adventure is this going to be? Beginners have to deal with bullets? He must be purposely trying to scare me to see if I’ll back down.
    I look back at the wetsuit I’m holding. It looks so much slimmer than I feel.
    “So I just get naked and squeeze in?”
    Jack hands me the little yellow box. “This should help.”
    I look down at it. “It’s cornstarch.”
    He taps his nose. “Full marks for being able to read your native language.”
    I look at him. I’m guessing he doesn’t want me to bake a cake with it. “Thanks?”
    “Use it like talcum powder.”
    I am so totally screwed. “Where do I suit up?”
     
    * * * * *
    He put me in a downstairs bathroom. It’s cheery with its yellow tile and colorful shower curtain sprigged with open umbrellas. Despite the décor, I’m still depressed. Why did he have to bring me back to his house, anyway? The place is clean and comfortable, making me want to leave for the ocean even less.
    Okay, so I couldn’t exactly get suited up at the office where the staff could see me, but still. Donna Reed’s bathroom is hardly the best place to prepare for diving into shark-infested waters.
    Anyway, wasn’t it enough of an adventure today when he made me get into that damn glass elevator again?
    I look at the suit and suck in my stomach. I don’t like this.
     
    * * * * *
    I meet Jack back in the kitchen, where he’s suited up himself. When he sees me, he looks at me kind of funny but doesn’t say anything.
    “What?” I ask, wondering if I put it on backwards.
    He looks me over. “Nothing.”
    I look down at myself. Jeez! I forgot to dust off the cornstarchy handprints all over me. Jack now has a veritable map of where I put my hands to press in my bumps and bulges as I stood in front of the mirror.
    “I…uh…had a little trouble getting it on…making sure it fit right.”
    Jack just nods. “Let’s fill the pockets.”
    The pockets are in weird places on the suit—the forearm, the outside of the upper arm, the outside of the thigh.
    I especially hate the thigh pockets. When filled, my quads look as monstrously invincible as Godzilla’s.
    And I don’t even know what they’re filled with.
    The only things I recognized that Jack handed me were power bars and some kind of gun. I hope not the kind with bullets. Unless it’s for the sharks.
    I don’t ask though. I don’t want to know.
    In a few minutes, we’re ready.
    “Let’s go.” Jack opens the kitchen door to the garage.
    My stomach lurches. Oh God. OhGodohGodohGodohGod. “I really like your shower curtain!” I shreik. “The one with umbrellas.”
    “Really?” he asks, big smile. “I have little towels that match.”
    “Really?”
    “No.” His smile disappears as he swipes the duffle off the table. “Let’s go.”
    “You know,” I say, looking out the glass doors of the kitchen, “this is an awesome view. Do you own that mountain?” I gesture to the steep incline starting about two hundred feet from his back patio.
    Jack turns to face me. “No, Lisa. I don’t own the mountain. My property ends where the grass stops and the scrub starts.”
    I scrunch up my nose. “Huh.”
    “What?”
    “Nothing,” I say. “I just expected a guy like you to own a ranch or a mountain or a lake or something like that, since you’re so into nature and the outdoors and everything.”
    “I don’t have to own it to love it.”
    “So,” I continue, “you just tramp around the globe, conquering nature