Nelson DeMille: Night Fall

He could be a little raunchy in mixed company, while she was usually soft-spoken and demure, with an occasional smile or witticism. In bed, however, he was still surprised at her sexual nuttiness.

She sensed he was about to come, and she rocked back on her haunches and said, “That’s a wrap. Scene Two. Wine, please.”

Bud retrieved the bottle of wine.

She lay on her back and thrust her legs into the air and said, “A wife-tasting party.” She spread her legs and said, “Pour.”

Bud knelt between her legs and poured the wine, then without further stage direction, he buried his tongue in her.

Jill was breathing hard now, but managed to say, “I hope you have that camera pointed right.”

Bud came up for air and glanced at the camera. “Yeah.”

She took the bottle and poured the remainder of the wine over her body. “Lick.”

He licked the wine from her hard belly and breasts and ran his tongue over her nipples.

After a few minutes, she sat up and said, “I’m sticky. Let’s skinny-dip.”

Bud stood and said, “I think we should go. We’ll shower at the hotel.”

She ignored him and climbed to the top of the sheltering dune and looked out at the ocean. “Come on. Set the camera up here and get us skinny-dipping.”

Bud knew better than to argue, so he walked quickly to the video camera, stopped it, then carried it with the tripod to the top of the dune and set the legs into the sand.

Bud looked out over the sand, ocean, and sky. The horizon was still lit by the dying rays of the sun, but the sea and the water were dark blue and purple now. Overhead he could see stars appearing and noticed the blinking lights of high-flying aircraft and the glow of a big ship on the distant horizon. The breeze had picked up, and it cooled his sweaty, naked body.

Jill looked through the viewfinder and switched to a twilight setting, then set the autofocus on infinity and zoomed out for a wide shot. She pushed the Record button, and said, “This is so beautiful.”

Bud replied, “Maybe we shouldn’t go down to the beach naked. There could be people around.”

“So what? As long as we don’t know them, who cares?”

“Yeah, but let’s take some clothes-”

“Live dangerously, Bud.”

She stepped off the dune, sliding and hopping all the way down the slope to the beach.

Bud watched her, marveling at her perfect naked body as she ran to the water.

She turned toward him and shouted, “Come on!”

He ran down the slope, across the flat beach. He felt silly running naked with his thing flapping in the breeze.

He caught up to her as she reached the water, and she turned him to the camera on the dune. She waved and shouted, “Bud and Jill swim with the sharks.” She took his hand, and they splashed into the calm ocean.

The initial shock of the cool water gave way to a pleasant sense of cleansing. They stopped when the salty seawater reached their hips, and they washed each other front and back.

Jill looked out at the sea. “This is magic.”

Bud stood beside her and together they stared, mesmerized by the glassy sea and the purple sky spread out before them.

To their right, Bud noticed the blinking lights of an aircraft, about eight or ten miles off Fire Island at an altitude of maybe ten or fifteen thousand feet. Bud watched the aircraft as it drew closer, the last rays of the setting sun reflecting off its wings. It left four white contrails in the deep blue sky, and Bud guessed it had taken off from Kennedy Airport about sixty miles to the west, and it was heading toward Europe. The moment called for romance, so he said, “I’d like to be on that plane with you, going to Paris or Rome.”

She laughed. “You panic when you’re gone for an hour in a hot-sheet motel. How are you going to explain Paris or Rome?”

Bud was annoyed and said, “I don’t panic . I’m cautious. For your sake.” He said, “Let’s go.”

“In a minute.” She squeezed his butt and said, “This videotape is going to burn up the TV screen.”

He was still annoyed and didn’t respond.

She took hold of his penis and said, “Let’s do it here.”

“Uh…” He looked up and down the beach, then at the camera on the sand dune, pointing at them.

“Come on. Before someone comes. Just like that scene in From Here to Eternity.”

He had a million good reasons why they shouldn’t have sex on the open beach, but Jill had a firm grip on the one good reason why they should.

She took his hand and led him to the shore where the gentle surf was lapping over the wet sand.

She said, “Lie down.”

Bud lay on the sand where the sea ebbed and flowed over his body. She lay on top of him, and they made love slowly and rhythmically, the way she liked it, her doing most of the work at her own pace.

Bud was a little distracted by the surf rolling over his face and body, and he was a bit anxious by being so exposed on the beach. But within a minute, the size of his world shrunk to the area between their legs, and he wouldn’t have noticed a tsunami breaking over him.

A minute later, she climaxed and he ejaculated into her.

She lay on him, breathing heavily for a few seconds, then she straddled him with her knees and sat up. She started to say something, then froze in mid-sentence and stared out over the ocean. “What…?”

He sat up quickly and followed her gaze out toward the water, over his right shoulder.

Something was rising off the water, and it took him a second to recognize it as a streak of incandescent reddish orange fire trailing a plume of white smoke. “What the hell…?” It looked like a skyrocket left over from the Fourth of July, but it was huge, too huge-and it was coming off the water.

They both watched as it rose quickly, gathering speed as it ascended into the sky. It seemed to zigzag, then turn.

Suddenly, a flash of light appeared in the sky, followed by a huge fireball. They scrambled to their feet and stared transfixed as pieces of fiery debris began raining down from the point of the explosion. About a half minute later, the sound of two explosions in quick succession rolled across the water and filled the air around them, causing them to instinctively flinch. Then, silence.

The huge fireball seemed to hang in the air for a long time, then it began falling, breaking up into two or three fiery pieces, falling at different speeds.

A minute later, the sky was clear, except for white and black smoke, illuminated from below by the glow of fires burning on the smooth ocean, miles away.

Bud stared at the blazing horizon, then at the sky, then back at the water, his heart beating rapidly.

Jill whispered, “Oh, my God… what…?”

Bud stood motionless, not quite comprehending what he’d just seen, but in his gut, he knew it was something terrible. His next thought was that whatever this was, it was big enough and loud enough to draw people toward the beach. He took Jill’s arm and said, “Let’s get out of here. Fast.”

They turned and sprinted across the fifty yards of sand and up the dune. Bud grabbed the video camera and tripod as Jill scrambled down the far side of the dune. Bud followed and said, “Get dressed! Get dressed!” They both dressed quickly and ran toward the Explorer, Bud carrying the tripod and Jill carrying the camera, leaving the blanket and ice chest behind.

They tossed the video equipment in the backseat, jumped in the front, and Bud started the Explorer and threw it into gear. They were both breathing hard. He left his headlights off, and with wheels spinning, he drove back to the trail and made a sharp right turn. He drove cautiously in the dark, along the nature trail, then through the parking field, and out onto Dune Road where he put on his headlights and accelerated.