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  Pleasure Cruise

  Spencer Collins lives life virtually, keeping the real world—and everyone in it—at a distance. When she’s given a chance to spend a week surrounded by sun, sand, and hundreds of women on a lesbian cruise, she has the opportunity to venture outside her comfort zone. If, that is, she can muster the courage.

  When Amy Donovan is named cruise director for a trip to the Caribbean, her mission is twofold: keep her scandal-plagued company’s reputation afloat and her hands off the passengers. Both prove problematic when she’s blindsided by her attraction to the sweet and adorably shy Spencer, only to discover a stranger’s quest for revenge threatens to turn their dream trip into a nightmare.

  Sailing the high seas might turn the tide of romance their way, if the killer doesn’t get there first.

  What Reviewers Say About Yolanda Wallace’s Work

  The War Within

  “The War Within has a masterpiece quality to it. It’s a story of the heart told with heart—a story to be savored—and proof that you’re never too old to find (or rediscover) true love.”—Lambda Literary

  Rum Spring

  “The writing was possibly the best I’ve seen for the modern lesfic genre, and the premise and setting was intriguing. I would recommend this one.”—The Lesbrary

  Murphy’s Law

  “Prepare to be thrilled by a love story filled with high adventure as they move toward an ending as turbulent as the weather on a Himalayan peak.”—Lambda Literary

  Lucky Loser

  “Yolanda Wallace is a great writer. Her character work is strong, the story is compelling, and the pacing is so good that I found myself tearing through the book within a day and a half.”—The Lesbian Review

  Pleasure Cruise

  Brought to you by

  eBooks from Bold Strokes Books, Inc.

  http://www.boldstrokesbooks.com

  eBooks are not transferable. They cannot be sold, shared or given away as it is an infringement on the copyright of this work.

  Please respect the rights of the author and do not file share.

  Pleasure Cruise

  © 2018 By Yolanda Wallace. All Rights Reserved.

  ISBN 13:978-1-63555-220-1

  This Electronic Book is published by

  Bold Strokes Books, Inc.

  P.O. Box 249

  Valley Falls, NY 12185

  First Edition: July 2018

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.

  Credits

  Editor: Cindy Cresap

  Production Design: Susan Ramundo

  Cover Design By Melody Pond

  By the Author

  In Medias Res

  Rum Spring

  Lucky Loser

  Month of Sundays

  Murphy’s Law

  The War Within

  Love’s Bounty

  Break Point

  24/7

  Divided Nation, United Hearts

  True Colors

  Tailor-Made

  Pleasure Cruise

  Written as Mason Dixon:

  Date With Destiny

  Charm City

  21 Questions

  Acknowledgments

  This book was incredibly fun to write for two reasons: it not only gave me a chance to take a virtual tour of some of the countries I have always longed to visit, it also afforded me the opportunity to catch up with some of the characters from my previous books.

  Like readers, I often wonder what some of my favorite characters’ lives are like now that they’ve found their respective happily-ever-afters. With Pleasure Cruise, I was able to revisit them and, in some cases, bring them a bit more turmoil along the way. I hope you enjoy the journey as much as I did.

  As always, I would like to thank Radclyffe, Sandy, Cindy, and the rest of the Bold Strokes Books team for providing the fantastic support system that allows me to continue indulging my favorite hobby.

  I would also like to thank the readers for their continued support. You rock!

  Finally, I would like to thank Dita for continuing to put up with me and all the characters in my head. I couldn’t do any of this without you.

  Dedication

  To Dita,

  Every day with you is a pleasure.

  All Aboard

  Amy Donovan loved her job. On most days. Today wasn’t one of those days.

  Keeping a tight grip on the walkie-talkie that would be her constant companion during the next eight days and seven nights, she watched anxiously as a steady stream of passengers laden with carry-ons made their way from the cruise terminal to the Majestic Dream. Most carried one or two small suitcases, while some had five or six pieces of luggage in tow. And that wasn’t counting the larger bags they had been required to hand over to a porter stationed outside the terminal. By the time the guests made it to their staterooms, their bags would be waiting for them outside their doors. Theoretically. With so many guests and pieces of luggage in play, there were guaranteed to be a few mix-ups. Amy expected to be fielding calls regarding lost and/or misplaced items for the next few hours—if not days.

  She had always envied travelers who packed light, but she had only recently become a convert. Her personal high was the five bags she had taken on a luxury cruise to Tahiti, but she had managed to cram all her belongings into one suitcase this trip because she would be too busy to wear much more than shorts, comfortable shoes, and a string of brightly colored SOS Tours T-shirts and tank tops. She planned to get dressed up for the formal captain’s dinner on the last night of the trip, but her more eye-catching outfits would have to wait until she wasn’t on call twenty-four hours a day. If someone’s toilet flooded their stateroom while they were lounging around one of the two pools, or a passenger had a medical emergency in the middle of the night, she needed to make sure she was wearing something sensible instead of sexy while she supervised the repairs or waited for the Coast Guard helicopter to arrive.

  This was work, not a pleasure cruise. For her and the rest of the staff, anyway. The passengers who had forked over thousands of dollars for one of several vacation packages her company offered might beg to differ.

  Amy was pleased to see that, despite the large influx of new arrivals, check-in was going relatively smoothly. According to a team member keeping an eye on things in the cruise terminal, the lines were moving quickly, and no one seemed to be objecting to the thorough security screenings. Apparently, everyone was already in vacation mode, even though their vacations had barely begun. She hoped the good vibes would continue after the ship left port and set sail for Turks and Caicos, the first of four scheduled stops along a route that would lead from Fort Lauderdale to three islands in the Caribbean and back again. If not, she and everyone else on board could be in for rough seas in the days ahead.

  Modern cruise ships were so big they were often referred to as floating cities. If that was the case, this particular town was smaller than some, and it had a distinctly lesbian feel. Amy wouldn’t have it any other way.

  She had been working for SOS Tours since the company went into business three years before, slowly working her way up from unpaid intern to salaried employee. When she first started working for the company, she had been a lowly gofer whose main responsibilities were making sure she kept the coffee pots full of fresh brew and didn’t screw up the daily lunch orders. Now she was an assistant vice president tasked with making sure two thousand paying clients’ “trip of a lifetime” didn’t turn into a col
lective nightmare.

  “No pressure,” she said under her breath, even though she was already tempted to gnaw at what remained of her fingernails.

  After the passengers turned over their passports to the purser for safekeeping and posed for a photograph the ship’s crew would use to identify them when they presented their ID cards during the voyage, they were allowed to board the ship and make their way to their staterooms on one of the ten decks. A few people balked at having to part with their passports—until seasoned travelers assured them it was standard procedure.

  The control freak in Amy understood their reluctance. She had been equally hesitant on her first cruise until the free spirit in her had convinced her that giving up a little bit of control was a fair tradeoff for the exciting adventure looming before her. The trip itself hadn’t been especially memorable, but it had sparked her love of travel and stoked her interest in seeking out a career in the industry.

  The disparate parts of her personality made her good at her job. Her organizational skills helped her keep each member of the team focused on providing their clients with the best possible experience, while her ability to go with the flow came in handy when the inevitable moment arrived that their carefully laid plans went awry.

  She had learned the hard way that no matter how many contingency plans she made, there was always at least one scenario she hadn’t expected. Things would be different this time, though. They had to. Because the alternative was unthinkable. If even one thing went wrong during this trip, it could prove disastrous. Not only for her, but her employers as well. The company’s reputation had already been damaged. Another bad outing could ruin it completely. Then where would she be? Most likely sitting on a barstool nursing a lemon drop martini while she decided what she wanted to do with the rest of her life after she had allowed the best job she ever had to slip through her fingers.

  “I can’t let that happen,” she told herself as the boarding process continued. “No way. No how.” Even though it was much too soon for a status report, she raised her two-way radio to her mouth and hailed Breanna Lafaele, her trusted second-in-command for the week. “Talk to me, Bree. How’s it going down there?”

  In addition to talking Amy off the ledge not if but when she got overwhelmed, Breanna was in charge of the Indies, SOS Tours-speak for clients who had chosen to travel on their own instead of with a life partner or a group of friends. Her twin sister, Leanna, also worked for SOS. Leanna spearheaded Wahines on Water, a program geared toward enhancing the vacation experiences of clients of color. The moniker reflected Leanna and Breanna’s Hawaiian heritage, but the group was inclusive of other minorities and their allies. In other words, WOW wasn’t a private party. Everyone was welcome to attend its get-togethers if they chose to accept the invitation.

  Breanna and Leanna looked and sounded so much alike Amy often had to refer to their name tags to tell who was who. There was no confusing their personalities, though. Breanna was the life of the party, while Leanna was more reserved. Relatively speaking, of course. On trips like these, when everyone left their day jobs behind and concentrated on giving the clients a vacation they wouldn’t soon forget, both twins turned into whirlwinds. One of many reasons Amy was grateful to have them on her team.

  “Everything’s as smooth as a set of silk sheets,” Breanna said with an earthy laugh that went a long way toward settling Amy’s jangled nerves. “Relax, girl. We’ve got this. What happened on the Cancún trip isn’t going to happen this time around. Not on our watch.”

  “From your mouth to God’s ears.” Amy wished she felt a fraction of Breanna’s confidence. She wasn’t normally wracked with self-doubt, but this situation was as far from normal as it could get. Perhaps she should stick to scouting potential vacation destinations instead of supervising the trips themselves. Too late for that. Even though the anchor had not yet been raised, for all intents and purposes, the ship had already sailed. “Let me know if anything changes.”

  “Will do.”

  Amy, Breanna, and the other members of the SOS Tours staff onsite had inspected every inch of the ship in the days leading up to embarkation. Not once, but twice. The administrators of the cruise line SOS had partnered with for this voyage had assured Amy everything was fine, but she didn’t want to take any chances. She couldn’t afford to. Not when so much was at stake. Not only was her name on the line. So was the company’s.

  SOS Tours was one of the most well known organizations focusing on women-only travel. The company specialized in cruises, though it had recently started adding resort trips to its brand. Amy was in favor of diversifying SOS Tours’ travel portfolio, but she had heard whispers from industry insiders and even some clients that they considered the move a very expensive mistake. Now the whispers were getting louder as the number of SOS Tours’ critics started to mount.

  SOS Tours was still trying to recover from the public relations disaster that had occurred during its inaugural land-based trip six months ago. After armed members of the infamous Jaguars drug cartel had stormed the swanky Mariposa Resort in Cancún, Mexico, the ensuing hostage situation had resulted in the death of one SOS Tours staffer, hundreds of traumatized guests, and numerous skittish customers.

  Amy had stopped trying to keep up with all the cancellations that had come rolling in once SOS Tours resumed normal business operations after the ill-fated Cancún trip. Clients weren’t the only ones who were nervous. Wary of a possible repeat incident, several SOS Tours employees had turned in their notices. Some had defected to rival companies, but most had chosen to enter another line of work altogether in case SOS’s bad karma followed them to their next travel-related gig.

  Amy couldn’t blame them for being anxious. Even though she hadn’t witnessed the events in Mexico firsthand, her friends’ accounting of what had taken place made her feel like she had been in the room with them while they cowered in fear.

  She had shed buckets of tears and tossed and turned through countless sleepless nights while she tried to decide if she should remain with the company or join the exodus out the door. In the end, she had decided to stay put. SOS Tours was her dream job, and her co-workers were like family to her. Now her loyalty was being rewarded.

  She had been granted the opportunity to serve as cruise director for SOS Tours’ first scheduled trip since the nightmare in Cancún. A great deal was riding on the outcome of the journey—possibly even the company’s survival.

  A successful voyage marked by thousands of smiling customers and even more fond memories would go a long way toward erasing the recent past. But if the trip went sideways—from bad weather to unexpected mechanical problems to a dreaded norovirus outbreak—it could mean the final nail in the coffin.

  Amy felt confident she could find another job if she had to, but she knew she wouldn’t enjoy her next position nearly as much as she did her current one. Where else could she get paid to help women plan the vacation of their dreams, then be granted the privilege of watching those dreams come true?

  Travel agencies had once been on the verge of becoming obsolete, thanks to the dozen or so websites that allowed potential travelers to book their own flights and accommodations, but business across the industry was on the upswing. Amy was happy to assist clients who had grown weary of trying to stay abreast of the latest travel restrictions and would rather leave the groundwork to professionals who were paid to keep up with the ever-changing list of sanctioned countries. Instead of jumping ship like her former co-workers had, Amy was determined to not only help SOS Tours maintain its standing in the niche market it served but improve upon it.

  “But first, I have to survive the next eight days.”

  * * *

  Spencer Collins showed her boarding pass and driver’s license to the security agent in the cruise terminal lobby. After the agent returned her documents and waved her through, her ears began to ring from the cacophony inside the cavernous building.

  “Look out,” someone said. “Coming through.”


  Heeding the warning, Spencer took a step to her left to avoid getting run over by a family of four, a couple in color-coordinated outfits and two teenagers paying more attention to the text messages on their cell phones than where they were going.

  “Whose idea was this again?” she asked herself after her close encounter with the harried nuclear family.

  Definitely not hers. The trip was her mother’s idea. Her parents booked a cruise for their anniversary each year. They always returned home raving about what a good time they had and asking Spencer to tag along on their next trip, but she always found a reason to beg off. This time, they didn’t give her a choice. They had taken her to dinner for her birthday and made a big show of presenting her with a card while they waited for dessert to arrive. Instead of the gift certificate to her favorite electronics store she had asked for, they had surprised her with an all-expenses paid Caribbean cruise.

  “Doesn’t the itinerary look amazing?” her mother had asked, barely able to sit still.

  “Yes,” Spencer had said hesitantly, “but I don’t know if I’ll be able to go.”

  “Nonsense,” her father had said. “You have more vacation hours built up than some people have regular ones. I’m sure that company you work for can live without you for a week or two. It’s time you got out of the house and let loose for a change.”

  Her idea of fun was going fishing on a quiet lake or playing a video game on her couch, not spending a week with two thousand random strangers.