James Bond: The Ravager

Outside the bar, Bond ignored the chill and gave himself a leisurely smoke, made warm and sultry by the wintry surroundings, the blue of the evening contrasted with the orange glow of the cigarette.

As he inhaled, Bond shut his eyes and saw blooms of fine red, perhaps pink, as the smoke was absorbed into his lungs. He opened his eyes and let the smoke make its own way free of his mouth, observing his reflection in the frost-flecked window that showed him the summery, overwarm interior that was his pending destination.

James Bond 007 of the Secret Service was not the fresh-faced young brave who had so yearned to join the Double-O Department. His enthusiasm for the calling and the work had not dimmed, but it’d been shaded with a fuller awareness of what he was sacrificing for the needed experience to make life worth living.

There was more blood on his hands than he could attribute to a man living a moralistic life, acting in self-defense. More bad memories than any libertine would acquire when dedicated only to debauchery.

But he’d made peace with every Faustian clause in this contract. The sleepless nights, the staggering pain, the isolation. He held in himself an importance that had not been seen in Britain since Parliament had taken over from princes, he could say that without ego.

Not that his ego was absent.

Gray spiced his blue-black mane. The scar that descended his right cheek, thin to begin with, had faded under layers of tan and time until he thought only his knowing eyes could pick up the hint of white that remained of it.

Bond took another draught of the restorative cigarette, holding the miasma in his lungs until he felt in equal measure warmed and seamy. Examining his face in the makeshift mirror—not quite craggy, but far from boyish—he wondered if he owed some of those gray hairs, those crinkles around the eyes, to the tobacco he was so voluptuously enjoying.

Well, if he did, what of it? He doubted it would hurt his chance with the birds, or the success of his mission, to put a fine point on it.

Bond’s own feeling was that there were few women who really cared for the model-thin pretty boys, scoured and airbrushed, with a surgeon for every flaw and a mincing emotionalism for every hint of troublesome masculinity. They might be good to look at, with their six-pack abs and teeth straight as brickwork, but there was about as much of them to love as a centerfold in a lad mag.

Women—those knowledgeable enough to discern their tail from their trousers, at any rate—considered experience as much as attraction. A man who led a life of travel, good food, and the odd, sensual smoke had a glow of maleness about him that could not be competed with.

It was a vainglorious theory, but he’d seen precious little evidence against it. All a justification to continue mingling tobacco and alcohol within a body that was well-paid to be the perfect weapon, perhaps.

Then again, it was pleasure enough to simply work such a neat package into chaotic ash. Bond took another drag, then flicked the stub unerring into the ashtray offered above a wastebin. He’d spotted his quarry.

She wore the cerulean blue piped with white that he knew to be the uniform of Aeron Global, an outfit that offered discreet and expert flight attendants—stewardesses, as Aeron itself stubbornly referred to them—for private flights.

In skirts, stockings, and pillbox hats, they were paid many times the wage of their contemporaries at Delta or Southwest. It wasn’t that the work was harder, just the standards. They must be single. Must be between the ages of 18 and 30. Body fat percentage in the single digits, if any. Breast implants weren’t required, but were covered by the company healthcare.

In short, they were expected to be young, sexy, and available. Keeping up the standard of feminine perfection that Wall Street power brokers and Saudi princes were used to. Bond could both shake his head at the flagrant indulgence and admit it wasn’t a half-bad idea. The feminists might scoff at the thought, but he wondered how many of them were pleased with the service they got from three hundred pound ‘flight attendants’ in baggy, sexless pants.

This particular Valkyrie could convince Bond to fly anywhere. She was of average height, but that was the only thing average about her. Her smart blue blazer was gone, leaving her in the tight, thin blouse beneath. She’d tied the shirttails into a knot over her belly button. Her abundant breasts dueled with the tightness of the plain white fabric that embraced them. Bond sensed she was too dignified to let slip more than she wished to reveal—but it was quite a contest.

Her pencil skirt accentuated her shapely thighs and revealed sculpted calves within snowy stockings. She’d let down her neat chignon and her golden hair fell in a stationary waterfall to her heart-shaped ass. The cascade stopped around the small of her back, but with an exuberant curve at her hips to match the ones at her chest, her womanly attributes seemed to blend together into a blur of perfection, like a parched man seeing an oasis.

Bond was far from thirsty, but such a vision of beauty was enough to make him feel he hadn’t feasted in a fortnight. He lavished a last look on her to immunize himself to her charms: tawny complexion, high cheekbones, hazel eyes with a touch of the Orient in their exotic slant. Bond doubted there was any way to avoid being excited by her. He would simply have to steer into the skid.

Anesthetized with thoughts of the mission, Bond slid inside the dive bar. The clientele was a mix of moneyed and low. Those amiable to be fleeced and those eager to do the fleecing. Men predominated, but there was enough femininity in the water to keep the freezing frenzy going. The stools were topped with red plastic, which was enough to keep the place from really being to Bond’s liking. But he was adept, from life and from training, at making the best of a bohemian situation.

***

The bartender had arrived with her martini, but Penelope Trait let it cool her hand rather than drink it. As though the martini were a camouflage, allowing her to blend in with this eclectic mix, she let her gaze roam around searchingly.

Several unaccompanied men were seated at the bar, any of them handsome enough to serve her purpose. If Emily Post were fresh in her mind instead of a distant memory, she might think of a way to go about offering herself up to their approach.

But that was the ladylike thing to do and Penelope didn’t feel like a lady. She felt desperate—a walking, talking need—and so long as that need was taken care of, manners and breeding were at the back of her mind.

Of course, that didn’t mean that she’d settle for her first suitor. Tragic as it was, not just anyone could take care of her need. She’d be willing to approach such a man, but the thing about him was that anyone masculine enough to satisfy her would be man enough to make the first move.

“There are only two reasons for a woman to drink alone,” said a voice behind her, soft but with a rough burn to it—like scotch whiskey for the ears.

Penelope turned her head and looked up into a rather handsome, rather savage face. To look at him, he was genteel, debonair, with a perfectly mannered grin that could’ve been measured out by computer.

But she couldn’t shake the impression of something primal in all that civility. Perhaps it was the sheer asceticism of the narrow face, the metallic eyes, the hair at some exacting midpoint between styled and unkempt. The thought persisted that a man who made such a show of softness had to have a roughness he was diverting from.

“She likes martinis?” Penelope offered with a coy gesture to the bartender that served double duty with his suitor—telling him she liked men who were of use to her.

“That either she isn’t ravishingly beautiful,” the man said, his tone making it clear this first option wasn’t the case, “or that there’s no man in the establishment with the daring to make a play for her.”

The bartender put Penelope’s second drink in front of her.

“That for my tab,” the man said, producing a credit card out of nowhere and holding it out to the barkeep. “And a vodka martini, shaken not stirred.”

As the bartender walked away, Penelope looked the man over. He wore corduroy trousers and a Henley shirt under a suede racing jacket. His physique was muscular, but not overdone. His clothing fit to his well-built body as comfortably as a cat’s fur.

“Well, I don’t know about daring,” Penelope said, “but at least you have money.”

“One can lead to the other, depending on how you spend it.”

“I don’t think money can make a man brave.”

“Callous, perhaps. The two are remarkably similar.”

“So which are you? Callous or brave?”

“Calculating. Rich or not, daring or not, I am sharing a drink with you.”

“That’s not much. You don’t even know my name.”

“We’re even. You don’t know mine.”

“You’ll tell me when I want to know.”

“So will you,” he said, eyeing her with the piercing blue gunmetal centering narrow slits of unblemished white. And she felt compelled to be in the spotlight of those eyes, that vastly experienced intelligence, for as long as she could take the burn of them. “What’s your name?”

“Penelope,” she said. She had no intention of giving him her last name. “And you are?”

“Bond. James Bond. Since you want to know.”