Author's notes:

Merry Christmas and a happy New Year to all of you :)

I did plan on uploading this chapter earlier, but real life and the Holidays happened, so it was delayed. Sorry about that.

This is the continuation of 'A Long Time from Home' and if you haven't read that, I advise you to do so.

The series is self-edited, so any mistakes are mine, though I now have a proofreader, that can catch missing words etc. Thanks to Jessejames932006 for doing that.

Due to its length, I placed ALTFH under the 'Novels and Novellas' section, but as you can see, ALTFH II is placed in the 'Sci-fi and Fantasy' section, which fits it better due to the elements of magic that's in it. At least in my opinion :)

Have fun and while you're at it, please rate the chapter and leave a comment :)

I have stated that I would upload chapters of 'Into the Chaos' (my Star Wars: The Old Republic story) every other time and that is still the case.

About the notation:

The Baylon language is a predecessor to Latin, which is why it looks like Latin at a glance.

Mental communication is denoted by a < and ends with a >, so a mental communication will look like this: "< Who are you? >"

Some warnings:

This is erotic action adventure, meaning that there will be both sex and violence, but I don't mix the two.

This story is posted on the Literotica website and the author does not give permission for it to be reposted or reprinted anywhere else without consent.

P.S. I haven't gotten an editor yet, so any mistakes are mine. Interested editors are welcome :)

P.P.S. While you're here anyway, please rate the chapter and leave a comment :)

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Chapter 3 -- Preparation

Start of August 2000, Villa Bonita, Costa Rica

The next few days went with getting used to being in Costa Rica, but thoughts of the kids we were here to rescue were never far from my mind and as Esther had said that she needed something to do, I had put her in charge of what to do with the kids after we had rescued them.

She had spent some days doing research and then came to see me one evening. "Ivan, we need to talk about housing for those kids."

"Yes, we do." I said and gestured at the balcony's other chair. "Have a seat."

She sat down, placing her notes in her lap. "I've been researching and taking care of damaged kids is a huge undertaking. It's nothing I can do alone."

"That is fair. What do you need?"

Esther took a piece of paper from her stack of notes. "We need people and a place to house the kids. Starting with the people, we need one or two teachers more, a nurse and a full-time psychiatrist to treat them. We need a building large enough for thirty kids and staff for cooking, cleaning, and maintaining the building."

"Eight to ten people?"

She nodded. "That sounds about right."

Leaning back in the seat, I looked at her. "What is your suggestion for the housing situation?"

"Further inland, there're some closed hotels. I would like to rent one of those." She said, "that should be room enough for both the kids and the staff."

"So, you need a hotel and at least eight to ten people working full time." I summarized, making her wince and nod. "Yes, I know it's a lot, but on the bright side the kids should be out of there in about half a year."

"And by then, new ones will have arrived." I said slowly, mostly thinking aloud.

"What!?" Esther exclaimed. "I thought you were going to shut down the operation!"

"Trust me, I've given it a lot of thought and I have decided to limit it, but not close it down completely. If I shut it down the kids will be sold to someone else." I explained calmly. "This way, I can buy them, have them healed and send most of them home where they belong, while the rest can get adopted by people who actually care... or are you suggesting I should leave them in the hands of some sick paedophile?"

"No!" She answered automatically and looked embarrassed. "Oh god, I'm sorry. I don't know what I was thinking."

"Never mind." I was silent for a moment, while I thought about what she had said. "No matter how we do this, we'll need to make it a long-term operation and keeping it secret is going to be a problem. That hotel you mentioned, must be bought, not rented. The people you hire, must be able to keep a secret and accept that the children are not going to be returned until they're mentally healed. Then there are the usual items, like clothing, food, school materials and whatever they need, plus various permissions from the government."

Esther sighed. "Too expensive, I guess."

That made me laugh. Parker and Curtis had made billions of dollars on their criminal activities and I was determined to use the most of this money to make life better for people, including a home for the children we were planning to rescue. "No, no. Just more complicated and I have no clue how to do this, without having law enforcement coming down on us, but that is something we need to think about, while we plan this."

She nodded slowly. "It was easier when I had the government on my side."

Thinking back on my time in the Securitas, I silently agreed with her. Esther was a former member of the Yamam, one of at least four special units within the Israeli Border Police, where she had been a sharpshooter, and from what I understood from the vague stories she had told, they had always had back-up units ready to move in with a moment's notice. The Baylon Securitas had operated the same way before the Disease, where Inquisitors had been sent in and as soon as it was safe for the back-up, they were sent in, so the Inquisitors could move on without worrying about what was behind them.

That had changed with the Disease, as the back-up became scarce, and we had to really think things through before we moved in on something. Not to survive, because that part didn't change, but what to do with the people we liberated. We could easily move in on the sites, that held most of the kidnapped children, but first we needed to have a support system in place, so we could take care of the children afterwards.

To make things worse, what we were planning to do was highly illegal as liberation of kidnapped children was supposed to sort under the police, but from Parker's memories I knew that at least some of them had been bought by the criminals, so we couldn't rely on the police to do it. That meant that not only did we have to make sure that we got the kids out, but we also had to do it in a way that made both us and the kids impossible to trace.

"What're you thinking?" Esther wanted to know.

"That without government help, we'll have to turn to other ways of doing things." I said slowly, feeling my mind speed up.

Parker had set up a criminal network called Erebus for smuggling goods, people and medicine, and as far as people knew, the whole organization was controlled by a mysterious figure named The Dream Lord with his two trusted business partners, who went under the names The Nightmare and The Dream Maker.

However, nobody had ever seen the three leaders and the reason for that was that they didn't exist as people. They were like characters in a play and the role of any of them could be assumed by Parker, Curtis or anyone they trusted to do the job, making sure that nobody could identify the leaders at any point.

Directly under three non-existing leaders, was an assembly of mind-controlled people who took care of running Erebus, using the directions given to them by The Dream Lord. All of them had codenames taken from Greek mythology to obscure their identity and all communication was done in code using electronics.

One of those people lived here in Costa Rica. Her name was Gabriella Delgado and though her job description was officially 'financial consultant', her real job was to take care of some of Erebus' finances under the codename Hemera.

I had read Parker's file on her and even with my limited experience of the modern world, she seemed like the least likely candidate ever to be a member of a criminal organization. Relatively young, extremely well educated and without any obvious ties to any form of crime, she was also the financial adviser to a humanitarian foundation and spent most of her time organizing funds for humanitarian work. On the other hand, it didn't really conflict with her position in Erebus, as she dealt only with the money coming from human smuggling (Not trafficking) and counterfeit medicine.

Her work with the humanitarian foundation was the reason for me thinking about her now. She had to know which hoops to jump through and which to avoid when it came to dealing with the government here in Costa Rica.

"Hmmm... I have a contact here, named Gabriella Delgado, who works for a humanitarian organization here in Costa Rica." I said slowly. "It might be a good idea to bring in on this. She will know what to do and what to avoid."

Esther nodded with a smile. "Excellent idea."

"Good. I'll talk with Delgado, while you find a good place. Or at least get into contact with someone who deals with selling hotels."

"I'll get right on it." She promised.

When Esther had left, I walked into the office and got hold of Sandra Rodriquez, the Chief Financial Officer of Starlight Merchant Group and talked it over with her, using one of the secure lines Parker had set up. Like all the important people in Starlight Merchant Group, Parker had mind controlled her for silence and loyalty, and I had transferred that loyalty to me, along with the rest of the Board of Directors.

Not only did she manage the finances of Starlight Merchant Group but she was she one of the few that had knowledge of the money Parker had made from Erebus, as she also managed his personal accounts.

She was more than willing to help, but unfortunately, I didn't understand half of what she was trying to explain, so in the end I decided to use one of the accounts Parker had created to stash away the money from Erebus and had her take care of it, while keeping Starlight Merchant Group out of anything illegal.

As I closed the connection, I realized that for the first time since leaving Baylon I was dealing with a system I couldn't easily understand. In the past it had only taken some light studying before I could understand a system, but modern economics was beyond that and I would have to get somebody to teach me once we returned to Oldenburg Island. Not that I needed to understand it completely, but I needed enough knowledge to ask other people to do things, instead of fumbling in total ignorance as I was now.

That would have to wait though. First, I needed to get hold of Gabriella Delgado, as well as the rest of Parker and Curtis' security force. Then we could see about the rest.

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The financial advisor

Start of August 2000, San Jose, Costa Rica

The dance club was an inferno of music, coloured lights, alcohol, and people, who were dancing on the small dance floor, while a young man was standing in a booth, fiddling with some sort of electronic equipment that made the music. Despite the ear shattering noise, people were clearly having a good time and the area was filled with positive energy.

Shaking my head, I made my way to the bar and caught the attention of the young man behind it, ordering a beer, before I turned around to look at the dancing people. It was a mixed crowd, but one of them was a dark-haired Latin woman in her early thirties, who was smiling widely as she whirled around on the dance floor. She was also the reason why I was in the capitol San Jose, as she was the Gabriella Delgado, I had spoken with Ester about.

I had reread Parker's notes about her and discovered that Parker hadn't been totally sure that his Loyalty Codex had worked as well as it should have done. Under most other circumstances, I would have shrugged it off, but as Delgado was one of the people controlling the flow of money, it was another reason to seek her out.

She lived here in the capitol, had a nice house in a nice area and in general didn't do anything out of the ordinary, except visiting clubs like this to dance on the weekends.

There was a lull in the music and at the same time, the bartender returned with my beer. I nodded thanks, before I returned my attention back to Gabriella Delgado, who had left the dance floor and was aiming for the bar where I was standing. As she came nearer, I realized she was short. At a distance and surrounded by other Costa Ricans, she had looked to be of normal height, but up close, it became clear she was only about 1.55 cm (5'1") tall.

I turned and moved discreetly to one side, creating an empty space next to me and a moment later, she pressed in between me and the man on the other side, trying to get the attention of the bartender. Since we were touching, I could use Ars Mentalis with very little chance of being discovered and I took advantage of that with a quick scan.

The first thing I investigated was the Loyalty Codex, but that was exactly as the ones I had seen in the people on the Board of Directors of Starlight Merchant Group, disproving Parker's doubt about her. The next thing I discovered was that her humanitarian work wasn't a cover for anything. Delgado was simply a caring person, who had been hijacked into a criminal organization by Parker, due to her skills with money. Because of her personality, Parker had been clever enough to make her handle the money from human smuggling and counterfeit medicine. Both were areas where Erebus's activities could be seen as helping people, though that was purely by coincidence.

Erebus was created as a smuggling and money laundering operation and human trafficking was just a tiny part of that. Their main focus was smuggling and selling counterfeit medication in Africa and Asia, which in my opinion wasn't a bad thing, despite the number of laws that were broken. At least not when it was done the way Erebus did it.

Not wanting to become enemies of the warlords they traded with, Parker had made sure that while the medicine they smuggled was indeed cheap copies, it was still real in the sense that it worked as promised. It was like a counterfeit purse: It might not be a real Gucci, but it still worked like a purse.

It meant that Erebus provided a lot of real medication, like anti-malaria pills, tuberculosis medicine, cancer and anti-infective drugs that actually worked, to people who could not afford it otherwise.

Not that it had been Parker's intention, when he created the organization, but it had been the effect and once the profit had started to roll in, policies had been put into place to ensure, it stayed that way. If a factory sold ineffective medicine to Erebus, the leaders of that factory were warned. Second time they were killed. In the rare instances, it had happened again under a new management, the factory was burnt down, the leadership killed, and a new supplier was found.

While harsh compared to the rest of the modern world, it was not unlike many of the systems of quality control in the ancient world. Deliver faulty weapons to the armies of Rome, Kemet (Egypt) or Lescare (China), and you were dead if it was discovered.

This policy ensured Erebus always delivered what they promised and that was entirely by design. It increased the chance that the police tended either not to go after the Erebus, or were easily bribed, since the medication worked and that was the core of how Erebus operated: It wasn't set up for maximum profit, but for maximum ease of operation combined with a minimum risk of creating enemies.

That being said, the world went through a staggering amount of medication and even with a slightly lower profit margin, Erebus still made an enormous amount of money. Especially since the invention of Viagra, which could be cheaply produced and was in demand everywhere. That Erebus was supplying some of the poorest people in the world with affordable medicine was exactly why Gabriella Delgado liked working for the organization and that it was illegal, just made it more romantic somehow. At least to her.

Having found out what I needed to know, I retreated from her brain and returned my attention to the beer, drinking some of it, while I pondered how to get her out of this noisy place and into the peace and quiet of the cool night air. This modern world had many wonders, but many of them were extremely noisy and I had a hard time dealing with all the disturbances.

The movement of my arm made Gabriella Delgado look in my direction. She had clearly expected a lower person, because as she turned her head, she was looking right into my arm and then looked up to my face with a slightly shocked expression on her face.

I swallowed a chuckle. On Oldenburg Island, where most of the people were of Danish and Dutch descent, my height hadn't been all that unusual, but here in Costa Rica people were generally shorter and I had suddenly become a giant. Not that it was anything new. While being short for a Baylon, I usually towered over most humans, especially Asians and Mediterranean's, though there were always exceptions to the rule.

Looking at me, Delgado raised her eyebrows. "Hello there."

She must have thought I was a tourist because she was speaking English.

"Hello there yourself." I replied with a smile. "Having a good time?"

"It just became better." She said as she returned the smile, and I could feel a spike of desire emanating from her. She glanced around and then returned her eyes to me. "Let me guess, you're here on vacation?"

Before I could answer, the bartender arrived with a tall glass filled with a pinkish liquid and topped up with a paper umbrella. "Here you go, Miss Delgado."

"Thank you, Roberto." She flashed a smile at him and then looked at me, but at the same time, the music started again, making conversation almost impossible.

Taking her glass, she stepped away from the bar, indicating with her head that I should follow her. I couldn't help but notice her round ass swaying as she walked away, confident that I would follow, which I did.

Seduction haven't been on my mind when I had decided to see her in person, but it was now.

The nightclub had an outside seating area and most of the tables were occupied. The table Gabriella Delgado was heading towards was no different, but as soon as she came near enough to the table to be heard, Gabriella said something I didn't catch and the woman sitting by the table stood up with a smile and walked inside, leaving us alone by the table.

"It was her turn to dance and my turn to watch the table." Explained Gabriella with a charming smile as she sat down. "So, what's a guy like you doing in a place like this?"

"Talking with a good-looking woman in a nice outside seating under the stars," I said. "I'm Ivan, by the way... and you are?"

"Gabriella."

We shook hands and then I asked. "So, what do you do for a living, Gabriella?"

"I'm an accountant." She said and then chuckled. "Yes, it sounds boring, but I work for a charitable foundation, which makes it a lot better."

"Oh." I raised my eyebrows. "That sounds interesting... Do tell."

That was all that was needed to get her speaking and it was clearly a cause close to her heart because her eyes lit up and she became quite animated as she told me about the humanitarian organization and the work they did for the children of Costa Rica.

Leaning back in the chair, I watched her as much as I listened to what she said. While not a beauty like Petra, Delina or any of the three women from Los Angeles, she was a good-looking woman and her passion was a turn-on for the simple reason, that it made me think how passionate she would be in bed.

Somehow the thoughts must have shown on my face because she stopped in the middle of a sentence, took a long look at me and blushed as she asked. "What're you thinking?"

"You really don't want to know." I stated calmly.

"Yes, I do!"

"Remember, that you were warned." I said as I held her gaze.

She blushed a bit more but nodded.

Leaning forward in the seat to get nearer to her, I started to speak in a low voice that couldn't be heard at the next table. "I was thinking that you turn me on, because besides being very sexy and good looking, you're obviously very passionate and I wondered if you were just as passionate in bed as you are when you talk about your job." I leaned back in the chair again and drank some cider, watching her blush even more. Then I added. "Too bad that you're most likely married, and I don't..."

"I'm not married." She interrupted me quickly and then giggled when I nodded towards the ring on her finger. "Oh that. I just wear it when I go dancing with my friends, so I don't have too many men trying to seduce me." The smile widened a bit as she added. "I don't even have a boyfriend."

"Well, that explains why the bartender called you Miss Delgado and not Mrs."

"Yes." There was a pause and then she asked. "What about you, Ivan? Any wife or girl friends back home?"

"No and I'm not looking for one either. I travel too much for that to work out."

"Oh... Work related travel?"

I nodded. "Yes. I work with quality control in a large corporation, so I get to travel a lot."

Her large brown eyes regarded me speculatively and I reminded myself that there was a very sharp mind behind those soft brown eyes.

"So which hotel have you chosen to stay at?" She finally asked.

"Hotel Presidente." I told her, making her lift her eyebrows a fraction. Hotel Presidente was a luxury hotel located nearby in the middle of San Jose. "It's a very nice hotel, I have to say."

"Yes, it's a very beautiful building." She chuckled. "At least from the outside. I don't think I've ever been there. I own a house here, so there's really no reason to visit the hotels... though Hotel Presidente has an excellent rooftop restaurant and café, as far as I hear."

"Yes, it's beautiful." I said with a small nod and thought for a moment. "If you're hungry, or in the mood for a snack, we could go there and grab a bite to eat when we're done with the drinks here."

"That sounds good." She said with a smile. "I would like that."

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So, we enjoyed a good snack in the rooftop restaurant while enjoying the view over the city. Even the conversation was interesting, as Gabriella talked about her work with the humanitarian organizations in general and especially orphanages, dropping titbits of information about her personal life in between the other stories.

"I must bore you with all that talk about my work." She suddenly said with a little laugh.

Shaking my head, I smiled at her. "No, it's quite interesting and you do tell a little about yourself."

"Like what?" She asked, almost challenging.

"Well, you live here in San Jose, but you're originally from Liberia, where the rest of your family, including your younger sister, lives. You're educated at the University of Costa Rica, which is why you moved here in the first place." I drank some of my chilled cider. "You work part time at a high paying job because that allows you to do humanitarian work as well. You like beer, but dislike being drunk." I smiled at her increasingly surprised facial expression. "You like the colour pink, but dislike brown, at least for clothes, and you like living on your own and are not looking for a husband."

"Wow." She said after a moment of silence. "You're good at extracting information."

"Thank you."

"What did you say your job was?"

I leaned back in the seat as I studied her. For some reason, the spike of lust I had felt from her had lessened while she had spoken about her work with the humanitarian organization. I guessed that she had seen things and heard stories our conversation had caused her to remember, which in turn had lessened her lust. It was also likely to linger in her mind, making any attempts of seduction an unwise move.

"Quality control, but the corporation I work for also has a charity and since I travel around a lot, I work for them as well, finding various projects that could need some help."

"Seriously? Normally people must apply to get help." She drank from the glass. "Trust me, I've sent more applications to charities than I care to remember. Mostly for nothing."

"They know." I said drily. "That's why they asked me to keep an eye out for worthy projects."

Learning forward and with hope in her voice, she asked. "Do they deal with orphanages by any chance?"

"Yes, but mostly in Africa and India." I told her. "I know that they have considered helping trafficked and exploited children from around the world, but apparently there are problems with that, as the police tend to send the children home before their treatment is finished... and from time to time, the children return home to the people who sold them in the first place."

Gabriella nodded with a sigh. "Yes, that happens more often than I like to think about."

"So, they don't want to get involved before they have a place where the children can be safeguarded until they can either return home or, if the danger to the child is at home, to a new home." I said, throwing the bait.

"Which is a problem, because it's against the law not to report a kidnapping."

I hadn't known that, but it made sense. "Exactly."

She was silent, drinking from the glass again to buy time, and then said. "It can be done, you know."

I raised my eyebrows. "Oh. How?"

"Well, it's not entirely legal, but trick is to make it a boarding school and not an orphanage." She said, a little smile playing on her lips.

I tilted my head a bit. "Why do I feel like you have done this in the past to help a child?"

Gabriella shook her head. "I haven't, but I've heard about it. Doing it that way will take some creative work with the official papers, but as far as I know, it's the only way to do it without outright breaking the law." She paused and added. "Provided that the laws about the care of children aren't broken."

I shrugged. "As far as I know, they just want to make sure the kids are given good healthcare and a chance to be guided back to normal, before they move on."

"A noble cause." She said, clearly thinking. "Are they prepared for a long-term investment?"

"Yes."

That made her smile. "Good, because that is what it's going to take. Running an orphanage costs a lot of money. Around five thousand American dollars per month for each orphanage with room for twenty-five children to be precise." The smile disappeared again. "It's expensive and getting money for more orphanages is very time consuming."

The talk about more orphanages surprised me somewhat. I haven't had time to research it, but on the surface, Costa Rica seemed to be a modern place, making the orphanages Gabriella helped run enough for the whole country. "Really? I wouldn't have thought that it was a big problem here."

Gabriella snorted. "Trust me, it is. There are more than twenty thousand orphans here and that is not a lot compared to the other countries in this part of the world."

I was silent for a moment as I did a quick calculation in my head. Sixty thousand dollars might be a lot for a humanitarian organization but compared to the amount of money Parker had stashed away, it was next to nothing.

"I'll make you a deal." I said slowly. "If you help the foundation with the legal side of their 'boarding school', I will make sure they finance not one, but two other orphanages for at least ten years."

That got her to raise her eyebrows. "Can you do that?"

"Yes... or at least I can make sure that there will be a bank account, from which five thousand dollars are paid each month to two orphanages of your choice."

"I'll have to require that all the money are there from the start." She said after having thought for a moment. "Just to make sure the funding doesn't suddenly disappear, and the interest earned on the money should cancel out the inflation."

"That is fair," I said. "Do we have an agreement?"

"We do." Said Gabriella with a wide smile and a slight nod. "Ivan, if this goes through, I'll be so happy that I can't even explain it."

I glanced at my watch. "Well, it's too late to make calls now, but I can do it tomorrow morning and hear what they say."

"That would be wonderful." She exhaled, but then frowned. "Damn. I'm going home for a family reunion tomorrow and won't return until Monday. Can you call me or send me an email?"

"Sure. Then we can meet again at a later date." I said with a slight smile.

Gabriella lifted her eyebrows in surprise. "You're leaving now?"

"No, no, but to be honest, if I seduce you now, it'll feel like I had made a promise to get you in a better mood and I don't know what the people at the foundation will say to this, so despite you being an extremely sexy and passionate woman, I'll take my chances some other time." I said calmly.

Her mouth dropped open in disbelief for a moment, but then she started to laugh. I waited patiently, while drinking my cider, until the laughter died out a little.

"That's the most honest declaration of intent I've ever heard." She told me, tears of laughter in her eyes. "And it's refreshing as well as true." Reaching over the table, she lay a hand on mine. "Thank you for saying it."

Taking a hand, I gave it a quick kiss, smiling a little as the touch of my lips sent a shiver through her. "Well, I didn't want you to think that I'm not attracted to you. Now is just not the time to act on it."

"As I said, it's a refreshing experience." She smiled at me. "I have no idea what to say to this, so let's return to talk about the boarding school. As far as I know, there are no vacant boarding schools here in Costa Rica your foundation can acquire, so may I suggest an empty hotel?"

I hid a smile as she reached the same conclusion as Esther and I had arrived at. "Sounds like a good suggestion. Do you have a good real estate broker you can recommend?"

"Yes." She said without hesitation. "Rosie Astaphan. She's a specialist in selling hotels and as an old friend of mine, I trust her."

"Considering that you look like you're twenty-five, you cannot be a day older than thirty, so she can't be that old a friend." I said drily, causing her to blush a little. "But I'll take your word for it."

The rest of the evening was delightful, as we ate, drank a little and talked for a few hours more, before Gabriella had to get home, so she could get up in the morning.

I wished her a good trip and got a kiss in return, before she jumped into a cap and went home.

Smiling to myself, I walked to my room to get some sleep. I would call her to tell that the deal had gone through in a few days and with that the first step in setting up a place for the children was done, enabling us to start on the rest.

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Searching for a hotel

Start of August 2000, Costa Rica

To save time, Esther contacted Gabriella Delgado to take care of the legal side while the rest of the women did the research on the places where the abducted children were being held, and I went looking for a place where they could live with the help of Rosie Astaphan.

Based in the capitol of San Jose, Rosie Astaphan was a specialist in selling hotels just as Gabriella Delgado had said, and she was the reason I was sitting outside a small café in Limon on the Caribbean side of Costa Rica, drinking a cold drink, while waiting for her to show up. During the last week, she had already shown me four hotels, none of which was what I had in mind for the orphanage or 'Boarding school'.

A familiar figure coming closer made me look to my right and discovered Rosie Astaphan walking towards the café. Like many other people here, Rosie Astaphan was a mix of Latin and African descent resulting in a lovely dark brown skin colour, long wavy black hair that was pulled back in a ponytail, and a bright white smile, which she used to full effect as soon as she saw me.

Smiling back, I waved her over and enjoyed the sight of her as she came closer. Her lightly coloured sleeveless summer dress waved delightfully around brown legs, while being tight enough to show full hips and an ample bosom. In short, she was a pretty sight to behold.

As I gestured toward the chair opposite me, she sat down. "Hello again, Mr. Emilian. I hope you have had a good day."

"It's becoming better by the moment, now that I have you to look at." I said with a smile. "I guess that you have some hotels for me to consider?"

She nodded with a smile and took off her sunglasses. "Only one today... and please stop flirting... As I have said often enough, I have daughters that are old enough to marry you."

Since she was lovely, fun, intelligent and a widow, I had flirted with her from the moment we met and over the last few days, it had become sort of a game. I would flirt; she would protest and flirt right back, clearly enjoying it.

Winking at her, I said. "That may be true, but I'm not interested in your daughters."

"Take care or I might think that you mean it." She smiled and placed a folder on the table. "I have a property for you to look at. It's brand new on the market, so I think it would be a good idea to see it as soon as possible. Preferably today."

"Good. Would you like something to drink, while we talk it over?"

"Some cold juice would be nice."

I waved a waiter over and ordered two glasses of fresh orange juice.

The main problem with finding a hotel was privacy. Many of the hotels Rosie had presented me with were placed in tourist areas with easy access to the beach, but very little privacy and I didn't want that. Protecting the kids would be much more difficult in such a terrain, whereas the hotels further inland were less accessible.

The orange juice arrived, and I toasted Rosie. "Nice... Now tell me about the hotel."

"It's perfect. Just what you want." She said as she placed the glass on the table. "Located on a hill, it was part of an old plantation, before it was turned into an eco-tourism and spa hotel called Vista Verde nine years ago."

She glanced at the folder but didn't open it. "It has twenty suites for guests and a separate building for the staff and everything else needed. Aside from the BBQ grills, there's a huge and beautiful dining area, a conference centre that can be used for education, and a nice spa area with a Roman bath and a sauna. There're also buildings for yoga, fitness, and other physical activities. Since it's located near the mountains and not by the beach, it still has the old stables with room enough to hold twenty horses."

She stopped and from my experiences with her, that meant that she was about to give some information that she didn't think I would like. "And the downside?"

"The area is huge." Rosie said matter-of-factly. "All in all, it's 154-acre of land, with 3 1/4 acres of garden and there's even four cottages there, with their own kitchens and baths."

I was silent while I processed the information, causing Rosie to add. "The last downside is that the main house might have to be totally renovated before it can be used."

The hesitation in her voice made me lift an eyebrow at her. "And why is that?"

Rosie grimaced, but then shrugged. "Last year, Vista Verde was closed during the rainy season for renovations of the stables and outbuildings. During that time, the previous owner died from a stroke, and nobody noticed, so he lay dead in the main house for months before he was found. To be honest it stinks and while a few of the contractors I've talked with, think that it can be cleaned, most think that you'll have to renovate most of the house before the smell disappears... which could be quite expensive."

"So why would I want to buy a house that smells of death?"

"Because even if it needs a renovation, it's a steal. Seriously, at this price you'll only be paying for the land and get the rest for free... Especially since the family wants money more than they want the property, where their father died."

Put that way, it sounded like a good deal. "Fair enough... Let's go look at it."

We left the restaurant, got into her car, and drove to the property, which to my surprise was in the hills near Villa Bonita. It was a good start and it got even better. As Rosie had told me, the house looked perfect from the outside at least, but her statement about it being an old plantation house couldn't be true, as it looked a lot newer than that.

"Are you sure about the building date on this?" I asked when we stood beside the pool in the immaculate garden and looked at the house.

"As far as the lower levels go, the answer is yes." She said with another of her charming smiles and briefly consulted her folder, before looking at me. "The upper level is a new construction made to look like the lower level, but instead of stone it's made from concrete and steel. The roof is made from cedar shingles with a rubber coating beneath it and the whole house is hurricane proof in the unlikely event it's ever hit by one. There's even an emergency generator that kicks in automatically if the power to the hotel fails."

"Can we go inside and take a look?"

"Yes, but you'll have to go alone." She sighed. "I'm sorry, but I can't take that smell."

Rosie switched off the security system and opened the door for me, but didn't come along, as I walked inside. The smell of death hit me like a slap in the face. It wasn't as bad as some of my experiences in ancient times, but it was the kind of smell that would stick to everything it came into contact with and I could understand why most people thought that you might as well tear it down and build something new.

I took a quick tour of the house, breathing through my mouth the whole way. If you ignored the smell of death that seemed to penetrate the whole house, it was beautiful.

The floors downstairs were the same kind of tiles, that had been in the house in Spain, while the upstairs room had floors made of dark brown wood. Throughout the whole house, the brightly coloured walls reflected the colours chosen for the furniture in the room and it was all done with excellent taste and finesse. That there was an outstanding view of the surrounding landscape from most of the upper floor windows didn't hurt either. Besides the smell, I loved the place, and it was exactly what I had been looking for.

I walked out to tell Rosie the good news, but as I came out, she immediately covered her nose and mouth with her hand and backed away. "Sorry, Mr. Emilian, but you really stink."

Taking a sniff at myself, I agreed. The smell of death clung to me like a very bad perfume. It wasn't only my clothes that stank, but also my skin and hair.

"That can be fixed." I said with a grin and emptied my pockets, placing the things on the ground, before jumping feet first into the pool, clothes, and all.

The water was pleasantly warm and when I got my head above the surface again, I could see the stunned look at Rosie's face, which made me laugh.

Before she could say anything, I said, "Call the owners, Ms. Astaphan. Start with a bid of two thirds of the price they're asking, because that's going to take some work. If you think I smell bad, it's a lot worse inside."

Rosie blinked a few times, but then smiled and nodded. "They know. They have been here."

"Good. So, call them, while I try to get the smell to go away."

She nodded again, took a cell phone and made the call, turning around so I couldn't hear what she said. That she turned away also meant that she couldn't see what I was doing, so I used an Ars Mentalis trick to clean myself and the clothes, making the smell go away. Since I needed an excuse for not smelling any more, I took off the wet clothes and threw them on the tiles next to the pool and started washing all over.

I was finished washing and had waded to the shallow end of the pool, when Rosie turned around with a hand over the cell phone's microphone and said, "They want at least...Holy Christ!" She stopped speaking abruptly and for a few heartbeats I wondered why, but that became obvious, as she was staring at me with eyes wide in surprise. As she saw that I was looking back at her, she blinked a few times. "You're naked!"

"Yeah... well... it's rather difficult to wash all over with your clothes on." I explained, cursing inwardly as I had totally forgotten about the modern taboos about nudity when taking a bath publicly. "You were saying something."

Without taking her eyes off me, she nodded slowly. "Yes..." There was a long pause. "They want 75 percent of the asking price." She blinked a few times and then shook her head. "I can't translate that into dollars right now."

"That seems fair. I'll buy it."

"Okay." She said without removing her hand from the microphone. "Do you want me to go get you a towel from one of the cottages?"

"Nah. I'll be dry from the sun before you get back anyway." I pointed out. "Do you mind if I leave the pool?"

"No, no." She suddenly grinned. "It's your house now anyway... Or will be as soon as I get back to them. I guess they didn't want the hassle of getting it renovated." She turned around, as if she had just discovered that she was still on the phone and started talking into it again.

I walked onto the tiles. They were almost scorching hot from the sun, so I hurried onto the grass, which was pleasantly cool compared to the tiles.

Rosie finished her call and turned around again. "I'll... get the papers ready... when we get back."

She sounded more than a little flustered, so I looked over at her. Not only could I feel the desire emanating from her, but the initial look of surprise was gone and had been replaced with a look of lust, as she looked me over like a piece of candy.

Reaching out with my mind, I gently connected with hers and got a load of conflicting emotions. Most of all a lot of lust and fear. She wanted sex and she wanted it badly, but at the same time, she thought that she was too old for me to be interested in her and along with that came a fear that she had misunderstood our flirting and a fear of being rejected.

"You're a very sexy lady, Rosie." I said as I slowly walked over to her, using her given name for the first time.

She blinked in surprise when I gently took her hand and kissed it without taking my eyes off her.

Feeling the fear slowly evaporate from her, I kissed her hand again, making a little swirl with my tongue on her skin at the same time.

She shivered, but didn't move away, so I dragged her closer as I stood up, whispering. "I want you."

Her pink tongue wetted her lips as I leaned in to kiss them.

She tasted like sweet fruit and spices and the lips proved to be just as soft as I had imagined.

Caressing hands wandered over my upper body, and I repaid the favour by dragging her close as we kissed, enjoying the feel of her body against mine Her hands wandered to my back, and she gave me a hug as she broke the kiss.

"Damn, you're making me all wet."

I grinned and I kissed the soft skin of her neck. "Well, I certainly hope so."

That caused her to laugh. "No, I mean you're making my dress wet. You're still wet from the pool."

"Another easy fix." I smiled and took a hold of her summer dress. "Lift your arms."

She did and a moment later, I had pulled the dress over her head, leaving her standing only in a white bra and ditto panties.

As I was already completely naked, I found it more than fair and took a small step back to admire her. The bra somehow pushed her breasts up, which of course created a deep cleavage, and I could see the entire swell of her brown breasts with every breath she took.

My eyes wandered downwards, over the slight bulge of her stomach to the rounded curves of her generous hips, where white panties almost shone against the light brown skin.

"You're sexy." I told her as my eyes went back to her face. "Very sexy."

The big smile was back on her lips as she said. "Well, you're not too scrappy yourself."

"Thanks, that's nice to hear." I said with a laugh and unhooked her bra with one hand and peeled it over her arms and off, before I pulled her into another kiss. My throbbing cock pressing into her stomach, making her push against it, wriggling her hips a little. In return, I fondled her breasts, teasing her nipples gently with my fingers.

"Oh god," Rosie murmured. "That's so good."

Silently agreeing, I sank to my knees, letting my hands slide over her velvet skin until they reached her panties. Hooking my thumbs in the rim, I pulled them down, over her hips and down her legs, enabling her to step out of them with a shifting of her feet.

Unlike most women I had been with so far, she wasn't shaven, but either she had trimmed it or just naturally didn't have much hair down there, because she didn't have much of a 'bush'. More like a lawn of small curly hairs.

Giving in to temptation, I ran my hands up her legs again, ending with one hand on her ass, while the other teasingly touched her pussy, running a single finger along the length of her moist opening. Obediently, the lips spread, so I was able to slide my finger slightly inside her lips, wetting it in her juices.

Rosie's breath quickened and she moaned slightly when I teased her opening with my fingertips, while caressing her buttocks with the other hand.

Leaning closer, I inhaled her aroma, enjoying the odour of her arousal. She smelled fresh and a little spicy at the same time, the scent making my mouth water. With a smile, I darted out my tongue, flicking it on her clitoris, making her whole body shudder.

"Oh God, Yes!" She moaned, spreading her legs to give me room to move. Sliding two fingers into her, I continued to tease and lick around the clitoris, while slowly moving my fingers in and out of her, listening to her moans as they increased in pace.

I took my sweet time licking her, slowly pushing her towards a climax. However, due to her focusing on keeping her balance, she didn't quite reach the goal, but on the bright side, she became more and more aroused as time went by.

"You're driving me crazy." She groaned.

I removed my head and fingers from her and turned her around with a firm grip on her hips. "Lean against the tree."

She did it without hesitation, presenting her lovely ass to me. The position wasn't optimal for licking her, so instead I inserted my fingers in her again, while kissing and licking the soft skin on her buttocks.

"Damn, that's good" She groaned, pressing her ass back against me, driving the fingers deeper into her.

With a smile to myself, I placed my thumb on her clitoris, while the two fingers inside her gently pressed against the walls of her pussy, right where her internal pleasure point was located. Then I started to move my hand back and forth again, fingers massaging the pleasure point, while the thump slid over the clitoris with every move.

"Oh fuck!" She groaned and shivered as I picked up the speed, going faster and faster.

It didn't take long before she came hard, her pussy spasming around my fingers as she bucked and swayed while pleasure soared through her body. Unable to keep standing, she sank to her knees, almost hugging the tree to prevent her from falling.

After absorbing the Vis she had released, I enjoyed the sight of a beautiful and sexy woman in the throes of ecstasy for a moment, but then walked the few steps to my clothes to get the condoms from my wallet. I really wanted to fuck her and for most women in this day and age that meant using a condom... at least from my experience.

I rolled the condom on my hard cock while walking back to Rosie and kneeled behind her. She shuddered as I dragged my latex covered dick up and down her wet slit and I could feel it open as the tip of the head pressed against it.

Rosie looked over her shoulder, lust in her eyes. "Just push it in, please."

With a slight nod, I thrust forward, shivering as the sensation of being inside that warm, tight, welcoming pussy ran through me. Moving my hands to each side of her hips, I took a firm hold of her and began to slide in and out.

"Oh God, yes..." Rosie moaned, using her hold on the tree to hold still against my thrusts. "So good."

I went little harder and was rewarded as Rosie began to gasp with each thrust, and I could see her arms tightening around the tree as her pleasure began to build again. So was mine. With Petra and Delina occupied be other things and me being in San Jose and Limon, I haven't had sex in a week, and I was starting to feel the effect of that, as I was a lot more sensitive than usual.

Shifting rhythm to a slightly slower one, I reached around her so I could play with her clitoris. A moment later, my other hand found her swinging breasts, groping them while pounding my dick into her with long, hard strokes.

Rosie gasped loudly and a few moments later, she cried out in a sharp burst of ecstasy as she bucked against me, holding on to the tree as if her life depended on it.

I kept thrusting into her clenching pussy, wanting her to come again and it didn't take long before she did exactly that, wave after wave of pleasure running through her as she howled in ecstasy. Then her knees gave out and she rolled onto the soft grass, ending up on her back.

With a smile I took off the condom and lay beside her, so I could caress her while she recovered. We were not in a hurry and there was enough time for a second round.

"So, when are you going to renovate the hotel?" Rosie asked lazily, a while later when she had regained her breath.

Chuckling I said. "Rosie, a moment after you told me that the house was mine, we were busy pleasuring each other... I haven't really had time to think about it."

"Sorry." She giggled and playfully slapped me. "Hear that? You made me giggle like some schoolgirl and I'm 41!"

It was the first time she had ever mentioned her age and it made me raise my eyebrows in surprise. As a friend of Gabriella Delgado, I would have thought that they were about the same age. "Really? You don't look a day older than 30."

That was rewarded with a smile and a kiss. "You're sweet, but I did tell you that I had daughters old enough for you to marry. Kristine is 21 and Sienna is 18."

"Yeah, I just didn't believe you." I said with a grin and looked at the house again, as I turned my thoughts back to the task of getting the smell of death out of the house or rather, I needed a method that could cover up my use of Ars Mentalis to do the actual task.

"But to answer your question, I think that I will try something else than renovation first. Like cleaning the place, adding some vinegar and..." I paused as I tried to find the right word for the salt I was thinking about. In Ancient Egypt, it had been used for many things, but the reason that I wanted it was due to its ability to stop bacteria and smell, which was the reason why the Egyptians had used it in mummifications. Finally, I gave up finding the right word. "I can't find the right word in Spanish, but I know it as natron."

That caused her to look up at me. "Natron? As in baking soda?"

"No clue... I don't bake. What does it look like?"

"A fine white powder... Kinda like salt."

"Sounds right. Can you use it for cleaning as well as baking?"

"Oh yeah." She said with a smile. "I use it to clean the bathroom and kitchen."

"Good. Then ten kilos of that, is what I need along with... " I did a quick calculation in my head, mostly converting from old measurements to new ones. "Two hundred litres of vinegar, fifteen kilos of salt, three litres of Tea Tree oil and about a hundred lemons."

Laughing, she shook her head. "I don't even want to know how that is going to help, but I'll look forward to the result if it works."

I let a hand run over the smooth skin of her back and finished off by grabbing her ass. "Well, it will take a lot of work before I'm finished... and that is after I get what I need."

"My brother-in-law has a store that sells all the stuff you mentioned, and I can even get him to deliver it here... But first there's something that I need."

With that, she slid down my body as she put a gentle hand on my balls and a moment later, her mouth engulfed my dick as her tongue played on the head. It went from semi-flaccid to erect in what seemed to be two heartbeats.

She played a little more, but then removed her head while using her hand on the shaft. "Tell me that you have more condoms."

"I do. They're in my wallet over by my things."

Rosie stood up. "Don't move."

She almost ran over to my things, took a condom, and opened it as she walked back to me, her breasts gently bouncing with every step she took.

When she reached me, she swiftly put the condom on me and without saying a word, she sat down on top of me, guiding my dick into her wet pussy with a blissful look on her face. "Fuck! It's sooo good."

I agreed. Her pussy was squeezing and massaging my dick as she slowly rode me, and I could see her orgasm building up. As she came closer, she picked up speed, slamming her round ass down on me with a force that made her light brown breasts bounce wildly.

Reaching up, I steadied them with my hands and massaged them. She started to groan, so I caught her hard nibbles between my fingers and squeezed them tenderly. She seemed to like that, so I squeezed harder, and she let out a moan as she pounded down on me and came in an orgasm that made her collapse on top of me, shivering as she lay there.

Almost by themselves, my hands started to wander over her body and for a while she just lay there with my dick inside her pussy while I caressed her body.

"Damn, that was awesome." She finally whispered into my ear. "And thanks."

"Thanks for what? You did all the work."

"Thanks for letting me be in control." I couldn't see her mouth as her face was next to mine, but I could hear the smile in her voice. "I needed that."

I didn't argue, but my senses told me another story: Somewhere deep inside her she needed a little pain to go along with the pleasure, to be used sexually and hard, with the man in complete control. She also secretly wanted someone to look at her while she was being fucked that way, but as we were alone, the second part would have to wait, but the first part, I could manage.

"I'm glad to be of service." I said with a chuckle. "Are you okay again?"

"Yeah, why do you... " She started to ask but stopped when I flexed my dick. "Oh!"

"Yes... we're not done yet." I stated and took hold of her neck with my left hand, holding her in place and smacking her ass with my right. Not hard enough for it to really hurt, but hard enough for it to be felt. It made her jump, which made pussy move on my cock. "Now move that lovely ass of yours."

Startled, she slowly moved it up and down.

I smacked her again. "Faster."

This time she actually moaned as my hand connected with her ass and she started to move faster.

Since I was still holding on to her neck, it wasn't easy and after a few moments, she lowered the pace again, earning another smack. "I said faster."

By now, she was so wet I could feel her juices running down my balls, and her hips were almost rotating on my dick as she tried to keep the pace. Just to be on the safe side I reached out with my mind, but there wasn't a shed of fear that I would hurt her for real.

That was as it should be, so I smacked her again as she lowered the pace. This time I was certain that she did it on purpose, just to get the smack, so I gave her one more, a little harder this time.

She almost came from that, and she was groaning into my ear as she stopped moving. Instead of smacking her again as she had expected, I caressed her ass and waited patiently.

Finally, she started moving again and then I smacked her. The surprise made her groan again.

"I'm moving, I'm moving!" she panted into my ear before she kissed me passionately on the neck.

She was indeed moving, rotating her hips on my dick as she went up and down, sending shivers of pleasure through us both and I could feel small rivers of her juices running down my thighs.

I let go of her neck and gave her a shove that made her sit straight up, followed by smack as she had stopped moving. "I didn't tell you to stop."

Rosie started riding again, slowly, and teasingly.

Her nipples were still rock hard, so I grabbed them both between two fingers of each hand and twisted as I squeezed them. My "Faster!" almost couldn't be heard over her howl of pleasure.

I kept the pressure on the nipples for a few heartbeats and then let go, causing another moan.

Encouraged by her reactions I rubbed and twisted her nibbles as she rode me, stopping only when it became clear that she was lingering on the edge of orgasm.

I kept her there for a while, enjoying the feel of her pulsating muscles around my dick each time I smacked her ass or played with her nipples, but her undulating hips were doing their job and I could feel the need to come rise within me.

Smacking her ass again, I let the hand slide down to her pussy and wetted a finger in juices before it travelled up between the buttocks, reaching her anus and simply pressed the slick finger into her rear entrance.

She stopped moving abruptly, so I twisted a nipple with the other hand. "Move!"

Shaking and shivering, she did as I said, driving herself up and down on my dick, while I played with her nipples and fingered her ass.

It didn't take long before she exploded in a powerful orgasm, which almost made me come as well. Wanting to come, I pulled her down to me by the neck and started thrusting upwards with my hips, driving my hard cock into her again and again.

Kissing me desperately, she came again. Then a third time, making her shriek in delight. That was all I could take and I erupted with a groan, emptying myself into the condom, the feeling making her come for a fourth time.

Then she collapsed on top of me, utterly spent.

-----------------

We walked back to her car arm in arm and I'm pretty sure that if anyone could see the smiles on our faces, they wouldn't be in doubt for one heartbeat that we had very good sex.

"That was the best sex I ever had." Said Rosie with a sigh as we reached the car.

Seeing that her smile had turned into a somewhat sad expression, I asked. "So why do you look so gloomy?"

She stopped and turned towards me. "Because I doubt that you are willing to repeat it. You're a handsome young stud and I'm just an old widow, that happ..."

That was as far as she got, before I took a hold of her neck and bent her over the hood of the car, forcing her upper body down, so her ass was in the air.

"Listen very carefully, Rosie." I said and smacked her ass hard with my free hand. "You're a very sexy woman." I smacked her ass again. "Do you know how I know that?" Another smack.

"I don't know!" she cried out, but feeling a spike of lust from her, I lifted her summer dress over her hips and yanked her panties down, giving me free access to her ass before I smacked her again "Because I have an excellent taste in women." *smack* "Simply put," *smack* "I don't fuck stupid women..." *smack* "and I don't fuck ugly women." I smacked her quivering ass once more and used the short break to open my pants, as I continued talking.

"Do you doubt my taste in women?"

My dick was already stiff, and the condom seemed to roll on almost by itself as I waited for her answer. At this rate, I would have to buy some more condoms very soon.

"N-n-no." She finally stammered.

"Good, because if you were stupid..." *smack* "or ugly..." *smack* "then this wouldn't happen."

Without warning, I took the half step that placed me right behind her and buried my stiff cock balls deep in her dripping wet pussy.

"Oh shit!" she exclaimed, quickly followed by "Oh... oh... yeah!" as I pounded my dick into her so hard that the car rocked.

She covered her mouth with her hands, and I doubt that I had pounded her more than five times, before she stiffened all over and came in a shivering orgasm, followed by a muffled scream.

Shifting one hand to her hip and the other to her shoulder, enabled me to get a better grip and pick up the pace a bit.

"Oh my God... Oh... my... God." She mumbled into her hands and stiffened as another orgasm rolled over her. "Too good... I... can't... take... any... more."

Wanting her to have a third orgasm, I ignored her and pounded on, enjoying the feeling of her wet pussy around my cock and her skin against mine.

It didn't take long before she came for the third time and by then she had collapsed on top of the car, completely exhausted.

Carefully I pulled her panties up again and took her into my arms in a hug. At first, she hung there like some big rag doll, but after a while, she started to come to her senses and hugged me back.

"Rosie, you're a competent, intelligent and very sexy woman." I whispered in her ear. "And I do want to have sex with you again."

Lifting her head, she looked at me with a slight smile. "Good... but we need to make a deal."

"A deal?"

"Yes. No matter what you say, you're too young for me in the long run." She said and I could see that her insecure side had disappeared and was replaced by Ms. Astaphan, the confident woman that could handle most things by herself. "Let's just have a nice friendship and some sex, when we feel like it."

I looked into her eyes and understood. At some point, she wanted a new man and a stable one at her own age. One she could grow old with.

"Deal." I said and kissed her. "You're a clever woman, Rosie. You know what you want, and you're going to get it and have some fun in the meantime. So, when we reach the town again, you go back to being Ms. Astaphan and I'm Mr. Emilian."

That sentence made her tilt her head as she looked at me. "You actually do understand. I'm amazed." She smiled her brilliant smile. "Now let's go do the papers and get all the rest you need."

The papers didn't take long to do and less than an hour later, the hotel belonged to the Vista Verde Foundation, though the deal still needed some official stamps before it was completely closed. Rosie and I walked to her brother-in-law's store, so I could buy the cleaning materials I needed for the house.

For some reason I had assumed that Rosie's late husband had been of Latin descent, but the man that Rosie introduced as 'Frank Astaphan, my brother-in-law' was a middle-aged white man, which proved for the millionth time that assuming things isn't really a good idea.

"So, Mr. Emilian, you bought the old Vista Verde hotel." Said Frank after Rosie had explained the situation. "That sounds like a good deal, if you can make the smell go away without breaking it all down."

"I plan on it, Mr. Astaphan. "I said with a smile. "Your sister-in-law said that you might be willing to deliver the things I need."

He glanced over at Rosie for a short moment, but then nodded. "That can be arranged. What exactly do you need?"

I repeated the list I had made in my head by the house. He noted it down and nodded. "That I can get you. Any specific cleaning equipment you want?"

I thought about it and shook my head. My knowledge of modern large-scale cleaning equipment was non-existent. "Not really, but if you have something helpful, just add it to the list."

"Okay." He said with a slight smile. "You're not afraid that I'll add a lot of stuff?"

"Not really." I said with a laugh. "If you were that type of person, your sister-in-law wouldn't have recommended you."

His smile got a bit wider. "True. When do you want it?"

"Well, I won't get the keys to the hotel before the papers are stamped and what not, so in a four days' time?"

He laughed. "You're lucky if it goes that fast."

"No, I have a very well-connected lawyer and financial expert both working on this."

"Good. Those paper pushers sometimes need a kick in the behinds to get moving... Around ten?"

"Sounds fine," I said. "How much is it going to cost me... minus any extra equipment you find?"

Frank did some calculations on a calculator and gave me a price, which I paid in cash.

After that, Rosie drove me back to Limon and said goodbye with a smile and a promise to meet up some other time.

------------------

"How did it go today?" Asked Esther later, when I returned to Limon and Dream Weaver. Since the big catamaran was moored in Limon, Esther and I had used it as our base here while looking for a hotel, since we would otherwise have to have Petra or Delina drive me back and forth from Villa Bonita or rent a room in the city. Both options didn't really make sense when Dream Weaver was moored here anyway.

"Perfect. We got a hotel called Vista Verde, but it needs to be cleaned before it can be used." I said and explained the state of the building, making her grimace. "Can it even be used without a total renovation?"

"I think so. I have a very old recipe for a cleaning solution that I would like to try before we do anything else... if that's not working, we'll have to bring in some professionals to clean it up or simply tear it down. In theory, the place will work without access to the main building, but I would prefer to avoid that scenario."

She nodded and started to ask more questions. Instead of answering them, I handed her the folder Rosie had given me. "Here... It's easier if you read it yourself."

With a slight shrug, she took the folder and sat down to read, while I got a cup of tea.

She looked up when I sat down in one of the chairs. "Twenty suites and some additional cabins? Isn't that too much?"

"Yes, but some of the cabins can be converted into something else and I would rather have too many beds than too few."

"Good point." She said with a smile and then asked. "What're you going to call the school by the way?"

"I frankly don't know. Do you have any ideas?"

Her grey eyes looked thoughtful for a moment. "Did you say the hotel was named Vista Verde?"

I nodded. "It's Spanish for 'green view'."

That made her chuckle. "To be honest, Vista Verde Boarding School sounds good."

"Well, it would be Vista Verde Internado in Spanish, but that sounds just as good."

Ester took a few heartbeats to test out the name and then nodded. "Yes. It's a good name."

"Good... If we need a sign to put on the gate or something, could you arrange that?"

"No problem, I'll just add it to the list of things to do."

----------------------------------

On the other side

Mid-August 2000, Costa Rica

While waiting for the papers to be approved, I decided to leave the rest of the planning to Esther and visit the two estates Parker the had on pacific side of the country. One had been used by Parker and the other by Curtis. Both to see what they were like, but also to transfer the security staff's loyalty to me, so they could help us liberate the children.

Esther had to stay in Villa Bonita to finish her plans for converting the hotel into an orphanage, so I enlisted Delina as a chauffeur and since Riya as a medic wasn't really part of planning the rescue mission, she wanted to come along as well.

The two villas were located less than an hours' drive from each other and we visited Curtis's Villa first, for the simple reason that it was the nearest.

The Villa itself was impressive and luxurious, and like Villa Bonita, it was surrounded by a large wall and other security measures. However, since I had the correct codes, we were allowed to enter.

The first thing I did was to transfer the staff's loyalty to me, just as I had done in Villa Bonita, but no sooner was I finished before Riya discretely tapped me on the arm.

"Mr. Ivan. Can I talk with the security force?" She nodded in the direction of two dark-haired women, who had the same light brown skin as she did. "I think I know one of them from back home."

"Sure. You can do that while we tour the house."

Her face lit up in a smile and a moment later, she walked towards the two women.

I admired her ass for a few heartbeats before the butler, a local named Santiago, came over to give Delina and me a tour of the estate, starting with the front garage, where seven luxury cars were kept in perfect condition while their owner was away. All of them were red and judging from the pride in Santiago's voice, I was supposed to know that Ferrari was one of the best car producers in the world. I didn't, but I managed to keep a straight face as he talked about the seven different Ferrari models parked there despite having no idea about the difference between a F50 and F54 or why one of the other cars was named Maranello.

"Petra is going to go bonkers." Chuckled Delina as we looked at the cars.

"Oh, why?"

Delina showed her teeth in a gleaming white smile. "She's a car nut. Granted, she's mostly into German cars, but Italian cars are a close second."

To be fascinated by something wasn't new. In the past, I had known people who had a thing for a certain kind or horses, weapons from a famous weapons smith, or works of a bard, but I hadn't known that Petra liked cars. It made sense since she had been a driver and bodyguard for high-ranking officers, which made cars part of her job, but she could just as easily have regarded them as just another tool to be used.

Santiago must have sensed that we weren't really into cars because the next place he showed us was the main building.

While impressive from the outside, the interior design was kept in a black and white style, I really didn't like. It was most likely very modern, but it was also cold and impersonal.

On the bright side, there weren't many personal knickknacks in the house and even Curtis' private rooms looked more like a picture from a magazine, than a place where people actually lived.

The only place with a glimmer of personality was the huge walk-in closet, where Curtis kept his clothes as well as his collection of expensive watches, jewellery, and other accessories for men.

Where Parker had been very traditional dressed, Curtis clearly favoured a more modern look, with lots of colours and most of the jewellery tended to lean towards the flashy side. Thankfully, Curtis's style in watches was more subdued and there were even a few I liked.

To my surprise, there was an entire section with lots of clothes and accessories with the same logo as on Curtis' cars: A shield with a prancing black horse against a yellow background, and the name 'Ferrari' written in black letters under it. There were Ferrari valets, ties, pens, keyrings, T-shirts, caps, sweatshirts and just about everything else that could feature a logo.

"Well, he sure had a thing for Ferrari." Commented Delina under her breath as she looked it over. "On the bright side, it's a pretty logo."

"Yeah, it could have been a lot worse." I agreed and looked at Santiago. "Let's see the rest of the out-buildings."

"Yes, sir."

We had just exited the house, when Svetlana, a heavyset Russian brunette that was the leader of the security force, came walking up to us.

"Can I have a moment of your time, Mr. Ivan?"

I stopped and looked at the Russian. Shorter than Delina, she was wider over the shoulders and as she walked her baggy camouflage clothing stretched over the arms and legs, making her look overweight. Her pretty face was a stark contrast to the body, as it was finely chiselled and had nothing of the heaviness of her body.

"Certainly, Svetlana."

She nodded to the butler, who took the hint and said his goodbyes before he walked away. When he was out of hearing range, she turned towards me again. "Did you know that the swine that was our former boss was a paedophile?"

I nodded tiredly. "Yes... I'm trying to clean up after him."

Her face and voice were almost expressionless as she asked. "Does that include the underground complex?"

"The what?" I asked in surprise.

Svetlana sighed and explained that there was an underground complex, where Curtis kept some of his favourite victims. Guarded by a small force that wouldn't allow anybody other than Curtis or other members of the small special force to go down there, they were almost impossible to reach.

Activating my memory, I searched for any information regarding an underground complex in the information I had taken from Parker, but to no avail. That meant that Curtis had to have done this on his own accord, without telling Parker about it.

"By all that is Holy." Mumbled Delina when the security guard had finished telling us about it. Then she looked at me. "We got to rescue them."

Before I had a chance to answer her Svetlana snorted. "That's not gonna be easy. The only contact we have with them is when we send food down the secret elevator in the kitchen, which by the way isn't big enough to transport a person. We haven't even seen any of them since Mr. Bunyan..." It took me a few heartbeats to recognize the name Curtis had used in Costa Rica. "... went on his vacation. We don't know how many there are, but judging from the amount of food, I would say somewhere between seven and nine, depending on how many kids there are down there, which we don't know either."

I sighed as I thought it over. While I agreed with Delina, rescuing the kids was going to be bloody. Most people weren't willing to spend years in an underground complex, so chances were that the special force was heavily mind-controlled. Unfortunately, that also meant that they might have been ordered to kill the kids and then themselves if the underground complex came under attack, which meant that I had to rely on stealth. On the bright side, Curtis's desire to keep his victims close at hand also meant that the entrance to the underground complex most likely was in his bedroom or office.

"Come. Let's check out the office and bedroom." I said and started to walk, followed by Delina and Svetlana. "There has to be a way into the underground complex from there."

We started our search in the office and I had expected to find the same kind of hidden elevator that Parker had installed in Villa Bonita, but there was nothing there, so we moved on to the bedroom, but there was no elevator there either. That left only the big walk-in closet and it didn't take long before Delina noticed a painting in a frame with a glass covering that seemed stuck to the wall, while the other two paintings in the room could be taken down.

Walking closer, I looked at the painting. It was a pleasant, but otherwise unremarkable landscape painting, showing a sunset over a beach and the only strange thing about it was that it sat in a solid metal frame and was covered with thick glass.

I tried to turn it, but nothing happened. In fact, it didn't move at all no matter how hard we tried.

"It has to be bolted to the wall from the other side." Grumbled Delina after a while. Looking at the picture like it had offended her somehow.

"Well, at least we know, that there has to be something on the other side." I replied thoughtfully, as I looked at the picture. It had to be a lock of some kind, but why make a lock you couldn't touch?

A thought hit me and made me smile. Curtis had been able to use telekinesis. He didn't have to touch any lock physically as long as he could see it and the glass made sure of that.

Reaching out with my mind, I pressed different parts of the picture behind the glass and to my satisfaction, one of the clouds slid into the picture when I pressed it, there was a 'click' from somewhere and then the potion of the wall swung open, revealing a door that looked like the door to the elevator in Villa Bonita. It was protected by an electronic lock, which required a combination of numbers before it would open.

I was about to try out some random numbers, when Delina stopped me. "Please, don't do that, Mr. Ivan. It can be programmed to set off an alarm if the wrong number is tried three times."

For once I cursed out loud, causing both Delina and Svetlana to look at me in surprise. It took me a few heartbeats to understand I had been swearing in Baylon, which meant that they hadn't understood anything.

"Sorry." I pondered the situation for a moment. "Can we pry the doors apart?"

"Sure." Said Delina with a nod. "But if the builders had any brains, that would set off the alarm as well."

"Yes, that is standard for security door." Agreed Svetlana.

That made sense. "What about the sides?"

"Most likely steel," Said Svetlana. "and this part of the house is built right up to the cliff, so I'm willing to bet that the whole elevator shaft is encased in sheer stone as well."

Stone and steel. That I could work with. Turning, I looked at Delina. "Could you go get the bag in the car, please?"

"Of course." She replied and walked out of the walk-in closet.

"Excuse me for asking, but what're you going to do?" Asked Svetlana curious.

"Rescue the kids." I answered without looking at her, as I took out the drawers containing the watches and jewellery and placed them on the ground. "But I don't want witnesses, so you might not want to be here for that, if you want to return home."

She looked at me in silence for a few heartbeats before she slowly asked. "How're you going to get through that door?"

"Trust me, I'll get through it."

Her eyes widened a bit. "You're like him... I mean... You have those Powers!"

That surprised me a bit. In my encounter with Parker, he had demonstrated that he could use telekinesis, but it was the first time someone had hinted that Curtis could do the same and Svetlana would have to have witnessed that to make the connection between opening a door and Powers. That she could even speak about it, also told me that the transfer of the loyalty codex had been successful, because otherwise she wouldn't have been able to even speak about it.

"What do you mean by 'Powers'?" I asked.

The Russian woman hesitated for a moment, before she said. "Believe me or not, but Mr. Bunyan could manipulate things with his mind alone, like switching the light on or off or opening a door." She tilted her head. "There's no way through that door with normal means, so I'm guessing you have a way to do it, that isn't quite normal."

I resisted an urge to shake my head in wonder. Magic and other powers had by and large been absent from this world for more than three thousand years, but for some reason humans accepted that those powers existed with an impressive speed once they had seen them in action. It was as if they somehow knew that once upon a time some of them had wielded those powers and the memory of that was still buried in their minds.

It wasn't even a cultural thing, since every culture I had ever encountered in the thousand years I had travelled the world, have had their own heroes with supernatural abilities.

Bringing my thoughts back to the task at hand, I looked at Svetlana and calmly asked. "Do you really want an answer to that?"

She hesitated for a moment, but then shook her head. "No... but you can't be all bad, if you want to rescue those kids."

"Thank you." I chuckled and looked over as Delina entered the room again, carrying my bag. "Here you go."

"Good. Now excuse me, while I change clothes."

The bag contained my Iron Silk clothes as well as my sword set, my remaining throwing knife and a pair of low boots with soft soles. I quickly undressed and was in the middle of taking my Iron Silk clothes on, when I heard Svetlana mumble "Nice!!" in Russian, as there was a spike of lust from her.

Delina chuckled. "I don't know what you said but be warned: Ivan speaks Russian." She thought for a moment and then added. "To be honest, he speaks most languages."

I chuckled at that. Because many of my ranged Ars Mentalis tricks depended on verbal commands which required that the recipient knew the language, I usually try to learn as many languages as possible.

Using Ars Mentalis and someone to learn from, I could learn any language in a couple of days and besides having learned Spanish, English, Korean, American Sign Language, Mandarin and Cantonese from Alice, Rita and Karen, I had also learned Croatian from the red haired Natasa, that I had met on the beach during the Night of San Juan.

The five women I liberated in Malaga had allowed me to absorb even more during the trip across the Atlantic Ocean. I had learned Russian and Ukrainian from Petra, Hebrew and Arabic from Esther, Tamil and Hindi from Riya, Urdu and Punjabi from Ayanna and both French and the Gambian Mande language from Delina.

Since it was one of the few tricks that was reversible, meaning I could use it to teach other people a language I knew, I had taught all five women Spanish as that was the language of choice in this part of the world. Besides that, Riya wanted to learn Latin for her medical studies, while Esther had wanted to learn French, and Delina and Petra opted for American Sign Language, which they thought would be practical while diving. Something they had both tried and liked. Ayanna, who liked French cooking, had been in doubt for a while but ended up learning French.

Getting my mind back to the present, I looked in the large mirror and saw Svetlana blush slightly. "Don't worry, Svetlana. I can take a compliment."

That just made her blush even more as I took on the jacket as the last part, after having secured the throwing knife on my forearm. That made the other arm feel oddly empty, but until I got the other throwing knife back from Alice, that was just the way it was for now.

For a moment, I stood still, enjoying the feeling of Iron Silk against my skin and the memory of other times that came with that feeling. Then I donned the scarf and hat, before I nodded to myself and turned towards the women. "Svetlana, now it's the time to stay or go. If you chose to stay, it's gonna be for a long time."

"I'll stay." She shrugged. "Not much to return home to, to be honest... and those girls need to be rescued."

"Your choice." I said and looked at the wood covered wall, studying it for a heartbeat, before activating an Ars Mentalis trick by saying "Pulvis (Baylon: 'Dust')".

A heartbeat later, the wood disintegrated, causing a light dust to spread in the room, while screws and every other non-wooden object fell to the ground.

"... Mother of God." I heard Svetlana mumble in Russian behind me, but I ignored it. With the wood gone, I could see the steel casing of the elevator and the brick wall surrounding it.

Focusing on the left side, I repeated the Ars Mentalis trick and made a large hole by pulverizing both the bricks and the cliff behind it. That made even more dust fly into the air, so I cleaned the entire room with yet another trick. Now I could see the side of the casing, but more importantly, as I had removed a bit too much at the bottom, I could see that there was no hole for the elevator to descend into.

"That's not an elevator!" Svetlana suddenly blurted, as she studied the casing. "That's a double security door."

Having no clue what she was talking about, I looked at her. "Double security door?"

She nodded. "Yeah. It has two doors, but you can only open one door at a time, limiting the number of people who can get through in a hurry."

"Thank you." I said and turned back to the cliff. The important part was that it wasn't an elevator since it allowed me to go through the stone instead of using the door. Drawing the sword, I entered the state of Mutatur Tempus Mente (Baylon: "Time shall be changed in the mind."). My brain accelerated and everything else slowed to a crawl. Mental Power surged through my body, strengthening the muscles, and making me faster.

I dusted another chunk of the cliff, making a large hole into what looked to be a natural cave system. What wasn't natural was the electric light on the wall, but it did enable me to see three armed guards standing in the cave, looking in my direction. Two were relatively close to the door, but the third was further away.

Like most people in this area, they were short, but their wide shoulders spoke of physical training. All three were dressed in dark clothes and carried a gun in a holster by their side and a rifle slung over their shoulders. Their facial expressions were one of surprise, but as soon as they saw me, they started to un-sling their rifles.

As always, when using Mutatur Tempus Mente the opponents seemed to move extremely slow, and I used the time to look for any security cameras. Finding none, I returned my attention to the two nearest guards, who were still trying to get their weapons to bear.

They never made it. Slipping into Vis Mediation for a heartbeat, I activated Pugnando Mico Gradus (Baylon: "Combat Flash Step") Vis, which allowed me to move incredibly fast for a short distance, while still being able to react to my surroundings. None of the two soldiers had time to react as I moved past them in a blur of speed, using the sword to kill them both, but the power only worked to take me past the two first guards, so the third got a throwing knife in the throat, making him fall to the ground.

Returning to normal speed, I made sure that all three guards were dead before I retrieved my knife and sneaked further into the cave system, trying to ignore the spine-chilling feeling spreading in my body.

Just like some beautiful places have a lot of natural positive Vis running through them, the cave system was filled with negative Vis, making it feel like a cemetery. Any positive Vis had been negated long ago and I could feel the negative Vis of the place, indicating that a lot of death and other terrible things had happened down here. It was just as suffocating as going into an extremely foul-smelling sewer and it would negate at least some of my Vis Powers, but I would have to make do with the rest.

The next guard I came upon didn't discover me right away, so I used the opportunity to study his mind pattern. To put it mildly, it was a mess. The mind-control had been done with a lot of power, but very little finesse and it was so extensive that the guard almost couldn't function as a normal person. I doubted that even the Mind Healers at Baylon would have been able to do anything, as any personality had been wiped out, leaving an empty husk of a person behind. Unfortunately, it was a husk prepared to kill anybody that entered the underground complex or, if failing that, kill the kids and then themselves to eliminate any potential witnesses.

Since I was reading his mind anyway, I picked out the layout of the complex, along with where he thought the five remaining guards were as well as the position and appearance of the four girls that were held prisoners. To my surprise, I recognized three of the four blonde and blue-eyed girls, as they had been in the photo album I found in Curtis' house in Malaga. I had thought that they were dead and that they were here was good news. At least I hoped so.

The caves they were held in were laid out like one of the large hotel suites I had seen in San Jose, with a central 'living room' surrounded by five smaller caves. Four of them functioned as bedrooms, while the last was the bathroom.

I shook my head. While rough and simple looking, the cave complex was, at least in my experience, an impressive piece of engineering as both the girls and the guards had excellent facilities, with electric light and running water. Of course, modern technology made this a lot easier than it had been in ancient times but doing both well and in secret must have taken a lot of resources.

Another strange thing was that none of the guards were sleeping. With four being awake and walking around, I would have expected the other four to be sleeping or at least resting, but for some unknown reason that didn't seem to be the case.

The third strange thing was their placement. Considering that there was only one entrance to the cave, I would have placed the guards at the front of the entrance where they could stop any potential invaders, but the guards were all over the place. Of course with the mindlessness of the guards, they might just have been wandering around since they had nothing else to do.

Getting my head back on track, I used a powerful mind attack to stun the guard, or rather, I tried to stun him, but the damage Curtis' mind control had done to his mind rendered the attack useless. He did feel the attack and spun around, saw me, and went for his weapon. Repeating the attack from earlier, my sword penetrated his heart before he could do anything.

Cleaning the blade, I sighed. With the guards being immune to mental stun attacks the chances for taking them alive were severely diminished.

With the mind control Parker had used, the guards would keep on fighting no matter how wounded they were, and that raised the possibility of me being wounded. Something I couldn't afford if I were to free the kidnapped girls.

On the other hand, with the damage to their mind killing the guards might be for the best. There was no way people this damaged could ever be anything else than the mindless killing machines they were now.

Just to be on the safe side, I examined the mind of the next guard I came across as well, but the result was the same as his mind was just as destroyed as the other had been. Unlike the others this guard was wearing some sort of armor on his torso and while I doubted that it would stand up against my sword, I took off his weapon arm, before the follow-up strike hit his unarmoured neck, cleanly cutting off his head.

Going through the complex, I slowly, methodically, and silently took out the rest of the guards, which left me with the four girls. Luckily, their cells had a window by the door, allowing me to study them before I walked inside.

I sent a silent prayer of thanks to the goddesses, when I saw that they were in good physical condition. They had been fed well and wore nice dresses, which was a lot better than I had expected considering how long they had been here. According to the year noted under the pictures in the photo album, Curtis had abducted both Christina Becker and Jade Wilde three years ago, while Anna Weber had been taken last year. I didn't recognize the fourth girl, but I assumed she had been taken the year in between the others, meaning that she had been here two years.

All of them looked to be around the same age as Cyra and Zen, making them twelve or thirteen years old.

Mentally, it was a different matter. They were all scared out of their minds and it took a lot of both talking and Ars Mentalis to calm them down to a level where I could explain to them that Curtis wasn't coming back, and I was going to take them out of the caves. When they finally understood it, they started to cry in relief.

While I comforted them, I scanned their mind patterns to see what kind of mind control Curtis had imposed in them. To my pleasant surprise, Curtis hadn't been nearly as heavy handed with the mind control on the children, limiting it to a minor behaviour alteration, preventing them from leaving the cave. That was good news and removing the light mind-control didn't take much energy. I would have preferred to do it in better surroundings, but as long as the mind-control was there, they couldn't willingly leave the cave, so it needed to go.

As I guided the girls out of the caves, I reached out to Delina and told her we were coming out. There wasn't much point in rescuing the kids, just to have our own security guards shooting at us.

"< Are they okay? >" Delina asked immediately.

"< Physically, yes. But they'll need a lot of mind healing >"

"< Okay... I'll tell Svetlana and the rest to relax... Are you okay? >"

"< Yes, and thanks for asking. I've already told the four girls that the female guards are there for their protection >"

"< Good. No need the scare them more than they already are >"

When we reached the security door again, I discovered that Delina and Svetlana had been joined by Riya and the two other Sri Lankan guards, as well as the two other Russians, meaning that the Romanians and the Pakistani were responsible for guarding the Villa.

The six women quickly put their weapons away and started to fuss over the four girls, who were slightly taken aback by the attention. They quickly got over it though and allowed Riya and the rest of the women to take them to the kitchen for some ice-cream. That left me alone with Delina and Svetlana again.

The Russian woman was looking at me with something close to awe, while Delina curiously asked.

"How many guards were there?"

"Eight, but after guarding this place for so long, they weren't really prepared."

"Wait. You killed eight guys armed with automatic weapons with a fucking sword?!" Svetlana blurted.

"No, I also used a knife." I said and frowned as I remembered something. "Which reminds me, that we need to collect the bodies later and dispose of them."

Svetlana shook her head a little as if to clear it. "Leave that to us, sir. We'll use one of the helicopters to dump them later."

"The helicopters?"

Svetlana nodded. "Yes sir. Mr. Bunyan used a helicopter to get faster to and from the airport, so we have a SA Dragonfly 16 parked in the hangar over by the garage." She paused for a moment. "Actually, there's also a SA Dragonfly 30 over there, but that one arrived recently, so we haven't flown it yet. We need your permission to do that."

"I thought it was just a large garage." Said Delina.

"No, no... that's a real hangar with spare parts and all."

"Who flies it?" I asked curiously.

"Oh... Both Elena and Afifa are pilots, and Stella is a helicopter mechanic. I think that's how Mr. Bunyan got the idea." She stated matter-of-factly, causing me to nod again. For various religious and cultural reasons many of the Armed Forces around the world didn't allow women in combat roles but used them for support. Consequently, many of the former military woman Parker and Curtis had bought through Erebus had skills that weren't directly related to fighting. Like Riya was a medic and Ayanna was an Airforce technician.

"Fair enough." I said and looked at the sword. "Now, please leave, Svetlana. I need to change clothes and discuss something with Delina."

"Yes. sir." The Russian said and started to walk out, before she stopped and looked at me. "Sir, Mr. Bunyan imported a lot more than these four kids and some of the older ones were taken away. Are you going to rescue the rest as well?"

"Yes... Every single child we can find."

That caused her to smile and say "Good!", before she saluted me and left.

I waited until I heard the bedroom door close and then took off the jacket as quickly as possible. I knew it was only in my imagination, but it felt like the stench of Negative Vis clang to my clothes.

"Bad?" asked Delina.

"Worse than bad." I said as I dropped the shirt on the floor. "Filled with negative energy."

She shrugged. "Well, that was to be expected."

I suddenly realized that Petra was the only one I had explained Vis to and as I got out of my pants, I said, "It's not just an expression, Delina."

"What do you mean?"

"What I am about to tell you is a secret. You can never tell this to anybody else. That's an order."

"Yes, sir." She nodded as the Loyalty Codex kicked in.

With a sigh, I said. "Besides being a Mentat, I can also draw on Vis Vitae... Life Energy if you will... to make some extraordinary tricks. It's a positive force, created by good feelings and life." Getting an idea, I said. "You know about the ancient Chinese symbol for Yin and Yang, right?"

She nodded again.

"Vis is very similar to that, with a positive and a negative side." I pointed over my shoulder. "That cave system in there is filled with negative energy, which is not good, when you use positive Vis like I do. I feel like I have been crawling through a sewer."

She looked slightly confused. "What do you mean? What kinda 'extraordinary tricks' are you talking about?"

"Mostly healing, but it can be used for other things as well." Holding out a hand, I slipped into Vis meditation for a heartbeat, choosing a low-powered, but flashy Vis power. Big blue sparks ran down my arm and onto my hand, dancing from the tip of my fingers and illuminating the area around us in a pale blue light. "Like this."

Delina looked at the sparks almost as if she was hypnotized and walked closer to touch them, only looking up when I moved the hand out of her reach.

"If you touch them, you'll get a slight shock." I explained as I brought the hand back. "It's not dangerous, but I needed to warn you."

"Thanks." She hesitated, but then shrugged. "I need to touch the sparks, just to see if they're real."

Carefully, she reached out and touched my hand, getting shocked a bit as the sparks travelled from my hand to hers, glittering like small stars against her skin for a moment, before they faded.

I stopped the Vis-Power, making the sparks disappear and caused her to look at me. A moment later, she nodded. "Okay, I believe you... but where does the energy come from?"

"From just everything that makes people feel good." I smiled slightly. "Orgasms being one of the best sources. Especially for me, since women tend to release more positive energy than men, when they come." She looked at me with wide eyes, as I continued. "However, one woman can only release so much energy, so more women mean more energy. It's not harmful in any way, but it means that I will never want to be dependent on only one woman."

"And here I thought you were just a womanizer." She said with a smile.

I returned the smile. "Oh, don't get me wrong, I like women and sex a lot, so mostly getting Vis Vitae is just an excellent excuse for having sex. Not that I really need one, but there're times when I actually need the energy women release."

She considered that statement for a moment. "Like now?"

I shrugged. "Well, I did use an awful lot of Vis in there and I feel drained, but it's not critical." Chuckling, I added. "And besides, it will take some hours before I'm ready for anything sexual. Violence and bloodshed don't turn me on. On the contrary, it turns me off, so we'll have to wait for at least an hour."

She walked over to me and to my surprise kissed me softly. "Ivan, you're the most powerful and dangerous man I've ever known, but somehow you also manage to be as sweet as honey."

--------------------------------

A bath and a change of clothes later, I joined the women in the estate's giant kitchen where the kids were getting ice cream.

Riya saw me immediately and walked over to me with a serious look on her face.

"I did a quick examination of the girls and physically, they are in good condition."

"Good." I said in a low voice. I already knew since I had done a quick scan of their bodies earlier, but it was always good to have a second opinion. "But it's not their bodies I'm worried about. They've suffered a serious trauma."

She sighed and nodded. "I know, but my skills are limited to the physical, so I guess the rest is on you." She paused. "How good are you really at healing the mind?"

"I'll be surprised if there's someone better on the planet." I answered truthfully. Due to Ars Mentalis, I had a very good understanding of how the mind worked and I'd been trained by some of the best mind healers in the world. Added to that, Ars Mentalis was uniquely suited for healing the mind, as it could be used to weed out bad thought patterns.

Riya blinked a few times in surprise. "Seriously?"

"Yes." Glancing over at the kids, who were looking at us with tentative smiles, I sent them a smile and looked back at Riya. "We can talk more about that at another time and place."

She nodded again. "Good idea."

Riya walked on and I walked over to the refrigerator to get something cold to drink, before I turned and looked at the four girls again.

With their blonde hair and blue eyes, they looked a lot like each other, despite having no family relations. Christina Becker and Ida Vogt were both German, but from two different parts of that country. Jade Wilde was from England and the last one, Anna Weber, was from France.

They were looking both happy and content as they slowly ate their ice cream, but from past experiences with liberated prisoners that had been abused, I knew that there was still a lot left to be healed before the kids could return to anything resembling normal.

It would take time and I sincerely hoped that the school would be ready soon, because we needed a place where the kids could heal and be healed in peace, so they wouldn't suffer too much when they were returned to their parents. For now, they would have to stay in Villa Bonita.

That would also give me time to read their minds to make sure they didn't suspect or knew that it was someone close to them that had facilitated their abduction, and not just a random kidnapping based on their looks. I didn't want to send these kids home to an unsafe environment where there was a chance that they would be abused again.

It also meant that I had to explain to the four girls that they wouldn't go home immediately, which might not go over well with them, but I hoped that the security question would persuade them.

Projecting trust into the girls, I walked a few steps closer, making them look up at me.

"Alright, girls, we need to talk... "

Thanks to the trust I had projected into them, the four girls accepted that for their own safety, they needed to stay with us for the time being, and I was on my way to get some sleep, when Delina hugged me from behind and whispered. "We have some unfinished business, you and I."

"Sounds promising." I managed to say, as her hand wandered down to my dick, massaging it through the pants.

"My thoughts exactly." She chuckled. "Follow me."

It's not often that I simply get fucked, but when we had entered the room she had found for us, Delina did exactly that. Using my dick as a tool to get herself off as fast and hard as possible. It wasn't as good for me as the other times we had been together, but to be fair, that wasn't exactly necessary for her to orgasm and release the Vis Energy I needed.

"Good enough?" Asked Delina with a smile, as she lay down beside me.

"Exceptional." I told her and kissed the sweaty brow. "I feel much better now."

Her lovely dark eyes narrowed in thought. "So exceptional sex, but not enough energy."

That made me laugh. "Something like that."

"How much more do you need?"

"More than any woman can give in one session." I said, caressing her soft skin. "And no, we can't just do it again with the same result. It takes a few days for the energy to regenerate."

She nodded and gave me a kiss. "If you're still tired, just sleep a little. I'll wake you up later."

With a yawn, I nodded. "That might be a good idea."

"Sleep well... I'll go get something to drink."

------------------------------

I was awoken by Delina, who softly said. "Don't open your eyes yet. Just enjoy it."

Wondering what she had planned, I just nodded and a moment later, I could feel her soft hands travel down my body under the sheet, until she found my cock.

The already soft hands felt like they turned to velvet as they gently caressed me, slowly making my dick grow hard. The one hand left the shaft and travelled to my balls, lightly teasing the sensitive skin with her fingertips.

The covers moved as Delina crawled under them and then her moist lips slid over the head, while the tongue played, sending shivers of pleasure through my body, and causing me to moan.

Apparently, the cover was in the way, because without removing her head from my dick or even breaking her rhythm, Delina removed them and continued with more energy than before.

It was amazing and as she had told me, I relaxed and enjoyed it, growing increasingly horny as time went by. Delina kept it going for quite a while, worshipping my dick with her mouth and hands but eventually she slowed down and moved her mouth to my stomach, raining kisses and licked up my chest until she reached my lips.

The kiss she gave me was soft, almost tender, and extremely sensual, as her soft lips caressed mine. That she kept steadily stroking me just added to the intimate feeling.

Suddenly, I felt the bed rock as another person climbed onto it and I realised Delina wasn't alone and for a moment I wondered who she had persuaded to join her and how, but then she broke the kiss just long enough to whisper, "Not yet. Keep them closed a little longer."

I nodded yet again and a moment later, the unknown woman placed a knee on both sides of my hips and another hand joined Delina's on my dick, guiding it until I felt wet lips of a pussy closing around the head. Then the unknown woman pressed down, causing the head to slip inside her.

I groaned into Delina's mouth, as the walls of the pussy closed around the head. It was an extremely tight fit, but she was so wet that she was able to keep on going, taking all of my dick inside her as she sat down on my lap.

I groaned again as she lifted off, her vaginal muscles clenching my dick firmly all the way to the top before relaxing as she went down again.

Delina broke the kiss again, whispering, "Is it good?"

I nodded. "Yes."

"Open your eyes." She whispered and moved her head away.

The sight that met me when I opened my eyes was both surprising and magnificent. Svetlana was sitting on top of me, riding me slowly, with an expression of pleasure on her pretty face. The surprising part was her body.

From the way her clothes had stretched over her body, I had thought she was overweight, but it was the complete opposite. She was trained to a degree I've rarely seen in a woman and certainly more than any other woman I had met in this age. Even most men would have been put to shame by her impressive physique, with bulging legs and upper arms, muscles moving like strong ropes under her skin as she moved up and down on my dick. The stomach tightening every time my dick hit a particular good spot, showing a six-pack.

Her breasts were small, most likely due to the workout it took to keep her body looking like that, but despite their limited size, they were nicely rounded, with hard, dark-red nipples.

All-in-all, she looked too masculine for my taste and it wasn't the sort of body that I would normally go for, but I had to admit to myself that her pussy was doing wonders to my dick, and judging from the expression on her face, she was enjoying it almost as much as I did.

The keyword was 'almost'. Yes, she was enjoying it, but I could feel that something was off... or at least not as good as it could be.

Reaching out with my mind, I connected with hers and quickly read her needs and wants.

As always, it was complicated, but all in all, she preferred to be fucked instead of being the one fucking a man, which she was in this position. Since it was connected to her physique, I discovered that she had started building her body due to Parker, who had mind-controlled her and used her for sex, while she was a guard at Villa Bonita. Since Parker had disliked muscular women and small breasts, she had simply started to do the only thing the loyalty codex allowed her to do, which was working out, as burning fat would do both of these things. The tactics had worked, as Parker had stopped going after her and eventually transferred her to another house.

Retracting from her mind, I smiled at her and gestured that she should come closer. Svetlana lowered her upper body, clearly expecting a kiss. She got one, but I also took hold of her and rolled us over, so she was under me.

Her eyes opened wide in surprise and she groaned as I started to move, using long strokes that almost took me all the way out of her, before I dived back in. My hands sought and found hers, pressing them into the mattress as I leaned forward to kiss her.

She eagerly responded, but at the same time she tried to move her hands, testing if she could get free. I just tightened my grip on her. Without leverage and with my weight, there was no way she could free her hands free unless I let her, and I wasn't about to do that.

Instead, I moved a little higher up her body, so my pelvic bone hit her clitoris. Unfortunately, that also meant that the head of my dick hit the bottom of her pussy and judging from her grimace it wasn't pleasant, so I backed off a little so it wouldn't happen again and thrusted deep into her.

This time the angle and dept was perfect and Svetlana threw her head back, groaning with pleasure, as I fucked her. Her legs came around my hips, holding me tight, but not so tight I couldn't move, and I steadily drove my dick in and out of her wet pussy.

"Please...please...oh God... please... don't stop." She cried and buried her head in my shoulder, her body twitching and shuddering beneath me, intensifying by the heartbeat, as she came closer to her climax.

Feeling playful, I lowered the pace, slowly thrusting in and out of her, making her journey towards the orgasm a crawl, while still going fast enough for her to come.

Suddenly, her powerful legs closed around me, as she threw back her head and shouted, "Ohhhhhh FUUUUUUUUCK!", her body shuddering against mine and her pussy clenching and releasing in waves. Along with it came a wave of Vis energy and I absorbed it eagerly, feeling it washing my tiredness away.

Raising my upper body and moving my knees forward, I used my grip on her arms to drag her into a sitting position on my lap before letting go of her hands and dragged her into a hug while she was still coming.

Moaning and shaking, she threw her arms around my neck and kissed me, her tongue diving into my mouth, as her hard nipples pushed into my chest. I returned the kiss, running my hands down her back to her firm ass, groping it.

Svetlana moaned into my mouth and then yelped as I suddenly dug my fingers into her buttocks, rocked back to keep my balance and stood up. With her arms around my neck and her legs locked behind my hips, she was abruptly lifted from the bed with my dick buried inside her.

She was lighter than I had thought, weighing about the same as Alice. Then again, Svetlana was almost a head shorter than the tall volleyball player, so the weight both made sense and made it easier for me to lift her as I stepped off the bed and walked the few steps to the wall.

Svetlana broke the kiss and looked wide-eyed at me when she felt the smooth wall against her back. I winked at her and let the wall hold the bulk of the weight, as I carefully released one arm and sneaked it between my body and her leg, before taking hold of her butt again. Then I did the same with the other arm, splitting her weight between my arms, my hips, and the wall, before I started to fuck her again.

"Fuck, that's deep!" She moaned and rested her head against the wall, while my dick penetrated her pussy deeper than before, making her groan louder and louder with each stroke.

Picking up the speed, I pounded her hard and fast and it didn't take long until she came with a loud squeal through gritted teeth.

As before her pussy clenched around my dick, increasing the pleasure for both of us and causing me to moan, but instead of stopping or slowing down, I kept the pace, slamming into her hard and fast. Her arms strengthened their grip around my neck, as she looked at me with her eyes wide and a look of pure lust on her pretty face.

Kissing her shortly, I began fucking her even harder than before, hard enough to cause my balls to slap against her ass and her to yelp with every hard thrust.

I was sweating now, drops running into my eyes, but a quick shake flung them away. This was too good to stop, and I could feel that Svetlana was ready to come for the third time. A moment later, she squealed, and her hips bucked against mine as she exploded in an intense orgasm.

Deciding to see if I could get another climax from her, I kept fucking her, going as deep as I could with every thrust.

"Stop!" She groaned. "Too sensitive!"

"Tough luck." I growled and kept pumping in and out of her, enjoying the way her pussy squeezed my dick. "I want you to come again."

For a second, she looked shocked and then tried to use her legs to push me away. It didn't help. While I don't have the bulging muscles that strong humans tend to have, hundreds of years of Martial Arts, sword- and archery training had made my muscles as strong as Iron Silk ropes, and while I had been temporary weak when I got out of the trance, the Salamander power I had used during the Solstice in Malaga to save Karen had taken care of that.

In short, my arms were stronger than her legs and for some reason that realization made her come again in a few heart beats, howling with pleasure as the waves of her orgasm soared through her body, making her pussy tighten in pulses around my cock again.

Now, I could feel that she really couldn't take any more. The nerves were simply too excited and if I continued, it would quickly shift from being extremely good to very bad, so instead of continuing, I turned towards the bed, intending to place her there.

In my efforts to make Svetlana come, I had forgotten all about Delina, but she was laying naked against some pillows on the bed, her long brown legs wide apart as she slowly rubbed her clitoris while watching me fucking Svetlana.

I placed the Russian on the bed and watched her curl up with a satisfied smile on her face, before looking over at Delina. "Are you up for a quick one?"

"Oh yes!" She nodded fervently and rolled over in the bed, before getting on her knees, presenting her perfectly rounded ass to me. "I'm so close!"

"Same here." I grunted as I moved in behind her.

Grabbing her hips, I slammed my cock deep inside her and held it there for a moment, enjoying the feeling of her quivering pussy around me.

"Oh yes!" She moaned, looking over her shoulder at me, "Take me until you come!"

Taking a deep breath, I began fucking her just as hard as I had fucked Svetlana a moment before. Delina squealed her approval and added to the pleasure by driving herself backwards, pushing my cock deeper inside her.

She was so wet my cock was making squishing noises each time I slammed her, and I could feel her juices running my thighs, not to mention a rapidly approaching orgasm. Watching me taking Svetlana must have seriously turned her on.

I committed that to memory for a later date and focused on fucking her. Delina wasn't the only one getting close to an orgasm, yelping and whimpering with each stroke, and I groaned when I felt my balls tighten, getting ready to release their load.

Delina suddenly howled as she came, and the feel of her pussy clenching around my dick set me off as well. Groaning as the orgasm overtook me, I erupted deep into her spasming pussy, while she pushed back against me, moaning deep in her throat.

When the eruption ended an endless moment later, Delina let herself fall onto her side and looked at me with a smile. "That was awesome!"

"Yeah." I agreed as I returned the smile. "Short, but good."

She glanced over at Svetlana, who had seemingly fallen asleep and switched to the Gambian Mande language, as she continued. "Is she going to be a regular sex partner?"

"I doubt it." I replied calmly in the same language. "I like women with softness and curves. Sure, she's pretty, but muscles don't turn me on."

That made her laugh. "Well, you looked turned on from where I was sitting."

"Oh, I was. She's a pretty woman, I'm just not normally attracted to her body type." I explained with a slight shrug.

"Ahh. Okay." Said Delina and yawned. "I need some sleep."

"Then sleep. I'll go for a walk."

"Have a good walk then."

"Sweet dreams."

----------------------------

The area around the estate was beautiful and I enjoyed the view as I walked the grounds of the estate to think about what to do with the two houses on this side of Costa Rica.

Considering the amount of Negative Vis in the building, I didn't want to use it for anything, and if Parker's second house wasn't different, I didn't want to use that either. However, despite the mind-control Parker had used and the inherent darkness in that, Villa Bonita didn't feel that way, and Parker's other house would most likely be similar to that.

Another thing to consider, was that if Parker hadn't known about the underground complex, it had been done in extreme secrecy, and one thing I had learned about this modern time, was that you needed permission for just about anything, making it impossible to keep something as large as an underground complex secret. So, I doubted that Curtis had a permission for it, making it illegal, and since I would own the houses as soon as the paperwork was done, that was a problem for me as well. Fortunately, that was something a specialist could be hired to fix, so I decided to do just that as soon as we got back to Villa Bonita.

The third thing to consider, was that Curtis and Parker had kept some of the artwork they had stolen over the years for themselves. Not what I would call a smart move, but they had been convinced that they could either claim innocence or use mind-control on any inspectors to avoid getting into trouble for it.

Since they had mind controlled most of the high-ranking police officers on this side of Costa Rica, they weren't wrong about it, but it was yet another thing I wanted no part off and thus I needed to arrange for the stolen art to be delivered back to its owners in a way that couldn't be tracked back to me.

In any case, we needed to remove everything belonging to Curtis from the house and have it transported to either Villa Bonita or Parker's other estate (Called 'Villa Blanca'), while most of the security guards would have to be moved to the school or Villa Bonita.

As the leader of the security force here, Svetlana could be in charge of packing Curtis' things for transport and have them moved to another location, while Elena and Afifa, the two helicopter pilots, could transport Riya and the four girls to Villa Bonita.

I sighed. As always, the list of things to do was getting longer every day, but the available time remained the same, meaning I had to delegate more jobs that I had already done so far.

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