"'We' are my board of directors, six totally trustworthy and closemouthed men who have been with me from the very beginning."
Alix reacted to this startling information with a look of complete dismay.
"Of course, we'll want to see the information that tells where El Primero is located so we can decide if salvage is feasible," Ponce said.
"But I can't give her location away," she said, crushed. "Not until I have a firm commitment from your company. And then there's the matter of negotiating terms."
Ponce dropped her hands and stepped backward, folding his arms across his chest. "I didn't doubt that you expect to be paid for your information," he said with irony. "I'm surprised that you waited this long to bring it up."
"Money isn't the main thing, but I'm in this business, too. I want twenty-five percent of the treasure plus my regular salary as a diver, which should include a bonus for underwater photography."
Ponce laughed, but not unkindly. "I knew you were going to hit me with something like this, and I'm prepared. If we get the go-ahead from the board I'll see that you're well compensated. The board will never agree to twenty-five percent," he told her, more serious now. "Fifteen."
"Twenty," she shot back, determined to hold her ground.
Ponce moved toward her, a warm light emanating from his eyes. She concentrated mightily on the gold chain around his neck. It reminded her of her goal—treasure.
"There's a precedent from our last salvage operation for twenty percent of the find. I'm sure I can get the board to agree that's what you deserve. If, that is, I can convince them to salvage El Primero at all. I'm an ex-officio member of the board, and I don't have a vote, but I promise I'll do everything in my power to push it through. I believe in you, Alix. I told you I play hunches, and you may be the best one yet."
"I think you really mean it." She heaved a sigh of relief and, suddenly exhausted, she leaned against the wall. Behind her a map rustled.
"Come on, you're tired. I'll fix you a drink. Today must have been a strain for you, full of emotional highs and lows."
She lifted her hands to her face, pressing them against her eyelids. Emotional highs and lows, he'd said. She thought ruefully that he didn't know the half of it.
Downstairs he led her into a room furnished as a living room. "I hold press conferences here, and this is where I meet informally with members of my crew," he explained in reply to her curious look. He indicated a long couch. "Sit down. You look beat."
She sank into the soft, cushioned depths of the comfortable couch. He busied himself at the bar on the far side of the room, then handed her a snifter of brandy and sat down beside her.
She took a sip. "Good stuff," she said.
"The best. Tell me about finding those letters. What a thrill it must have been!"
In her relief at the way this was going, she felt like opening up to another human being for the first time in a long, long while. "Yes, it was wonderful," she said, and the words came pouring out. Ponce was silent, watching her with a relaxed interest much different from the wariness he'd displayed when they met.
Alix told of her total astonishment when she first stumbled over the initial letter, then of tracking back through reel after reel of microfilm to find others that would corroborate the first. It was a whole chapter of her life that, in her need to keep the letters secret, she had not dared to open to anyone until now.
"I've spent time in Seville, at the Archives of the Indies," Ponce said. "I've employed historians to dig through stacks of records there, looking for clues, hints, anything at all that might lead me to treasure. None of them has ever found anything as meaningful as this."
"Strangely enough I was on to the secret of El Primero de Mayo even before I found the correspondence between Daré and Hoyo Solorzano," she told him.
Ponce's eyebrows shot up. "How?" he asked.
"Well," she said, settling herself more comfortably on the couch, "I researched a paper for one of my former college professors when I first arrived in Spain. He was writing an article for an historical journal about the captains of the Spanish galleons that sailed the seas between Europe and the New World. During the course of that research, I found the only known biography of Antonio Daré, the captain of El Grifon and, as we know now, El Primero de Mayo."
"I didn't know such a biography existed." Ponce seemed fascinated, his attention riveted to her story.
"Daré was something of a maverick among sea captains. His biographer was Fray Miguel de Ribas, a monk who knew him in the monastery where he retired after he and Hoyo Solorzano failed to salvage King Philip's jewels. Fray Miguel portrays Daré as a colorful and eccentric character, full of tales of the seafaring life."
"I'd like to read that biography sometime."
"The original is in Spain, of interest only to specialists in Spanish maritime history," said Alix. "I do have a copy of it in the original archaic Spanish, and I'd be glad for you to look it over sometime, though the translation is tedious. Fray Miguel mentions Daré's obsession with the first of May—a date on which Daré, who went a little bit bonkers in his old age, would rave on and on every year about lashing winds and driving rain—"
"The first of May—'el primero de Mayo' in Spanish," said Ponce softly.
"Exactly." Alix smiled. "Wind and rain—a hurricane. The biographer thought Daré was ranting about a disastrous hurricane that took place on May first. It's unlikely, though not impossible, that a hurricane would occur at that time of the year. They usually strike in late summer or fall."
"A monk who had spent his life in a Spanish monastery wouldn't know that," mused Ponce.
Alix nodded in agreement. "Probably, if I were to read Daré's biography more carefully, I could find other clues that, along with the microfilm, would verify El Primero de Mayo's existence on the ocean floor."
Ponce shook his head in amazement and admiration. "All these years I've been paying people to look for hints of treasure, and they've never turned up as much information as I've heard from Alix Pendenning in one night," he said. She felt a sense of electricity and excitement radiating from him; he was one of the most vibrant men she had ever met.
"Now you've heard how I became obsessed with searching for sunken treasure," said Alix, wanting suddenly to know more about him. "Tell me what sparked your interest."
And then she was listening spellbound as Ponce told her about the very first gold escudo he'd found while working a wreck off Sebastian Inlet as a teenager.
"I'd dreamed of finding treasure from when I was a wide-eyed kid listening to stories of commercial fisherman who swore those wrecks were still down there. Later, I talked to divers who wouldn't reveal much information for fear of getting in trouble with authorities for illegal salvage."
"Divers you worked for?"
"Ones I worked with. My mentor–a cousin who followed the rules himself–hired whoever happened along. I was with him when I plucked my first gold piece off the floor of the ocean and realized what it was." Ponce looked reflective for a moment, and very nostalgic.
"You recognized it right away?"
Ponce laughed. "An old codger I'd met on the beach near the Sebastian Inlet used to look for them in the dunes after storms. He'd found a few pieces of eight and described them as looking like an Oreo cookie. You know, the filling of the Oreo would be the coin, and the cookie part would be the crust that had gathered on the outside from being so long in the ocean. So when that Oreo appeared in front of me down on the floor of the ocean, I knew it wasn't edible."
Alix laughed too, pleased that Ponce enjoyed sharing details of his first find. Their eyes met, glowed in recognition, warmed to the acknowledgment that a rapport was established between them. Ponce reached over and touched her hand, which lay palm down on her knee. Unable to tear her gaze from his silvery eyes, she turned her hand over, resting it trustingly in his. His fingers tightened, gripping hers for only a few seconds. Then they relaxed, but not before she felt an electric flow of energy from h
is hand to hers.
This peculiar sensation unnerved her. She was uncertain about this situation. She'd already decided that there was no room in her life for a relationship of the sort that her mind, going off on a tangent of its own, kept conjuring into unbidden images.
She clamped a tight lid on her emotions, then ventured a look at their clasped hands. Her eyes fell conveniently on her wristwatch.
It was well past midnight.
"I can't believe we've been talking so long," she said, thinking that, amazing as the rapid passage of time was, at least the late hour was an easy out.
"I'd better get you home."
He sounded regretful, but he released her hand and took her empty glass back to the bar.
As they prepared to leave, she checked her purse for the reassuring roll of microfilm. Yes, it was still there, the important information that told the location of El Primero de Mayo, and in her jacket pocket was the roll she had just shared with Ponce. A thought occurred to her.
"Do you have a safe in here? I'd like to put this roll of microfilm in it." She removed it from her pocket and held it out to him.
"Of course." Ponce took it from her and went upstairs again. While he was putting it in the safe, she thought of the second roll of microfilm, the one that told the location of the shipwreck. But she didn't want to part with that yet. Although she trusted Ponce completely, she didn't know his associates. She didn't want anyone to be privy to that particular information until the board gave the go-ahead.
Ponce swung the heavy office door open and they stepped out into the moist air. Crickets chirped somewhere, and again the scent of honeysuckle was strong in the breeze.
"The honeysuckle smells wonderful," said Alix when Ponce had locked the office door behind them. "Where is it?"
"Not far from here," he told her, pocketing his key and slipping his arm around her shoulders. Alix didn't mind; in fact, she liked the warmth of the physical contact with Ponce. Suddenly he said, "Would you like to see it? The honeysuckle is in full bloom now. It's beautiful."
She found herself saying, "I'd like that."
The night air would have chilled her had it not been for Ponce's arm around her. They walked slowly along the sidewalks, deserted now. Ancient buildings leaned in on them from either side of the street. Ponce gestured at a low building on their right, U-shaped and constructed of coquina rock. "That's Casa del Hidalgo, the Spanish government's exhibition and cultural center. Across the street is the Hispanic Garden, with its statue of Queen Isabella. See that arbor beside the plazuetta? That's where the honeysuckle grows."
The honeysuckle billowed across the heavy top poles of the arbor, creating a shadowed and secret corridor. Even from across the street the fragrance wafting from the tiny yellow flowers was strong and heady.
Ponce slid his hand down her arm, a slow, supple gesture, and wrapped her hand in his. Her hand felt pliant and soft between his strong fingers and wide palm. They crossed the street and entered the bower of honeysuckle, disappearing into the sweet-smelling tunnel.
"How lovely," murmured Alix, who felt as though she were drowning in opulent fragrance.
She could barely see Ponce until her eyes adjusted to the flower-filtered starlight. They stood apart—only not so far apart that she could not sense his dynamic presence, his ebullient energy. His dark skin looked velvety smooth. His eyes were smoky in the darkness, and her head felt bubbly and effervescent.
Fragrant honeysuckle, sweet and languorous, dipped down in bunches and swirls between the bars of the trellis, separating them. But slowly, their movements seemingly inhibited by the heavy air around them, they moved toward each other, first wanting, then seeking. They met before a great loop of flowers, cool and edged with green, and she saw that his eyes, cupped by their lower lids, now revealed a new sultriness. Her own lids felt heavy, and she wondered what she must look like to him.
Self-consciousness vanished as he dipped his head toward hers through the loop of honeysuckle and caught her mouth with his.
She didn't know which was the more prominent sensation—that of the honeysuckle framing their faces, wrapping them in fragrance, or Ponce Cabrera's lips touching hers for the first time. But then there was no question; his lips won, first tentative, finding her out, discovering the contours of her own lips now totally possessed by his.
Then, more confidently, he moved upon her mouth with such tenderness, with such knowing and wanting, that even the honeysuckle faded away into the night, leaving her aware of nothing but the warm moistness of his lips, so amazingly, unbelievably sensual and desirable. And it wasn't just her lips that were involved—this one kiss seemed to have lifted her into a kind of suspended world, a place where skin tingled, where sensation spread from the confluence of their lips and melted through her, diffusing hotly through her body.
The sweet fruity scent of honeysuckle brought forth a ripeness within her; she burgeoned, swelled, grew impatient for the picking. For she was ready to be tasted, to be savored and appreciated as no man had savored her since Daniel.
His lips released hers, and impatiently he brushed the encircling branch of honeysuckle away. He stood before her now, and his arms went around her in a singularly possessive gesture, pressing the full length of her to his hard, masculine body. Then he was kissing her again, and this was no tentative, romantic kiss but a kiss of power and might, of passion and promise, of forthright desire. And she clung to him, not denying her own answering passion, wondering if she had lost her mind. She ceased to smell the cloying scent of honeysuckle—her nostrils, her whole being, filled with the musky male scent of Ponce Cabrera.
"You know I want you?" The question was sharp, direct, and for a moment she buried her face in his broad chest, drawing her hands forward and resting them on his shoulders, noting the little knobs beneath the skin there, protrusions of the bone. His body must hold other little secrets that were small deviations from the norm. Everyone had them, whether they were moles, odd curves, or soft convexes where there should have been hollows.
Would she get to know the idiosyncrasies that distinguished Ponce from the rest of the male populace? Would he learn hers, discover the two dimples at the base of her spine, note with interest and delight the butterfly-shaped birthmark below her right hipbone, laugh at the way her left little toe turned over on its side? A blanket of intimacies spread out before her, and she wondered if they would pick it up, wrap it around them, and cloak themselves in its warmth.
She released his shoulders. He kept his arms around her waist. She looked him full in the face and his eyes drew her into their smoldering gray depths.
"I'm very attracted to you." She drew a deep breath. Admitting this had been a big step. She could hardly believe she'd heard herself correctly. She exhaled, gaining time. Then she said, shaking her head, "I'm not sure it's right for us, Ponce."
"You're right for me, Alix. I sensed immediately that you weren't like most women. There's a quality about you, a responsiveness to the world, that most people lose by the time they're twenty or so. It's a jadedness, a wariness about what kind of garbage the world will dump on them next. Somehow you've missed it. You haven't given in to it."
She stepped backward, feeling slightly offended. His hands dropped from her waist. He must be telling her she was naive.
"I've had plenty of garbage dumped on me," she said slowly, thinking of Daniel.
"I didn't say you hadn't. I'm only observing that you haven't let it get you down. You're so refreshing—have I failed to explain what I mean?" His eyes searched hers anxiously for reassurance. She felt somewhat relieved, and she smiled at him, unable to resist his charm and his earnestness. She'd heard lots of lines in her time, but Ponce's words rang too true to be one of them.
"Oh, Ponce. It's nice being with you like this. The honeysuckle, the romance, a beautiful spring evening. I just don't want to get carried away. I don't want to be swept off my feet."
He studied her, letting time interpose itself between them to
dull the bright passion that had swept them along, threatening to overwhelm their senses. Then he smiled, an easy smile that penetrated and warmed the cold spot deep inside her, a smile that seemed to acquiesce.
"I'll take you home," he said quietly, caringly. He put an arm around her waist and walked her across the starlit plazuetta with its flowering planters and its dark statue, and Alix wondered if, after all, she had already been swept off her feet.
Chapter 4
She didn't see him the next morning, and she knew why. He was busy checking her references. She had given him the name and telephone number of the curator of the Spanish Maritime Museum, and she knew he would contact Bobby Turk. There was nothing to do but wait for Ponce to verify her background and assure himself of her integrity.
It was actually something of a relief not to be around him. She had expected her meeting with the renowned Ponce Cabrera to be stressful, but not in the way it had turned out to be. It was disconcerting to discover that she wasn't immune to sexual matters. At least not where he was concerned.
She spent all morning waiting futilely for a maintenance man to come and replace a burnt-out fluorescent bulb in the tiny kitchen. In the early afternoon, keeping a sharp and watchful eye out for Daniel, she dragged a lounge chair across the grass to the bulkhead that bordered Salt Run. She wore a sleek bikini for sunbathing and carried a book to read, though she found she was unable to concentrate on it. Instead she kept gazing out over the water and thinking about Ponce.
Or was she thinking about herself? Once she'd covered the basics—his gray eyes, their color so changeable from mood to mood; his crisp black hair falling in curls over his forehead; the way he somehow gauged her feelings and knew when to firm the gentleness of his touch into a more intense caress—once she'd thought about all those things she found herself caught up in her own reactions to him.
Certainly it was more than a physical thing—she knew herself well enough for that. Physical magnetism made up part of their attraction, but there was also the fact that she and Ponce were interested in identical things. Even after so short a time together she sensed that he possessed the same drive and commitment she did, and the idea that she had met a kindred soul was both compelling and fascinating.
The Beach Bachelors Boxset (Three Complete Contemporary Romance Novels in One) (The Beach Bachelors Series) Page 4