by Cherry Adair
“Penny for them.” Jonah murmured, once again sitting next to her. Callie wasn’t sure how that had happened since he’d been seated at the other end of the table when she’d arrived for dinner.
“My thoughts are worth a lot more than a penny,” she said lightly, draining the last cold drop of tea for something to do with her hands and mouth.
He always needed a shave, and tonight was no exception. The scruff looked good on him. Sexy. Bad-boy sexy. The kind of man a woman like her rarely, if ever, attracted. She was too by-the-book, and she suspected that Jonah had thrown away the rule book in his teens.
“Is your ring too big?” His voice only carried the eighteen inches between them. “You might want to keep it in the safe, I’d hate for you to lose it.”
“It’s insured.”
A warm breeze made the small white lights dance and sway overhead, leaving it hard to read him. The smell of him made her hormones sit up and pant. It was ridiculous that soap could turn her on like this. Maybe she should just use it herself and get over it.
“You smell like the tropics,” he said.
God … “It’s sunblock.” Eager—more than eager—to change the subject, she raised her voice to include the others. “Who was your visitor this afternoon?”
Jonah’s half smile was annoying. “Are you aware Fire Island is inhabited?”
Realizing that she was listing to the side, Callie straightened in her chair. “I don’t know about inhabited. People go there to climb the volcano or camp, I think. I’ve never been there, and that’s about all I know. Why? Were your visitors from there?”
“Three of them showed up unannounced.”
“That was very neighborly.”
“Who’s this?” Saul asked from the other end of the table.
Jonah filled everyone in on the three elderly men who’d showed up, and made light of what sounded to Callie like a rooster fluffing its feathers to scare off the fox.
“Are you saying,” she asked, amused, “that three old men threatened to kill themselves if you didn’t go over there tomorrow?”
“Nope. They tried to impress on me that if I didn’t show up, their lives would be toast—but not voluntarily.”
“Senile dementia,” Vaughn suggested, refilling his wineglass, then filling Leslie’s. Without missing a beat, Jonah moved the bottle well out of Brody’s reach. Vaughn continued, “For all we know it was spies from another salvage operation coming to see what we’ve discovered. You didn’t tell them about our city, did you?”
The mention of a rival salvage company coming to scope them out sent a little shiver down Callie’s spine. Like a fox in a henhouse, she was sitting right in the middle of them, having enjoyed a pleasant meal.
Jonah shook his head. “I’m supposed to report to their head honcho. Tell him what we’re doing here. None of their business, but I’ll go because these geezers really seem to believe they’re in danger.”
“If they th-think they can just waltz in here and grab our treasure, fuck them!” Brody said.
Besides her natural distaste for sloppy drunks, Callie gave Jonah props for cutting Brody off. Drinking and sailing didn’t mix well and put them all at risk.
“Maybe they’d heard rumors about the sinking of Ji Li, and want a cut if we find anything?” Callie put the mug down because she was fiddling. Loosely clasping her fingers together, she rested her hands on the table. “Then they most assuredly know about the ruins under her.”
Jonah leaned back in his chair, not looking in the least concerned that someone else was trying to horn in on his salvage. “What they know is immaterial. They have no jurisdiction over us, and we have the right to salvage what we’ve claimed.”
“Do you think they’ll make trouble of some kind?” Saul looked concerned.
“Maybe fifty years ago,” Jonah told him lightly. “They’re ancient and harmless. Hell, my abuela could take all three of them. I think they’re curious, and bored. We’re something new in the neighborhood and we offer some summer entertainment.”
Jonah had just revealed two things. He had a grandmother. And she was Spanish. “You have a grandmother?”
Rydell had told her the Cutters had no relatives other than themselves. Jonah had been a surprise. A half sibling. Clearly accepted by his brothers, since they’d handed him a multimillion-dollar ship with all the bells and whistles.
He cocked a dark brow. “Why so surprised? Did you think I was hatched?”
“I—no.”
He smiled. “She’s a spry eighty-two, and lives in Cádiz with seven cats and her boyfriend, who happens to be a younger man of seventy-three.”
“Is that where you’re from? Spain?” She hadn’t noticed before, but there was a breath of an accent on certain words now that she listened for it.
“Born there, went to school in England, then got a bachelor’s and a master’s in marine science from Webb Institute. That’s where I met Maura.”
“You have degrees?” She didn’t mean to sound quite so incredulous.
“Marine engineering and naval architecture. Before I signed on as Nick’s captain, I was designing ships.”
Designing ships? Rydell hadn’t mentioned that Jonah had even gone to college, let alone that he was a marine architect.
“Nick?” Callie knew all about Nick Cutter. He’d scuttled his own ship with a fortune of diamonds on board to elude the authorities. He was as crooked as his brothers.
“My middle half brother. Same father.”
Callie glanced down the table, but everyone was listening to something Saul was telling them and not eavesdropping on Jonah’s story.
Daniel Cutter, the man who apparently couldn’t keep his equipment in his pants, had lived with his wife and three sons on Cutter Cay, in the Caribbean. He’d also lived and been “married” to Jonah’s mother. Callie wasn’t sure if he’d been legally married to two women or not. “Does your mother still live in Spain?”
“She died three years ago. Heart failure. She was only fifty-four. Her death was the impetus for me to seek out Zane, Nick, and Logan, see if we could make a connection. Be a family.”
“And?”
“It’s as though we didn’t grow up thousands of miles and cultures apart. I’ll do anything for them.”
She nodded. “To prove yourself.” Rydell and Peri, his baby sister, were her family, too. They loved her, and she’d been married to their younger brother, Adam, for six years. There was nothing she wouldn’t do for either of them. All they had to do was ask. Which was why she was here.
She understood Jonah’s need to gain his brothers’ trust and approval.
“Nah. Don’t need to,” Jonah said, unwittingly echoing what she was thinking. “We’re family. How about you?”
“Nope,” she said, keeping it light. “I’ve been an orphan for many years.” She shrugged. “My parents, ironically, were killed by a drunk driver. Both drivers were blitzed out of their minds.”
“That sucks.”
“I don’t mean to sound fatalistic, but it was inevitable. Driving drunk was a favorite pastime of theirs.”
“Is that where you got this?” He reached out to run a light finger down the length of her arm, tracing the worst of the scars. Nobody had ever touched her there other than at the hospital, and Callie felt that brush of his finger in every pulsing cell in her body as if it were a live wire.
The symbol of her survival, and so much a part of her she rarely gave it any thought. She jerked out of reach, picking up her empty mug as if it were a blastproof shield that could protect her. “Not in the accident that killed them, no. This happened when I was fifteen.” The last time she’d ever gotten into a vehicle with either of them. “No one died that day, but they had to get us out of the car with the Jaws of Life. I was just grateful when I woke up in the hospital and saw the bandages after surgery and knew I didn’t lose my arm.”
He was quiet for a long time. The conversation at the other end of the table was petering out, and pe
ople were starting to tune in to their conversation.
“No grandparents?”
“No,” Callie said, feeling uncomfortable divulging anything more personal—she’d already overshared. “Both sets died before I was born.”
“Ah, man, that fucking sucks!” Brody yelled too loudly. “Do you need a hug? I’ll give you a hug.” Spreading his arms wide, he hugged the space around him. “Come ’ere, darlin’.” Wiggling his fingers for her to come to him. “Big bad Brody’ll give you some lovin’.”
“Big bad Brody is going to get his ass kicked,” Jonah said with a little heat. “Sit down and shut up. One more warning, and I tear up your contract. No more drinking on board.”
“On that happy note, I’ll say good night.” Callie got to her feet. Men like Brody were easy to handle. And since the only man she knew who was remotely like Jonah was Rydell, she knew she had to get out of his force field before she did something foolish. “It’s been a full day, and I still have some jet lag to sleep off.”
She’d shared more with Jonah than she’d ever shared with any man other than Adam. Not even Peri or Ry knew some of the things she’d told Jonah tonight.
“The offer of the safe is open if you need it.”
She was twisting her wedding ring around her finger again. This time unconsciously. “I’ll keep it in mind. ’Night, everyone.”
“Let’s all go tomorrow and check them out. Going by yourself is ridiculous. If they’ve got a problem with you, then they have a problem with all of us,” Leslie suggested.
Callie didn’t hear the answer as she headed downstairs to her cabin.
She didn’t call Rydell to report as she’d agreed to do. In part because he had bigger fish to fry at the moment, but more because, first, before she gave him more details on Jonah’s city she wanted to have all her ducks in a row, and second, just because she’d been related to Rydell once upon a time didn’t mean she was under his command and unable to think on her own.
Callie grinned at her mixed metaphors.
Ry could wait. Just because this would be short-term didn’t mean she’d rush the process. There was a right way to do this and a wrong way. And no matter who was going to end up with the spoils, as long as she was involved, every i would be dotted, every t crossed.
Callie kept her own counsel. So far they hadn’t seen anything that could be easily transported. The mosaics should’ve been left where they were until she—or someone—went over them with a fine-tooth comb and sucked every bit of information out of them, documenting every inch along the way. But she hadn’t been able to resist bringing a few samples to the surface.
Don’t get too invested, she cautioned herself, sliding her palm down the smooth surface of the highly polished brass rail as she navigated the stairs to the lower deck where most of the cabins were located. Prizes had a tendency to be whipped from beneath a person’s feet when they least expected it. She merely had a loan of the Lost City. A temporary taste.
Despite sunscreen, she’d gotten a little burnt. It felt amazing to be out in the field, diving again after months in a classroom. She loved teaching at the University of Miami, her alma mater, but nothing beat the silent beauty underwater.
What she’d seen that afternoon was incredible, and she was eager for what the next morning would bring. She’d make notes and look at the photos she’d taken down there before hitting the sack.
Hearing footsteps behind her, Callie turned to see Jonah heading to his cabin as well. Since their doors were opposite each other, unless she ran into her cabin and slammed the door in his face—which she admitted to herself was a huge temptation—she was going to have to interact with him sans the buffer of the other divers.
Six
Sucking in a deep breath, Callie held it for a calming moment, shoving her keycard into the lock for a quick cowardly getaway at the earliest opportunity.
Jonah stood a little too close for comfort, eyes amused. “Sorry about Brody. I’ve already given him a warning. I’ll talk to him again in the morning.” The deep rumble of his voice rolled through her, sending vibrations of awareness to her nerve endings.
Her unsteady breath came a little too fast. Whatever it was that Jonah had, it was her kryptonite, which worried her. “I appreciate it. I don’t like drunks, but I can handle myself.”
The smile left his eyes. “You’re under my protection. You shouldn’t have to.”
She opened her eyes wide and turned to face him. “Under your protection? Wow, that’s very medieval of you. I’ve been fighting my own battles since I was five.”
“Must be exhausting.” The corridor was narrow and dimly lit as he came abreast of her. “It was a good dive this afternoon.”
“Fascinating. I can’t wait to go down in the morning. ’Night.”
“Wait—” Jonah’s voice too was low; the silence of the lower deck, the insulating, barely there hum of machinery, made the space far too intimate. Especially since the closer he was to her, the more aware of him Callie became.
It was a strange chemical reaction she had no control over. She gave him an inquiring glance as she pushed open her door. Her feet might be planted, but inside she was running like hell. He’d showered earlier and still carried a trace of soap on his skin. He was one of those men who looked sexy with a day’s growth of stubble. She wondered how abrasive it would feel brushing her skin. For a nanosecond her overstimulated brain was filled with the image of Jonah skimming his lips down her body … She imagined the prickly softness of that stubble, she almost felt the delicious damp skim of his mouth.
His eyes were a deep, marine blue in the dim lighting as he took the half step necessary to bring them face-to-face. Thick, short black eyelashes masked the color for a moment, and when he met her gaze again something hot and raw flared between them.
Breath snagged painfully in Callie’s lungs as Jonah reached out to touch her cheek. “You got too much sun today.”
His finger remained, cupping the curve of her face, making her cheeks burn hotter than any sunburn. His touch was light, a butterfly’s kiss, but she felt that touch in every atom of her body.
Her tongue stuck to the roof of her dry mouth. “I forgot to reapply sunscreen when we got back. I’ll be more careful tomorrow.” She should step backward into her cabin and shut the door. In a moment. Tension stretched between them like a rubber band.
His thumb, light as a wish, skimmed across her jaw, then lingered at the corner of her mouth. Her lips parted automatically. His pupils flared. “What is it about you that makes me want to touch you every time I see you?”
Ditto. “I—” I want to jump your bones, Jonah Cutter. Apparently she didn’t have to like or respect the man to want him with every fiber of her being. She’d never, never ever, felt this way in her life. It was—unsettling.
She swallowed around the lump in her throat, forcing herself not to lean into him. Attempting not to inhale the clean smell of his skin—which was like catnip to a cat—and forced rational between tingling lips. “I’m married, remember?”
The heated glint in his eyes vanished, and he gave her a cool, mocking smile as he shoved his fingertips into his shorts pockets. “Which is why I’m not already kissing you and hauling you into my cabin like a caveman right now.”
“Married or not.” Callie dragged her gaze away from the tent in his shorts, magnified by his hands bunched in his pockets. “The answer will always be no. I never was interested in Neanderthals. Besides which, I love Adam, and would never cheat on him.”
Taking his keycard out of his pocket, he flipped it end over end between long, tanned fingers. “He’s a lucky man.”
“I tell him that every day.”
He frowned. “I’ve never slept with a married woman—”
“Good for you,” Callie said drily, grateful to have something to hang her annoyance on. She used it like a shield. It was all about self-preservation. “I’ll alert the media in the morning.”
“You didn’t let me finish.�
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“I have no plans of letting you get started,” she shot back.
He leaned in, his mouth a breath away from her own. Close enough that the energy buzzing between them made her lips feel as though he were kissing her. “I’ve never slept with a married woman, and I don’t intend to. Ever. You don’t have to worry about my actions, they’re strictly honorable. I believe in monogamy. As much as I loved my father, he couldn’t keep his dick in his pants. I was lucky—my brothers accept me for who I am. But I’ll never do to a woman what Daniel did to my mother and the mother of my brothers. Your virtue is safe from me, and your husband can rest easy. I won’t poach.”
Her eyes were so fixated on his lips, she noted the almost-smile that lifted the corners ever so slightly. Hell, she could feel the damn movement of his mouth. “’Night, Callie. I’m glad you agreed to join us.”
Without responding she slipped into her cabin and shut the door, then sagged against it weakly, her heart pounding. She slid to the floor, leaning her head against the door, and squeezed her eyes shut. Dear God, the man had powerful mojo. “Please let this feeling go away, please.”
She sat there for several minutes, too wiped out to move.
Then she heard the door across the corridor quietly close. He’d been standing mere feet away the whole time. Probably had heard her muttering to herself through the door.
Callie dropped her head to her knees and groaned. She was in deep, deep trouble.
* * *
After enjoying three cups of coffee with his breakfast, and a pleasant hour online reading his daily fix of news, Jonah was as ready as he’d ever be for Fire Island. Going was a pain in the ass. He, like everyone else, was eager to get started on the salvage, and this delay, while not earth shattering, was annoying and inconvenient. But a promise was a promise.
As much as he’d loved his dad, the man was the king of promise breaking. Of course, it was hard to juggle two families a world apart. But at the time, Jonah, and his mother, had no idea about the other half of his father’s life.
His father had taught him a lot. Sailing, love of the sea, a passion for salvaging … and not to break promises, and never to cheat on a woman. The good, the bad, and the ugly of Life’s Lessons taught to Jonah by the late, great Daniel Cutter.