He glanced around. All cabinets and doors were secured, but it looked like the bridge deck comprised of an outdoor barbecue grill and bar, with what looked like relaxed lounge seating towards the stern. He shook his head. He could just see Lowry and Dunn out on the water, cooking up a few prawns on the barbie as they schmoozed with councillors and other officials. He frowned. Come to think of it, he didn’t remember seeing a yacht in Lowry’s list of assets. Or Dunn’s. Who owned the boat?
He crossed to the trapdoor that led down to the cabin, keeping below the line of the deck railing. He grasped the handle. The damn thing was locked. He shoved his hand inside his pocket and grimaced. These weren’t his shorts, damn it. He didn’t have anything on him that he could use to pick the lock.
The boat heaved, as though someone had grasped the ladder from the pontoon. There was no sound, but the boat rolled as someone climbed the ladder to the deck.
Chapter 14
Cole shifted back into the recess in front of the wheelhouse entry. It was the only spot he could get to without calling attention to himself, and the only door that was dark against the white surrounds of the deck. If he kept still and silent, he might avoid detection. If not, well, at least he’d have the element of surprise. Cole melted into the darkness, keeping his breath even and his eyes downcast to avoid any reflection off the whites of his eyes.
A dark, stealthy figure climbed on board. Lights spilled from the house, and from boats moored further up the river, but they were too far away to shed more than a faint glow over the gloom on deck. The guy looked like a lightweight, and Cole couldn’t see any weapons. The man was dressed head to toe in black, including a balaclava. A tad overdramatic. Cole resisted the urge to smile.
Tall, slim, the figure paused for a moment, clutching the railing, before taking slow, measured steps toward the cabin trapdoor. Every now and then the figure would pause and hang on to the railing with both hands, trying to adjust to the slight pitch and roll of the deck.
Cole frowned. Whoever he was, the guy wasn’t good on boats.
The figure approached the cabin entry, and hunched over. Cole heard a jangle of keys, and his muscles tightened. Keys. Lowry? Dunn? The stature wasn’t quite right for either of them. And why wear a mask?
He didn’t know what alerted the guy. He hadn’t moved—heck, had held his breath when he’d hunkered down mere centimetres from him, but suddenly the figure in front of him stiffened, and his head lifted. Turned.
Cole lunged. The guy moved like lightning, rolling out of the way and rearing up on hands and knees, one foot flashing out in a roundhouse kick that caught Cole in the upper chest. He grunted as he was propelled backwards. The guy followed through with a right hook that Cole only just managed to block. He tried to grab the wrist, but his opponent was too quick, dancing back on light feet. Cole advanced, swinging, but each of his blows were deflected as the guy retreated, blocking and striking out with his feet, until he came up against the settee toward the rear of the deck. When his opponent’s legs came in contact with the soft barrier, the guy flashed out with a rapid one-two punch combination that had Cole seeing stars, jumped back up onto the lounge and instantly leapt in a somersault over Cole’s head.
What is this, jumping jacks? Cole swivelled in time to cop a foot in the gut. He doubled over, grabbing the foot, and twisted. Instead of screaming in pain, his opponent flipped with the movement, and caught him in the cheek with his other foot.
Damn it! His opponent rolled and sprang into a low squat, his arms stretched, palms out in a defensive pose. Cole sucked in a breath. The guy was good, keeping him at a distance. Cole knew if he could just get past the legs, he’d have a chance of subduing him, using his larger bulk to his advantage at close quarters. If he could just get closer, damn it.
The guy flicked his hands, twice, in that ‘come and get me’ invitation that was both cocky and annoying. Cole narrowed his eyes and lunged.
As expected, the guy sidestepped. Cole was ready for him, changing direction at the last moment. They both crashed to the deck, rolling and twisting in an effort to get the upper hand. Cole grunted when an elbow struck him in the solar plexus, and jerked his head out of the way of an open-handed strike. Legs flashed as the guy tried to kick him off, but Cole gritted his teeth and pushed past the kicks, using his bulk to flatten the guy, giving him no room to draw back and strike.
That’s when he felt it. The soft mound of flesh against his palm. His eyes widened in shock as he halted. “What the f - oof.”
He’d loosened his grip for a moment in surprise, and she’d gotten one arm free to poke a fist in his ribs.
“Stop, damn it!” he grunted as he grabbed the wrist and forced it down on the deck above her head. “Mel, it’s me!” He ripped the balaclava off her head. It was dark, but at this close distance he could make out her shocked features, the whites of her eyes as she stared back up at him.
“Colin? What the hell?” Her whisper trailed off into an angry squeak. “What are you doing?”
“We really should stop meeting like this,” he remarked, and grinned.
Rumpelstiltskin frowned. “What do you mean, he’s gone?” He glanced idly at the back of his hand. His skin was getting smoother, not so lined. He was getting stronger. Good. He looked up at the figure flitting about in front of him.
Esmerelda waved toward the bedroom. “He’s. Gone. Not there, anymore. Poof!” she snapped her fingers, ignoring the little cloud of shimmer that arose. Her wings shifted with her frustration, spreading the puff of glimmer around Gabe’s living room.
Rumpelstiltskin sneezed. “Stop spraying that stuff around, will you? That’s what got us into trouble in the first place.”
Esmerelda stalked up to him, colour high in her cheeks as she wagged her finger at him. “No, you got us into trouble, Rump.” She turned and paced away. “First you got him high on fairy dust, then you sent him swimming in the river, now you’ve lost him.” She continued to mutter away to herself. Her golden braid swished with each step, each swing of her arms.
Rump folded his arms as he watched Essie stalk from one end of the abode to the other. She was a pretty little thing when she got her dander up. That much hadn’t changed. The fact that he’d gotten her dander up—well, that hadn’t changed, either. She flung her arms up in exasperation to punctuate some point—what, he wasn’t sure as he’d stopped listening—and more fairy dust sprinkled over the furniture. This place had carpet. It was going to take Gabe quite some time to clean it up. Rump sure wasn’t going to do it.
He’d been quite cranky when he was assigned this mission, until he’d heard he was to team up with Essie. They had unfinished business to resolve, like how he’d wound up in Confinement in the first place. Sure, he was here to help this fairy tale pan out, help the humans and all that trolldung. Humans. He could take them or leave them. Frankly, he’d rather leave them. But if it meant he could track down those who had betrayed him, if he could find those responsible for trapping him in that hellhole for all the ages, then sure, he could smile and sprinkle fairy dust.
And then he’d get even.
Essie stopped in front of him, her bright blue eyes sparkling. He was sure she didn’t realise she was on full-glimmer. Even her braid was beginning to glisten. He wasn’t going to tell her, though. Let her vent some steam.
“Where would he go?” he asked her quietly, cutting through her rant.
She frowned. “What do you mean?”
“If Turtle Man isn’t in his room sleeping off the last of his fairy fog, where would he go?”
Essie threw up her hands. “That’s the problem. If I knew that, he wouldn’t be missing.”
Rump shrugged. “Maybe we should go home, then, write this one off.”
Essie gasped, and Rump raised his eyebrow. From her reaction, you’d think he’d suggested they go get fog-faced on dandelion wine and dance on the G.F.C.’s table. The mental image of Essie table-dancing was enough to make him hard. All over.
“You can’t be serious! We can’t do that,” she hissed. “We’re F.G.E.s. Well, I’m an F.G.E. I’m not quite sure what you are,” she corrected herself. “We can’t just give up, Rump. These people need to learn their lessons. Besides,” she shook her shoulders to smooth her wings, “I have a perfect record. I’m not about to ruin it.”
Rump leaned against the wall. “Why is it so important for them to learn their lesson?”
She gaped at him, then stepped closer, her expression earnest. “We all need to learn lessons, Rump. If we don’t learn, we don’t change. We’d just keep doing the same old thing, over and over again.” She shuddered delicately. “There’s no growth in that. And we all need to grow.”
Rump shrugged. “So what’s the big deal if these guys don’t ‘grow’? There are plenty more fairy tales in the ether.”
She gave him a patient little smile, and Rump realised he was about to be instructed on Fairy Lore 101. She had that ‘let-me-tell-you’ look on her face.
“There’s a ripple effect, Rump. One thing affects the next, and the next. Can you imagine if there were no ripples? Everything would stagnate.” She shuddered again.
Rump straightened from the wall and stepped closer to the fairy. She smelled of honeysuckle and sunlight. “What about you, Essie?” His voice was soft as he took another step, and she didn’t retreat. Her wings trembled though, and he smiled. “You’re always guiding everyone through their fairy tale. Do you ever have a chance to live your own tale?” He brushed a glistening tendril of hair like spun gold from her face. He couldn’t deny that he found her attractive. Had always found her attractive.
“Maybe this is your fairy tale,” he whispered to her as he slowly lowered his face.
Her hand shot up to slip between their lips. “Hardly.” She stepped back and frowned. “I don’t get a fairy tale. I just police them.” Her hand dropped to a tiny bottle at her hip, as though to clutch a talisman, and his jaw tightened.
“A protection port? Really, Essie?”
She put her hands on her hips. “I knew you’d try your powers on me, Rump.”
“Interesting.”
She arched an eyebrow. “What? That I know how you think, how you operate?”
“No. It’s interesting that you don’t think you can resist me.”
”Oh, I can resist you just fine,” she retorted.
He gestured to the bottle as he slipped past her. “Apparently not without help.”
She glimmered, then seemed to get herself back under control. “Whatever. This isn’t about us, Rump. Let’s get back to the mission.”
“Ah, but there is an us, isn’t there,” he said, triumphant at her admission.
She rolled her eyes. “Only for this case, Rump, which brings me back to my point. Where is our Frog Prince?”
He sighed. He wanted to talk about ‘us’, maybe see just how strong that damn protection port was, but she was right. The sooner they got this Turtle Man sorted, the sooner he could return to the Fairy Isle, and launch his own revenge. He wrinkled his nose. He just didn’t think Melanie and Turtle Man were the right fit.
Melanie was sweet, but she was a fighter. He’d noticed that about her after working with her for a while. She was smart, quick—she needed a strong man to help shoulder her problems, and while Turtle Man was strong, they just didn’t meld as well as—oh, no. No, he didn’t care about humans. He certainly wasn’t going to care about this pesky, gentle, annoying, caring, wormy little warm-hearted creature he was responsible for. No.
“When that nasty man bundled us into that taxi, it looked like most of the fairy fog had lifted,” Rump told her. “What would Turtle Man do?” He had no idea what his charge would do, and it hurt his mind to try and think like a human.
She shrugged. “He gatecrashed a party. Not just anyone’s party, but his boss’s party.”
“Would he be embarrassed? Would he want to hide?”
Essie nodded slowly. “Possibly, he is a little on the shy side. Unless….” She looked up at him, wide-eyed. He matched her gaze.
“Unless…” he halted. He had no clue.
“Unless he went back to apologise.”
Rump frowned. “Why in troll’s hole would he want to do that?”
Essie sighed in exasperation as she flitted to the door. “Because it’s the nice thing to do. Because it’s the right thing to do. Because it’s the mature thing to do.”
Rump shook his head. “These humans don’t make sense.”
He watched for a moment as she took to flight, her wings a glimmering golden streak in the night sky. She seemed to really care about these humans. But that was Essie, always caring, always interfering. He smiled as he -shimmered, following her glimmer trail. He’d learned one thing about his adversary—er, partner.
Essie was a fairy godmother who didn’t believe in her own fairy tale.
Chapter 15
Cole dodged a knee that jerked dangerously close to his groin as Melanie bucked beneath him.
“Steady, there,” he gasped.
“Get off me.”
He shook his head, and he rested his weight against her purposefully, using his bulk to stop her struggles. “What the hell are you doing here?” he whispered at her harshly. “I could have hurt you, damn it.”
She snorted. “With those nancy-girl hits? Please.”
He smirked. “Yeah, well, I’m the one on top…” Her body lay beneath his, her thighs on either side of his hips, and both were breathless. He’d never fought a woman before, hadn’t expected it to be quite so…hot.
She tried to move her wrists, but he held tight. “Only because I let you,” she muttered.
He smiled. “Yeah, right. You’re full of surprises, you know that?” She seemed so sweet, so gentle, yet she fought like a back-alley brawler.
She frowned. “Get off me.”
His gaze dropped to her lips. Her mouth was parted as she tried to regain her breath, and he enjoyed the contact for a moment, breast to chest, groin to groin, before slowly pulling away from her. He sat, his back against the settee. “Why are you sneaking around this boat?”
She sat up and smoothed a few tendrils of hair that had escaped her tight bun during their tussle.
“It’s my boat, I can sneak around it if I want to. The question is, what are you doing here?” she snapped.
He cocked an eyebrow. “This is your boat?”
She pressed a hand to her stomach and swallowed. “Yes. Now, why are you here?”
“Are you okay? I didn’t hurt you, did I?” God, he hoped not. The colour seemed to have drained from her face. Admittedly, he must have shocked her. Hell, she’d shocked him, but he couldn’t remember landing any punches with any real force. She was too good at defence.
“I’m fine,” she rasped, meeting his gaze with a direct look. “What are you doing here, and what the hell were you thinking, jumping me like that?”
“Sorry, I wasn’t expecting you to sneak around in your cat burglar getup. If this is your boat, why do you need to creep on board like a prowler?”
The boat dipped and rocked, and she swallowed. “It’s mine in name only,” she said quietly. “Lionel put it in my name for tax purposes.”
He nodded. Ah.
“You haven’t answered my question. Why are you here?” she asked as she braced herself against the deck and a cabinet.
“I’m snooping, just like you.”
She opened her mouth as though to deny it, then shrugged. “Why?”
“Good question. Why are you snooping on your stepfather?”
She wagged a finger briefly, before quickly bracing herself as the boat pitched. “I’m sure we’ve had this conversation before. Enough. Why are you snooping on my stepfather?”
Although pale, her face showed a determination he knew he wasn’t going to dodge this time. Maybe if he coughed up a little information, it would satisfy her. Not the whole truth, of course, just enough to placate her. Keep it relevant to her information. She didn’t n
eed to know about the massive undercover operation into fraud and corruption that was focused on her stepfather.
“I saw those files. Some of those properties down south sold for way under market price. I checked.” He shrugged. “He had to have help with that. I’m just trying to figure out what game your stepfather is playing.”
She frowned and leaned closer. “This isn’t a game, Colin. This is serious. My stepfather is not the kind of guy you want to play with.”
He cocked his head. “What kind of guy is he?”
“He’s not nice. He manipulates. He’s ruthless. He’s…not a decent gentleman.” Her last words were whispered, as though they were the worst qualities.
“A decent gentleman?”
She blinked, and Cole tried to ignore the light sheen in her eyes. “He has no personal integrity, no honour. He’s insensitive, brutish, and he enjoys hurting those who are weaker than he.”
Cole’s muscles tightened at the words she’d bitten out in a low tone. “Has he hurt you, Mel? Has that bastard laid a hand on you?” He was taken aback by the rage he felt at the thought of that man hitting Mel, or…worse.
She shook her head. “No, not like that.”
“Then like what?” he whispered back, ducking his head close so that he could meet her gaze. “What has he done?”
“He’s never hit me.”
Her words were very succinct, but he thought it was what she wasn’t saying that was telling. He clenched his teeth. “What has he done to you?”
She shook her head. “No, don’t get the wrong idea. He likes to get close, but he’s never done anything. Not to me.” Her gaze was like cold steel in the night.
Not to her. Somebody else? A slow horror crept over him. “Your mother?”
Her gaze dipped, and he fisted the hand resting on his knee. Damn.
“She—she has some problems,” Melanie said, and blinked as a tear slid down her cheek. “We’re working on it.”
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