To her left, a derelict pier extended out into the channel. At one time boats must have docked here.
Javi joined her and dropped an armful of driftwood on the rocks. He’d been busy.
“What’s on the other side?” she asked.
“Cat Cay, a private island.”
“Is it inhabited?”
“Very much so, with a yacht club and an airport.”
So civilization—help—was tantalizingly close, but they couldn’t see it or get to it. “Why don’t I see any lights?”
She felt rather than saw him shrug. “There’s nothing on this end of the island.”
“How wide is the channel? Could we swim across and find help?”
When he didn’t answer, she looked at him. His serious face appeared ghostly in the dim light. The steady wind ruffled his hair, blowing it away from his face.
“Are you considering that idea?” she asked, refocusing on the dark stretch of water. The slight moon cast a thread of light across the choppy ocean.
“It wouldn’t be an easy swim for anyone,” he said. “Especially in this wind. It’s a good distance.”
Cat shivered. Something in his voice told her he’d contemplated a swim. She’d finally warmed up. Could she actually get in the water and kick toward land she couldn’t even see?
“I’m a good swimmer,” she said.
“The distance isn’t the biggest problem,” he said.
“What is?”
“There’s one hell of a current in that channel. Even large motor yachts are warned to watch for drift.”
She took a deep breath. “But it’s possible?”
“Not tonight. We’re too tired. We’d be swept away and drown.”
Unsure if she was relieved or sorry, Cat nodded.
“And the timing is wrong,” Javi continued.
She glanced at him again, realizing he’d given a swim to Cat Cay serious consideration long before her suggestion. He stared across the channel, a muscle in his jaw working.
“Even if by some miracle we made it across, we’d have to hike to the yacht club. By the time we found authorities and convinced them how dire our situation is, the pirates would have departed in Spree. Once again we’d be safe, but not your friends.”
Reminded of the terror being endured by Joan and Debbie, a small noise escaped Cat.
“We might as well just hunker down and wait for rescue right here,” Javi said.
“So forget plan B,” Cat said. “We’re back to plan A.”
He nodded, as if to himself. “Plan B will only be a last resort, and only in daylight.” He turned away from the ocean. “Come on. Let’s find a place to bunk down for a few hours. We need to get out of this wind.”
He picked up his wood, and she followed him back to the closest structure, gathering her own driftwood on the journey.
He stopped in front of a one-story building. He used his shoulder to push against a wooden door that hadn’t been painted in decades. The door burst open after only a few shoves, so it likely wasn’t locked but only swollen shut with moisture.
She peered inside. Empty.
“Let me go first,” Javi said.
Their footsteps echoed eerily off bare concrete block walls as they entered a room with no furnishings. The flooring, a concrete slab, was covered by sand. They were out of the worst of the wind, which was a relief, but she knew the grit easily found its way inside under the doors or through the window openings. In one corner, underneath an opening that once surely contained glass, Cat spotted a burned area on the ground where previous visitors had made a fire.
So others had taken shelter here in the past. Had they survived their ordeal? Or maybe they were just out camping, having fun, throwing back tequila shots.
“What was this structure used for?” Cat asked.
“I’m not sure,” Javi said, “but a lighthouse keeper would have lived here at one time.”
“What a lonely existence,” she said.
“He might have had a family. And some people like to be alone.”
She shot him a look. Was he talking about himself? Or maybe her. The wind howled around the structure with a steady whine. Cat stepped to the burned area and dropped her wood. Needing to sit down, she placed her back against the concrete and slid to the floor.
“You okay?” Javi asked.
She pulled her knees toward her chest and hugged her legs. “I think I just lost my third wind.”
Laughing softly, Javi dropped his own wood on top of hers. He removed the snorkel bag from his shoulder and joined her on the ground, leaning against the wall next to her. She resisted the urge to rest her head on his shoulder.
“It’s been one hell of a twenty-four hours, hasn’t it, Irish?”
“Yes, it has.” Twenty-four hours ago, she’d been sleeping peacefully in Javi’s bed, blissful and sated after fabulous sex. Now look where she was. Stranded on a deserted island with the sexy captain and terrified for the safety of two of her oldest friends.
What she’d like to do right now is curl up next to Javi, close her eyes and forget she took a vacation.
That would never happen. Not with Joan and Debbie held captive. Not when she was hyperaware of Javi. It was as if she sat next to a sparking electric current that short-circuited her brain.
When she lay beside him, would she even be able to rest?
“Cat, I—”
Whatever he’d wanted to say, he changed his mind. Why? The subject must have been serious because he didn’t call her “Irish.” At least he knew her real name. She’d been wondering about that.
He came to his feet. “I’ll make the fire.”
The captain worked quickly and efficiently to stack the wood. Out of the wind, the fire was easy to ignite and the temperature—at least in their corner—began to rise. Fortunately, most of the smoke drifted outside through the window opening.
He rejoined her against the wall, extending his legs before him onto the floor. She remained curled into a ball.
“Warm enough?” he asked.
“I’m fine.”
“How do you feel?” he asked.
“I don’t know how to answer that.”
He nodded. “Fair enough.”
“Do you have any idea what time it is?” she asked.
“I’d estimate around nine o’clock.”
9:00 p.m. She and her friends ought to be sitting in Spree’s cockpit counting stars after a day in the sun, drinking tequila and dissing Debbie’s ex.
“I wonder how Joan and Debbie are doing,” Cat murmured.
“Don’t think about it,” Javi said. “That doesn’t do you or them any good.”
That was true, of course. Maybe Javi could control his thoughts, but she didn’t know how to shut down the worry, the fear. The regret.
Maybe it was better to face reality, painful as it was. Most likely her friends were already dead. Or soon would be.
“Tell me the truth,” she said. “They’re going to die, aren’t they?”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
JAVI SWITCHED HIS focus from the fire to Irish. She hadn’t phrased her words as a question. She was making a statement.
“Don’t give up on me now,” he told her.
“Do you really believe there’s a chance we can save them?”
He hesitated. The odds weren’t in their favor.
But he couldn’t sit back and allow low-life druggie perps to destroy Spree and two young women. Not while he could still breathe. So okay. Maybe Dr. Moondrift was right about his need to control the world.
But after Berto’s murder, he’d dedicated his life to bringing criminals to justice. If ever a situation fit that model, this did.
“There’s always a
chance,” he insisted.
She closed her eyes. “I want to believe that.”
“Then do. Hope is a good thing.”
She sighed and stared into the fire. “I keep wondering what I could have done differently.”
“What? You’re not blaming yourself for what happened?”
“How can I not?”
“You weren’t even on Spree.”
“Exactly. They used the ladder I left down to climb aboard, didn’t they?”
“Come on, Irish. It’s standard practice to leave a ladder down when anyone is in the water. You know I insisted on that in the safety briefing.”
She shrugged. “Yeah, well, I’m the one who did it, though.”
He picked up a rock from the floor and tossed toward the fire. “If you want to blame someone, blame me. I was on the boat and let it happen.”
She looked at him, her eyes reflecting the light from the fire. “What did occur? I never asked. I saw you three motor back from the island while I was in the water.”
“I’d gone to my cabin to give your friends some privacy when I heard male voices. There was no doubt about their intent. They claimed they’d kill one of the women. My assessment remains the only way to help them was for me to disappear and stay alive.”
She nodded. “I guess you did the right thing.”
“Gee, thanks for that resounding vote of confidence.”
“You’re welcome.” She interlocked her fingers and placed them on her knees. “I’m sorry I called you a coward.”
“Forget it.” How could he blame her? His actions looked precisely like a captain deserting a sinking ship. He’d hated leaving the women at the mercy of the pirates, but sometimes the job called for hard decisions.
“But I can’t forget it,” she said. “Not since you told me about the bank robbery.”
“That was different.”
She remained silent a moment and then said, “I was in a store once during a robbery and didn’t do anything to stop the shooting.”
Javi stared at her. She’d been through a shooting? “You’re a civilian. You shouldn’t do anything.”
“I knew the kid, though. I should have done something, but instead hid behind the potato chip rack.”
“How old were you?”
“Sixteen.”
Javi cursed and tossed another rock. So they both had their demons to contend with.
“You were a kid yourself. You did the right thing.”
“Maybe. I wish I could stop thinking about Joan and Debbie, wondering what they’re going through.”
“I know,” he said softly, understanding that kind of thinking all too well.
Outside, the wind had strengthened and something crashed into the north side of the structure. Cat jumped at the sound, but sighed and relaxed. An errant gust found its way inside, causing the fire to flicker.
The storm would soon be on them.
Would Spree’s anchor hold? If it dragged, would the pirates know what to do? Would the weather force them to move Spree before he had time to put his plan into action?
“Did you really sail all over the world with your parents?” Irish asked.
“Yeah. We circumnavigated twice.”
“I can’t imagine what it was like to grow up on a sailboat,” she said.
“For me it was...normal. But remember, I didn’t have any other life to compare it to.”
“So your parents never worked?”
“Oh, they worked in every port, but they never held a job for long. My dad can fix anything so could always get work in a marina. My mom is a great cook, but would take any sort of menial labor if we needed money. Usually to pay for repairs when something broke on Ganesh.”
“Was it ever scary? Like when you were out in bad weather where you thought the boat would sink?”
“Oh, yeah.” Remembering a particularly nasty typhoon named Suri in the Indian Ocean, Javi threw another pebble toward the fire. When the mast had snapped, even his dad had been worried. They’d been forced to remain in dry dock for months.
“Especially before the arrival of the internet and reliable weather reports,” he continued. “And before GPS we had to use celestial navigation for long crossings. It’s easier now with all the technology. But you still have to know how to handle a boat.”
“Sounds exciting.”
“It was definitely that,” Javi agreed. “When you live on the water, life is simpler. You’re constantly battling the elements, and you learn what’s important. It’s an education you can’t get any other way.”
She nodded. “That’s the way I felt when we were crossing the Gulf Stream. When you have to focus on keeping the boat upright to stay alive, everything else becomes trivial.”
“Exactly.” Javi gathered more stones. He should have known Irish would understand, but once again she’d surprised him.
“What are you doing with those rocks?” she asked.
“I’m trying to clear a smooth space so we can lie down.”
“Oh.” She placed her head against the wall and closed her eyes. “Good idea, but I won’t be able to sleep.”
He smiled, believing she’d go out as soon as she stretched out. “But you can rest.”
“So why did you leave that life?” she asked. “I mean, why don’t you live on a boat now if it was so idyllic?”
“I never said it was idyllic,” he said.
“But you obviously loved it.”
Javi halted a toss midthrow and jumped to his feet. How did they get on the subject of life aboard Ganesh? He walked to an opening where a window had once been and looked out. Nothing to see but darkness. The smell of the storm was stronger. A gust flung sand against his face, so he stepped back.
“Things changed,” he said.
“What changed?”
He faced her again. She was persistent. “I decided to go into law enforcement.” And that was the truth.
She squinted up at him. “You don’t want to talk about it,” she said. “Why?”
“Maybe I’d rather talk about you.”
“Because that’s such a fascinating subject,” she said.
“I think so.”
“You do?”
He couldn’t see her face clearly, but suspected her cheeks had flushed a healthy pink.
“I know nothing about you except you survived a shooting and grow orchids. A family business, you said?”
“Yes. My grandparents started Green Gully Orchids in Homestead, Florida, which is famous in orchid circles, believe it or not.”
“Were you born in Homestead?”
“Yes, although I have traveled some. With my mom and dad, just like you, but on an airplane to orchid shows all over the world.”
“Are orchids hard to grow?”
He could feel her eyes on him across the dark room. “We are so not going to discuss the cultivation of orchids right now.”
“It’s better than thinking about Joan and Debbie.”
“Yeah,” she agreed, her voice resigned. “Anything is better than that.”
He moved back to her side and joined her on the ground again. He hadn’t liked the distance between them.
“So let’s talk about your plan to put Spree out of commission,” she said. “Is there any way we could disable the sails so the pirates can’t sail away?”
“Maybe,” Javi said, staring into the flames. Once again she’d surprised him. “We could cut the lines, but that means getting on and off the boat without being detected. Possible, but a lot more dangerous.”
“I think the whole idea sounds dangerous.”
“I’m willing to entertain any other options.”
She sighed. “I wish I had one to offer.”
A log on the fire shifted, sending sparks into the air as it collapsed into the bed of embers. He remained silent, listening to the steady flicker of the flames. Irish was deep in her own thoughts, maybe trying to plot another way out of this disaster. He wouldn’t mind if she amazed him one more time and came up with a better solution than his own.
More likely she was obsessing about her friends in captivity. He was worried about them, too, but focused his mental energy elsewhere.
“So let’s assume we fix Spree so she can’t move,” she said. “The point of that is you believe the pirates will abandon ship, leave Joan and Debbie and come ashore.”
“What else can they do?” Thunder rolled in the distance, and Cat tensed.
“They could use Spree’s dinghy and motor to another island.”
“I have no intention of leaving the dinghy for them.”
“We’re going to take the dinghy?”
“Yes. I’ll hide it in the mangroves for us to use later, if necessary.”
“Then how will they get ashore?”
“The same way we did.”
“Swim,” she said.
“They’ll attempt to bring their stolen goods with them. If we’re lucky, at least one of them will drown from the weight.”
She remained quiet, obviously mulling over the new details of his plan. Trying to poke holes in his thinking. He was getting used to her refusing to immediately accept everything he proposed.
“What if we left the dinghy on the beach in plain sight?” she said.
He hesitated. “As bait, you mean?”
“Yeah, incentive to lure them ashore.”
“Sight of the dinghy would be hard for them to resist,” Javi said, intrigued by the suggestion. “It might work.”
“I just want to pull them away from Joan and Debbie.”
Javi gave himself time to think it through. “The only downside would be if they got control of the dinghy.”
“That won’t happen if you surprise them on the beach.”
“I prefer a surprise attack in the mangroves,” he said. “There’s two of them and they have guns.”
“How can their guns work if they swim?”
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