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Chapter 10
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Her identical twin. Not "the new Camryn." Not "the old Camryn" playing some kind of game. Literally, not figuratively, a stranger.
Her name was Kate.
And Camryn was dead.
Long after he'd disconnected from Chuck, Mitch remained in a stupor, staring blindly into the distance, his thoughts a tangle of disjointed realizations. At least he'd retained the presence of mind to turn the wheel over to Darryl. He'd then wandered out onto the bow, where he leaned against the bulwark, his face to the wind, and struggled to bring the true picture clearly into view.
Camryn had died in the wreck. The news brought surprising pain. Guilt, mostly, for not having found a way to stop her from self-destructing. He felt a sense of loss, too—not for a woman he loved, because he hadn't actually loved her, but for a woman he'd intimately known and cared about. For the mother of his child, despite the fact that she hadn't been a good mother. He had hoped she would eventually find her way to a safer, more fulfilling life and a satisfying sense of self.
Perhaps she finally had.
That reflection tightened his throat, so he pushed on to grapple with other facets of the situation. Apparently, Camryn had left Arianne with her sister. The story Kate had sobbingly told him yesterday probably held aspects of the truth. He believed her grief was real. And her guilt. Thinking back to what she'd said, he guessed she felt the same guilt he did. She hadn't tried hard enough to intervene before her sister had destroyed herself.
Why hadn't Kate contacted him immediately about Camryn's death and turned Arianne over to him? Maybe Camryn hadn't told Kate about him, or their joint-custody agreement. If Camryn had been determined to keep Arianne away from him, he could imagine her hiding that information from a sister who "butted in to her affairs," as Kate had put it. Camryn might have been afraid that Kate would do the right thing and contact him … or simply refuse to get involved with a kidnapping by giving her whatever help she'd wanted at the time. Money, probably. And a baby-sitter.
But he had no way to be certain that Kate hadn't known about him all along.
She clearly wasn't being truthful. Camryn might not have said much about him, but when he'd stormed her house Friday afternoon, he'd been damn clear that he wanted his daughter, Arianne. Why hadn't Kate explained that she was Camryn's identical twin, showed him identification and informed him of his wife's death? "I'm not Camryn," he vaguely remembered her saying. That had been her only attempt to tell him—just that one, unsubstantiated statement. She'd then allowed him to believe what he would.
She'd given him enough rope to hang himself. A disturbing thought. After forcing his way into her house and ignoring her claim that she wasn't Camryn, he'd handcuffed her and carried her off to his boat. Where he'd kept her for days. And forced her to go to bed with him. Nearly seduced her in her sleep.
Sacre Dieu. It was possible, he guessed, that he was in big trouble. Had that been her intention from the start—to turn the tables on him and charge him with a crime, or crimes, as the case may be? His citizen's arrest didn't show in a very good light considering he'd nabbed an innocent party.
But why would Kate want to destroy him? Why had she kept up the impersonation and invented that story about memory loss? No wonder she'd passed all his tests with flying colors. She hadn't remembered anything about their time together because she wasn't Camryn. It was taking him some time to fully digest that incredible truth.
At least the drastic change in personality suddenly made sense.
But now he needed to know who this Kate Jones really was, and why she was pretending to be Camryn. He also couldn't forget the possibility that she'd accuse him of assault, false arrest, kidnapping and whatever other charges her attorney could level at him … then sue for custody of his daughter, her niece.
He had to stay one step ahead of her.
The first thing to do, of course, was call his attorney. He needed to be prepared for any charges Kate might file against him. He also wanted his lawyer to research the legal claims, if any, she might have on Arianne. He'd already asked Chuck to thoroughly investigate her background and her activities with Arianne.
To allow his lawyer and investigator more time, Mitch decided to delay his arrival at port. Now that he knew she wasn't Camryn, he couldn't hold her once they reached shore. She might turn him over to the authorities. Or, she might try to find a way to run with Arianne.
Maybe Kate was, in her own way, worse than Camryn. More devious and cunning. More dangerous in her subterfuge. Dangerous because she'd seemed so … perfect. Beautiful, poised, elegant. Intelligent. Sensitive. Honorable. Desirable.
Damn her. She'd been playing one hell of a game with him. He wondered what prize she was playing for. He was afraid he knew. Arianne. Why did Kate want her? Not that it mattered. No one would take his daughter away from him again.
The thought of Arianne filled him with keen longing to see her. With fair weather, he could make it home as early as tonight. As tempting as that was, he could not afford to ignore the threat posed by the woman pretending to be her mother.
Two could play at Kate's game of subterfuge. He was ready to rise to the challenge. Both his attorney and investigator would handle the matter with absolute discretion, he had no doubt. And he himself would tell no one else about her impersonation. He'd wait, watch and listen. When she made her final move—whatever that might be—he'd be prepared to outmaneuver her.
"Mitch?"
The sound of her low, smooth, feminine voice drew his gaze away from the sea. She stood a short distance aft, with one hand braced against the cabin's exterior wall, her hair pulled back at her nape and pretty blond tendrils trailing beside her face. She was wearing pleated denim shorts and a strappy, peach-colored top. She looked fresh, sweet and appealing as hell.
She wasn't Camryn. Her name was Kate. So damn hard to believe that two people could look that much alike. Yet the differences in the way they presented themselves had been plain from the start. She'd made a damn fool of him.
"Yeah?"
"Your po'boy sandwich is still waiting for you in the galley. Remy wants to know if you're going to eat it."
"Later. Ask him to put it up for me."
She nodded, smiled slightly and turned to leave. She then hesitated, and turned back to him. "Remy said that if the weather holds, we should be getting into port sometime late tonight. I was wondering…" She searched his face with clear anxiety. "Will you turn me in to the authorities immediately, or … may I see Arianne first?"
Aha. First clue to her intentions: she wanted to see Arianne. No surprise there. She'd been asking to speak with her all along. She'd cried when he'd taken the baby, and got choked up whenever she talked about her.
"I haven't made up my mind yet."
"I'd love to spend a little time with her. We've been apart for days now, and she's not used to being away from me."
He didn't answer.
Her full bottom lip tightened, and she tilted her chin in that subtly arrogant way that he'd come to think of as her "queen" look. "She's only a baby, with people she doesn't know. She'll be suffering from separation anxiety. At her age, it can be very acute. Traumatic, even."
He stiffened. His daughter didn't know his family because this woman had kept her from them. Had it been deliberate? "Separation anxiety," he repeated. "Meaning, she's missing her mama?"
She reflected for a while on that interpretation, as if afraid to agree; afraid of walking into some trap. With good reason. Her mama was dead. After a short pause, though, this sweet-faced, angel-eyed impostor nodded, her ponytail riffling in the breeze, the shiny blond tendrils dancing around her troubled face. "She's missing her mama, and she doesn't recognize anyone around her."
"By now, she'll be feeling right at home," he assured her, hoping it was true. Joey, his other sisters and his parents would see to it, he was sure. "Which is a good thing, considering we won't be pulling into port for anoth
er day or so."
"Another day or so! But Remy said—"
"Remy's not the captain. I am. And I—" he loomed closer, backing her against the cabin wall "—have plans for tonight. And maybe the night after that."
"Plans?" Her voice emerged in more of a whisper, with a throatier quality … or maybe he just imagined so. No doubt about the rising color in her face, though. Was she thinking about this morning—the way they'd hungered for each other; undulated to a slow, hot rhythm; fit together with sleek, utter perfection? "Wh-what kind of plans?"
He couldn't help a slight smile. She wasn't Camryn. And she'd gotten herself into this mess by pretending she was … in his bed. "You'll see."
There it was in her gaze—clear, bright anxiety. But beneath the anxiety, a smoky intensity grew. And distracted him. Stirred his blood. "About this morning," she whispered, her breath sweet and warm against his face. "It won't happen again. I'll sleep in the galley, if I have to. Or on the roof, or in the engine room."
"What's the matter, chèr'? Don't trust yourself with me?"
Her lips parted in protest. "If there's anyone I don't trust, it's you. You promised to stay on your side of the bed."
"If I'm remembering right, we were on my side of the bed. Which means you were the one trespassing."
"Oh!" Incredulous, she glared at him. "Of all the arrogant, conceited, cockeyed ways of looking at things."
"Are you saying it isn't true? That you … didn't want me?"
The very air around them pulsed with tension while he waited for her answer. "I'm saying," she breathed, "that it won't happen again."
And because he had to touch her, he drew the back of one finger slowly down the curve of her face. Her eyes darkened. His body throbbed into hardness. And he knew he was in trouble. Because he wanted it to happen again. He wanted to hold her. Make her smolder in his arms.
Forcing his hand away from her beguiling soft skin, he turned and strode to the wheelhouse. He was glad, damn glad, when she didn't follow him. The last thing he needed was sexual involvement with another beautiful stranger; one with the same entrancing face and body as the last. This one would pose even more of a danger to him, though. She stirred him on too many levels.
He couldn't have her, and that was that.
Darryl glanced at him from his stance at the wheel, and after studying his face, said, "Close da doors, Mitch. We need to talk."
Curious and surprised, Mitch closed all three doors of the wheelhouse, noticing as he shut the starboard side that Kate was headed for the back deck. He'd been a damn fool to touch her.
"You think she's telling da truth, don't you?" Darryl charged.
Mitch faced him with uplifted brows. "Who, Camryn?"
"Of course. Who else? Just because she passed our tests, you're buying her 'lost memory' story."
"Chuck Arceneaux called me with some information. She was in an accident. A serious one, just like she told me."
"Yeah, well, dat don't mean she can't remember you. And even if she can't, she's still Camryn. Just because she's acting different don't mean she really changed. You need to get her to da judge. Charge her wit' kidnapping. Put a scare into her."
Mitch didn't answer. He wasn't sure if he'd take her to the authorities or not. That depended on what his attorney advised, and what his investigator learned about her.
Darryl shook his head in patent disgust. "I saw da way you were looking at her, and heard you laughing wit' her dis morning. Don't fall for her schemes, man. She messed up your life once. She'll do it again."
Though Darryl didn't know Kate's true identity, he still had a good point. She couldn't be trusted.
Mitch sauntered across the wheelhouse and clasped him on the shoulder. "Don't worry about me, Darryl. I'll be fine. Pay attention to your own woman problems."
"I don't have any."
"No?" Mitch pursed his lips in reflection, nodded, peered out to sea. "Good for you. By the way, Joey asked how you're making."
Darryl shot an intense glance at him. "She did? When?"
"Yesterday, when I called her."
Darryl pressed his lips into a thin white line and returned his attention to the sea. A while later, he asked in a softer voice, "She's probably passing a real good time wit' dat baby, eh?"
"Yeah, I imagine she is. She'd love another one of her own." Mitch watched his oldest, closest friend struggle to keep his face impassive. "She'll find herself another husband soon enough, I'd think," Mitch predicted. "Henri's been dead for over two years already. I imagine she's tired of being alone."
A slow flush climbed into Darryl's face, but he didn't answer, and Mitch decided to have mercy on him. He'd given him enough hell for one day. "Set the course for Main Pass Hole. I've been hearing talk on the radio. They're marking shrimp."
Darryl frowned in surprise. "Are you saying we're gonna drag tonight?"
"I'd say it's time we made some money, wouldn't you?"
Nodding in puzzled approval, Darryl set the course for Main Pass Hole. And Mitch silently congratulated himself on his foresight. No one would think it strange that they'd delayed their trip a day or two if the shrimp were running. And chances were, he'd find shrimp tonight. The moon, wind and temperature were all perfectly set for a good haul at Main Pass Hole.
As an added plus, they'd be dragging all night long. Which meant Ms. Kate Jones could have that bed all to herself. Both sides of it. And he wouldn't have to sweat it out, trying not to cross that line.
Kate was deeply relieved when she learned the nature of Mitch's plans for the night: to shrimp. When he'd mentioned his nighttime "plans" earlier, he'd deliberately given her a very different impression—that he'd been referring to her. Sleeping with her.
She hadn't thought of much else since. Other than, perhaps, his hot, intimate stare, and the feel of his long, hard finger trailing down her face. How could one gaze and a simple touch have made her heart race, her insides simmer? But they had.
It wouldn't do. She couldn't get involved with a man who believed her to be someone else. And that was just one of the many complications she faced with Mitch Devereaux. If Camryn had been telling the truth about his mistreatment, Kate would have to betray him by taking his daughter. The farther she could keep from him—both physically and emotionally—the better off she would be.
Then again, how could she learn the truth about his character if she avoided him? And why, in her heart of hearts, did she now believe he wasn't capable of deliberately hurting a woman? Was her perception influenced by her attraction to him?
Never had she been more confused! A night of shrimping would be a very good thing.
"Drop the big ones."
Mitch's command boomed from the intercom, and Kate watched Darryl crank the enormous winch on the back deck. Moments later, the cables ground, the boat quivered and the nets descended from the outriggers to vanish beneath the waves. The engine groaned as if in protest, then the boat sped up to a steady, purposeful hum.
They were "under tow."
Kate couldn't wait to see what they would catch. For the past couple of hours, since late afternoon, they'd been dragging the try-net, a miniature version of the big nets, to see what they'd find. After several drags that turned up a few small shrimp but mostly "trash fish," as Remy called everything they wouldn't keep, Mitch changed his route.
The try-net then yielded ten shiny brownish-white shrimp, almost transparent, along with the trash fish. "Yie, yie! We marking 'em now, chèr'," Remy told her. "Nice ones, too. Twenty-six thirties, I'd say."
Even Darryl looked pleased at the count.
Forty-five minutes after they'd dropped the big nets, Mitch called, "Let's pick 'em up." Darryl worked the winch again, and Kate held her breath as huge, bulging nets were hoisted from the water to hang on either side of the boat.
Dressed in faded jeans, a drab T-shirt and heavy gloves, Mitch strode to the stern and tugged at ropes to draw the nets to the deck, the muscles in his neck, shoulders and arms flexing with e
very forceful pull. Once the heavy, dripping nets had swung over the stern, he gave two mighty tugs and leaped out of the way. An avalanche of wet, squirming creatures cascaded into a pile. A large, glistening seashell rolled across the deck. Angry blue crabs scuttled over a dented license plate, brandishing their pinchers for battle. Eels, squid, shrimp and fish jumped and wriggled in every direction.
Mitch opened the other net, and doubled the size of the pile. Remy dragged baskets, short-handled rakes and low stools into the midst of the catch, while Darryl's gloved hands quickly dove into the pile and snatched out the most valuable fish—flounder, mullet and redfish, mostly, which seemed to please him.
"Go inside," Mitch told Kate. "You'll get hurt out here." He then strode down the port-side walkway to the wheelhouse.
And the deckhands set out the nets again for another drag.
No way would Kate miss the most exciting part of a shrimping trip. Obstinately she remained on the back deck, watching Darryl and Remy rake through the living pile. "Culling," they called it. With nimble fingers, they picked out the shrimp, tossed them into baskets and pushed aside the "trash," which they periodically shoved overboard through scuttle holes in the rail.
In the waning light of evening, Kate watched the trash fish flutter to the sea, and noticed fins following the boat. Big fins. Many of them. And they weren't the curved, graceful ones she'd seen yesterday. These were, undoubtedly, sharks.
"Yeah, dey sharks," Remy replied to her exclamation. "Dey follow da boat, waiting for trash fish. Don't fall overboard, chèr'."
She made very certain not to.
She found herself a culling stool, a rake and rubber gloves, and helped the men sort through the pile. She wasn't as quick at picking up shrimp as they were, of course. The spiked heads of the squiggling shrimp tore into her thin latex gloves and hands, the blue crabs pinched her and fish flicked seawater into her eyes.
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