by Cherry Adair
Logan went downstairs with Jed. “Doctor really did say he checked out fine,” Jed assured him as they took the stairs.
“I want these people caught and brought to justice,” Logan said grimly. “This is unacceptable on every fucking level.” And it made his belly clutch to think that Annie might have something to do with it. He was not a curious man. He researched his wrecks diligently, and knew what he was about as far as salvaging went. Unlike Zane or Nick, he didn’t care who’d been on board a centuries-old ship, or why. He wasn’t interested in the details of the past as much as he was fascinated by the present.
And he sure as hell had never been curious about a woman. Mystery schmystery. He didn’t give a flying fuck if a woman wanted to keep her past blacker than night.
But Annie Ross…? For some inexplicable reason, Logan wanted to ferret out all her secrets, wanted to know where she’d been when she was thirteen, and seventeen, and twenty. Seven days ago.
Maybe he’d get some of the answers today.
He heard the throbbing beat of salsa before he and Jed turned the corner into the galley. The room smelled deliciously of strong black coffee, bacon, and the yeasty fragrance of freshly baked bread. The sunrise was visible through the large windows, and bright white light suffused the spacious galley, glinting off spotless stainless steel appliances and white marble countertops. The place looked as sterile as an operating room to Logan. Not a thing out of place. Hipolito ruled his galley with an iron fist in a steel oven mitt.
“Breakfast is already set out,” the chef told them as he poured, handing each man a large, steaming mug, then returned to his bread dough, prepping the next batch of rolls. “How is Miss Annie doing?” he asked, not glancing up from his task. He didn’t like people in his galley, and made no bones about it. He’d made an exception for Annie, a big concession from him.
“She doesn’t seem to have any ill effects,” Logan answered. “How are you feeling this morning? Any problems here?”
“I always sleep with my window open, so I wasn’t that affected.” He shrugged his rounded shoulders, then punched into the soft dough. “Dell, tiene un pequeño dolor de cabeza. A very small headache, which he’ll be pleased to tell you about, so don’t ask him how he is when you see him! Six extra meals for how long?”
“Until we’re sure we don’t need the security,” Logan told him flatly.
Hipolito thumped his dough with his fist. “Excelente.”
“Annie still sleeping?” Jed asked, as they went down to the common room to grab breakfast.
“How would I know one way or the other?” Logan asked mildly as they strolled into the empty room. Hipolito’s handiwork had already been sampled, as was evidenced by the stack of used plates, and the hole right in the middle of the scrambled eggs. Wes’s signature serving.
Jed shot him a knowing look. “Hello? Have you met my friend Logan Cutter, rescuer of fair maidens and slayer of dragons?”
“She’s in my office, talking to Nick.”
In the process of tonging bacon onto his plate, Jed looked at his watch, and gave him a raised brow. “At six A.M.? Interesting thing for the least curious man I know to do.”
Jed was aware that Nick had the uncanny ability to identify exactly where someone was from just by listening to them speak. By the look on his friend’s face, Jed knew what Logan was up to—speeding up the “getting answers” part of the process.
“If she wanted you to know, she’d tell you,” Jed pointed out, scooping up fried potatoes from the heated serving dish. Logan topped off his coffee and grabbed an orange sweet roll, and they went outside to sit at the table under the awning. He shot a regretful glance at the dive platform that no one was using. All the equipment was up near the table because the guys had checked every valve and hose, and emptied and refilled all the tanks. Logan was leaving nothing to chance.
“In light of last night’s events, I can’t wait for full disclosure,” he told Jed. “She thinks her cousins were responsible, but I have my doubts. Rydell is still on the other side of the world. Sea Bitch”—he used his mug to indicate the sleek ship, barely visible on the edge of the blushing horizon—“is a woman alone.”
Jed shoveled eggs in his mouth. “So, not Rydell, or Sea Bitch. Could still be Annie’s relatives, right? Considering they were ruthless enough to throw a woman overboard, this sounds right up their alley.”
“Yeah. And we know they have no problems hitting people on the head.” Logan finished his coffee and set the mug on the table. “I have someone in Lima getting their backstory for me. A quick Internet search pulled up their criminal records, and a few newspaper articles hidden on the back page. Not particularly interesting, petty shit. Nothing to indicate they could pull off a stealth mission involving tanks of CO.”
Jed pushed his empty plate aside and reached for his mug. “Maybe they have partners in crime, people who know exactly how to stage an operation like that.”
“Yeah. Maybe. They want the treasure from La Daniela. So why swoop in on day one when they have no idea what we have and how much more is below? Why not wait until we have everything in bins and then come and take it? It doesn’t make sense. Not even for small-time operators like this.”
“So what are you thinking? Pirates?” Jed drank. “They didn’t take anything, right? Could be they were testing our security. Or lack thereof.”
“Well, it’s pumped up now,” Logan said shortly. “And we’ll all be more vigilant from now on.”
* * *
Daniela had no idea why Logan had insisted she be the one to tell his brother what had happened the night before. It was the very crack of daybreak and the poor man must’ve been dragged out of bed for absolutely no reason. Nick was half a world away, and she was pretty sure he’d rather hear the story from Logan, but his older brother had brought her a cup of coffee—exactly the way she liked it—and disappeared to do “Important Things.”
After talking to Nick Cutter for twenty minutes, she put the phone down and yawned. She’d woken at some godforsaken hour to Dog wanting to go out, and as she’d opened her door, Logan had been about to go into his cabin next door. There’d been a moment there when they’d just stared at one another, and her heart had skittered.
She didn’t remember going back to her cabin after he’d teased and tormented her, and she didn’t remember letting Dog in. Clearly Logan had done both. She’d woken to find herself in her bunk, Logan’s cashmere blanket wrapped around her, Dog sprawled across her feet.
Despite the brevity, she’d slept, she realized, like a rock. The first time that had happened in months. Even during her two-day rest, she’d slept lightly.
Logan had fed her some story about his middle brother being worried, and asked her to give Nick the details. She didn’t have many of those, but she gave it her best shot. His brother was charming, and funny, and surprisingly quite chatty.
Daniela placed the emerald bowl she’d been holding back on Logan’s desk. It really was quite beautiful. And worth, she guessed, a large fortune on the open market. That side of the family had had the damn thing for hundreds of years. It stunned her that they hadn’t sold it at some point.
Apparently each generation had believed that the La Daniela treasure was worth a lot more than a giant stone.
She was just about to get up and turn on the television to watch the news, when the door opened. She used her momentum to head for the door. She didn’t want a face-to-face with Logan this early in the morning.
“All done?” he asked easily, stepping inside, but leaving the door open. He was alone. No Dog in sight. He’d changed into royal blue swim trunks and a red muscle shirt, and his feet were shoved into deck shoes, no socks. He’d shaved, and looked bright-eyed and delicious.
Daniela’s heart skipped several beats. “I’m sure he wanted you to tell him. I told him what I knew, but he wants you to call him later.”
“Yeah. I’ll do that. We’re still checking out your cousins.
“How abo
ut that guy you thought was in South Africa?”
“He’s still in Cape Town. He could’ve sent someone else to do the job, but that’s not Case’s style. We’ve ruled him out for now. Want breakfast?” Apparently perfectly at ease, he was blocking the door.
No. She did not want to sit across a table from him and attempt to swallow. If it turned out that her cousins hadn’t snuck on board last night, and it hadn’t been the guy in South Africa, that could only mean one thing. Victor and his minions had found her. “I’ll grab something later,” she said with forced cheer. “Is anyone diving yet? I’d love to watch.”
She had to leave. She’d come up with some reason, and just—leave. Logan knew to watch his back about her cousins. Bringing them to him was bad enough. But bringing the kind of trouble Victor favored? No. She couldn’t do it.
“Nobody’s going down today. Don’t worry, the treasure will still be there tomorrow. It’ll take weeks, if not months, to retrieve everything. We’re checking all the equipment six ways from Sunday to ensure nothing else was tampered with.”
“Of course.” Weeks? Months? She’d be long gone, and hopefully, alive. On the other hand, Logan would be in danger with every gold bar and emerald he brought to the surface.
Daniela hadn’t left and she was already worried for him.
“Ever dived?” he asked, propping a hip against his desk so that she had to turn around to look at him. She’d rather not. Everything about him was too … Big. His body. His personality. The brilliance of his eyes. He was too in her face. And that was when he was sitting six feet away from her.
She suppressed a shudder at the very thought of diving. She was in far more imminent danger from him. “I’m not crazy about putting my face in water.”
“I’ll take you down and teach you. Once you get used to it, you’ll love it.”
Yes, she’d heard that before. Just not in the same context. Daniela rubbed the goose bumps on her upper arms, and swallowed the jolt of fear that shot up from her tummy into her dry throat. “I think I’ll grab a shower, then see if Hipolito needs help in the galley.” And figure out what the hell she’d do on land with no money.
“Do you run?” His voice stopped her at the door.
She certainly had been ready to do just that a nanosecond ago. Daniela hesitated, her hand on the edge of the half-open door. She turned her head to glance back at him. “Run?” she asked warily. “Where?”
“A few laps around the upper deck. Dog needs a run several times a day or he’ll just lie around, eating bonbons and snoozing in the sun. We do the treadmill if it gets too hot for him, but the deck makes a good track, and it’s early yet. You game?”
His sparkling cobalt eyes said he wasn’t talking about anything as mundane and safe as a jog around the deck.
Ah. She’d wondered about the purple running shoes Wes had brought back for her. Now all the pieces clicked into place. She didn’t want to spend any more time with Logan than was absolutely necessary to be polite. But there was no good reason she could offer as to why she couldn’t go with him. It wasn’t as if she had something better to do. “Dozer doesn’t really eat bonbons, does he?”
The corner of his mouth twitched. “Not sure what they are, but probably not. Hard to open the package without opposable thumbs, and I can’t be with him twenty-four hours a day to watch his calorie count.”
Was he … joking with her? It came so out of left field, Daniela wasn’t quite sure how to react. “I—um, I have a bad knee,” she said with faux regret.
“No problem,” Logan said cheerfully. “We’ll take it slow. Go put on your shoes. Meet us back here in five.”
* * *
She kept him waiting an informative thirty-seven minutes.
His door was open, so she stepped inside. “Ready?” she asked sweetly. Dressed in lavender shorts, a purple-and-yellow striped tank top, and purple running shoes—all clearly courtesy of Wes—she looked like a luscious, lickable grape Popsicle.
He smelled the clean woman and grapefruit scent of her skin all the way on the other side of the cabin, and was unsurprised by his body’s instant response.
Damn logic, and to hell with general principles. He wanted this woman as he’d never wanted any other woman in his life.
Her thick, glossy dark hair was tied back in a high ponytail, which showed off her stubborn chin and the sweet curve of her cheek. Her legs looked a mile long, with strong, lean runner’s muscles and mouthwatering definition.
Letting his eyes devour every inch of her from lips to toes and back again, Logan swung his feet off his desk and stood, Dog at his side. “I am.” I really, really am ready, sweetheart.
With Nick’s help, and the time she’d so generously allowed him to talk to his brother and make a few discreet phone calls, it hadn’t been that hard to put the puzzle pieces together. Not all the pieces, he was sure, but the gist. And not all the pieces he had, fit.
He needed Miss Daniela Rosado of Washington, DC, to fill in the blanks.
They emerged onto the forward deck where one of the security men stood, arms akimbo, booted feet spread, facing the water. White-blond crew cut, muscled, and built like a brick house. Knife strapped to his ankle, gun at his shoulder. He looked ready for anything. “Sven, right?”
Logan frequently had security on the ship when they were hauling treasure, so he was used to heavily armed ex-military men strategically placed around his ship. They all were.
But Daniela gave him a startled glance as the guy said, “Yes, sir.”
Logan rested his hand lightly on the small of her back, indicating she move to the foredeck. Her skin was cool beneath the thin fabric of her top, and she shivered slightly, shifting out of reach to walk beside him. “If whoever snuck on board wasn’t one of your two prime suspects,” she asked casually; “who do you think it was?”
Logan shrugged. “Could be almost anyone. People know that I have uncanny luck finding valuable wrecks. Don’t worry about it. The local cops are on it.”
“You don’t think it was personal?”
“Conjecture is useless at this point. The cops haven’t even had twelve hours to figure it out.”
“Will they shoot to kill if an intruder comes on board?” she asked, glancing back at the security guy as she started to warm up.
“Would you prefer they shoot to almost kill?” he asked dryly, more interested in watching her warming up than anything else right then. She was poetry in motion.
Holy shit, Logan thought shaking his head at his own folly. The woman was a lie machine, and had some heavy-hitting friends in very high places, according to Nick.
“We have forty-six people on board,” he told her, shoving the disjointed bits and pieces of his hasty investigation aside to be worked on by his subconscious. “And the bad guys didn’t hesitate to pump my ship full of lethal gas. Hell yeah, they’re ordered to shoot to kill. If anyone harms what’s mine, they’d better be prepared for the consequences.”
He stretched his arms over his head. He schooled his features to blandness, when what he wanted to do was rip into the assholes with his bare hands. “Worried your cousins will get hurt?”
She stopped stretching. “Frankly, I’d be stunned if they aren’t hurt at some point during all this. I don’t want them dead, they are blood after all, but I wouldn’t mind if they were—suitably bruised.”
“I can assure you, for hitting you, and for chucking you into the water at night? They’ll get a little more than suitably bruised. Yes, boy. We see you,” he told a prancing, butt-wagging, tongue-lolling Dog. “Ready?” Logan asked Daniela.
Because right or wrong, fact or fiction, he was more than ready.
They did a steady circuit around the entire ship, keeping a good slow jogging pace. Clearly she was a runner. “Again?” he asked, amused when she took off without answering.
“Race you,” she yelled into the wind, Dog at her heels as they took a left turn at the aft deck, picking up the speed to a balls-out run. Logan dro
pped back a few steps to admire the view, then loped ahead.
“Sure,” he yelled over his shoulder. “Twenty laps equals about a mile. How many do you usually do?” He liked a good hard five-mile run first thing. Of course, he preferred hot and heavy sex first thing, but that wasn’t usually to be on a months-long salvage. Fist. Run. Fifty-fifty.
“Ten.”
“Laps?”
She made a rude noise. “Miles.”
Logan laughed. “Liar.” And he didn’t give a shit.
The longer she ran, the more mussed she became, as her thick, shiny hair slithered from its mooring, to stick to the sweat on her skin. Her olive skin became flushed, her eyes shone. It was almost as if running was liberating her from her cage of fear. Logan wished he could give her that when she was still.
Dog stopped at the four-mile mark, flopping down in the shade, and watching their every circuit. They stopped at six. A good run, a perfect day, and the shocking, sheer pleasure of running with a partner when he’d always preferred running alone. But for the rare occasion, Logan didn’t even run with Jed.
His heartbeat and respiration were elevated, and he was hotter than hell. Hot because the morning temps were rising, and hot because his mermaid had her hands braced on her knees, head down, butt up. It was a fine look.
Grabbing two bottles of iced water from a plastic bucket Harris had left out for them, he opened one, draining half before he came up for air.
If he’d been alone, Logan would’ve taken a dive off the railing to cool off. Looking at her, with the thin cotton of her top clinging to her damp skin, and her eyes glowing as she stood up to face him, made him even hotter.
He cracked the other cap, unscrewed it, then handed it to her, ensuring their fingers brushed. Her eyes widened at the contact before she muttered, “Thanks,” and rubbed the frosted bottle across her flushed cheeks, then around the back of her neck.
Her hair had fallen completely out of the rubber band, and hung in glossy damp strands around her shoulders. She shoved it off her face as she chugged the water. For a moment he indulged his new hobby—her, watching her throat work as she drank.