by Amy McKinley
One would have thought that our presence wasn’t necessary with a hired crew, but both Carl and Gary had decided the race would be forfeit, as would the bonus research money, without both teams on board. It was ridiculous.
With my legs spread wide to help myself stand on the rocking deck beneath my feet, I focused on breathing and staying out of everyone’s way. Carl’s sailboat cut through the water at a relatively fast pace, neck and neck with Zen Pharmaceuticals’s boat.
Not much longer, I told myself. I had to hold out for maybe another half hour. The turn to head back wasn’t too far ahead. A buoy with a bright-orange flag and small flashing light bobbed in the distance. Each boat had one to avoid any accidents, as it was an amateur race—a stupid race.
As we closed in on the turn, the wind died down. I pulled air in slowly and steadily, as my therapist had taught me to do during flashbacks or difficult situations. It was a major step for me to be on a boat in the overly choppy, deep water. The yacht itself was a trigger only if the weather was severe, but not nearly as traumatic as the threat the churning water presented.
Shouts rang out between the deckhands and a sparse few from my team with some experience. In a couple more seconds, we would swing around the marker, a hair’s breadth behind the other boat.
A thick fog rolled in. Eerie tufts of white floated across our path, increasing in density by the second. Visibility decreased to what looked like less than a thousand meters. It seemed to get quieter as a sense of wariness permeated the air. I wanted to go home or to my lab—anywhere but on that boat.
I wrapped my arms around my stomach. John, one of the scientists on my team, stepped up to my side and gave me a tight smile. “You okay? You look a little green.”
“Yeah. Not a fan of boating.” I’d done my best to stay out of everyone’s way. “This fog is frightening. What if we hit the other boat?” It was one of my worst nightmares and not an unfounded one—it had happened before when I was on a similar vessel.
“Don’t worry. Carl is at the helm and watching the radar. We’re basically on top of the turning point.”
Someone called John away, and he left with a sympathetic smile. Virtually alone in an unobtrusive corner of the stern, I huddled deeper into my windbreaker. I was worried as the sailboat was heeling, a term referencing leaning that I’d learned and hoped not to experience. Wind filled the sails, and we went faster as the craft angled over the water. The waves rocked the vessel harder. Someone shouted to watch the lines. The boat lurched, tilting at an alarming level as we took the turn too fast and too tight.
My heart slammed against my rib cage. The sudden shift threw me off-balance. I staggered closer to the rail, scrambling to secure my footing. Sea spray drenched me from head to foot. Another wave hit the craft, and a heavy weight collided with my side. I lost the fight to stay on deck and flew off my feet. The boat was mid turn as my left hip struck the rail. The angle of the vessel, along with a rogue wave crashing over the bow, sent me over.
A scream lodged in my throat as blinding terror strangled my vocal cords. My body hit the unforgiving water. Darkness enveloped me as the ocean churned and swallowed me. The cold temporarily shocked my body. My lungs strained to hold air. The past collided with the present as I found myself in a similar situation to the one I’d been in as a kid. The events intermingled. Just as I had then, I clawed my way to the surface. Please, God. Let me live.
The surface seemed so far away, but each kick brought me closer. With every ounce of strength I could muster, I fought my way up and soon broke the surface. Gasping, I drew air into my starving lungs. I bobbed with the current, choking as the waves tossed me around. Kicking, I kept my head up. My arm shot up, and my head went under. Shit. The boat was quickly moving away. No one saw me go over?
I gasped for breath, intent to release a yell for help. A fist of salty water filled my mouth. I gagged and coughed. A minute later I tried again with little success. My scratchy voice drowned in the roar of the departing boats and rush of water.
Through the fog, I treaded water, fought the waves, and searched the deck. Water splashed in my eyes, and the fog made seeing the people on the boat difficult. I squinted through the barrage of sea spray in hope that someone had noticed and if they were, in fact, turning around to rescue me.
I was freezing. With my gaze trained on the retreating boat, another wave of sheer terror flooded me. The fog rolled in even more thickly, and in between the tufts of white, I swore I saw a familiar man near the back, leaning down. Not far behind him was a girl. Dad?
The boat continued to move farther away. I blinked, trying to focus. It couldn’t be him. He and my sister died. It wasn’t them. I swiped the back of my hand across my eyes, wiping tears and water from them.
I was going to die too. Self-preservation kept me fighting, and I searched for safety, for any way out of the nightmare. The buoy wasn’t far. I could make it to that. I propelled into motion.
My arms and legs were fatigued, the cold seeping in and leeching all feeling from them. My teeth chattered as I made a desperate attempt at swimming toward the buoy, though my limbs felt heavy as concrete, and the waves pushed me further away.
A sob slipped past my shaky lips as I realized the futility. They weren’t coming back. No one had seen me go overboard. I would die out there alone. Maybe I would finally see my family again.
My head slipped under, and I fought for the surface again. The buoy was farther away than I’d thought, and the waves were pushing me back with every stroke I attempted. My body was tiring. Again, I went under. Kicking with everything I had, I struggled to get above the water. The waves were so choppy. More tears came. This is it. I knew when I went under again, I wouldn’t have the strength to surface.
A wave crashed over my head and pushed me down, and I rolled with its velocity. I held air as long as I could in my lungs—until I couldn’t.
My thoughts scattered into that end-of-life kind of thing. My life flashed before my eyes.
I could see the boat. People screamed and fell over the side. I saw him, my dad. The water tossed us around. So many of us were screaming and crying. The next time I surfaced, groggy, my head pounding from hitting it against something, I searched. He wasn’t there. He must have fallen in when I was under. Arms clung to me, and I blinked. My mom’s face swam into focus.
Mom. I sobbed.
Part of me knew she’d died, but I couldn’t separate what had happened before and what was in the present. Is she here with me? Did she come to help me? Or is this the past? I couldn’t make sense of it anymore. Disoriented and hopeless, I let everything slip away: the accident, the deaths, the loneliness. I should have died that day too. Fitting that I am now.
Something slipped around me, pulling. Limp, I was a rag doll in its grip. It didn’t matter. I was done. The air leaked from my nose, water filled my lungs, and darkness enveloped me.
I choked, spewing water. Coughing, I shook as strong arms held me tightly.
“I’ve got you. You’re okay.” A deep voice brushed against my ear. “Chris, give me a blanket.”
Seconds later, a blanket was tucked around me. A man, not the one holding me, hovered above me. He had short dark hair and concerned green eyes. “Better?” he asked.
“Yes.” I burrowed back against the one who held me, his body heat doing more than the blanket. I nodded, keeping the man named Chris in my sight as he retreated to the steering wheel of the speedboat—cruiser?—we were on. I wasn’t sure what it was called.
The reality that I was on a different boat, held by a man I didn’t know, should have been concerning, but who he was and why I wasn’t dead or at least on the sailboat was too much for my traumatized mind to process.
His arms tightened, and he scooted us back along the floor of the boat. My body never moved from his, and I felt… safe. Exhausted, I sank further into his warmth and slipped under again.
My teeth chattered, and the man’s arms tightened around me as the boat sliced throu
gh the waves. From what he’d said, I’d blacked out for a while after he’d rescued me. My arms and legs were heavy from the ordeal, and I badly wanted to sleep. I turned toward my rescuer’s chest, not wanting to face him yet but willing to shamelessly burrow into him for the warmth and safety his strong embrace offered.
Conflicting emotions battered me. It wasn’t real. I mean, I did fall overboard, but it was different, I thought. As I’d nearly drowned, my mind had played tricks on me. Dad wasn’t on the deck, my sister wasn’t by him, and people weren’t spilling over the side as I had. No one had died.
I sniffed. Tears continued to roll down my cheeks, dropping onto the blanket tucked tightly around me that blended into the one draped across his wet shoulders. The scent of ocean and man seeped into my senses, and I calmed, at least enough to stop crying. I was fine aside from the cold and a headache. They were just flashbacks. Everything will be okay.
The roar of the motor slowed, and we coasted. The waves slapped against the side of the boat. We pulled up to the docks, and Chris jumped off to secure us. I didn’t want to move. The man who held me threw off a lot of heat, which I badly needed. His arms stayed firmly around me as I remained tucked against his solid chest. He made me instinctively feel safe, and I didn’t even know who he was.
Chris came back into view, jumped onto the deck, and sat in a seat facing us. Elbows to knees, he leaned forward. “How are you feeling?”
“Okay.” I cleared my raw-from-screaming throat. “Better.”
“The boat you were on just docked.” He glanced past my shoulder to the man I leaned against.
“Are you ready to get up?” My rescuer’s deep voice rumbled in his chest and sent a different kind of shiver through me.
I nodded. But no, I wasn’t.
In one smooth motion, he rolled to his feet from where we’d sat on the deck without releasing me. I slid down a little as he stood. My head barely reached his shoulder.
“We need to get you warm.” He lifted me fully into his embrace. I would have protested, but my legs were jelly, so I couldn’t.
“I got the boat,” Chris called to us as the man holding me jumped from the side to the dock with me firmly cradled in his arms. I needed him to put me down before anyone on my team saw. Well, soon at least, anyway. He was far too comfortable.
“Oh no! Jules!” Too late. A group of women from my team crowded us, forcing me to turn my head from his warmth.
No one met my eyes. What’s going on? I frowned at the fake concern coating their voices then followed their gazes to the man who held me. I sucked in a breath. Holy shit. Dread filled me. He’d tilted his head down, and his laughing eyes caught mine. No, no, no, no. The pilot who’d flown my boss and me to DC a few times was my rescuer, the very one who’d shamelessly flirted with our flight attendant. It’d been so uncomfortable with the whispers, the laughter, and her blush-stained cheeks.
Heat from embarrassment pushed some of the chills away as I took in his broad shoulders, strong chin, and chiseled face—he was as gorgeous as Ben Dahlhaus. It was annoyance, I told myself. I was feeling irritation, not attraction. Definitely not.
I dragged my gaze back to the ladies on my team, who were all traitors. They weren’t concerned that I’d fallen overboard and suffered a flashback to before I lost my dad and sister. No, they only wanted to get close to Trev Shaw, the man who held me and apparently all their fantasies. They were idiots. Seriously—a group of brilliant women was fangirling over a guy. I’d heard them enough times, gushing about him after Sandy had gone out with him once. At least only three of my colleagues, Sandy, Linda, and Melissa, had morphed into teenagers. Even so, they were highly intelligent people who worked under me, and at the sight of a handsome man with muscles and charm leaking out his ears, they turned into adolescents. It was an embarrassment to working females everywhere.
“Jules!” Carl’s deep voice boomed over my simpering colleagues as he jogged from the boat toward us. Will my humiliation never end? The women continued to fawn over Trev, asking if he was okay and praising him for rescuing me. I had to fight to stop from rolling my eyes.
I pushed against his chest, but he didn’t budge. His arms remained locked around me. “Let me down.” I refused to look at him. I was grateful to him but in no way going to join his fan club. As he lowered me to the ground, I put some necessary distance between us. The women around us closed ranks.
Huffing, I stepped outside their ring of adoration and came face to face with Carl. His hands clasped my arms, which were shivering again.
“What happened?” Concern swam in his eyes, and some of the tension in my shoulders eased.
“I’m not entirely sure. When the boat turned and that big wave hit, I lost my footing.” My shoulder and hip throbbed, reminding me what else had happened. “Something slammed into me from behind, and I went over.”
The color drained from his face. “What hit you?”
I shrugged. “No idea. Whatever slammed into me was pretty hard. Could have been gear that’d come loose, or maybe someone else lost their balance and bumped into me?”
He shook his head. “Well, I’m glad you’re okay.”
“Did you see me go over?”
“No. Fran yelled that you’d fallen over, but after we rushed to the rail to see where you were, Trev had dived off his boat and was swimming toward you. When I saw that you were safe and he was bringing you back to his boat, we headed in.”
Thank God for my assistant. A shoulder bumped me, sending a fresh surge of pain through it. “Sorry, Jules.” A warm hand squeezed my arm as Fran leaned close. “I’m so glad you’re okay. And wow, if I’d known he was near, I might have jumped overboard too.” Fran grinned before she shoved herself in between Sandy, who was vying for a better position next to Trev, and me.
Brainwashed and hormonal groupies surrounded me.
Wait—why is he here? “Carl.” I narrowed my gaze at him, despite my shivering. “Why would Trev have been here too? He’s not part of our team.”
Carl grunted and avoided my question. “Ladies, head over to the picnic area.”
No one moved.
“Now.”
A few of the women grumbled as they left to go to the wooded picnic area, where the others had gathered after learning I was okay. I was freezing, and I could not afford to get sick. I would give him a few seconds at most to answer. “Carl, please tell me why he’s here before I head home.”
He awkwardly patted my shoulder. “Of course. Give me a minute to explain. Trev”—he motioned for my rescuer to come closer—“I asked you to meet with us here about a security risk we learned of this morning.”
I couldn’t deal. I wanted to go home and forget the day. “Carl, I need to go. I’m sure this morning was some weird prank from one of the Zen scientists.”
“I don’t think so, Jules.” He turned to Trev. “We have a possible military breach. After talking it over this morning with Rich Stevens, who coordinated our involvement with the soldiers and branches, he and I thought you would be the best person for the job. I appreciate you meeting me here today.”
This isn’t happening. I wrapped my arms around my waist, knowing exactly where the conversation was headed. “I don’t need a babysitter.” And I doubted it was one of the soldiers; Carl was being paranoid. It had to be one of the other scientists. I narrowed my eyes and turned to Trev, who was observing me with an expression I couldn’t decipher. “No offense to you. I’m sure the incident was nothing. A harmless joke.”
“None taken.” His deep voice rolled over me, playing me like a fine-tuned instrument.
I needed to go. “Carl, I’m getting another headache, and I’m freezing and can’t get sick—you especially wouldn’t want that. I’m going to bail on the rest of the activities planned for today. Trevor, thank you again for pulling me out of the ocean.” I turned on my heel and hurried as quickly as my legs would carry me, as far from them as I could get. The day needed to end.
Jules rushed away
without a backward glance. She was different—she intrigued me. Once she was in her car, I faced her boss to find out what he wanted. If it meant spending some time with the one woman who seemed to be immune to me, I wanted in. She was a puzzle I wanted to figure out.
“So you talked to Rich?” Rich Stevens was our government contact for Gray Ghost Security, a private military team my brother and I were a part of, along with several guys we grew up with and a few from our time as active Navy SEALs. We were basically family.
I sized up Carl Aldridge. I’d flown him and Dr. Jules Moretti once or twice at Rich’s request—Rich had described something to do with military-exclusive vaccines. Both times, she’d ignored me after a polite greeting. Jessica had been the flight attendant, and for some reason, Jules had seemed irritated when we’d joked around. I’d caught her subtle glares but had no idea what I’d done to deserve them. Jess was a friend, and I had been teasing her about her boyfriend. I wasn’t sure what Jules heard or what it had been about my hushed discussion with Jess that had set her off.
I could admit that Jules was a beautiful woman, but she’d seemed cold and standoffish before. But after I rescued her and held her in my arms, the good kind of sparks flew between us. It was unexpected and confusing, something I hadn’t experienced much in the past, at least not to that degree. Her silky skin was like a live wire beneath my fingers. I wanted time to figure out what the pull between us was.
“Yes, I talked with Rich.” Carl broke into my thoughts, and I focused on him. “I also spoke with Gary from Zen Pharmaceuticals, and he confirmed that none of his scientists had conferred with my team the night before or the morning of the screen-saver problem. To give you some more background, Jules is spearheading a top-secret gene-editing procedure that only a handful of soldiers are receiving at this time. While I believe this problem comes from within our company, given our firewalls, I cannot rule out outside threats.” He rubbed the back of his neck and pressed his lips into a thin line. “She is vital to my company, and I need someone to guard Jules.”