Dangerous Embrace

by Nora Roberts

  She passed the harbor, unconsciously scanning for Ky’s boat. It was there, in the same slip he’d always used—clean lines, scrubbed deck, shining hardware. The flying bridge gleamed in the afternoon light and looked the same as she remembered. Reckless, challenging. The paint was fresh and there was no film of salt spray on the bridge windows. However careless Ky had been about his own appearance or his home, he’d always pampered his boat.

  The Vortex. Kate studied the flamboyant lettering on the stern. He could pamper, she thought again, but he also expected a lot in return. She knew the speed he could urge out of the second-hand cabin cruiser he’d lovingly reconstructed himself. Nothing could block the image of the days she’d stood beside him at the helm. The wind had whipped her hair as he’d laughed and pushed for speed, and more speed. Her heart thudded, her pulse raced until she was certain nothing and no one could catch them. She’d been afraid, of him, of the rush of wind—but she’d stayed with both. In the end, she’d left both.

  He enjoyed the demanding, the thrilling, the frightening. Kate gripped the handle of her briefcase tighter. Isn’t that why she came to him? There were dozens of other experienced divers, many, many other experts on the coastal waters of the Outer Banks. There was only one Ky Silver.

  “Kate? Kate Hardesty?”

  At the sound of her name, Kate turned and felt the years tumble back again. “Linda!” This time there was no restraint. With an openness she showed to very few, Kate embraced the woman who dashed up to her, “It’s wonderful to see you.” With a laugh, she drew Linda away to study her. The same chestnut hair cut short and pert, the same frank, brown eyes. It seemed very little had changed on the island. “You look wonderful.”

  “When I looked out the window and saw you, I could hardly believe it. Kate, you’ve barely changed at all.” With her usual candor and lack of pretention, Linda took a quick, thorough survey. It was quick only because she did things quickly, but it wasn’t subtle. “You’re too thin,” she decided. “But that might be jealousy.”

  “You still look like a college freshman,” Kate returned. “That is jealousy.”

  As swiftly as the laugh had come, Linda sobered. “I’m sorry about your father, Kate. These past weeks must’ve been difficult for you.”

  Kate heard the sincerity, but she’d already tied up her grief and stored it away. “Ky told you?”

  “Ky never tells me anything,” Linda said with a sniff. In an unconscious move, she glanced in the direction of his boat. It was in its slip and Kate had been walking north—in the direction of Ky’s cottage. There could be only one place she could have been going. “Marsh did. How long are you going to stay?”

  “I’m not sure yet.” She felt the weight of her briefcase. Dreams held the same weight as responsibilities. “There are some things I have to do.”

  “One of the things you have to do is have dinner at the Roost tonight. It’s the restaurant right across from your hotel.”

  Kate looked back at the rough wooden sign. “Yes, I noticed it. Is it new?”

  Linda glanced over her shoulder with a self-satisfied nod. “By Ocracoke standards. We run it.”

  “We?”

  “Marsh and I.” With a beaming smile, Linda held out her left hand. “We’ve been married for three years.” Then she rolled her eyes in a habit Kate remembered. “It only took me fifteen years to convince him he couldn’t live without me.”

  “I’m happy for you.” She was, and if she felt a pang, she ignored it. “Married and running a restaurant. My father never filled me in on island gossip.”

  “We have a daughter too. Hope. She’s a year and a half old and a terror. For some reason, she takes after Ky.” Linda sobered again, laying a hand lightly on Kate’s arm. “You’re going to see him now.” It wasn’t a question; she didn’t bother to disguise it as one.

  “Yes.” Keep it casual, Kate ordered herself. Don’t let the questions and concern in Linda’s eyes weaken you. There were ties between Linda and Ky, not only newly formed family ones, but the older tie of the island. “My father was working on something. I need Ky’s help with it.”

  Linda studied Kate’s calm face. “You know what you’re doing?”

  “Yes.” She didn’t show a flicker of unease. Her stomach slowly wrapped itself in knots. “I know what I’m doing.”

  “Okay.” Accepting Kate’s answer, but not satisfied, Linda dropped her hand. “Please come by—the restaurant or the house. We live just down the road from Ky. Marsh’ll want to see you, and I’d like to show off Hope—and our menu,” she added with a grin. “Both are outstanding.”

  “Of course I’ll come by.” On impulse, she took both of Linda’s hands. “It’s really good to see you again. I know I didn’t keep in touch, but—”

  “I understand.” Linda gave her hands a quick squeeze. “That was yesterday. I’ve got to get back, the lunch crowd’s pretty heavy during the season.” She let out a little sigh, wondering if Kate was as calm as she seemed. And if Ky were as big a fool as ever. “Good luck,” she murmured, then dashed across the street again.

  “Thanks,” Kate said under her breath. She was going to need it.

  The walk was as beautiful as she remembered. She passed the little shops with their display windows showing hand-made crafts or antiques. She passed the blue and white clapboard houses and the neat little streets on the outskirts of town with their bleached green lawns and leafy trees.

  A dog raced back and forth on the length of his chain as she wandered by, barking at her as if he knew he was supposed to but didn’t have much interest in it. She could see the tower of the white lighthouse. There’d been a keeper there once, but those days were over. Then she was on the narrow path that led to Ky’s cottage.

  Her palms were damp. She cursed herself. If she had to remember, she’d remember later, when she was alone. When she was safe.

  The path was as it had been, just wide enough for a car, sparsely graveled, lined with bushes that always grew out a bit too far. The bushes and trees had always had a wild, overgrown look that suited the spot. That suited him.

  Ky had told her he didn’t care much for visitors. If he wanted company, all he had to do was go into town where he knew everyone. That was typical of Ky Silver, Kate mused. If I want you, I’ll let you know. Otherwise, back off.

  He’d wanted her once…. Nervous, Kate shifted the briefcase to her other hand. Whatever he wanted now, he’d have to hear her out. She needed him for what he was best at—diving and taking chances.

  When the house came into view, she stopped, staring. It was still small, still primitive. But it no longer looked as though it would keel over on its side in a brisk wind.

  The roof had been redone. Obviously Ky wouldn’t need to set out pots and pans during a rain any longer. The porch he’d once talked vaguely about building now ran the length of the front, sturdy and wide. The screen door that had once been patched in a half a dozen places had been replaced by a new one. Yet nothing looked new, she observed. It just looked right. The cedar had weathered to silver, the windows were untrimmed but gleaming. There was, much to her surprise, a spill of impatiens in a long wooden planter.

  She’d been wrong, Kate decided as she walked closer. Ky Silver had changed. Precisely how, and precisely how much, she had yet to find out.

  She was nearly to the first step when she heard sounds coming from the rear of the house. There was a shed back there, she remembered, full of boards and tools and salvage. Grateful that she didn’t have to meet him in the house, Kate walked around the side to the tiny backyard. She could hear the sea and knew it was less than a two-minute walk through high grass and sand dunes.

  Did he still go down there in the evenings? she wondered. Just to look, he’d said. Just to smell. Sometimes he’d pick up driftwood or shells or whatever small treasures the sea gave up to the sand. Once he’d given her a small smooth shell that fit into the palm of her hand—very white with a delicate pink center. A woman with her first gift o
f diamonds could not have been more thrilled.

  Shaking the memories away, she went into the shed. It was as tall as the cottage and half as wide. The last time she’d been there, it’d been crowded with planks and boards and boxes of hardware. Now she saw the hull of a boat. At a work table with his back to her, Ky sanded the mast.

  “You’ve built it.” The words came out before she could stop them, full of astonished pleasure. How many times had he told her about the boat he’d build one day? It had seemed to Kate it had been his only concrete ambition. Mahogany on oak, he’d said. A seventeen-foot sloop that would cut through the water like a dream. He’d have bronze fastenings and teak on the deck. One day he’d sail the inner coastal waters from Ocracoke to New England. He’d described the boat so minutely that she’d seen it then just as clearly as she saw it now.

  “I told you I would.” Ky turned away from the mast and faced her. She, in the doorway, had the sun at her back. He was half in shadow.

  “Yes.” Feeling foolish, Kate tightened her grip on the briefcase. “You did.”

  “But you didn’t believe me.” Ky tossed aside the sandpaper. Did she have to look so neat and cool, and impossibly lovely? A trickle of sweat ran down his back. “You always had a problem seeing beyond the moment.”

  Reckless, impatient, compelling. Would he always bring those words to her mind? “You always had a problem dealing with the moment,” she said.

  His brow lifted, whether in surprise or derision she couldn’t be sure. “Then it might be said we always had a problem.” He walked to her, so that the sun slanting through the small windows fell over him, then behind him. “But it didn’t always seem to matter.” To satisfy himself that he still could, Ky reached out and touched her face. She didn’t move, and her skin was as soft and cool as he remembered. “You look tired Kate.”

  The muscles in her stomach quivered, but not her voice. “It was a long trip.”

  His thumb brushed along her cheekbone. “You need some sun.”

  This time she backed away. “I intend to get some.”

  “So I gathered from your letter.” Pleased that she’d retreated first, Ky leaned against the open door. “You wrote that you wanted to talk to me in person. You’re here. Why don’t you tell me what you want?”

  The cocky grin might have made her melt once. Now it stiffened her spine. “My father was researching a project. I intend to finish it.”

  “So?”

  “I need your help.”

  Ky laughed and stepped past her into the sunlight. He needed the air, the distance. He needed to touch her again. “From your tone, there’s nothing you hate more than asking me for it.”

  “No.” She stood firm, feeling suddenly strong and bitter. “Nothing.”

  There was no humor in his eyes as he faced her again. The expression in them was cold and flat. She’d seen it before. “Then let’s understand each other before we start. You left the island and me, and took what I wanted.”

  He couldn’t make her cringe now as he once had with only that look. “What happened four years ago has nothing to do with today.”

  “The hell it doesn’t.” He came toward her again so that she took an involuntary step backward. “Still afraid of me?” he asked softly.

  As it had a moment ago, the question turned the fear to anger. “No,” she told him, and meant it. “I’m not afraid of you, Ky. I’ve no intention of discussing the past, but I will agree that I left the island and you. I’m here now on business. I’d like you to hear me out. If you’re interested, we’ll discuss terms, nothing else.”

  “I’m not one of your students, professor.” The drawl crept into his voice, as it did when he let it. “Don’t instruct.”

  She curled her fingers tighter around the handle of her briefcase. “In business, there are always ground rules.”

  “Nobody agreed to let you make them.”

  “I made a mistake,” Kate said quietly as she fought for control. “I’ll find someone else.”

  She’d taken only two steps away when Ky grabbed her arm. “No, you won’t.” The stormy look in his eyes made her throat dry. She knew what he meant. She’d never find anyone else that could make her feel as he made her feel, or want as he made her want. Deliberately, Kate removed his hand from her arm.

  “I came here on business. I’ve no intention of fighting with you over something that doesn’t exist any longer.”

  “We’ll see about that.” How long could he hold on? Ky wondered. It hurt just to look at her and to feel her withdrawing with every second that went by. “But for now, why don’t you tell me what you have in that businesslike briefcase, professor.”

  Kate took a deep breath. She should have known it wouldn’t be easy. Nothing was ever easy with Ky. “Charts,” she said precisely. “Notebooks full of research, maps, carefully documented facts and precise theories. In my opinion, my father was very close to pinpointing the exact location of the Liberty, an English merchant vessel that sank, stores intact, off the North Carolina coast two hundred and fifty years ago.”

  He listened without a comment or a change of expression from beginning to end. When she finished, Ky studied her face for one long moment. “Come inside,” he said and turned toward the house. “Show me what you’ve got.”

  His arrogance made her want to turn away and go back to town exactly as she’d come. There were other divers, others who knew the coast and the waters as well as Ky did. Kate forced herself to calm down, forced herself to think. There were others, but if it was a choice between the devil she knew and the unknown, she had no choice. Kate followed him into the house.

  This, too, had changed. The kitchen she remembered had had a paint splattered floor, with the only usable counter space being a tottering picnic table. The floor had been stripped and varnished, the cabinets redone, and scrubbed butcher block counters lined the sink. He had put in a skylight so that the sun spilled down over the picnic table, now re-worked and re-painted, with benches along either side.

  “Did you do all of this yourself?”

  “Yeah. Surprised?”

  So he didn’t want to make polite conversation. Kate set her briefcase on the table. “Yes. You always seemed content that the walls were about to cave in on you.”

  “I was content with a lot of things, once. Want a beer?”

  “No.” Kate sat down and drew the first of her father’s notebooks out of her briefcase. “You’ll want to read these. It would be unnecessary and time-consuming for you to read every page, but if you’d look over the ones I’ve marked, I think you’ll have enough to go by.”

  “All right.” Ky turned from the refrigerator, beer in hand. He sat, watching her over the rim as he took the first swallow, then he opened the notebook.

  Edwin Hardesty’s handwriting was very clear and precise. He wrote down his facts in didactic, unromantic terms. What could have been exciting was as dry as a thesis, but it was accurate. Ky had no doubt of that.

  The Liberty had been lost, with its stores of sugar, tea, silks, wine and other imports for the colonies. Hardesty had listed the manifest down to the last piece of hardtack. When it had left England, the ship had also been carrying gold. Twenty-five thousand in coins of the realm. Ky glanced up from the notebook to see Kate watching him.

  “Interesting,” he said simply, and turned to the next page she marked.

  There’d been only three survivors who’d washed up on the island. One of the crew had described the storm that had sunk the Liberty, giving details on the height of the waves, the splintering wood, the water gushing into the hole. It was a grim, grisly story which Hardesty had recounted in his pragmatic style, complete with footnotes. The crewman had also given the last known location of the ship before it had gone down. Ky didn’t require Hardesty’s calculations to figure the ship had sunk two-and-a-half miles off the coast of Ocracoke.

  Going from one notebook to another, Ky read through Hardesty’s well drafted theories, his clear to-the-point documentat
ions, corroborated and recorroborated. He scanned the charts, then studied them with more care. He remembered the man’s avid interest in diving, which had always seemed inconsistent with his precise life-style.

  So he’d been looking for gold, Ky mused. All these years the man had been digging in books and looking for gold. If it had been anyone else, Ky might have dismissed it as another fable. Little towns along the coast were full of stories about buried treasure. Edward Teach had used the shallow waters of the inlets to frustrate and outwit the crown until his last battle off the shores of Ocracoke. That alone kept the dreams of finding sunken treasures alive.

  But it was Doctor Edwin J. Hardesty, Yale professor, an unimaginative, humorless man who didn’t believe there was time to be wasted on the frivolous, who’d written these notebooks.

  Ky might still have dismissed it, but Kate was sitting across from him. He had enough adventurous blood in him to believe in destinies.

  Setting the last notebook aside, he picked up his beer again. “So, you want to treasure hunt.”

  She ignored the humor in his voice. With her hands folded on the table, she leaned forward. “I intend to follow through with what my father was working on.”

  “Do you believe it?”

  Did she? Kate opened her mouth and closed it again. She had no idea. “I don’t believe that all of my father’s time and research should go for nothing. I want to try. As it happens, I need you to help me do it. You’ll be compensated.”

  “Will I?” He studied the liquid left in the beer bottle with a half smile. “Will I indeed?”

  “I need you, your boat and your equipment for a month, maybe two. I can’t dive alone because I just don’t know the waters well enough to risk it, and I don’t have the time to waste. I have to be back in Connecticut by the end of August.”