by Rachel Grant
Copyright © 2016 Rachel Grant
All rights reserved.
ISBN-10: 0989301095
ISBN-13: 978-0-9893010-9-1
Cover art and design by Naomi Ruth Raine
Copyediting by Linda Ingmanson
This book is a work of fiction. References to real people, events, establishments, organizations, or locations are intended only to provide a sense of authenticity, and are used fictitiously. All other characters, and all incidents and dialogue, are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in encouraging piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.
COLD EVIDENCE
The frigid waters of the Pacific Northwest are about to get hot…
The only thing Navy underwater archaeologist Undine Gray fears more than facing former SEAL Luke Sevick is never scuba diving again. But when a dive on a Cold War-era US Navy submarine ends with an accidental explosion, she’s terrified of going into the deep, forcing her to beg the most experienced diver she knows to take her back to the bottom of the cold Salish Sea.
Luke wants nothing to do with the woman who destroyed his career a dozen years ago but finds it impossible to turn his back on her plea. Caught off guard by an attraction he doesn’t want to feel, he’s eager to be done with this mission of mercy. But when they dive on the wreck, he only gets sucked in deeper. Someone has been digging on the Navy sub…and it appears the explosion that almost killed Undine was no accident.
To find the truth, Undine must navigate murky waters and the unexpectedly hot undercurrents swirling between her and Luke. Worse, divers are searching for something lost in US waters during the Cold War, and they’ll do anything to keep Luke and Undine from finding it first.
Bonus content for Cold Evidence and my other books is posted on my website, where you can also sign up for my New Release Mailing List.
This one is for Darcy,
Critique partner, late-night IM sanity checker, and dear friend.
I don’t know how I’d navigate these murky waters without you.
Chapter One
Strait of Juan de Fuca, Northeast of Neah Bay, Washington
September
Undine Gray fluttered her fins, swimming slowly upward to the decompression stop with one hand gliding along the anchor line. She spotted her destination, a bucket tied to the line, and floated up the last five meters. She and her dive partner, Yuri, had each deposited a book in the pail for reading during the twenty-minute decompression stop.
She set her dive computer to alert her when it was time to ascend again. Now that she was within radio range of her team on the dive boat above, she pressed the button on her full-face radio-equipped mask. “Undine to Petrel, had to abort dive due to trouble with my tank. At decompression stop now. Send oxygen. Over.”
“Sorry to hear that, ’Deen. It checked out before you dove,” Jared said and added a few curses before he released his radio button.
“I know. Not your fault. Over.” But it was a serious problem that her fifteen minutes of bottom time had to be shortened to less than five. Given the depth of this dive, the surface interval required meant she wouldn’t be able to dive again until tomorrow. They’d just lost an entire day from their tight schedule. Maybe she shouldn’t be so pissed at Yuri. “Yuri’s tank was fine. He refused to abort. I ordered him to surface—this goes against every protocol he agreed to—but with my tank leaking, I couldn’t afford to waste a minute arguing and had to leave him. He said he’d locate the datum we dropped yesterday and hook up the permanent buoy line, then surface. He should reach the decompression stop in five minutes. Over.”
“Gotcha. I’ll talk to Yuri. If he pulls something like this again, he’s fired,” Jared said. “Over.”
“Good. That’s what I told him. Removing the full-face mask to switch to pure oxygen. Going radio silent. Over.”
“See you on deck in twenty, ’Deen. Over.”
She slipped off the full-face mask with the built-in radio and regulator and fitted the pure oxygen regulator attached to the boat via a long hose over her nose and mouth. Then she donned her regular dive mask, cleared it, and blinked the salt water from her eyes. With twenty minutes to kill and no longer in the dark deep, she switched on her flashlight and plucked a book from the bucket and chuckled at finding a Tom Clancy Cold War-era spy novel. Surely her Ukrainian dive partner had already read all of Clancy’s books by now? But then, compression-stop reading was more about passing the time than getting engrossed in a novel, and once a paperback book had been immersed, there was no letting it dry out to read on land. Perhaps she should have brought an old favorite as Yuri had, instead of a new romantic suspense novel; then she could just reread favorite scenes as she waited for the nitrogen buildup to release from her bloodstream.
Five minutes in, her computer beeped, reminding her that Yuri should have joined her at the decompression stop by now. A glance into the dark depths revealed no faint glow from below, and unease settled in her gut. Yuri had said he would ascend after he located the anchor base for the permanent buoy. If he didn’t find it within five minutes, he’d promised to abort and surface.
She gripped the mask with the built-in radio. After a moment’s hesitation, she switched back to her scuba tank so she could talk to Yuri. At this in-between depth, the radio should reach both the bottom of the strait and the boat on the surface.
She cleared the mask, then said, “Yuri, man, where are you? Over.”
Silence.
The team on Petrel would have heard her, but they wouldn’t muddle Yuri’s response by chiming in.
She glanced at her air tank. Dare she risk descending again? Yuri could be injured or stuck. If she descended again now, she would be pushing her tank to the limit. But there was an oxygen line at the decompression stop. She didn’t need to save air for that.
“Yuri?” she said again. “Say something. Anything. If you need help, I’ll come get you, but I don’t have enough air to mess around. Over.”
The weather had been calm today, and the slack tide provided the perfect window. This should have been a piece-of-cake bounce dive even though it was deep, but her gauge indicated a too-rapid loss of air when she’d reached one hundred and ninety feet. She’d had no choice but to abort. She had over a thousand hours of bottom time—more than most divers twice her age, and far more than the middle-aged salvage specialist, but he refused to acknowledge her expertise because she was Stefan Gray’s daughter, and he wasn’t a fan of the marine biologist who’d gone Hollywood to fund his research institute.
One thing Yuri didn’t understand was her father might be a celebrity underwater explorer, but the man was a scientist first, last, and always, and he was probably the most experienced and knowledgeable scuba and technical diver on the planet. As his daughter, she knew diving almost better than she knew walking. Her screwing up a dive was akin to Neil Armstrong’s kid not being able to find the moon in the night sky.
Yuri’s refusal to ascend with her was a small, stupid rebellion, and now it was one that could cost both of them their lives, because she had to go after the old fool.
She addressed the team on Petrel. “I’m going to find Yuri. Send Loren down with a tank for me. If Yuri has to ascend quickly, I’ll inflate his buoyancy compensator vest, but I’ll stay down so I can decompress. Radio the Coast Guard. We might need an airlift to a hyperbaric chamber for him or both of us. Over.”
“Copy that, Undi
ne,” Jared said. “A NOAA vessel isn’t far off our starboard. Maybe they can provide assistance. Loren is radioing them and alerting the Coast Guard we are a team of Navy contractors with a civilian diver who has failed to—”
His words cut off. A second later, the line in Undine’s hand went slack. She pulled on the rope as she looked upward. A giant flash lit the surface, piercing the dark water above her head. A wave pulsed downward, sending Undine spiraling through the gray depths.
She lost the flashlight. The book. The bucket. The anchor line. Everything was gone as she tumbled end over end in an underwater current with the power of a fifty-foot breaking wave. There was no up, no down. Just water, which broke the seal on her mask and flooded her sinuses.
She had no idea how far she’d been tossed or even her depth. It was far too soon for her to surface, but one hand found the strap for the heavy air tank, while the other found the pull cord for her buoyancy compensator vest.
She released the tank and tugged the cord, then shot to the surface.
Luke Sevick reacted instinctively and slid his arm around the rail mounted to the dive platform and gripped his wrist, bracing himself for the sudden wave triggered by the rapid series of explosions off the port side. Frigid water sluiced over the low platform of the research vessel, drenching him. His body lifted and his chest slammed into the side as the boat rocked, but his grip held and he remained on the platform instead of being tossed into the icy strait.
The biologist to his left wasn’t so lucky. Henry was swept over the edge as smoothly as a poached egg slides from a pan.
Shit. This was supposed to be a calm day out at sea. None of the crew had donned their survival suits. Stupid.
He braced for a second wave. After the drop, he grabbed the nearest life buoy and tossed it to Henry, then he climbed to the upper deck and hurried to a lifeboat. He had only a few minutes to fish the man out before hypothermia would get him. Plus, they needed to see if there were survivors from the boat that blew up.
What the fuck was that? He hadn’t yet begun to wrap his brain around the explosion. He’d barely had time to react to the resulting waves.
He pulled back the cover of the lifeboat and jumped inside just as two others reached the rail. “Joan, lower us down! Martin, you’re with me.” They were all trained for water rescues, but Martin was a stronger swimmer, and as a former SEAL, Luke was the most experienced with this sort of thing. It was an easy call to make.
The boat dropped. Martin grabbed the loose bowline, while Luke took the helm. He started the engine within a second of hitting the water and set a course for Henry, who, thankfully, had caught the floatation device. A hundred meters beyond Henry, he caught a flash of orange in the water. A life vest?
Could someone from the wreck have been thrown that far?
“After we grab Henry, we’re checking out the wreckage. I see orange at twelve o’clock,” he shouted over the roar of the motor.
“There was a diver-down flag by the boat. I heard over the radio they’re out here for that Navy salvage project,” Martin shouted back.
That explained the dive setup he’d been admiring before the boat blew to hell.
Luke steered the craft to Henry’s side, and Martin scooped the man from the water.
“Hold on!” Luke shouted. He gunned it, aiming for the fleeting orange that dipped and bobbed in the unsettled water.
Odds were anyone on that boat was fish food, but he had to try.
He slowed. As the boat neared the debris field, the figure took form. It was a body, a woman from the shape. She was faceup thanks to her BC vest, wearing a dry suit.
A diver, as Martin had suggested. If she hadn’t been on the boat, she might have a chance.
He and Martin pulled her into the lifeboat. He laid her flat on the bench seat and pulled off the full-face mask. Water poured out. Hell. How long had she been without oxygen?
She still had a pulse.
“Shit,” Martin said, “She’s bleeding from the ears. Popped eardrums. Probably bent. You good with rescue breathing?”
Luke nodded.
“I’ll radio the Coast Guard and tell them to get their chopper ready. She needs airlift to a hospital with a hyperbaric chamber.”
“Do it,” Luke said as he checked her airway and tried to inflate her lungs. Nothing. He gave her abdominal thrusts, then turned her to the side as she vomited seawater.
He pressed his mouth to hers and gave her breath. Her chest rose. He filled her lungs again as Martin gunned the engine, steering the small boat toward Coast Guard Station Neah Bay, which was less than two nautical miles away.
Another lifeboat had launched from their NOAA vessel and was headed for the debris field, likely to search for more survivors. They would do the same as soon as this woman was loaded on the Coast Guard copter.
She vomited a second time, then her chest rose of its own accord. She was breathing. He wasn’t ready to cheer, though. She could yet suffer a stroke—if she hadn’t already.
He lifted one eyelid, then the other. Bloodshot with uneven dilation. At the very least, she suffered from external ear squeeze, but the fact that she was unconscious indicated an air embolism.
She needed to be kept flat and warm. No point in removing her dry suit until they had her at the station and could wrap her in heated blankets for the airlift.
He studied her face as her breathing evened out. There was something familiar about her, but the creases around her cheeks and eyes from the mask and bluing of her lips made it hard to tell. She could just have one of those faces.
Martin had mentioned the Navy, and he knew a lot of people in the Navy diving realm. Water-based ops had been his SEAL team’s focus. It was possible he’d met this woman at some point.
He swept the end of her dark, wet braid off her chest, revealing a name emblazoned on her dry suit: Gray.
His stomach dropped as his gaze returned to those blue lips and wide cheekbones. There was a family named Gray who was synonymous with scuba diving and underwater research. So deeply entrenched was the family business, they had custom-fitted dive suits with the family name emblazoned on the left breast.
And underwater explorer Stefan Gray’s daughter, the pretty water nymph, Undine, was the woman who’d fucked up his life twelve years ago.
Chapter Two
The pressure in Undine’s skull was unbearable. A vise closing in on her temples. She was vaguely aware of being moved. Cool air hit her skin as her dry suit was sliced open and pulled from her body. Warm blankets pressed around her, and she let out a soft purr, then settled into oblivion, escaping the pain.
She dreamed of Luke Sevick, first his smiling face that had made her teenage heart swoon, transforming into the red-faced anger of their final meeting. Shame and longing settled in her belly, even in sleep. She hated dreaming of Luke, hated the way it made her feel about herself, the deception she could never erase.
But dreaming of him was inevitable, like the sunrise. Usually the dreams came when things were going well, her subconscious kicking her in the teeth and telling her she didn’t deserve success or happiness.
Trina—the only friend Undine had dared share the story with—thought the dreams were a sign Undine pined for him, but she knew the truth. The dreams were her secret scarlet letter. She was the reverend in that old book, the one who bore a hidden stigmatic letter on his chest, remaining silent while his partner in sin, Hester Prynne, was forced to bear hers publicly.
She got off scot-free from their indiscretion—which had been entirely her fault—while Luke lost everything that mattered to him.
She drifted into consciousness, took in that she was in a hyperbaric chamber, then unwillingly retreated back into the dream world where she revisited her greatest shame.
Luke, laughing as they sat by the campfire on the beach, his arm draped casually around her. The feel of her heart rate kicking up as she realized he was about to kiss her. Not just their first kiss, but her first kiss. Ever.
And he didn’t know. Couldn’t know. Because he thought she was an experienced nineteen-year-old.
The only good thing about dreaming about Luke was she always recognized it was a dream. Her subconscious couldn’t fool her, because no way in hell would Luke Sevick ever be a part of her life again.
She only wondered why he visited her dreams today. He was a harbinger that things were going too well, but she had the unsettling feeling that wasn’t the case now. Hazy images of pain, shock, and tumbling in the sea came to her in the lucid dream. She couldn’t remember what happened but had the distinct feeling it wasn’t good.
She pushed at the edges of sleep, grabbing on to consciousness. Pain pierced her temples. Her joints ached. She slowly opened her eyes to a blurry, bright world. Again, she recognized the insides of a hyperbaric chamber.
I have the bends?
She never screwed up diving. She was a damn encyclopedia of dive safety. Hell, she’d been teaching safety classes since she was sixteen, working at her father’s institute. That was how she’d met Luke.
What happened?
She closed her eyes against the bright light and tried to focus on something other than the pain in her skull. The line to the surface snapped, a light flashed, and the sensation of tumbling rocked her. She coughed at the memory of water invading her mask, forcing its way into her mouth and nose.
She opened her eyes again and realized someone was in the room. Whoever it was had moved to the side of the chamber. Slowly, she focused on the face that gazed into the chamber window.
She blinked. Once. Twice. She must be dreaming. This wasn’t possible.
The man’s gaze fixed on hers. His eyes narrowed. “Hello, Undine,” Luke Sevick said.
She closed her eyes and prayed this was yet another Luke nightmare.