Eyes of Fire (14 page)

She opened her mouth to answer him, then realized that she really was in some kind of danger and that she might be jeopardizing her livelihood and her life—not to mention the lives of Jem, Yancy, Jacques, Brian and even others—if she didn't try to discover what was going on without having to close down the island. She hated it, but he was her best bet.

“You're a bastard, and I really hate you, you know that?” she said to him.

“So you informed me the day you asked me to leave.”

“I haven't changed my mind.”

“Well, you know what? You're still a little brat.”

“Am I? I thought I was a bitch.”

“You're a woman of many moods, Miss Carlyle.”

She wanted to hit him. Nearly five years since she had seen him! she told herself desperately. She shouldn't still be so furious. So hurt.

She'd been so damned naive! When she'd first seen him, she'd thought he was wonderful. So tall, so handsome and so at home in the water. A noble type of guy. His dad had been a cop; he'd wanted to be a cop. His skill in the water had allowed him to be a different kind of cop. He'd almost instantly formed a bond of friendship with her father.

And he'd been so determined to keep his distance from her, to be a professional.

It didn't help any to know now, to admit to herself, that she'd been determined to seduce him. Determined that if she could get him, she could hold him. She'd never wanted anything with such blind, reckless desire. She'd plotted, planned, been bold, argumentative, mocking.

She'd done her best to torment him. She'd fought with him. If he was interested in a sunken ship, she mocked his knowledge of it. He argued that divers were basically safe against shark attack; she recited incidents of sharks attacking divers. He argued back.

She brushed against him every time she passed him.

She wore his patience down. She wore his resistance down, as well.

She challenged him in the water, and he met her every challenge. His smile, his laughter, captured her heart.

But whether they fought or found common ground, he'd talked to her. By the fireside at night, he'd talked to her about his job, about the bad guys who led kids astray, about the kids in the ghettos who somehow had a sense of right and wrong no matter what ugliness they saw in their lives. He'd come undercover, but, like her father, she'd been informed right away who he was. She was a nice adornment for the role he was playing, though. Naturally his nobility had extended to his determination to protect her, but then, his drug smugglers weren't hardened criminals, just rather stupid ones.

He'd had an aura of danger, of excitement, that had been irresistible to her. And they'd had lots of time together. Time beneath the sun, sailing on the
Sloop Bee.
By the fire.

In bed.

Talking, laughing, arguing.

Making love.

How many times, she wondered, in that span of a few months? Thirty? Forty? Fifty? Enough to remember so clearly that she couldn't forget now, even when she prayed to.

The last thing she wanted to do was remember being with him while she was standing there on the pathway being told that she was a brat and a bitch.

“Fine!” she snapped, staring at him, her hands clenched into fists at her side. “Follow me from here to Kingdom Come if that's what you want, but I warn you, stay the hell out of my way.”

He didn't reply, so she started walking again. He followed.

She leaped aboard the
Sloop Bee.
The day seemed exceptionally hot. The sun was already shimmering down, so she stripped off her shirt and shorts and mechanically began to check their supplies, though Jem was so efficient that it was scarcely necessary. The air cylinders had all been filled and stored in their slots; the ice chest had been loaded with sodas and water and a few beers and wine coolers for the drinkers on the way back in. There was absolutely no drinking on the way to the dive sites.

The
Sloop Bee
was forty-two feet long and carried twenty divers and their supplies comfortably, two cylinders per diver for plenty of air for two dives per trip. She ignored Adam while she continued to check the supplies. She went on ignoring him as she sat down to draw up her dive plan, painfully aware that he was still watching her, tension drawing his face taut.

“My turn,” he said suddenly.

She looked up, almost jumping when she found him hunched down in front of her, a finger sternly planted beneath her nose. He, too, had stripped off his shirt. The muscles of his chest were already glistening from the warmth of the sun. His features were tense, eyes hard and bright, voice harsh as he spoke. “You made up your mind about things, told me what I was thinking and feeling. You had it all decided, and you weren't willing to listen to a word I said. Say what you want now—you acted like a wretched little brat back then. Maybe I didn't respond well, but you insisted I get off your island, and I did it. I was probably an idiot to let you act like a queen to begin with, but I won't make that mistake again, so you get this. We have a situation here. Your father was almost certainly murdered. Hank Jennings, as well. You can ignore those facts if you want to—but I can't.

“So you get this straight—accept the fact that I'm here for the duration, and don't you dare get your little butt in my way!”

“Why, you—” She stared.

“And who the hell does that baby belong to?”

“What?”

“Whose baby is it?”

“What business is it—”

“Whose is it?”

He was so insistent that she found herself answering him when she longed to slap him. “Brian is Yancy's baby, obviously.”

“Obviously? Yancy is black, and that baby is white. And he—”

“He
what?
”

“Who does that baby belong to?”

“Take another look. Yancy's heritage is mixed. Brian is her son.”

“Is that what you're hoping people will believe?”

She eased back, incredulous. “Yancy is the color of café au lait. She—”

“Yancy is beautiful,” he said impatiently. “That isn't the point.”

“Then what is?”

“Sam, tell me! Who is that baby's father?”

“Well, let's see—you're definitely not. Since you're insinuating that the child is mine and we haven't had relations in almost five years. Wow. Long pregnancy.”

She was amazed to see the depths of his anger. But it wasn't her place to share what had gone on with anyone else.

“Who does that baby belong to?” he demanded again.

She stared hard at him. “Yancy.”

“Let's try again. Who is that baby's father?”

“You can try from now until hell freezes over. What you're asking is none of your concern.” His fingers suddenly closed over her knees. His eyes were hot and level with hers. “Damn you, Sam, you're going to tell me.”

“Damn
you,
Adam. I'm not.”

She looked over his shoulder. The others were coming down the path toward the
Sloop Bee.

“People are coming, right?” he said.

She felt his hands on her bare knees. Her heart hammered furiously, and blood was rushing to her cheeks.

She wanted so badly to lash out at him. Instead she tried to rise. She bumped against him, felt his breath against her bare thighs, felt something wickedly hot within her begin to burn. Why didn't arguing with him cool the fever inside her instead of making it worse?

“Excuse me,” she muttered.

He set his hands on her waist. To keep her balance, she was forced to clutch his shoulders.

His eyes met hers, and she couldn't seem to draw her gaze away from him. She was still furious, yet she suddenly wanted in the worst way to know just what had happened, how the hell they had messed everything.

He shook his head, steadying her as he rose. Aware that the others were nearly upon them, he lowered his lips to her ear. “Damn it, Sam, I swear to God, you are going to give me answers.”

She pulled back, freeing herself from his hold before she replied. “The hell I will!” she promised vehemently, sweeping by him. And then she added for good measure, “The absolute hell I will!”

J
erry North, exquisite, blond and beautiful, was the first to reach the
Sloop Bee,
arriving just as Sam escaped Adam.

“Jerry, come on board and give me a hand,” Sam called cheerfully.

“Of course!” Jerry said.

Jerry was wearing dark glasses, and Sam couldn't see her eyes. The woman was smiling, but it seemed tense, as if she wanted to be just about anywhere rather than where she was.

“You're not afraid of boats, are you, or of being out on the water?” Sam asked, concerned.

“Bless you, no,” Jerry said. “But thanks for asking. You're a dear.”

“I just don't want you to be unhappy.”

“I'm not unhappy. I'm thrilled. Just thrilled.”

But she
was
unhappy, Sam was certain of it. Liam hopped on board just behind her, and Sam thought that Jerry jumped a mile high when Liam set his arms on her shoulders.

“I can't wait to see these Steps,” Liam said enthusiastically.

Jim Santino jumped aboard, flinging his head to toss his hair out of his face. “Ah, yes! The mysterious Steps.”

“They're not so mysterious,” Darlene announced, hopping aboard. “I mean, obviously they were carved by someone a million years ago, and once upon a time, they actually went somewhere.”

Adam laughed outright, and the others chuckled, as well. Except for poor Darlene, who looked offended. “Really, that's a perfectly logical—”

“Yes, dear, of course it is,” her mother told her. “That's why they're all laughing.”

“At ourselves,” Adam assured her, “for not being so quick to point out the obvious!”

In another few minutes everyone had boarded. Jem was at the wheel, and Sam showed him her dive plan. A moment later, they were under way.

Their first site for the day was going to be the Steps. Sam had planned a thirty-minute dive to fifty-five feet. While Jem motored them out to the site, she sat with the children, going over the dive tables with them again so they would know how deep they could stay down and how much air they would use. Children were usually better dive students, in Sam's opinion. Adults were too quick to assume they could stretch the safety factors built into the dive tables. Oddly enough, young divers also tended to be more careful with their equipment. She stressed to them how important that was—if someone had a hole in his tennis racket, he would be unhappy and might lose a match, but he would survive it. An improper mixture of air in a cylinder would not just be inconvenient—it could kill.

Sam had been determined to stay away from Adam on the way out, but Darlene had stars in her eyes where the man was concerned, and Brad found him just as interesting. Even when Sam had purposely gathered them around her to work on the tables, they had enthusiastically called Adam over, suddenly seeming to need him to confirm all her lessons.

“Nearly there, if you all want to start suiting up!” Jem called.

Sam slid into her own environmental protection suit, a light “skin,” since the water temperature around the island tended to remain warm, even in winter. She was an advocate of suits, though, simply because they did what their name implied—protected divers from the environment. She'd been hit a few times by the tentacles of jellyfish—with and without protection—and it was much, much better to have protection, she had discovered.

Liam Hinnerman was an old-time diver. He hated wearing a suit, but he did for her dives. He'd begun diving, he'd told her, before many of the associations that now certified divers had existed. Liam liked being a teacher. He'd wagged a finger beneath her nose, telling her, “You forget, young lady, that this
certification
thing is all comparatively new. I was diving when they still called a damn tank a tank instead of a
cylinder.
All this book learning and computers!”

She'd very patiently reminded him that with the number of sports divers that had begun enjoying the sea in the last few decades, it was necessary to train people in order to save lives.

“Humph!” he had told her. “Stupid people shouldn't dive.”

It was difficult arguing with Liam Hinnerman. He had his own brand of logic.

Jem dropped anchor and came around to help the divers into their buoyancy control vests, weights and cylinders. Sam went through her speech, automatically slipping into her own vest and cylinder as Jem came up behind her to help her. Her speech was about taking care of coral, reminding them that it was actually alive. She also warned them that buddies needed to stay together and watch out for one another.

“We're making this one a thirty-minute dive, folks, so enjoy the Steps, and if you take it all the way down to fifty-five feet, remember to watch yourselves coming up.”

“Watch out for our buddies—did we decide who our buddies are going to be?” Liam asked.

“Can't be me today,” Jerry North said, waving a hand in the air. “I'll be up here, sunning with Jem.”

“I'm with short stuff over there,” Sukee said, winking at Brad. “A promise is a promise.”

“I'm a threesome with Sam and Adam,” Darlene said, afraid that someone might try to change the previous night's arrangements.

“I've got my wife!” Joey Emerson announced, smiling adoringly at Sue.

“And I've got my
husband,
” Sue said.

“Is that mushy, or what?” Brad muttered.

“Hey, kid, mind your manners!” Sukee suggested.

“Oh, I, er, I didn't mean anything,” Brad moaned.

Adam tousled his hair. “She knows that. Women just like to give men a hard time.”

“I think it's the other way around,” Sukee murmured suggestively.

Adam laughed, a smile on his face as he returned Sukee's stare. The air seemed to sizzle between them.

Irritating as hell, Sam decided.

“Well, mushy or not, son, I've got your mother,” Lew Walker said.

“Oh, you guys aren't mushy anymore,” Brad said.

“Ouch!” Judy murmured.

“Young man, you'd better mind your manners!” Sukee told him. Brad grinned.

“That means we're stuck with one another,” Jim Santino told Liam, who nodded glumly in return.

“I can already tell that the dive we made the day before yesterday is going to prove to be the better of the two,” Jim said.

“But today we're diving the Steps,” Sukee said. “Come on, short stuff, let's get in the water. I want to see these magnificent relics.”

In twos and threes, the divers went off the back platform of the
Sloop Bee.
Sam held her mask to her face as she plunged in, checked to make sure that all her divers gave her an okay sign, then joined Darlene and Adam.

It was odd. Adam's eyes, completely silver in the watery silence surrounding them, seemed very large behind his mask. He still seemed tense, watching her with the same anger he had shown her ever since they'd been at the breakfast buffet when Brian had come trundling out to demand a piece of corn muffin.

The hell with him, she decided. She pointed downward and began a slow descent, making sure that Darlene was following without suffering from any of the squeezes that could occur due to increasing water pressure.

It was a beautiful portion of the sea in which to dive. A coral slope fell slowly into the sea right by the sandy floor where the Steps plummeted downward. The Steps themselves were very large, a good foot thick, and approximately four feet by four feet wide. Following them downward, Sam and her party passed by a school of amberjack, a half dozen pretty yellow tangs, one massive grouper—a fish that weighed about five hundred pounds—and a curious barracuda. Darlene cringed at the sight of the multitoothed sea dweller. As Adam drifted by Sam to reach Darlene, it felt to Sam as if he touched the entire length of her body.

He seemed to realize the stirring he had caused and paused, staring at her.

She had to remind herself to breathe. This was ridiculous. He was behaving even more oddly than he had been now that he knew about Brian. Why? What difference did it make to him? He seemed convinced that Brian had to be hers, and angry about the baby's father, which was absolutely ridiculous. Wasn't it?

She was furious herself, dying to send him off the island. No, dying to hurt him the way he had hurt her. Then she had to admit that it wasn't really the truth. The truth was, she was…

Dying to touch him. In the middle of the water. To reach out, take his hand.

No! She wanted to tear his hair out.

At least, that was what she
should
want, and she told herself it was what she did want. Wrong. She wanted to…just touch his hand….

Run her nails down his back….

No, just her fingertips….

She wasn't breathing! she reminded herself. The first rule of diving was to breathe continuously. She tore her eyes from his. Darlene was still staring at the barracuda. At last Adam set a hand on Darlene's shoulder and gave her the thumbs-up sign.

They moved by the barracuda without incident.

Sukee and Brad were just ahead of them. Sukee motioned them over, and they all watched a ray try to cover itself with the sand to escape their curious eyes. Sukee shot down lower, following the Steps. They followed.

It was a beautiful dive. They followed the Steps until they suddenly disappeared into the ocean floor, pointing out fish and sea fans and exceptional pieces of coral along the way.

At fifty-five feet the group was still basically together. The Emersons—hand in hand as they floated through the water—studied the ground. Brad and Sukee remained near. Lew and Judy Walker, too, seemed happy to stay hand in hand, cruising along the bottom.

Both Jim Santino and Liam Hinnerman seemed to be studying the stones.

Well, they had all wanted to see the Seafire Isle Steps. Everyone had seemed avidly determined, beyond eager. Now they were here.
So just what in God's name were they all looking for?
she wondered.

Something. All of them.

And all of them somehow suspect.

Even if her father—and Hank—
had
met with foul play, she told herself sternly, it was only Adam's presence making her feel that her father's enemy was now among the guests on Seafire Isle.

Sam found herself studying the stones, seeking some elusive answer herself. Here, at the fifty-five-foot mark, they didn't create a clean trail as they did at the lesser depths. It seemed that someone had tired of his task and thrown the last few any which way.

Ahead was an ocean ledge, leading to deeper water. Sam, with Darlene right beside her, was still staring at one of the Steps, studying the craftsman-ship, when she realized that Adam had gone ahead of them.

He had disappeared over the ocean ledge.

Curious, she caught Darlene's hand and shot after him. When they reached the drop-off, he was already returning.

His right hand was clenched, as if he was carrying something. She stared at him questioningly, but he pretended not to notice and tapped his watch. It was time to go up.

Back on the
Sloop Bee,
the guests all talked excitedly about the Steps. Sam was quiet.

She'd tried very hard to watch Adam, to see what he was up to. But he'd never let her see what he had been carrying, and when she'd asked him outright, he denied that he had found anything, and the hostility between them made it difficult to insist he tell her the truth.

“Where next?” Liam Hinnerman demanded.

“Nellie's Reef,” Sam said, forcing herself to forget Adam and whatever he was up to. “Our second dive of the day will be at a small outcropping of coral we call Nellie's Reef—supposedly because a girl named Nellie chose it as a place to throw herself into the sea to drown.”

“Did she? Drown?” Darlene asked.

Sam smiled, shaking her head. “When she threw herself in it was low tide, and the coral was so high that she ended up standing on it—and then she was rescued by the young man she had thought had forsaken her.”

“That's nice,” Darlene decided.

“Don't tell her the rest of it!” Adam warned.

“The rest of it?” Darlene said.

Sam shrugged. “Some people say there's more to the story. And it's really not bad. Actually, it's kind of nice.”

“Then tell me,” Darlene insisted.

Adam did the telling. “Nellie and her beau had a wonderful wedding, a half dozen children and lived happily ever after.”

“That's still nice,” Darlene said.

He shrugged.

“Yes, they lived to ripe old ages—then had themselves buried at sea on Nellie's Reef,” Sam said.

“Oh,” Darlene murmured. “So do they haunt the reef?”