In Deep Waters (10 page)

Ben had never seen anything like it. Kayla had turned his crew into a bunch of pathetic blubbering idiots. A good thing she was leaving.

"Working with you guys is so much fun. You've made me feel at home." She looked each one of his crew in the eye, everyone except him. "I'm so lucky I've gotten to meet you all."

Ben saw the chests expanding and the egos inflating. Not what he needed. But hey, she was saying goodbye. He couldn't complain.

"But something's come to my attention." She paused and looked at each of the men again. "We need to address it and put a stop to it or I'm going to have to leave."

Eugene went pale. "Leave?"

"Over my dead body." Monk picked up a knife.

"You can't leave," Madison cried.

"If you leave, I'm going with you." Fitz waved goodbye.

She '$ leaving.
Ben had the urge to do a little two-step. He didn't feel bad for making her leave. It was the only solution. His crew would be upset for a day or two, then things would return to normal and--

"I know about the bet."

It was so quiet you could have heard a transponder ping three miles underwater. No one moved. No one even blinked.

Ben stared at Kayla, unsure where her announcement fell in with her goodbyes.

"I'm flattered. Truly flattered, but marriage..." She flipped her hair behind her shoulder, and Ben's groin tightened. No doubt she didn't have a clue how sexy
that move was or she wouldn't have done it just then. Poor guys. He hoped they knew she wasn't torturing them on purpose. "It's not for me."

"Ever?" Anguish filled Eugene's voice.

"Not right now." Her bottom lip quivered slightly. "Or in the near future, either."

"But in the not-so-near future?" Stevie asked.

"I, uh, don't know."

That seemed to give the men hope. They were a pack of rats clinging to lifelines in the middle of a hurricane. It was time to let go and face their fates.

"What about a boyfriend?" Fitz's constant smile was nowhere in sight. "Are you looking for a boyfriend?"

"The only thing I want to find is the
Isabella."

Ben heard a collective sigh. He wondered how they would react to her final goodbye. Man, he hoped they didn't cry.

"What about after we find the
Isabella?"
Zach asked.

Ben snickered. Until Kayla stepped aboard, everyone had called the
Isabella
the
Izzy.

Kayla furrowed her brow. "Do you think mixing business with pleasure is a good idea?"

"Yes," six voices answered without a hesitation of doubt.

She sighed. "Well it doesn't matter, because I could never be interested in a man who made me part of a bet."

Kayla had guts. Nerve, too. Ben respected that. He only wished she'd get on with it and say she was leaving.

"Does this mean you're not interested in any of us?" Monk seemed to be having a hard time comprehending this. "In me?"

"You guys are all great," she said. "And attractive, too."

Monk grinned. "Some more than others."

Kayla's laughter reached across the dining room, and Ben felt as if he'd been hit in the solar plexus. "Each of you has your own special quality."

"What quality?" Zach asked.

"I want to know mine," Stevie said.

Eugene readied his pen. "Me, too."

"You really want to know?" Kayla asked.

Another resounding yes filled the air.

"Well, let's see." She looked to her right. "Stevie has great hair and is the most amazing cook. I need to start working out or my waistline is going to disappear."

Stevie blushed. "That would never happen."

"You are too sweet." Kayla looked at Fitz. "And you have the best sense of humor. I've never laughed or smiled so much in my life."

Fitz made a grand gesture of thanks and fell out of his chair.

"And Zach." Kayla grinned. "This may be a little personal, but you have the nicest butt. So great I wish we didn't have to sit down during our shift so much."

Zach nearly floated off his chair. "Gee, thanks, Kayla."

Fitz smacked Zach on the arm. "She's still not going to marry you."

"And Wolf." The sincerity in Kayla's eyes made Ben sit up and take notice. "I've never met a man so strong, yet so sensitive. Some woman will thank her lucky stars when she lands such a great husband and father."

Wolf sat straighter, and he hugged Madison.

"Eugene." Kayla's smile softened. "How did one man get to be so smart and so cute at the same time?"

"When you combine DNA from--"

"It was a rhetorical question, Einstein," Monk said.

"And Monk." She blew out a puff of air. "You have so much charm it should be illegal. You should be in the movies. Or consider going into politics."

Monk smiled. "Only if you'll be my first lady."

"What about Gray and Vance?" Eugene asked, his pen ready.

"Gray has a killer smile. Those dimples of his are lethal weapons. And Vance is a natural athlete with a great body."

Eugene frowned. "Yes, we know that about Vance."

"Hey, guys." Fitz grinned. "Together we're Kayla's perfect man."

"What about the boss?" Eugene asked.

A deer caught in the headlights had never looked so cute. She bit her bottom lip. "He, uh, wasn't part of the bet."

Ben had to give her credit. She was fast on her feet.

"Come on," Stevie urged. "Tell us."

She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "Ben is...nice when he wants to be."

Fitz laughed. "You know what they say about nice guys..."

Everyone laughed. Not Ben. He was nice? The other guys had great butts, smiles, bodies, brains. And he was... nice?

"So you guys aren't mad at me?" Kayla asked.

"No."

"Of course not."

"Disappointed, but not mad."

The men tumbled over themselves to reassure Kayla. Ben didn't care. All he could focus on was
nice.

Kayla seemed relieved. "And the bet..."

"Off," Wolf said. "I'll return the money."

"Great." The edges of her mouth curled up. "Now I get to stay."

Not stay, say goodbye. Ben wasn't nice. If she'd thought a meaningless compliment would change things, she had another thing coming. He stood. "You're leaving."

Her smiled widened. "I'm staying."

"But we agreed--"

"Yes, we did," she interrupted. "I agreed to leave if we couldn't resolve the problem with the crew. But I resolved it, so I'm staying."

Madison clapped. "She's staying. She's staying."

The crew and Kayla joined in.

"Come on, Daddy," Madison said. "Clap."

Ben gave an unenthusiastic clap and slumped in his chair. A damn mutiny--that's what this was.

Chapter Six

Everything had changed, yet nothing had changed.

Ben had kept his word and moved the search to her coordinates. Transducers were dropped overboard for reference points. Echo sounders helped the crew draw a seabed profile of the newly mapped-out search area. And the first pass was completed.

Sitting in the control room, Kayla stared at the monitors in front of her. Acoustic echoes received by the transducers became electronic impulses that traveled up the cable and into the bank of computers in the control room. Line-by-line images formed on the screens. But there was one problem. The only thing she saw was mud. No debris trails, no interesting geological formation. Nothing but mud.

She glanced at the row of recorders--glorified typewriters and printers--covered in black dust. The whole area smelled like graphite. But no marks were being made to signal a target or anomaly standing out from all the sediment.

The ship was now on its second line, making its way back at a constant two knots, slightly overlapping the previous pass. They called it mowing the lawn. It was more like watching the grass grow. Kayla sighed.

What was happening to her? She hadn't felt this restless before. But the success or failure of the search rested on her shoulders. She could no longer blame Ben for looking in the wrong place. And the longer it took to find the ship, the antsier she got.

The
Isabella
was out there. Where?

The investors and the museum were counting on her. Her reputation was on the line. And her father...

She touched the talisman around her neck. The indentations beneath the pads of her fingertips were like old friends. She could describe the talisman by memory-- pie-shaped and two inches long with untranslatable markings.

She had to find the
Isabella.
Not only for everyone else, but for herself, too. Her father's research had given her a clue about her past. Symbols written alongside his notes about the lost pirate ship matched those on her necklace--an heirloom from her mother's family. If she found the ship, maybe she could find answers about her past. The odds were unbelievable. Kayla didn't care. She was alone and tired of living a life punctuated with question marks.

Kayla stared at the monitors and forced herself to stay awake. She yawned and stretched her arms above her head. Her body clock still hadn't adjusted to this shift. She wondered if it ever would.

"Coffee?"

"No, thanks." Kayla glanced back, surprised to see Ben at this time of night.

He wore gray sweatpants and a white T-shirt and
looked as if he'd just rolled out of bed. A day's growth of whiskers made him look more dangerous and even a little sexy. He brushed his hand through his sleep-rumpled hair. The careless style looked good on him. Too good for a man she wanted to avoid at all costs.

Their relationship had worsened since the other night when she'd confronted the crew about the bet. She still couldn't believe she'd pulled that off. A good portion of her success she owed to Ben. Indirectly, of course. He made her reach inside herself and do things she'd never thought possible. She'd tried to emulate Ben's strengths, be bold and daring. It had given her the courage to take a stand.

Everyone seemed to respect what she'd done. Everyone except Ben. The tension between them had increased to the point where even Madison noticed.

"What's going on?" he asked.

"Nothing." She wished he would go back to his cabin. "Aren't you supposed to be asleep?"

"I was, but Madison woke up. Baby Fifi fell out of bed and she wanted a glass of water."

"Doesn't Baby Fifi drink from a bottle?"

His easy, sleepy smile, the first directed her way in days, was as warm and comfy as a pair of flannel jam-mies.

He glanced around. "Where's Zach?"

"He traded shifts with Monk tonight."

"So where's Monk?"

She pointed to the monitor showing Monk as he checked the cable on the big drum. "On deck."

Any trace of sleepiness disappeared. Ben was alert and ready. For what, she didn't know. "You shouldn't be alone."

"Monk will be right back. I know what to do if a target shows up."

"Did something break?"

"Monk wanted to check the cable." Ben's eyes darkened. He apparently didn't believe her. "That's all I know," she said.

He raised a brow. "A little defensive."

"If I looked at you as if you'd stolen the last cookie in the jar, you'd be a little defensive, too." The firm set of his chin told her not to expect an apology, but she wanted to understand him better. If only to avoid future confrontations. "Are you like this with everyone? Or just me?"

"A combination."