Shell Game (4 page)

He didn’t know why but something about this old bird was quite captivating. A mischievous twinkle gleamed in her marble-blue eyes.

“Yellow,” he supplied.

The glimmer brightened to the level of a Fourth of July sparkler. “I knew it. Two thirty this afternoon. Afternoon trivia. Leeward Lounge. I’ll save you a seat!”

Before Luke could process the order, never mind respond, the woman scampered off like a kid after a new kitten. Instead of being annoyed, all he could do was smile. He hadn’t planned on spending his vacation playing trivia with a spry granny, but, so far, she was the most interesting action he’d come across. Besides, SEALs like to win. If the grandkid was any good at her schoolwork, how hard could it be to out-trivia a bar full of senior-citizen Jeopardy enthusiasts?

* * *

Holy biceps
. Sharla leaned back against the cabin door and sucked in a lungful of much-needed air. The minute she’d spotted the guy on the weight bench, she’d lost her breath and had never quite recovered. A time or two she thought she’d noticed him looking in her direction but finally decided it had to have been her imagination.
Or wishful thinking
.

And where had that come from? She was not in the market for a man of any kind for any reason. But damned if just looking at the guy in the fitness center hadn’t set her girly parts to a low simmer. Had she found the courage to brush up against him, she’d have no doubt bubbled over in a full rolling boil.

Pulling her wristwatch from her pocket, she checked the time. Almost eleven.
Blast
. She was supposed to have met her grandmother an hour ago for morning trivia. One of the reasons Nana and Great-Aunt Leticia loved to cruise on this line was all the trivia. Sharla hadn’t meant to linger at the fitness center. All she’d really wanted was a little intro information. But when Kyle had opened his mouth and that Australian accent had come out, she had instinctively followed him about like a sappy puppy. Then she’d spotted Mr. Weight Lifter and lost all track of coherent thought. And time.

Still pressed against the cabin door, Sharla felt the handle jiggle behind her back before her grandmother shoved her forward.

“I’m going to have to tie a bell around your neck, aren’t I?”

“Sorry, Nana. Lost track of time.”

“Hmm. I don’t suppose you know what color T-shirt the leader wears in the Tour de France?”

Sharla shook her head.

“What is the largest web-footed bird?”

Sharla shrugged.

“Okay, you’re forgiven. This time.” Nana eased past her granddaughter. “Are we having lunch in the dining room or upstairs in the cafeteria?”

“Do you have a preference?”

Nana studied the daily schedule in her hand. “No, so long as I’m not late for the Sexiest Man competition poolside at one o’clock.”

Sexiest Man? On this ship? Sharla wasn’t sure if she should laugh or cry. “Maybe we’d better do the upstairs buffet just in case. Give me ten minutes to shower and change, and we can head up.”

A highlighter in one hand, Nana sank onto her bed still studying the schedule.

Sexiest Man Contest. What was her grandmother thinking? Grabbing a short-sleeve shirt and tan shorts from the closet, Sharla’s thoughts shifted to the sweat-covered muscles of Mr. Weight Lifter. Now
that
was sexy. Even she wouldn’t mind hurrying through lunch if it meant another glimpse of that eye candy. Stepping into the phone-booth-size shower, Sharla had to admit, maybe her grandmother had the right idea after all about having fun on this trip.

* * *

The minute Luke crossed into the back portion of the cafeteria, the bitter smell of burned rubber slapped him in the face.

“Smells like the cook stepped away from the stove,” a nearby passenger said, then laughed.

“Or fried his shoes,” another added, scooping up several cookies from the dessert island.

Dish already in hand, Luke scanned the immediate area, searching for fire extinguishers and alarms. His eyes quickly surveyed the walls for outlets and sparks. The smell—growing stronger—had nothing to do with overcooked lunch.

Plastic grates formed the ceiling that hid the wiring for the lights and the pipes for the sprinkler system. At least if the place went up in flames, the sprinklers would kick in before any serious damage could be done.

Of course one of the first things he’d learned in basic training was to never count on
if
.

Waiters in Hawaiian shirts meandered about. Cooks in high white hats flipped burgers and filled salad bowls, but not a single member of the staff had their nose to the air in search of the source of the nasty odor.

Damn, where was the source?

Giving up all pretense of being a hungry passenger in search of food, Luke set aside his plate and, not spotting electrical outlets on the walls, focused his attention on the grated ceilings where he could see all the wiring and fixtures above.

Somewhere
…

Flash…

Sparks splattered like holiday fireworks. Pointing to the fixture at ten o’clock, Luke turned to the nearest cook and hollered, “Fire. Turn off the lights.”

Like a scared rabbit, the little guy turned tail and ran into the kitchen.

Expecting him to come running out any second with a fire extinguisher, Luke was taken aback to not only see that the lights were still on but to have a second cook stroll out of the kitchen, glancing about as though searching for an empty seat in a crowded restaurant.

This was not good.

A slender middle-aged woman—with a nose that could probably have sniffed out drug smugglers—let out an ear-shattering screech. “Fire!”

Luke could envision it now. Five hundred people trampling their way past the fire brigade in a mad dash to jump overboard. “Let’s clear the way, everyone. Nice and easy. Move along.”

The waiters actually had the nerve to give him a dirty look, while cook number three made an appearance through the galley entry, and the small fire flashed across the wire to the corner in another burst of flames.

Clearly no one had any intention of dealing with the problem at hand. Luke grabbed the nearest employee in blue pants and a white shirt, which hopefully meant the guy was some kind of lunchroom supervisor. “Get everyone out of here. Do not let them panic.”

Brows buckled in confusion, the idiot didn’t move.

Luke pointed to the fire in the ceiling and shouted, “Now.” Relieved to see the man’s eyes widen as he called for his staff to clear the restaurant, Luke waited expectantly. And still no alarms sounded, no sprinklers kicked on and no extinguishers were brought in.

Talk about FUBAR. If the sailors on board a navy vessel took this long to find a damn fire extinguisher, Uncle Sam wouldn’t have any ships left to sail. Enough was enough. Working his way past the slow-exiting passengers still adding food to their plates—apparently missing lunch was a fate worse than getting trapped by a fire—Luke ignored the befuddled staff huddled by the doorway and stormed into the galley.

Seriously
? Three paces to his right. In front of everyone. Bright red with black letters. He grabbed the CO2 extinguisher designated for Class B electrical fires that no one else seemed to be able to find, and pushed past the kitchen crew now muttering in broken English and other miscellaneous dialects.

Below the fire, Luke positioned the discharge horn, broke the safety seal and pulled out the pin. Holding the base, he tested the discharge and, squeezing the handle, moved closer to the fire source. When the yellow and red licks of flame smothered to nothing, he backed away, released the handle and set down the canister.

Turning around in the now smoke-filled room, Luke found himself surrounded by uniforms.

A wall of men with arms crossed, brows furrowed and none too happy.

“Oops.”

Chapter Four

“Hurry up. I want a good seat poolside.”

“What seat?” Sharla followed her grandmother. “Every passenger on the ship has to be on deck.” This morning on her way to the fitness center, Sharla had been surprised to see so many deck chairs already occupied. She loved the sun as much as the next guy, but some of those people must have been up at the crack of dawn to reserve their spot.

“Always glass half empty.” Her grandmother shook her head and eased her way ahead of Sharla to the open area by the pool, then looked around at the—as predicted—occupied chairs.

Her fingers to her forehead, Nana dramatically wiped nonexistent sweat from her brow, and the hairs on Sharla’s neck prickled with awareness.
She couldn’t
.

Slowing her gait, Nana walked from one deck chair to another, holding on to the backs like a railing.

She wouldn’t
. Sharla picked up her pace in an effort to catch up with her grandmother.

Pausing behind a chair with a middle-aged man reading a paperback, Nana scanned the area, and…

Crap.
She did
.

Like a two-ton anvil, Sophia Garibaldi dropped to the ground with a well-practiced thud.

Any hopes Sharla might have had of reaching her grandmother first faded into oblivion as a crowd of sunbathers swarmed the little old lady gracefully sprawled across the deck. If nothing else, Sharla had to give her grandmother credit. The woman knew how to take a dive.

“Excuse me.” Sharla pushed through the growing group of onlookers. “That’s my grandmother.”

Few people moved.

Sharla had never learned the art of slithering through a crowd undetected. That skill had ended a generation before with her mom. Though trained in the family business, Sharla’s mother had fallen in love and followed the straight-and-narrow, if not somewhat nomadic, lifestyle of Sharla’s archeologist father.

Once in a while one of the old-timers in the family would try to teach Sharla some of the arts, but Nana didn’t want to upset her son-in-law and risk being banned from visiting Sharla. Especially when she reached school age, and her mom would go off with her dad on some expedition or other and leave Sharla with Nana.

The cruise ship version of poolside Muzak came to an abrupt stop. “Alpha, alpha, alpha. Midship pool, deck eleven. Alpha, alpha, alpha.”

Double crap. Sharla had no idea what the code word
alpha
meant, but she did understand
pool, deck eleven
. The cavalry was being called out for her con-artist grandmother. Marvelous.

Finally squeezing between the last two oversize passengers between her and her grandmother, Sharla was able to see up close how pale the old woman looked. A sudden sense of panic raced from her stomach and gripped her by the throat. Could the collapse have been real? Was her spunky seventy-five-year-old grandmother not as healthy as Sharla had thought?

Propelled by fear for her beloved Nana, Sharla shoved aside the samurai-sized passenger still in her way and stood at her grandmother’s feet. Dropping to the ground, Sharla studied Nana quickly.

Another passenger had his fingers on Nana’s neck while staring at the watch on his other arm. “Probably dehydration,” he muttered to no one in particular.

“Excuse me.” A deep male voice sounded past the curious onlookers still hovering closely around.

Sharla glanced away from the man checking Nana’s pulse to see a ship’s officer slip in beside him, then, after a single glance, signal to the staff who had accompanied him. While her heart stuttered to a normal beat, she watched her grandmother carefully. No movement of any kind. Damn it.

Sharla shouldn’t have been so hard on Nana. It was difficult to remember that her grandmother was reaching the end of the average life expectancy for a female living in Florida. Nana was so damn feisty that Sharla realized she hadn’t really come to grips with the idea that Nana would ever die. And Sharla certainly wasn’t ready to lose her grandmother now. A multitude of possibilities flipped through Sharla’s mind, from a ministroke to a massive coronary and everything in between. Her mouth totally dry, she was unable to swallow back her fears. If Nana had merely passed out from the heat, she should have come to by now. Dang it. Why was she still out cold?

And then Sharla saw it. Not much. But she suddenly remembered the tell. The double tap of an otherwise unnoticed pinkie. The old biddy was faking it. For a damn deck chair.

The moment two of the ship’s staff returned with a gurney, Nana’s eyes miraculously fluttered open. Her dazed and confused look was worthy of an Academy Award.

“What happened?”

The ship’s doctor checked her pulse under the watchful eye of the passenger physician in a Speedo.

There should be laws about mature men in Speedos.

“You passed out. What’s your name?”

“Sophia. Sophia Garibaldi.”

The doc glanced at Sharla and waited for her confirming nod. “Very good, Sophia. How many fingers am I holding up?”

Nana had the audacity to squint and strain before answering, “The sun’s in my eyes, but I see two.”

“That’s right.” The man took hold of her wrist and turned to his watch. “What did you have for breakfast?”

“Coffee and a muffin.”

Sharla almost laughed in her grandmother’s face. Nana had eaten a specialty three-egg omelet with bacon, sausage and a side of French toast. The woman’s metabolism was the envy of every over-thirty female on the Eastern Seaboard.