The Reef

by Nora Roberts

  Matthew pushed them back. “And consists of?”

  “Consists of, consists of.” Scowling, LaRue snatched his tobacco pouch. “The, ah, mouthpiece, the hose, the what is it, stages?”

  “What’s a stage?”

  “This is pressure-reducing unit. Why do you worry me with this?”

  “You don’t dive until you know the equipment inside-out, until I’m sure you understand the physics and physiology.” He offered LaRue a sharpened pencil. “Take all the time you need, but remember, you don’t dive until you’re done. Buck, give me a hand on deck.”

  “Sure, be right there.”

  LaRue glanced over his test sheets, glanced at Matthew’s retreating back. “What is Boyle’s Law?” he whispered to Buck.

  “When the pressure—”

  “No cheating,” Matthew called back. “Jesus, Buck.”

  “Sorry, LaRue, you’re on your own.” Shamefaced, Buck followed Matthew out on deck. “I was just giving him a little hint.”

  “Who’s going to give him a little hint if he forgets the basics when he’s forty feet under?”

  “You’re right—but he’s doing good, isn’t he? You said he had a knack for diving.”

  “He’s a fucking fish down there,” Matthew said with a grin. “But he’s not skipping the details.”

  He was already wearing his wet suit and now zipped it. He gave his tanks and gauges a last check, then let Buck help him strap them on.

  “We’re just going down for a little recognizance,” Matthew commented as he adjusted his weight belt.

  “Yeah.”

  Buck knew they were over the site of the Marguerite. Both he and Matthew avoided discussing the wreck, or what had happened. Buck avoided Matthew’s eyes as his nephew sat to put on his flippers.

  “Tate wants some pictures,” Matthew said, for lack of anything better. Everyone knew they wanted a firsthand look at what VanDyke had left behind.

  “Sure. She was always big on getting pictures. Kid grew up nice, didn’t she?”

  “Nice enough. Don’t give LaRue any more hints.”

  “Not even if he begs.” Buck’s smile faded when Matthew slipped on his mask. Panic reared up and grabbed him by the throat. “Matthew . . .”

  Matthew paused, one hand on his mask as he prepared to roll into the water. “What?” He saw the anxiety, struggled to overlook it.

  “Nothing.” Buck wiped a hand over his mouth, swallowed hard while nightmare visions of sharks and blood swam in his head. “Good diving.”

  With a brief nod, Matthew slipped into the water. He ignored the impulse to dive deep, lose himself in the silence and solitude. He crossed the distance to the New Adventure in an easy crawl, gave up a hailing shout.

  “Ready to roll up there?”

  “Just about.” Ray, full-suited, came to the rail with a grin. “Tate’s checking her camera.” He lifted a hand in a wave to Buck. “How’s he doing?”

  “He’ll be all right,” Matthew said. The last thing he wanted to do was dwell on his uncle’s fears. Now that they were here, he was impatient to begin. “Let’s go, Red!” he shouted. “The morning’s wasting.”

  “I’m coming.”

  He caught a glimpse of her before she sat to pull on her flippers. Moments later, he watched her graceful entry. With a quick pike dive, Matthew was following her down even as Ray dropped into the water.

  The three of them descended, nearly side by side.

  Matthew hadn’t expected the memories to swarm up at him like the bright, quick fish. Everything about that summer came back, unbidden and unwelcomed. He remembered the way she had looked when he’d first seen her. The wary suspicious eyes, the quick flares of anger, resentment.

  Oh, and he remembered his instant attraction, one he’d smothered, or tried to. The sense of competition when they’d teamed as diving partners, an edge that had never really dulled even after they’d melded into a unit.

  There was the thrill he’d experienced when they’d found the wreck. Those times with her that had opened both his heart and his hopes as nothing and no one ever had before. Or had again. All the sensations of falling in love, of working together, of discovery and promise spun through him as they neared the shadow of the wreck.

  As did the jarring aches of horror and loss.

  VanDyke had left little but the shredded shell of the galleon. Matthew knew at one glance it would be a foolish waste of time to bring down the airlift and dig. Nothing of any value would have been left behind. The wreck itself had been destroyed, ripped apart in search of that last doubloon.

  It surprised him to feel sorrow for that. With careful excavation, the Marguerite might have been saved. Instead she was in pieces, left for the worms.

  When he glanced at Tate, Matthew could see clearly that whatever vague regret he felt for the ship was nothing to what she was experiencing.

  It shattered her. Tate stared at the scattered planks, not bothering to attempt to block the wave of grief. She let it wash over her until she felt it deep inside.

  He’d killed her, she thought. VanDyke hadn’t been content with his rape, but had destroyed the Marguerite. No one would see what she had been, what she had meant. Because of one man’s greed.

  She might have wept if tears hadn’t been so late and so useless. Instead, she shook off the comforting hand Matthew put on her shoulder, and lifted her camera. If nothing else, she’d record the devastation.

  Catching Matthew’s eye, Ray shook his head, gestured so that they swam a short distance away.

  There was still beauty surrounding her. The coral, the fish, the waving plants. But it didn’t touch her now as she recorded the scene that had once been the stage for such great joy.

  It was fitting, she supposed, that it had been ruined, destroyed, neglected. Just like the love she’d once offered Matthew.

  So, she thought, that summer was finally and completely over. It was past time to bury it, and start new.

  When they surfaced, the first thing she saw was Buck’s pale, anxious face leaning over the rail.

  “Everything okay?”

  “Everything’s fine,” she assured him. Because it was closer, she pulled herself aboard the Mermaid. She stopped, turned and waved to her mother, who was recording the event on video aboard the New Adventure. “Pretty much what we expected,” she told Buck after she had dropped her weight belt.

  “Bastard tore her apart, didn’t he?”

  “Yes.” She glanced over as Matthew climbed on deck.

  “Ray wants to head south right away.” He pulled off his mask, ran a hand through his hair. “You might as well stay put,” he told Tate before she could rise. “It won’t take long. Buck?”

  With a nod, Buck headed up to the bridge to take the wheel.

  “Best plan is to do some swim-overs.” After tugging down the zipper of his wet suit, Matthew sat beside her. “We could get lucky.”

  “Are you feeling lucky, Lassiter?”

  “No.” He closed his eyes as the engine purred. “She meant something to me, too.”

  “Fame and fortune?”

  The words cut, but not as keenly as the edge of her voice. His gaze, hot and hurt, swept up to hers before he stood and strode toward the companionway.

  “Matthew.” Shame had her springing up after him. “I’m sorry.”

  “Forget it.”

  “No.” Before he could take the stairs, she grabbed his arm. “I am sorry. That was hard on all of us—going down, seeing what was left. Remembering. Taking it out on you is easy, but it doesn’t help.”

  In impotent fury, Matthew’s hands whitened on the rail. “Maybe I could have stopped him. Buck thought so.”

  “Buck wasn’t there.” She kept her hand firm on his arm until he turned to face her again. Odd, she thought, she hadn’t realized he would blame himself. Or that he had room in the cold heart she’d assigned to him for guilt. “There was nothing any of us could have done. Looking back doesn’t help either, and certainly doesn
’t change anything.”

  “The Marguerite’s not all we’re talking about, is it?”

  She was tempted to back off, to shrug his words away. But evasions were foolish, and she hoped she was no longer a fool. “No, it’s not.”

  “I wasn’t what you wanted me to be, and I hurt you. I can’t change that either.”

  “I was young. Infatuations pass.” Somehow her hand had found its way to his, and linked. Realizing it, she flexed her fingers free and stepped back. “I understood something when I was down there, looking at what was left. There is nothing left, Matthew. The ship, that summer, that girl. All that’s gone. We have to start with what’s now.”

  “Clean slate.”

  “I don’t know if we can go that far. Let’s just say we’ve turned a page.”

  “Okay.” He offered a hand. When she took it, he brought hers unexpectedly to his lips. “I’m going to work on you, Red,” he murmured.

  “Excuse me?”

  “You said we’ve got a new page. I figure I’ve got some say in what gets written on it. So I’m going to work on you. Last time around, you threw yourself at me.”

  “I did no such thing.”

  “Sure you did. But I can see I’ve got my work cut out for me this time. That’s okay.” He skimmed his thumb over her knuckles before she jerked her hand free. “In fact, I think I’m going to enjoy it.”

  “I don’t know why I waste my time trying to mend fences with you. You’re as arrogant as you ever were.”

  “Just the way you like me, sweetheart.”

  She caught the lightning flash of his grin before she whirled away. Try as she might, she couldn’t quite suppress the answering upward tug of her lips.

  It was hell knowing he was right. That was exactly the way she liked him.

  CHAPTER 18

  S WIM-OVERS TURNED UP nothing impressive. Tate spent most of the afternoon closeted with her father and his research while Matthew took LaRue, fresh from passing his written certification, on a practice dive.

  She had already organized the heaps of notes, the snippets from the National Archives, wreck charts, the material Ray had culled from the Archivo General de Indias in Seville.

  She’d separated his maps, charts, storm records, manifests, diaries. Now she concentrated on his calculations.

  Already she’d figured and refigured a dozen times. If their information was correct, they were certainly in the right area. The problem was, of course, that even with a location, finding a wreck was like separating that one special grain of sand from a fat fistful.

  The sea was so huge, so vast, and even with the leaps in technology, a man’s abilities were limited. It was highly possible to be within twenty feet of a wreck, and miss it entirely.

  They had been almost foolishly lucky with the Marguerite. Tate didn’t want to calculate the odds of lightning striking twice, not with the hope and excitement she could see whenever she looked into her father’s eyes.

  They needed the Isabella, she thought. All of them did, for all manner of differing reasons.

  She knew the magnetometer aboard the Mermaid was in use. It was a fine and efficient way of locating a wreck. So far the sensor being towed behind the Mermaid had picked up no readings of iron such as would be found in cannon, riggings, anchor.

  They had depth finders on both bridges so that any telltale change in water depth caused by a wreck would be distinguished. They had set out buoys to mark the search pattern.

  If she was down there, Tate thought, they would find her.

  She stayed in the deckhouse after her father had gone out to starboard.

  “You’re not going to put roses in your cheeks in here, Red.”

  She looked up, surprised when Matthew held out a glass of her mother’s lemonade. “You’re back. How did LaRue check out?”

  “He’s a good diving partner. How many times are you going to go over all this?”

  She tidied papers. “Until I’m finished.”

  “How about taking a break?” Reaching out, he toyed with the sleeve of her T-shirt. He’d been working on this approach all day, and still wasn’t sure he had it right. “Why don’t we take a run into Nevis, have dinner?”

  “Dinner?”

  “That’s right. You.” He tugged the sleeve. “And me.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “I thought we’d turned the page.”

  “That doesn’t—”

  “And I’m not keen on the big pinochle game that’s being planned for tonight. As I remember, you weren’t big on cards either. The resort has a reggae band out on the terrace. Some dinner, a little music. There won’t be time for much of that once we find the Isabella.”

  “It’s been a long day.”

  “You’re going to make me think you’re afraid to spend a couple of hours with me.” His eyes flashed on hers, blue as the sea and just as arrogant. “Of course, if you’re afraid you’ll throw yourself at me again.”

  “That’s pathetic.”

  “Well, then.” Satisfied he nailed the approach after all, he headed back for the companionway. “Wear your hair down, Red. I like it.”

  She wore it up. Not to spite him, she assured herself. But because she wanted to. She’d changed into a sundress the color of crushed blueberries borrowed from her mother’s closet, at Marla’s insistence. The full skirt made it easy to climb in and out of the tender.

  Once she was settled in and the little tender was speeding toward the island, she admitted that she looked forward to an elegant restaurant meal, with a little music tossed in.

  The air was balmy, the sun still bright as it traveled west. Behind the protection of her shaded glasses, she studied Matthew. His hair was whipping around his face. On the tiller, his hand was broad and competent. If there had been no history between them, she would have been pleased to have such an attractive companion for an evening’s relaxation.

  But there was history. Rather than diluting the pleasure, it added an edge to it. Competition again, she supposed. If he thought she would fall for that rough-and-ready charm a second time, she was only too happy to prove him wrong.

  “The weather’s supposed to hold all week,” she said conversationally.

  “I know. You still don’t wear lipstick.” When she instinctively flicked her tongue over her lips, he dealt with the resulting hitch in his pulse. “It’s a pity most women don’t realize how tempting a naked mouth is. Especially when it pouts.”

  Deliberately, she relaxed her mouth again. “I’ll enjoy knowing it’s driving you crazy for the next couple of hours.”

  She turned her attention to Nevis. The mountain’s cone was swirled in clouds, a striking and dramatic contrast to the brilliant blue of the sky. Far below, the shore spread white against a calm sea. The sand was dotted with people, pretty umbrellas and lounging chairs. A novice sailboarder struggled fruitlessly to stay upright. As she watched him fall into the water again, Tate laughed.

  “Too bad.” She cocked a brow at Matthew. “Have you ever tried that?”

  “Nope.”

  “I have. It’s a hell of a lot of work, frustrating when you think you’ve got it then lose your balance and capsize. But if you catch the breeze and go, it’s wonderful.”

  “Better than diving?”