Dead in the Water

by Janice Kay Johnson - His Best Friend's Baby

  He traced the route she suggested with his finger. Convoluted, relatively speaking, but as long as they weren’t spotted by his shipmates, they could escape the net they were trying to cast.

  She slipped the charts back into the plastic that protected them from water damage, her gaze on him thoughtful.

  Damn. She’d been working herself up to something. Adam tensed.

  Her chin lifted. “I don’t understand why they’re so determined. They head back to Alaska, who can even prove they were ever here? I didn’t see a name or registration number on the freighter, and I couldn’t make out the name on the yacht. Plus, they didn’t see me.”

  “You’re hundred percent sure?”

  Her forehead crinkled, but she said, “They wouldn’t have left if they had.”

  “Look at it from their point of view. Say they didn’t see you, but they decided to send someone back to make sure I was dead. What did they find? My body? Nope. The empty kayak, floating hull up? Not that, either. Maybe some debris, like the paddle, but probably not much, because the smaller stuff would have dispersed fast.”

  “Your body could have become submerged.”

  “But I was floating when they last saw me.”

  “And...and currents among these islands aren’t as straightforward as the tide they deal with out on the open water.”

  “Kayak wasn’t going to sink, though. And it’s gaudy as hell.”

  Claire wanted to be stubborn, but her usually sky blue eyes had darkened with worry.

  She went with stubborn. “They could be back in Juneau by now, but they’re not. The drugs they transferred to the yacht are well on their way to a warehouse, ready for distribution. You’re one man. You didn’t have anything on you. No camera, no flash drive, no phone. Unless you have something stashed in Juneau, wherever you were staying, you can’t prove anything. So why are they so worried?”

  * * *

  ADAM COULD WISH she weren’t so logical, except she was his only backup. Reality was, the other agents involved in the overall investigation wouldn’t start worrying about him for days, unless the freighter docked and he didn’t check in. If that rusty old tub didn’t reappear, they’d know he had no way to call, and would assume that something unexpected had come up and he was just keeping his head down. Doing his job.

  That left Claire.

  In a tight situation, he’d appreciate her brains as well as her astonishing strength. Right now, he wished she hadn’t followed that train of logic quite so far down the line.

  “I was there to nail them for drug trafficking. They’ve been transporting a steady stream of top-quality product to the US. I hadn’t gotten even a hint of anything else, so no, I don’t have anything useful stashed back in Juneau. I’ve passed on what I’ve learned.” He paused. “I was back on board the ship when I overheard something not meant for my ears.”

  “Because your boss already distrusted you?”

  “Because this wasn’t something anyone high up in the organization wanted the grunts to know. Most of us on that ship were grunts.” He hesitated again, his instincts always to hold what he knew close. But he did need her, and if he had to scare her to make her more cautious, he’d do that. “This time,” he said bluntly, “they’d been persuaded to carry something extra. I’m sure they were paid well, but it wouldn’t surprise me if everyone who knew about the extra cargo isn’t eliminated as soon as they show their faces back in Alaska.”

  “Weapons?” she whispered.

  “Close enough.”

  Her eyes narrowed, and he caught himself twitching at her piercing scrutiny. She saw a lot deeper than he liked...or was damn good at faking it. He knew he wouldn’t want to face her in a job interview if he were hiding part of his past.

  Suddenly, she stood and crossed her arms, looking down at him. “Which makes it important you get the word out as soon as possible.” Not a question.

  He inclined his head in agreement.

  “There wasn’t anyone else on that ship or in port who can do that.”

  “No.”

  “Let me ask this.”

  He knew where she was going.

  “What if they catch up with us and you get shot, but I make my getaway? What if I survive and you don’t?” She bent toward him, with her slim body not as good at looming as she probably imagined, but she was making her point, all right. “Shouldn’t I know who to contact and what to tell that person?”

  Adam closed his eyes and scrubbed a hand through his hair, stiff from the salt water. “Yeah,” he said hoarsely. This went against all his training, but she was right. Hell, he might die by making a beginner’s mistake in the kayak she’d already described as frail. Or because he was injured, far from his peak health and strength.

  “Well, then?”

  He wanted to stand and pace. He needed to expend some of his fear. Aware of his weakness, he made himself stay put.

  “Uranium. Terrorists convinced a couple of dumb-ass traffickers to carry the makings for a nuclear bomb—or several, who knows? All they saw was the bucks.” He rubbed his thumb and forefingers together. “Worse thing is, I don’t know what group is behind this, or who is waiting for the delivery.” In his intensity, he leaned forward. “Passing on the name and registration number for the yacht is critical.”

  Claire stared at him, unblinking.

  * * *

  AFTER DROPPING HIS BOMBSHELL—bad pun—Adam made her memorize the information as well as the phone number to reach his boss.

  Somehow, Claire stayed calm. Or managed to look calm anyway. She had a suspicion it would all hit her at some unexpected moment, just as grief for Mike had earlier. After everything she’d seen and learned in the past twenty-four hours, it took a lot to stir her out of her state of numbness.

  Why was this happening to her? The biggest drama in her life had been the final months with Devin followed by their breakup. Right now, the Devin situation was receding fast in her rearview mirror. A jerk, so what. A real crisis? Terrorists getting their hands on the critical ingredient to manufacture a nuclear bomb... No comparison.

  While brooding silently, she removed the evergreen branches hiding her kayak. Then she did her best to shove the huge, scary problems into a compartment in her brain that had a really sturdy door, focusing instead on carrying the kayak down to the water while slip-sliding on the rounded rocks that made up the beach. A careless trip could leave her injured, too.

  Plus, it was easier to think about the next step than the big picture.

  When Adam saw what she was doing, he scowled and shot reflexively to his feet. “Let me help—”

  “I carry it all the time. You don’t need to be lifting anything yet.”

  His lips tightened and he relented. Claire had already noticed he didn’t like to feel weaker than her. Of course, in his case, a need to be tough was probably a professional requirement.

  He did watch in grim silence as she suited up, just in case she took a dunking. That got her thinking. Yes, he’d clearly hated letting her do the heavy work, but was that really because he needed to swagger in front of a woman? He’d been a lot more open to her suggestions and even orders than Devin ever would have been, even in a life-and-death situation. She’d like to think Adam just had old-fashioned good manners, or maybe tended to be protective. Being protective would come naturally to anyone in law enforcement, she assumed.

  On the other hand, it was still open to question who he was. Maybe he’d cooked up this latest story to remove her doubts. It was certainly a good one. He’d hardly taken his eyes off her since his revelation about the contraband on the ship, as if he was assessing the effectiveness. Did she buy it? Didn’t she?

  Next step, she reminded herself.

  “I’ll help you pack and load your kayak tomorrow morning,” she told him, “so we won’t worry about any of that. Um...why don’t you bring you
r chair down to the waterline instead of having to stand?”

  She read a flicker in his eyes as frustration rather than annoyance at her continued coddling. Without a word, he picked up the lightweight chair and carried it down, picking his way carefully. His boots probably weren’t entirely dry, but cold and clammy had to be an improvement on soggy. His own pants, sweater—with holes torn by the bullet front and back—socks and briefs were still draped over a huckleberry bush, probably dry.

  Wow, would he be able to get into Mike’s wet suit? Aghast, she wondered why she hadn’t thought of this latest problem already. Damn.

  Next step.

  She shoved this new worry onto the pile.

  Once she started her demonstration and found herself stumbling over her own tongue, Claire discovered how self-conscious Adam Taylor made her feel with his attention one hundred percent on her.

  Of course, part of it was her awareness of his tall, strong body and what it looked like beneath his clothes. She knew the pattern of brown hair on his chest and had no trouble at all picturing his hard belly and strong thighs. She’d even saved a mental screenshot of him naked, despite pretending to herself that she wasn’t looking.

  By that time she had to be beet red, a step up from the sunburn she could never seem to avoid on these trips, given her extremely fair skin.

  If Adam looked quizzical, who could blame him?

  He watched intently as she showed him how to hold the superlight carbon fiber paddle. Mike had used a different style of paddle, so she used her own spare paddle for Adam to practice the grip.

  She had him study the interior of the cockpit, with the seat and back cushions, the foam thigh braces and foot braces. The rudder... No, too much, she decided. It turned out he knew how to read the compass.

  As she cinched up her spray skirt around her waist, Claire hoped Mike’s wasn’t too tight for Adam’s more muscled torso. As a beginner, he was unlikely to do any rolling maneuvers, but without a spray skirt, even moderate waves would start filling the compartment with water. He’d be ankle deep or more in no time. Given the temperature of the water, he’d get cold. The risk would be even higher if he couldn’t use the wet suit.

  She stayed close, demonstrating forward and back strokes, the sweep stroke for turning, braces for stability. Then she returned to shore, pulled the kayak up and answered questions.

  They ought to be holding this lesson in a swimming pool, or maybe a placid lake. She shouldn’t be having to condense even basic techniques and knowledge into an hour exhibition. Even if he magically achieved mastery of the strokes, he’d still lack seamanship, the understanding of weather, tides, the subtle changes, what it took not to make a fatal mistake.

  But finally, she said, “We need to figure out whether you can get into Mike’s wet suit. As long as the weather stays nice, it’s not as important—the fleece pants you’re wearing will be okay. At least now you have some dry pants to change into at the end of the day. But there’s no guarantee about weather, and if you get really wet it could trigger another bout with hypothermia.”

  He listened with an odd expression on his face. When she was finished, one side of his mouth turned up in a smile she could only think was tender. Her heart cramped hard.

  “You’re doing your best, you know,” he said in his gravelly voice. “That’s all you can do. Don’t beat yourself up.”

  They stood close enough, she could have taken one step forward and leaned on him. Rested her forehead against his broad chest.

  Even the temptation scared her. Instead, Claire snapped, “The better you plan, the more chance of success. You must know that.”

  “I do,” he said quietly, that same quizzical look in his eyes, the same tilt to his mouth.

  She turned her back to start to lift her kayak. Almost immediately, some of the weight vanished. Adam had grabbed the toggle at the stern with his left hand, and all she had to do was lift from the bow.

  Weight shared.

  Chapter Seven

  Adam was all but twitching with his need to do something. Anything. Get on with tomorrow’s plans, whether he was ready or not. Scramble through that damn tangle of vegetation to a point where he could watch surrounding waters through the binoculars while wishing they were a rifle scope.

  Have sex.

  That wasn’t an option for a lot of reasons, starting with the fact that Claire Holland was a nice woman who’d risked her own life to save his. He’d known her for twenty-four hours—and that was generous, given that he’d been semiconscious for a good part of that time. There was plenty he still didn’t know about her, but he’d bet she wasn’t the kind of woman who had brief hookups with men, even if she felt the stirrings of attraction. So as fast as that ephemeral thought crossed his mind, he banished it.

  He thought about suggesting they take the kayaks out far enough to get a peek but knew that was not possible. He wouldn’t be ready tomorrow, but he really wasn’t ready right now.

  The tentative warmth of the day felt good, if he’d been in the mood to lean back and relax.

  Claire had picked up an electronic reader, told him that no, it wasn’t displaying the time because it couldn’t connect to the internet any more than her cell phone could. “I want to finish the book I’m reading,” she’d announced, “and after that it’ll be dead until I have a chance to charge it.”

  If she had a chance.

  She had to be thinking that. He’d give anything to ensure she survived the coming days. Almost anything, Adam amended—he needed to get to someplace he could make a phone call. The bomb, depending on its size, could kill thousands to hundreds of thousands of people. That had to come first. Maybe it was fortunate that he needed her to get him to that phone. He wouldn’t have to make a hard choice.

  She abruptly set down her reader, stood and marched over to pick up a bag and carry it back to her chair. She dug inside and came up with a pile of tattered paperbacks that she held out to him.

  “You’re making me crazy. You can read, right?”

  With all the hairs that had escaped the braid or broken off around her face, she made him think of a ruffled owl.

  “You’re peeling,” he commented.

  “Gee, I didn’t notice.” She waggled the books, and he accepted them.

  Then she plunked down in her chair hard enough she was lucky not to bend the aluminum frame.

  So, she didn’t like him staring at her. He got that, but suspected she was as antsy as he was. They had the whole day to get through, and days were too damn long at this latitude. The two of them would have to go to bed well before the sun set if they were to make a really early start.

  What in the hell were they supposed to do all day?

  He bent his head to look at the book on top of the pile. A thriller, which wasn’t likely to be pleasant recreational reading at the moment.

  “Listen,” Claire said suddenly.

  Adam cocked his head. There it was, distant but audible. An outboard motor. That was no cabin cruiser or fishing boat.

  His body went rigid.

  Voice as tense as he felt, she said, “The tide’s far enough out they can’t get close enough to see us.”

  “I’m going out to where I can see them.” He rose to his feet. “Do you have flares, in case we get lucky and spot some innocent boaters?”

  “Yes. Should we bring one?”

  “Let’s hold off. We don’t dare set off a flare if there’s any chance the skiff is nearby. Where are the binoculars?”

  “You’re not going without me,” Claire insisted, just as she had yesterday.

  She’d kept the binoculars close at hand. He was glad to have her given the difficulty of the trek. If he fell and did further damage to his shoulder, he was screwed. Likewise, if he sprained or broke an ankle or ribs. Or if she hurt herself. In fact, he had to grab her once when her boot became wedged und
er roots crisscrossing a crack between rocks, and she returned the favor a few minutes later.

  The distant hum of the motor continued as background noise that rasped his nerve endings. If only he had a rifle.

  No, better not to take a shot even if he’d had one. Unless he succeeded in killing both men in the boat, or punching enough holes in the aluminum hull to sink the thing, all he’d have done was pinpoint their current location.

  Thinking about weapons gave him an idea, though. He’d check to see how many flares were available between the two kayaks. They could potentially be used as weapons, and he’d be especially happy to find a flare gun. In the event the two of them got cornered and were under attack, flares might draw attention his former buddies wouldn’t like.

  Today, Claire and he pushed farther out toward the rim of the island, although they paid the price of a sore ankle—in his case—and a wealth of scratches on both their faces and hands.

  Once they had a good view, they hunkered down behind the scrappy vegetation and rounded granite.

  After two or three minutes of waiting, Claire burst out, “It’s like...the whine of black flies or mosquitoes!”

  “I’d like to swat this one,” he agreed.

  The reflection off the water was bright enough, he had to blink frequently. “Did Mike have dark glasses?” he asked.

  She gave him a startled glance. “Yes. Unless they were in—” Her voice became smaller. “I think he might have been wearing them.”

  Oh, well. Protection for his eyes would be a luxury, not an essential.

  Once again, she spotted the boat before he did, making him think she had exceptionally sharp eyes. “There. Only...it’s not the same boat.”

  He trained the binoculars on the gray-green inflatable boat, and immediately confirmed the identities of the two men in it. “Son of a—” he muttered under his breath. “The skiff ran really low in the water with both of them aboard. This is newer and larger.” Motor didn’t sound any more powerful, though.