His smile faltered. “So that’s how it’s going to be, is it? All work and no play?” He nodded. “Okay, Doc. That’s fine. I was only told you needed an expert crew to recover a wreck. And since I’m the one with exponentially more experience in the actual water, pulling up items from the sea floor, and responsible for the safety of everyone aboard this vessel, I’d planned to call the shots with my divers and my crew on my boat.”
She crossed her arms and took a seat at the table, like she intended to dig in and stay awhile. “But you don’t have the historical or preservation expertise.”
Wow. The good doctor did not mess around when she went for blood. Fine. If she wanted to go head-to-head, he’d oblige his guest. “True, but now that we know the location of the wreck, once you give us the specifics of what’s down there, we really won’t need that expertise until we bring it to the surface, now will we? So you can tag along after the initial dive-recovery plan is formed and get some sun while we bring things up for you.”
Bella bristled and crossed her legs as well, her foot bouncing, making the silver ring on her second toe wink in the sunlight streaming through the conference room windows. Good. At least now she knew he wasn’t a guy to be pushed around just because she had a pretty face. What really amazed him was how she could be so demanding when she hadn’t even been on his ship more than half an hour. It concerned him that she threatened the well-run order of his ship. Not every man on board could resist her charms.
“You don’t know precisely what you are looking for, or how to catalog, clean, preserve, and store it properly once it comes up,” she insisted. “That’s my expertise.”
He let a slow, almost predatory, half smile lift the edge of his mouth and derived a small sense of satisfaction as the pulse at the base of her creamy throat beat faster. Doctor Dupré still thought she had the upper hand with him, but she didn’t realize he’d already discovered two of her vulnerabilities: the wreck and her attraction to him. “Which is why I guess the financial backer wants us working together on this.”
“Who exactly is the financial backer on this project? Mr. Palmer was a little sketchy on the details.”
She was fishing for answers, which amused him. “If he didn’t tell you, then it’s not my place to reveal the source.” He struggled to keep his expression as neutral as possible.
“But you’re friends.”
“Close enough that I know him as well as I know myself.”
Bella let out an exasperated sigh, uncrossed her arms, and gripped the edge of her seat. “That explains a lot.”
His eyes narrowed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You think you can call all the shots because you have a doohickey, and I don’t,” she said, waving a hand in the general direction of his groin.
He paused for just a second and tried not to laugh. “Did you just call my junk a doohickey?”
She glanced down at the floor a moment, a delicious pink color staining her cheeks before her gaze connected with his again. “That’s not the point. The point is, I need to be in charge of the salvage. The wreck could be in a delicate state.”
She huffed out a breath and leaned forward putting her forearms on her knees, giving him an exceptionally nice view of her cleavage that just about dropped his jaw to the floor. He’d gone rock hard the moment she’d entered the room, and he’d smelled her perfume—a light, mix of citrus, flowers, and sugar, like limoncello sipped on a Sicilian seashore on a hot summer day. Prolonging their meeting one-on-one was just adding to his torment.
Perhaps he’d do best to wrap up their introduction and give himself a breather before he had to talk to the rest of the crew. He forced himself to look at the images on the screen instead of her and hoped his long T-shirt was long enough. If he didn’t look at her, perhaps his brain could outpace his libido. He needed to put some distance between them, which on the confines of a ship wouldn’t be easy.
“The point is, Doctor Dupré, that on board this vessel you will act as a professional and that includes not micromanaging or harassing my crew. I have experience handling a ship of this size. Managing a professional and experienced dive crew. And the ship’s crew. Ordering and maintaining equipment, purchasing supplies before we need them, and transporting the artifacts back to shore safely. I do all that. Plus. Why don’t you stick to what you’re good at? Cleaning, ID-ing, and cataloging our finds.”
He gave her a moment to process that. He could practically hear the cogs in her brain turning. She remained silent. Good. There was only one boss on board, and that was him. If she insisted on pushing, he’d play hardball. He hoped to hell it wouldn’t come to that. “We’ll be meeting with the rest of the crew in thirty minutes. Please pull together whatever additional data you may have for us to review. It will give us a better scope of what we’re searching for before we go down again to set up a sonar scan grid.”
She didn’t respond, but he could hear her even, shallow breathing. The air held an electric charge that amped up every sense. Just having her in the same space altered everything, like the sensation before a thunderstorm. “Are you on board with that, Doctor Dupré?”
The whisper of movement as she shifted in her chair told him she was no longer seated. He turned and found her chair empty. She was gone.
Thirty minutes later there was sharp knock on her door.
“Doctor Dupré?”
The sound of his voice made all the downy little hairs on her arms raise. Dangerous. That’s what he was. Just like lightning. She’d seen it so many times before with the women in her family. Men who were in it for the quick hit and then disappeared. Well, no thank you. She was not interested. Somehow she hadn’t gotten that message to all her girl parts just yet.
“Sorry, no one is home right now, but we’ll get back to you soon. Please leave a message at the beep. Beep.”
“You have one minute to open this door, or I will.” The change in his tone from casual to imperious put her even more on edge. I will not give in.
Bella didn’t budge from her seat in the cushy chaise in the corner of her room. Why should she? She’d already made up her mind she was finding a way out of this. She would not be conned, duped, or stripped of her legacy because it was a man who claimed he was in charge of the biggest event in her life.
“Thirty seconds.” His voice held an edge of irritation. Good. He’d certainly irritated her enough. In fact, she was downright uncomfortable around him.
“Ten seconds.”
Mentally she did a countdown in her head and stood up to stare out the porthole window in her berth. She fully expected him to walk away. In her experience, men never did what they promised.
After she silently counted down, three…two…one, and didn’t hear anything, she felt justified in her assessment and smoothed her damp hands down the side of her shorts.
Then the doorknob rattled and turned, and the door, which she knew without a doubt she’d locked, burst open. Bella turned and stared at the tanned man who filled the doorway to her cabin. “You’re late for the all-hands meeting, Doctor Dupré.”
“And you opened my door without permission.”
He tossed a brass key up into the air and caught it in his hand. “Master key. It lets me in every door on this ship.”
“But you can’t do that.”
“Actually, since I’m the captain, and it’s my ship, I can.” He slipped the key into the pocket of his shorts and leaned his muscular body against the doorjamb. “I’ve come to get you. You aren’t always late to meetings, are you? It might send the wrong message to the crew.”
Bella didn’t care for his accusatory tone. She wasn’t part of his crew to be commanded as he pleased. She was in charge of this operation. He just hadn’t acknowledged it yet. And as of five minutes ago, she’d decided not to attend the all-hands meeting because she had no intention of working with him if he wasn’t going to recognize her as the lead on this operation.
The first chance she got, she’d radio
back to the mainland and have them send out the chopper. Surely she could talk some sense into Harry, and he could talk some sense into the financial backer. McCormack needed to be advised of his role in this operation and accept it or be replaced.
“Guess you’ll have to carry on without me, since, as you so clearly indicated earlier, I’m not really that important to what we’re doing here.”
A muscle in his jawline ticked. “We can’t have the meeting to plan the first research dive without you, and you damn well know it.”
“That doesn’t sound like an apology.”
“Maybe because it isn’t.”
She shrugged and tried to shut the door on him. Tucker’s large hand splayed on the dark teak door stopping the movement, his dark tan looking pale against the even darker wood.
“There’s no point in shutting it. I’ve got the key, remember?”
Bella pinched her lips together.
“What’s your game plan?” he said, his tone mocking. “If you think you can run back to your boss and ask him for another dive and recovery crew, you’re bound to be disappointed.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Really. And you would know this, how?”
“As I said before, I’m a close personal friend of the financial backer for this project. You don’t include me in on it, then he’ll pull your funding, and no more dive. We’re a package deal.”
“We’ll see about that.”
He crossed his arms and leaned his shoulder on the doorframe again, still blocking her only exit out of the tiny but well-supplied cabin. She had nothing to complain about as far as the accommodations.
The smooth wood floors had fluffy area rugs in soft blues, which matched the blue and white nautical theme of the cabin, and there was a porthole window large enough to open and lean out, taking in the beautiful view of endless sea. She had a queen-size bed that she’d discovered was pillow soft when she’d flung herself down on it earlier and a bathroom of her own with marble counters, a radiant-heated floor, and an oversize shower that looked heavenly.
But that angular jaw, those clear blue eyes under dark intense brows, and most of all, that arrogant, smug smile made her do a double take. “Go ahead. Feel free to use the satellite phone. It’s over on your dresser,” he said.
She would—later. But she wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of watching her do exactly what he said. She’d do it in her own good time. The air seemed to instantly be sucked out of the room by his mere presence. She had no intention of letting him see he’d gotten the advantage over her. Or confirming his suspicions that she found him attractive.
And absolutely, under no uncertain terms, did she plan to jeopardize this operation by getting too friendly with McCormack. She’d been fooled once by Phillip, letting her carefully constructed barriers down around a man from that family, and had paid the price. No, getting involved with another McCormack wasn’t worth it. Besides, he may have had that roguish air about him that marked him as different from Phillip, who was more of a corporate type, but that didn’t make him good dating material.
He was too laid-back, too much of an adventurer, to ever settle down in one place with one woman, at least that’s what she suspected. The McCormacks weren’t men to be tied down to anyone for very long. Even his own father and half brother couldn’t make do with just one woman. In fact, the only thing she could say that recommended this McCormack over his half brother was the fact that at least Tucker kept his word. He’d said he’d open her door, and he had. That gave her pause. What if he promised other things? Would he keep his word then as well? Just contemplating it made her squeeze her thighs together.
The allure of a bad boy and unlimited freedom to do whatever she pleased was a strong aphrodisiac to Dupré women, but Bella resisted for one simple reason: her family. The small part she had left had to come first. She’d mortgaged everything to make the salvage of the Rapid happen, and she owed them the security and respect the find would bring.
“Are you going to make the call and stop stalling this operation, or are you going to hole up in your cabin being self-righteous until your funding runs out? We’re on a tight schedule. Hurricane season is coming.”
Her hands bunched into fists as she fantasized about punching that smug smile right off his chiseled chin. She hated feeling forced into anything, worse still hated feeling helpless. “I’d be happy to come talk to the crew, once you apologize and they realize that I’m in charge of this operation.”
“But I’m not apologizing, you’re not in charge, and we both know it.”
She took a step forward, challenging him. “You wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for me.”
He gave her a devilish grin. “Ditto, sweetheart. You wouldn’t be on my ship, the closest you’ve ever been to getting your hands on the treasure, if it weren’t for me,” he shot back.
Everything in her vision seemed to take on a reddish tinge. She hadn’t been this upset by a man since Phillip had flipped her world upside down. And in her mind that meant one, and only one, thing. Tucker McCormack was dangerous. “You’re wrong about not being like your family.” She shook her head. “You’re just like them.”
With that she stormed right by him out of the cabin.
Maybe he was. God knew he had his old man’s chin and cheekbones. What else had he inherited that he didn’t realize since he’d never really been around his half siblings? Tuck pounded the edge of his fist on the cabin’s doorframe. Damn it. He’d overplayed his hand and lost the match.
Bella was not a woman to take orders. It only made her dig her heels in harder like a swordfish fighting on a line. The only saving grace in this situation was she couldn’t go very far. No matter how often she walked away, or which direction, there was no way for her to get off the ship unless she swam or had a helicopter pick her up.
“Cap?” Tuck turned to see Toneau peeking around the corner from the staircase.
“We’ll be starting the meeting in five.”
“Is the doctor coming?”
“That’s up to her.”
Humor sparked in Toneau’s dark eyes. “Is she giving you a run for your money, Cap?”
“Let’s just say she’s not making it easy.”
“Sometimes the hardest fish to catch are the sweetest to eat,” he said and winked.
“Not on this ship. Remind the crew of the protocols. I don’t give a damn how attractive the doctor is, there’s no fraternizing. Are we clear?”
“Aye, Cap.”
He could hear Toneau’s heavy footsteps thumping up the staircase to the deck above as he left her cabin and followed Toneau back up to the conference room where he knew his crew was waiting for him. Once Doctor Dupré had time to calm down, perhaps talk to her boss again, then realize she was well and truly stuck with him, she’d come around, and they could get this project underway.
He walked in the conference room, and the laughing and chatter among his crew members died down as he moved to the head of the table and the big screen mounted to the wall. “Okay, we’ve got a big day ahead of us. We’re going to send out the ROV again to look for a debris field to narrow our search pattern down. We’re also going to send out two teams to cover more area. Many of you know this could be a potentially big haul for us.”
“What exactly are looking for?”
“That’s—” He stopped mid sentence as Bella opened the outside doors and came walking in, backlit by sunlight shining off the water. He coughed to cover the sudden tightness in his throat.
“That’s what Doctor Dupré is here to explain to you.”
All heads turned as she walked toward him, and for good reason. He’d never seen a doctor who looked this good. And he wasn’t alone. He noticed some of the more obvious stares and made a mental note to reinforce with the crew that she was off-limits. Then made another to remind himself a time or two.
Any woman on his crew needed to feel as if she were completely safe, especially when they were working and living together in such
a confined space for weeks and possibly months on end. Having a no-fraternization policy just made the boundaries clear and easy for everyone to follow.
“But before we get started, let’s do a few introductions. Garvis Barclay, our ROV driver.” He looked like a cross between military, with his buzz cut and big frame, and a New Jersey bodybuilder with his deep tan and the carat diamond studs in each ear. “Next to him is Jake Williams, who’s our backup ROV driver and sonar tech.” Williams and Barclay were like the odd couple. Williams, with his thick-rimmed dark glasses, bald head, and ZZ Top-style brown beard down to nearly his navel, didn’t look anything like Barclay, let alone like he could work with him.
“Opposite him is Kylen Scott, our other sonar tech. He’ll be handling mapping out the wreck and recording everything we do to satisfy the authorities and historians we’re not screwing anything up.” Scott looked like he was maybe eighteen, with his farm-boy grin, white-blond hair and blue eyes, despite the fact he was in his thirties. He gave Doctor Dupré a big smile, and she nodded at him.
“The redhead next to him is Rory Guereaux. He’ll be your lab assistant and will be in charge of making sure all the artifacts are cataloged out of the storage pods when they come up, photographed, and treated however you see fit.” The stocky man, whose freckled skin was burned nearly the same color as his hair, smiled.
“I’m half Irish, half Cajun, so if you need me to tell anyone off for you on this boat, let me know,” Guereaux added.
Bella blushed slightly. “Thanks, I’ll remember that.”
“You’ve already met our first mate, Toneau. And next to him is Tom Reeves who handles our magnetometer.” Tom’s dark hair and even darker eyes were his most distinguishing features. He was thin and pale, almost like a Goth throwback. Tuck assumed the guy lived on energy drinks and rarely ventured out of the control room.
Her Sworn Enemy (Men of the Zodiac) Page 4
