After sliding from the bed, Loralei leaned over to pick up the clothes someone had folded and put on the chair in the corner. A low, appreciative whistle sounded behind her.
Straightening, she spun, tugging at the gown to make it cover more of her body than it was.
Jackson filled the doorway. Arms crossed over his chest, one of his shoulders propped against the jamb, he frowned at her.
The expression sent an unwelcome shiver through her—awareness tinged with a bit of apprehension. It was hard to miss the soldier lurking beneath the relaxed facade.
He could keep her inside this room and probably do it without breaking a sweat.
“They said you’re refusing medical treatment.”
Loralei yanked her shorts on beneath the gown. “Yes.”
“Why would you do a stupid thing like that?”
Bent at the waist, she glared up at him. “Because I’m not sick,” she ground out. “I don’t want X-rays or blood tests. And I sure as hell can’t afford a night in a hospital that most definitely isn’t in my network.”
“I filled out your paperwork and agreed to cover your expenses.”
What the hell. “Why would you do that?”
“Because I’m the reason you’re in here.”
God, she didn’t want to appreciate the gesture or the fact that he was taking responsibility for what he’d done. But she did.
Which made it twice as hard to forget the wanton way she’d thrown herself at him not an hour ago. And the way he’d politely said no.
“Look, it’s been a hell of a long day. I had to get up at the butt-crack of dawn to make my flight this morning. I’ve been awake for almost twenty hours at this point. All I want right now is a soft bed and about a day of uninterrupted sleep.”
Unfortunately, she’d be lucky to get in a solid four hours before she had to be up and back on the Emily.
Her muscles seized at just the thought of being back on that ship, surrounded by water.
Closing her eyes, Loralei tried to will away the panic attack she could feel lurking at the edges of her consciousness.
“How about a compromise?” His gentle voice, closer than she expected, startled her.
Loralei’s eyes popped open to find Jackson standing before her. His hands hung loosely by his sides, but he watched her with that sharp gaze that saw way too much.
“Let them take the X-rays and run the blood work. If everything looks fine, then I’ll take you back to your hotel. An hour at the most.” He paused, rocked back on his heels and shoved his hands deep into the pockets of his worn jeans. “Please.”
Something about the way he said the word made her think he didn’t use it often. He struck her more as the kind of man used to issuing orders and having them followed.
The doctor’s words tumbled through her head.
“I’m not staying the night.”
“Okay, you don’t have to stay.”
“And I’m not wearing the damn gown.”
Jackson chuckled, the sound tickling across her senses. “Fair enough.”
He leaned his head out the door and spoke softly to someone who’d obviously been waiting on the other side.
She sagged against the edge of the bed. Suddenly, she was certain she was going to regret giving in to him.
* * *
JACKSON WAS RELIEVED Loralei didn’t appear to have any lasting effects from her near drowning.
The doctor had said her chest film was clear, her oxygen levels fine.
It had taken slightly more than the hour he’d promised, which Loralei would get over.
He had no idea how she was still awake. And not just awake, but wired. It could have had something to do with the diet soda she’d been mainlining since the doctor had told her she could have something to drink.
Maybe Jackson should have listened to her and let her leave when she’d wanted. Then they both would be in their own beds, asleep and decidedly less annoyed.
But for some reason he couldn’t make himself leave.
His crew was expecting to ship out bright and early in the morning, which would be in a couple hours. Not that he couldn’t handle a single night without sleep. He’d experienced worse conditions in some of the grittiest shit holes in the world. In comparison, this was a walk in the park.
After pulling into the circular drive of her hotel, Jackson stopped right outside the entrance. She didn’t wait for him to come around, but got out and slammed the door shut behind her before stalking away.
Jackson planted his rear against the side of the car and watched her through the huge wall of glass that now separated them. Half way across the lobby, she came to a halt, seeming to stare at the bank of elevators on the far side. He watched her shoulders rise and fall on a deep breath. Then she dropped her head back and looked up at the ceiling. What the heck was she doing?
A moment later he found himself inside the lobby, standing beside her and trying to make out the words she was muttering under her breath.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“I lost my room key.” She turned. He expected to be treated to another of her patented glares, but instead was met with pure exhaustion shining out of puffy eyes. She was running on fumes and probably had been for the past hour, caffeine and soda masking the truth. “When I nearly drowned.”
Aw, hell.
“And my ID is upstairs.”
Without saying another word, he walked over to the front desk and, with an apologetic smile, started explaining the situation to the nice woman working reception at three in the morning.
Luckily, the woman had been on duty when Loralei checked in late in the afternoon so remembered her and was willing to reissue her key.
Grasping her hand, Jackson slapped the piece of plastic against her palm, curled her fingers over it and took a step toward the door.
Escape. That’s what he wanted.
So he couldn’t explain why he didn’t actually walk out the door until the elevator Loralei disappeared into closed between them.
6
LORALEI WAS FRUSTRATED...with herself and her team. She was exhausted, cranky and on edge. She was trying desperately to hold it together so that she wouldn’t hyperventilate every time her gaze swept across the deck and the vast blue ocean surrounding them.
A battle she was seriously afraid she was going to lose eventually.
And then what?
The last thing she needed was for her team to figure out she couldn’t handle being this close to the water. They were already reluctant to listen to anything she had to say, treating her like a little kid instead of their boss.
“No, Brian, I am not going to argue with you about this again. I want to go here.” Loralei stabbed a short nail at the map showing an inlet on the far side of a tiny island.
“But...” Brian sputtered.
They’d been having this argument for the past fifteen minutes.
“No buts, Brian. Is this my ship?”
He frowned, his eyebrows snapping together as his light brown eyes flashed. Loralei was too pissed herself to heed the warning.
“Yes.”
“Great. I’ve done the research.”
And she had. The minute she’d uncovered the information on the Chimera, stuffed into the back of a filing cabinet in her father’s office, she’d been intrigued.
It was the kind of story that grabbed her attention. Add in the Civil War angle...cat nip for any professor of American history. The American Revolution was her specialty, but that didn’t stop her from appreciating the impact the Civil War had had on the country.
And how easily the outcome could have changed at any point in the struggle.
She’d quickly gotten lost in the material she’d discovered, wanting to learn more. It hadn’t taken her long to slip down the rabbit hole of research.
The Chimera had a varied history. Initially she had been a cargo ship, running trade routes between Europe, China and the West Indies. Somewhere along the way a
major plantation owner in the French West Indies had purchased the ship and settled into transporting goods and people between the islands and America.
She had been profitable, right up until the Civil War had interfered with the market for luxury goods. However, the plantation owner, with family and land in Georgia himself, had had a stake in the outcome of the war. And influence over many powerful, rich friends in the Caribbean. He’d rallied support from the other merchants and plantation owners, who had feared a change in the slave culture in America could negatively impact their own way of life on the islands.
Supplies and munitions had been gathered. Money had been quietly raised. And everything had been loaded onto the Chimera, a ship that routinely ran the route and had the experience and crew to slip past the blockades.
Unfortunately, she never made it that far.
According to an eyewitness report from a boy from the surrounding islands, the Chimera had anchored in the inlet hours before the hurricane that sunk her had hit. Most historians discounted the statement. In order for the Chimera to have been there, she would have been days off course even before the threat of the storm.
Loralei wasn’t in the habit of discounting anything, especially considering the Chimera had been lost for such a long time.
“Take us there, Brian. Now,” Loralei ordered, slamming her palm down over the map and glaring up at him.
Teeth grinding together, Brian spun on his heel and headed out of the little room she’d commandeered to spread out her research materials.
She wasn’t convinced this was the place where the Chimera had sunk. In fact, she’d be more surprised if they found her than if they didn’t. But it was a starting point. There were still several leads she wanted to run down.
Just the thought of getting lost inside the old documents and historical records gave her a tiny, giddy thrill.
Confident Brian would follow her instructions, at least for now, Loralei popped the lid of her laptop and called up a site she often used for research.
One plus to staying glued to her computer was that for those few hours, tucked in a room below deck, she could almost forget she was on a ship.
At least until the Emily pitched, and Loralei was thrown off balance for a few seconds before the ship righted herself.
Her stomach rolled. Loralei squeezed her eyes shut.
And the first thing she saw was Jackson’s calm, steady gaze as he’d watched her last night on the dock, water dripping from his hair and face, concern and guilt clouding his eyes.
Nope, not what she needed right now.
* * *
“WE HAVE COMPANY.”
Marcus’s shout from the helm had frustration pouring into Jackson’s blood stream.
Biting back the foul language desperate to escape, he tossed down the equipment he’d been inspecting in preparation for taking the team out, crossed the deck and climbed the ladder to the helm.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“Pretty sure that’s Lancaster’s ship,” Marcus said, pointing out the glassed-in window to starboard.
He growled beneath his breath. “What the hell is she doing here?”
This inlet hadn’t been on any of the documents James Lancaster had stolen from him.
Had she gotten a look at his newest information before he’d found her crouched on the deck? Not possible. Or at least he’d convinced himself of that.
Since Lancaster had broken in he’d been more careful with his research. And Loralei Lancaster hadn’t struck him as the kind of woman with B-and-E skills in her back pocket.
Swearing again under his breath, Jackson fought back the urge to hit something. Apparently he’d been wrong.
Why the hell had he given her the benefit of the doubt? Believed her when she’d looked up at him with those wide green eyes and said she was sorry.
He’d let his libido convince him. Hell, she’d probably used that against him, too. Thinking back, she was the one who’d initiated that steamy kiss in his room, all wet and tempting and practically naked.
She’d known exactly what she was doing.
Letting any part of him hope she wasn’t like her father was just stupid. It was a lesson he wouldn’t forget again.
Jackson stared out across the bright blue water. Crap. There wasn’t a thing he could do about it now that Loralei’s team was here. Luckily, he didn’t think the Chimera had actually gone down in the inlet, only that she’d been here before the hurricane hit.
But he believed in covering all the bases. And following the leads as they came. Since the last eyewitness testimony he’d uncovered had the Chimera here, that was where they were starting their search.
As much as he wanted to bar her from diving on the site, Jackson didn’t have the power to do that. He needed to make sure his team was down first and uncovered anything of value so that he could keep the information to himself.
Spinning for the door, he was back on the deck with his team in record time.
“Hurry up, boys. We have work to do and I’m not a fan of wasting daylight. Get your equipment checked and prepped, and get your asses in the water.”
Marcus sent him a knowing grin. Chad offered him a small salute, but used a strategic finger to do it. The rest of the team simply put their heads down and went to work.
He didn’t care that he was taking out his foul mood on them. They were tough. They’d survive.
“We’ve got company and I don’t want them getting their hands on something that’s ours.”
That lit a fire under some butts, because these guys were as invested in finding the Chimera as he was. As part of the discovery team, they stood to make a nice, tidy bonus when they uncovered her. They weren’t any more enamored than he was with the idea of someone else beating them to the punch.
Out of the corner of his eye, Jackson saw Emily’s Fortune pull in about forty yards away and anchor.
Positioned on the diving platform on the back of the ship, he paused for several moments, scanning the decks. He wasn’t looking for a glimpse of Loralei because he wanted to see her beautiful, treacherous face. No, all he wanted to do was let her know she was in for a fight.
There. As far away from the railing along the deck as she could possibly get, she stood. Her legs were spread wide against the gentle pitch and roll of the deck, her knees soft as she unconsciously compensated for the motion.
But he noticed she didn’t once look at the water around her. Her face was pinched, her eyes squinting against the bright glare of sunlight.
Maybe she felt his eyes on her. Or maybe she was looking for him as he’d been looking for her. But he knew the moment their gazes collided. Felt the impact of it straight through to his bones...not to mention in his groin, which tightened painfully inside his wetsuit.
Crossing his arms over his chest, he stared at her as his men splashed into the water behind him. Then, when it was his turn, he offered her a bastardized salute, obviously unwilling to give her the real thing. With that one gesture, he managed to call her a coward, a thief and issue a little friendly provocation.
Right before falling backward into the water.
* * *
HEAT DID NOT blast through her when Jackson Duchane stared at her across the space between their ships.
She wouldn’t let it.
It was clear the man was angry with her. She could read it in his stiff body language and the half-assed gesture he’d given her before falling into the water. What she couldn’t tell was why... He had a few things to choose from. Was he upset about what had happened last night? Was he pissed she’d shown up at his dive site? Or was he angry over something else she hadn’t thought of yet?
She didn’t have the luxury of time or energy to care. Not when she was hanging on to her control by a thin thread.
Although, that tight smirk he’d tossed her before disappearing beneath the glassy surface of the water had done one thing for her—it had helped steel her spine.
She ha
d to get her shit together so that she could beat his arrogant ass to the Chimera. He couldn’t win. Her dad would be so disappointed if she let him.
This was the man who’d almost drowned her. He wasn’t nice. Her father hadn’t liked him. She needed to remember that and not get caught up in his pretty face and amazing body.
Even if he had saved her. And insisted on taking care of her.
But those things didn’t negate his other actions.
All around her, the team bustled with activity. They were pulling out equipment, setting up everything for the dive. And she stood in the middle of it feeling useless and helpless. She had no idea what any of them were doing. And up until that moment, she’d thought she had no desire to learn.
But now wasn’t the time to slow them down with questions. Not when Jackson’s team was already in the water.
She heard the splash as several men with tanks strapped to their backs dropped into the sea. She simply stood there, waiting. Several members of the team were on deck to monitor the equipment. They watched the feed from cameras the divers had taken down to survey the ocean floor and checked in with them regularly.
All she could think about was her mom’s accident down there beneath the cool blue water.
Jackson. Brian. The rest of her team. They were all down there, as far as she was concerned taking risks. That realization made her stomach flip uncomfortably.
Knowing there was nothing for her to do up here but wait, Loralei headed below deck to do the one thing she could to contribute—continue her research.
It was hours later when an excited shout dragged her back to the present. Loud feet slapped the deck above her head. Her first instinct was to assume something was wrong. Heart pounding, Loralei rushed out and up, bracing for whatever disaster she was about to face.
Instead of blood or fear, she found several of her team members whooping and hollering with glee, huge smiles on their faces.
She watched a hydraulic arm at the back of the boat swing from the water out over the deck and lower something down. Minutes later the whirring sounded again as the heavy cables rolled back, revealing a solid object covered with barnacles and brine. It was cylindrical, larger on one end than the other.
Under the Surface Page 6
