Deep Blue (12 page)

Joe’s air had completely run out. He had headed for the surface, tossed his tank in the boat, and begun free-dive searching. Conn knew he had maybe a couple of minutes. He prayed Hope and Michael’s tanks weren’t already empty.

His heart rate had returned to normal, though the fear was still there, clawing at his insides, the terror that they might already be dead. It had taken sheer force of will to regain his steady control, but Hope and Michael’s lives depended on it. These next several minutes would determine their fate and he needed his every thought to be sharp and calm and clear.

He tried to think what might have happened, what scenario could have occurred that would keep both of them hidden from view.

A cave, he suspected with growing dread, a place where they couldn’t be seen. Had they somehow been trapped inside? It seemed more and more likely, and if that were so, odds of them dying in such a place were building with every lost second.

Conn’s heart squeezed. He forced himself to ignore it.
Stay calm,
he told himself.
Find them.

And that’s when he saw her. Swimming with all her might in his direction, frantically waving her hands. She wasn’t wearing her tank and he could see by the desperation in her face that she was completely out of air. He shoved toward her, forcing the powerful muscles in his legs to propel him closer, determined to get to her before she fell unconscious.

She realized he had spotted her and it seemed to give her a last shot of strength. She pushed the last few feet between them and then he was shoving his regulator into her mouth, praying he had enough air left for both of them to reach the surface.

Hope took a couple of reviving breaths, pulled the regulator out, turned, and started madly swimming away. She was leading him to Michael and though he wanted to keep her by his side, to keep sharing his air with her, he let her go, allowing her to swim as fast as she could.

They reached the cave just seconds later and the minute they were inside, he gave her another breath of air. She breathed at his side as he moved toward the boy, instantly spotting the rockfall that had trapped him in the cave.

Hope took a breath and together they moved the rocks that were holding Michael’s foot and flipper in place. The instant he was free, they all started swimming for the entrance to the cave. Hope picked up her dive light on the way out and Michael swam, holding onto her tank, while Conn and Hope shared the last of his air.

Though the dive was shallow, the surface seemed miles away. Both tanks went dry a few feet from the top, but they were close enough to make it now without a problem. Their heads broke the surface at the same time and a few seconds later, Joe’s black-haired head popped up.

“Thank God,” he said when he saw them, and there was no disguising the mist that sprang into his dark eyes.

No one said anything as they climbed into the boat, Joe helping Michael, Conn hauling Hope aboard. The gear came off, got tossed into the bottom of the Whaler.

Conn cast a glance at Michael, saw Joe pull the boy against him and give him a man-sized hug. Conn turned and pulled Hope into his arms.

“I thought you were dead.” It was true, though he had refused to let the idea form in his head until now.

“I tried to find you,” she said. “I swam and swam, but the coral all looks the same and I had to keep letting the air out of my lungs.” She clung to him and he just held her. He was shaking, he realized. He had never reacted this way to a close situation before.

“Are you sure you’re all right?” he asked, still holding onto her, refusing to let her go.

He felt the nod of her head against his chest. “I’m all right.” She looked up. “I don’t…I don’t know about Michael.”

Reluctantly, he released his hold, sat back, and turned to the boy. Joe was examining Michael’s ankle. The skin was broken and torn, bloody in several places, but the cuts didn’t look too deep.

“Anything broken?” Conn asked.

Joe continued his exam, moving the ankle around, checking the shinbone upward toward the knee. “Doesn’t look like it.”

Michael was okay. Hope was alive and safe. A sweep of relief went through him, hitting him so hard it made him dizzy. It was followed by a rush of anger.

He turned a hard look on Hope. “What the hell happened down there? You two were supposed to stay close to Joe and me. What in God’s name possessed you to go off on your own?”

Hope swallowed and shook her head. “It all happened so fast. We only swam a little ways away and Michael saw this cave and I followed him in, and he must have hit something and the rocks fell, trapping him, and…”

She looked up at Conn and her eyes were bleak and filling with tears and he knew she was thinking how close both of them had come to dying.

He tried to hold on to his anger, but it was no use. Instead he hauled her back into his arms. “God, I was so damned scared. I’ve never been that scared. Don’t you ever—ever do anything like that again.”

“It was my fault,” Michael said softly from behind them. “I knew better. I led Hope into that cave and I almost got both of us killed.”

Hope moved next to the boy, leaned over and wrapped her arms around him. “It was an accident. It never occurred to me something like that could happen. We’ll both be more careful next time.”

Next time?
Conn recoiled at the thought. Would she really go down there again? He wasn’t sure he could let her.

“You saved my life,” Michael said to her. “If you hadn’t gone out and found Conn, I’d be dead.”

Hope gave him a falsely bright smile. “We made it.” She hugged him again. “That’s all that counts.”

They didn’t say more as Joe fired up the outboard engine and headed the Whaler back to the
Conquest.
Conn dreaded facing King, but there was no way he was going to keep what had happened a secret from the boy’s father.

In the end, after a long, fatherly hug and telling him how much he loved him, King grounded the boy for not staying close to Joe and indulging in the rash behavior that could have gotten both him and Hope killed.

Michael was safe. Eyes glinting with tears, the big man thanked Hope for saving the life of his son and it was obvious she had made a lifelong friend.

Once everyone was settled back aboard the
Conquest
and Michael was returned to his father’s care, Hope slipped away from the galley and headed down to her cabin. She was closing the door when a big hand wrapped around the edge and pushed it open.

Conn walked into the room and the next thing she knew he was kissing her. Kissing her and kissing her and she was kissing him back as if she couldn’t get enough.

“I almost lost you today,” he said against the side of her neck. “All I could think of was how much time we’d wasted.”

The top of her swimsuit came off as if by magic and his mouth fastened on her breast.

“Conn…” she whispered as he pulled and tugged, bit down on her nipple, took the fullness into his mouth. Hope’s head fell back and her fingers dug into his wavy dark hair. “We…we can’t do this here. Someone…someone might hear us.”

“I don’t give a damn who hears.”

And suddenly neither did she. She wanted Conner Reese. And after what had happened, she needed to feel alive. She wanted to feel the beat of her own heart, the sweet pull of air into her lungs. What better way than making love to a man she desired?

Mercifully, Captain Bob fired up the engines just then, covering the little panting sounds she was making.

“There really is a God,” Conn whispered, nipping the side of her neck, his palms cupping her breasts, kneading them, gently pinching the ends. Pleasure rolled through her, hot and wild and sweet, and she wanted more.

She ran her hands over his body, exploring the muscles and sinews, the heavy cords in his shoulders, the ridges of muscle across his ribs. His nipples intrigued her. She bent her head and pressed her mouth against the flat copper disk, worked the tiny crest that hardened beneath her tongue.

Conn made a low, growling sound of pleasure and she felt his hands in her hair. Tilting her head back, he kissed her again, taking her deeply with his tongue while his hand moved lower, inside the elastic band on her bathing suit bottom. Long fingers skimmed over the thatch of burnished curls at the entrance to her core, slipped between the soft folds of her sex.

“God, you feel good.”

She was wet. Slick and hot and on fire for him. She moaned as he began to stroke her, pressed herself against his hand. He slid the swimsuit over her hips and it slipped down her legs, pooled in a damp lavender heap at her feet.

Hope reached for his suit, urged it down those long, hard-muscled legs, then tentatively reached out to touch him. He was big. Thick and hard, smooth skin over steel. Her hand trembled as it skimmed over the heavy length jutting toward her.

“I want to be inside you,” he said. “I can’t think of anything I’ve ever wanted more.”

“What about…?”
Protection?

“I’ll take care of it.”

She whispered a soft little word of agreement that still hovered on her lips as he scooped her up and carried her over to the bed. He settled her in the center of the bunk, then followed her down, kissing her all the while. His mouth was hot and fierce as it moved over hers, sending liquid heat surging through her. His skillful fingers found her again, slid deep inside.

“You’re tight,” he said, stretching her, preparing her to accept him. “How long has it been, Hope?”

She wanted to lie to him, make him believe there was nothing unusual in this wild mating. She simply could not. “More than two years.”

The admission seemed to please him. He settled to his task like a man with a mission, and in minutes she was writhing beneath him, begging him to take her.

Conn just kept tasting and teasing, kissing and nipping, his big, clever hands bringing her nearer and nearer the peak.

“Please…” she whispered. “I need you, Conn.”

His tall frame straightened above her. His eyes met hers, the most intense blue she’d ever seen. She felt his hardness at the entrance to her passage, and then he was surging forward, thrusting hard inside her. Hope’s breath caught. For an instant, neither of them moved. Then Hope arched upward, wanting more, taking him deeper still.

She heard Conn groan.

They started moving together, their bodies in perfect sync, the pleasure so sweet she knew she wouldn’t last long. She tried to hold back, wanting to heighten the moment, but Conn was relentless, pounding into her again and again. He filled her completely, seemed to absorb her into his very skin. It was as if he claimed her in some way, made himself a part of her. It was frightening, but also fiercely erotic. Her body responded as it never had to another man and she tumbled over the edge.

Her release hit hard, washing over her in wild, nearly unbearable waves of pleasure. She pressed her mouth against his skin as she cried out, but Conn didn’t stop. Not until she’d reached another towering climax. Only then did he allow himself to reach his own powerful release.

Conn eased himself off her. He kissed her softly one last time, eased onto his side, and curled her against him. For long moments, neither of them moved. “I knew it would be like this.”

She didn’t ask what he meant. She had suspected such a strong physical attraction would make for a powerful sexual congress.

Conn lifted her hand and pressed it against his lips. “What happened out there today…I’ve been on dozens of missions. I’ve lost men in the line of duty. I’ve never felt like I did today.”

“Michael’s just a boy, not a soldier, and I’m a woman. I suppose to you that would make a difference.”

He stared up at the ceiling. “Maybe.” Conn came up on an elbow to look at her. “You were amazing down there. You stayed cool in a really bad situation. And because you did, you saved that boy’s life.”

She shrugged, but she couldn’t help being warmed by his praise. “I got lucky. I found you in time.”

His eyes darkened. “Yeah, you did. But you went way too far. You should have headed for the surface before you ran out of breath. You were only seconds from drowning.”

“I was just going up when I spotted you. I thought I could make it that much farther. I figured you wouldn’t let me drown.”

“Yeah, well, you took a damned big chance.” And then he was kissing her again, ravishing her mouth as if he might devour her.

They made love two more times before Conn left her bed.

Later that night, the boat would be making its near-weekly trip for supplies. Hope pled a headache and skipped the evening meal, not prepared to face the rest of the crew after what she and Conn had been doing all afternoon.

She thought that he might return to her cabin sometime during the night but prayed that he would not. She didn’t want the men talking about an affair that might end in a day or two. She didn’t want them gossiping about her at all.

But Conn didn’t return, and though part of her was relieved, another part wondered if he might be having the same second thoughts that she was having.

The
Conquest
was docked in Port Antonio when Hope awakened the following morning. Outside the porthole, she could see activity all around her: a pair of local fishermen selling their catch of the day, American tourists taking pictures along the pier, an old man dangling his fishing line in the water. Several small black children ran alongside their mothers, who held up their handcrafted items for sale.

Michael’s grandmother, a stout, gray-haired black woman wearing a bright-colored housedress, arrived late in the morning, happy to have her young charge returned. It went unsaid there would be no mention of yesterday’s near-disaster. Instead, the boy told the plump older woman about the giant manta ray he had seen and how much fun he’d had during his stay on the boat.

Michael waved good-bye to his father and the crew, and Hope and the others waved back. “You do good in school!” King called after his son. “And do what your grandmamma say.”

Watching him cross the parking lot to the old car his grandmother was driving, Hope thought of the young boy’s brush with death and a soft pang rose in her chest. She had wanted children so badly. She thought she had found the ideal mate in Richard. Instead, Fate had a bitter lesson in store for her, one she had yet to truly get over.

“He’s a good boy,” Conn said, walking up beside her, his gaze following Michael’s slim, brown figure as the youth disappeared into the battered old car. “I still can’t believe how close we came to losing him.”

“You were great with him. I didn’t think you’d be a kid sort of guy.”

One of his dark eyebrows went up. “Why not?”

“Are you saying that someday you’d like to have a family?”

He shrugged those wide shoulders. “There was a time I wanted one. Back when I was married.”

“But not anymore.”

He glanced off toward the water. “I’m not interested in marriage. I don’t want to go down that road again.”

Hope couldn’t agree with him more. She had almost been married, almost had a child, but wound up with neither. She didn’t want that kind of pain again.

“You could still have kids,” she said. “You could adopt or maybe pay a surrogate mother.”

He snorted a laugh. “Sorry. I believe a kid deserves both a mother and a father.”

“Hey, a lot of people raise children by themselves. Ever hear of single parenting?”

“Yeah, but most of those people wind up that way after a nasty divorce. I still don’t like the idea.”

Hope didn’t answer. Before Richard, she had considered having a child by herself. Women did it all the time. But she had kept thinking of her parents and what a happy childhood she and her sisters had been blessed with. True, her real mother had died, but her stepmother was terrific. As children, they had been lucky to be raised by such a wonderful couple.

She felt Conn’s gaze on her and looked up at him. “What?”

“About yesterday afternoon…”

“That sounds like a movie title. So what about yesterday afternoon?”

Conn shook his head. “I don’t exactly know what happened. I was just so afraid you were going to die. And so damned glad you didn’t. I needed to touch you, to know for sure you were all right. I think you needed me, too.”

“We were definitely good together.”

“Regrets?”

“Lots of them. What about you?”

“I’m not sure.”

She looked out over the turquoise sea, watched a big brown pelican plunge into the water after a fish. “I think we ought to slow things down, give ourselves some time.”

“We don’t have much time. That’s the problem.”

“True. But that’s the way life is sometimes. Whatever we decide, both of us have jobs to do. We need to worry about that first.”

Conn nodded, knowing she was right, but he didn’t look too happy about it. As if to prove the point, Andy Glass walked up just then.

“Captain Bob’s looking for you, Conn. We got a problem with the aft capstan. I thought maybe you’d take a look.”

“Sure.” Conn cast her a last, lingering glance. “I’ve got to go. We’ll play this by ear. For now.”

That sounded like a good idea. Even if the
for now
held a note of authority she wasn’t sure she liked.

The day slipped past. Eager to resume their search, the crew finished resupplying the boat in record time and by the end of the afternoon, they were headed back out to sea. She didn’t see Conn again until the crew started casting off lines and the boat began easing away from the dock. He’d had errands to run in Port Antonio. He had a job to do and a lot of men and equipment he was responsible for.

She thought of him as she stood at the rail on the way back to the island. Her body still felt pleasantly sore in intimate places, tingling when she remembered some of the things they had done. She’d been way overdue for some recreational sex and Conn had certainly filled the bill. She had been taking birth control pills for years, ever since her miscarriage, just to keep her periods regular, even if they hadn’t used protection there wouldn’t be a problem.

But any sort of relationship would be short-lived, a few more weeks at most. Neither of them was interested in marriage, or any sort of long-term relationship, yet saying good-bye to a man like Conn might not be that easy to do.

Not if she let herself get even more involved with him than she was already.

She would give it some thought, Hope decided, wondering if “playing it by ear” meant he would show up in her cabin that night. She wasn’t sure what she would do if he did.

But knowing the way he could make her body sing, she would probably weaken and let him in.

They resumed their hunt for treasure, taking up the GPS grid pattern that marked the spot where they had left off. In this area of the ocean, the currents that ran along the island had sheared the underwater sandbar so it dropped off steeply. Hidden below the surface, for a helpless, storm-tossed ship it would be like hitting a solid brick wall. Though they were searching three-quarters of a mile offshore, the water along the edge of the shoal was only about forty feet deep, making it easy to reach anything they found.

Conn gave Andy a break and took a turn watching the monitors, checking the video camera and side-scanner, listening for the ping of the magnetometer that would signal a hit, alert for any clue as to where they might find the
Rosa.

Assuming she was actually there.

They were moving south along the shoal toward the far end of the island, but taking it slow so they wouldn’t miss something. Conn had been in the chart room a little over an hour when Joe came in to spell him.

“Why don’t you go get a cup of coffee or something?”

Conn shoved back his chair. “Thanks, I could use a cup.”

Joe had never mentioned the hours Conn and Hope had been missing below, but Conn figured his friend knew what was going on. The fact that Joe wasn’t razzing him about it meant he knew the interlude had meant more to Conn than just a mindless round of sex.

Which worried the hell out of him.

As he left the chart room, his mind returned to the hours he’d spent in Hope’s bed. As usual, Joe had been right. Hope Sinclair was one hot lady.

But Conn was right, too. Hope was trouble. With a capital T.

He replayed the nearly ill-fated dive that had sparked the encounter, how frantic he had been when he hadn’t been able to find her, how terrified that she and the boy would drown. He had held those feelings in check and kept his head, knowing if he didn’t, Hope and Michael’s chances would be even slimmer.

Then both of them were safe and all his calm control flew out the window. When he’d hauled her into the boat and into his arms, something had broken loose inside him, some animal instinct that said she was his and clawed at him to have her. He had followed her down to her cabin and the minute he had touched her, kissed those soft, slightly trembling lips, he was lost.

He had needed to put his mark on her, imprint himself on her in some primal way.

It was frightening.

Terrifying.

Not even Kelly had affected him that way. Of course, Kelly had never come close to dying.

Conn told himself it was nothing more than that, an instinctual need to reaffirm life after a close brush with death. But even now, he wanted her. Through the open hatchway, he saw her standing near the rail and his groin tightened. Inwardly, Conn cursed.

“Hey, man! Come over here! Take a look at this!” The excitement in Joe’s voice brought him back to reality. With a long, steadying breath, he turned and walked over to the video monitor.

Conn’s gaze sharpened on the screen. He looked, then looked again. The magnetometer was pinging like crazy, and his pulse began to thrum. “Looks like another anchor.”

“Yeah, but this one’s miles away from the
Santa Ynez.”

“True, and I don’t think the scatter pattern fits.” Conn pointed toward the screen. “According to the professor, the storm swept down from the northwest, moving the last two ships in the fleet south and east, missing the Serranilla Banks and pushing them toward the island. From the last sightings of the
Santa Ynez
mentioned in the sailor’s journal, the ship would have been blowing in from the northwest. The anchors would have been used to keep the ship from running aground. They would have wound up in a line starting north of the reef. Of course, a hurricane might have moved it or the sands may have shifted.”

“What’d you find?” Captain Bob came down from the wheelhouse.

“One of the anchors,” Conn said. “Let’s just pray this one’s from the
Rosa.”

And this time, it might just be. The
Nuestra Señora de Rosa
had been sailing close behind the
Santa Ynez.
There was a very good chance the anchor could belong to the
Rosa,
running along behind her.

“I heard you found another anchor.” Hope came into the chart room along with the camera guy, Tommy Tyler.

“Looks like.”

“That’s great. Maybe this is it.”

“If it’s really off the
Rosa,
we’d at least know she’s here.” He turned to Joe. “See any sign of anything else, like maybe one of the cannons?”

“Not so far,” Joe said.

But the magnetometer continued its pinging. “Andy, you take over here. Joe, let’s go get our gear.”

“Hey, buddy, if you’re waiting for me—”

“I know, I’m backing up.”

“I wanna go with you guys,” Tommy said. “If the anchor’s off the
Rosa,
I want some pictures of your first discovery of the ship.”

Conn just nodded. The kid was all right—once you got used to him. And he was conscientious about his work, which gave him solid marks in Conn’s book. “If you’re coming, you better get moving.”

Tyler took off like a shot, and Conn and Joe went to collect their gear.

They took a hand-held blower with them to move the sand out of the way, but as nearly as they could tell, the anchor had no markings on it of any kind. They dived the area all afternoon while the boat continued to search in a tight grid pattern around the artifact, but the only other thing they found was a length of iron chain completely oxidized and corroded.

Conn was tired by the end of the day and a little discouraged. He shed his gear and his wetsuit and put the stuff away, then went down to the chart room.

“Anything else turn up?”

“Not a thing,” Andy said.

“Well, we found something, at least. That’s more than we had yesterday.”

Joe walked in just then. “Did you get any more hits?”

Andy shook his head. “’Fraid not.”

“What say we call the professor, get his take on this?”

“Good idea.” Conn reached over and picked up the phone.

Hope was standing on the deck of the
Conquest
the following day when the Pleasure Island yacht arrived with Professor Marlin. Ron Keegan and Wally Short came with him, two additional divers Conn had hired to help with the search. The men had hopped the island plane, then Chalko ferried them out to the boat on the Sea Ray.

“Glad to see you, Doc,” Conn said to the professor, shaking his hand.

He turned to Ron and Wally. “Welcome aboard.” The three men shook hands with obvious warmth.

Ron Keegan grinned. “I wasn’t sure you’d really find anything out here. Looks like you did.”

“We aren’t exactly sure what we found, but after talking to the professor, we decided to bring you guys out.”

On the phone, the professor had agreed with Conn that logically the anchor they had found was too far south to belong to the
Santa Ynez.
He was excited, convinced the artifact belonged to the
Rosa.
Still, the winds of time and fate were fickle, and in the ocean anything could happen.

“Ron Keegan and Wally Short, meet Hope Sinclair. Hope’s doing a series of magazine articles for
Adventure
magazine.”

“I guess that explains all those boats,” Ron said, cocking his head toward the half-dozen sailboats and powerboats floating several hundred yards away.

Hope ignored the dark look Conn tossed her way. “It’s nice to meet both of you.” Ron was a tall, lanky, sandy-haired man in his thirties, obviously excited about the prospect of finding treasure. Wally Short matched his name, barrel-chested, short and stout, in a pair of baggy Bermudas that showed the hairiest legs Hope had ever seen.

“You already know Joe,” Conn said to them. “You can meet the rest of the crew once you get settled in. Joe can show you where to stow your gear.”

“Sounds good.” Wally looked nearly as eager as Ron. Treasure hunting was contagious and these two appeared to have caught the bug. They took off after Joe, trailing him along the deck, while Hope followed Conn and the professor down to the chart room.

“I could be wrong,” Dr. Marlin said as he looked at the video screen. “It might have come off the
Santa Ynez
.”

“It could have. I have a hunch it didn’t. Scatter pattern isn’t right. Unfortunately, there were no distinguishing marks on it.” Conn reached over and pulled out a stack of photos. “Tommy Tyler took these pictures.” He slid the stack in front of the professor and spread them out on the table. “In this one, Joe is standing next to the anchor so you can get an idea of the size. It measured fourteen feet.”