Through the Maelstrom (14 page)

She rubbed her temples. Who the hell carries around a variety pack of condoms on a cruise? Becky Ann, that's who. She sneaked another peek. Ribbed for her pleasure, extra-large, extra sensitive.
Oh, God!

Then she read the note scribbled on the sticky pad. Laughing, she slammed the drawer shut before standing and changing for dinner. Like they needed
seven
condoms. Did she expect them to go at it the entire night? Becky Ann was such a nut. Serena loved her like the sister she never had, but she was out of her mind.

After showering again to tame her hair enough to curl it, she opened the drawer and read at the note again, falling into another fit of laughter:

Serena was in over her head, but at the moment she couldn't think of a better way to drown.

***

A
t last, he was a free man. Mostly, he had one shift left in the morning, but he could spend the rest of the night with Serena.
Alone at last
. Christophe had loathed leaving her to work for the evening, but he needed the coin. He'd done well on tips that evening, at least he thought he did. A good omen for the future, perhaps?

Josiah placed his camera in the bag he had hanging from his shoulder. "Well, hero, I guess you should be off finding that girl of yours." The man's attitude toward him had changed dramatically since word came back to ship regarding the shark. While the loss of hostility was refreshing, he didn't for one minute believe Josiah liked him. Not so long as his mother championed illegal methods of forging documentation so he could remain in the twenty-first century.

Serena and Becky Ann came around the corner and thoughts of Josiah and Mrs. Baker left his mind. Serena wore a simple black dress this evening, the sleeves stopping just before her elbows and the flow of the skirt skimming her knees. She had on the same high, strappy shoes from the night before, and he nearly groaned with longing to have her wrap her legs around him while wearing them. They would become a fixation for him, he had no doubt. Dark brown tresses curled around her shoulders and her eyelashes appeared fuller and darker than he'd seen them. She'd reddened her lips as well. She was stunning before, but tonight she was sultry.

He'd barely cast a glance at her friend until he noticed Becky Ann leaning over Serena's shoulder and staring hard at Josiah as he fastened the bag holding the camera. Realizing he was under observation, the man looked at the blonde who grinned and said, "Checking for a wedding band." She scooted past Serena and held out her hand. "I'm Becky. Becky Ann. Is your shift ending? Would you like a drink?" The two of them walked off together.

"Poor guy. He's doomed." Serena moved into place beside him and added, "Once he listens to anything that freckled-face temptress says, he's wrapped around her little finger."

Christophe laughed and slid an arm around her. "What happened to her man from yesterday?" They seemed to be quite friendly on the beach and at the dining hall.

Serena scowled. "Apparently he was engaged. Can you believe that slime ball?"

Sadly, he could. He'd known men like that all his life. "He didn't deserve her." If the fiancée wasn't on the ship, she'd never know how many trysts her man sought in her absence. And that's one thing Serena would never need worry about with him. He only needed one woman in his life.

"He really didn't." Serena cocked her head to the side and added, "Josiah seems nice. Loyal."

"That he is." Becky Ann was very frank. Josiah was too, so they'd be well matched. The night sky above them was filled with stars, and beneath them the ship rocked ever so gently. "Are you ready to have dinner?"

When she nodded, Christophe gestured for her to lead the way. They had only taken a few steps when the ship lurched, groaning and sending things toppling and crashing off tables. Chairs that weren't nailed down slid every which way, and Shouts of surprise rang out. He barely caught Serena before she took a nasty spill down the short flight of stairs on deck that led to where her cabin was located.

"What was that?" Serena clung to his coat as he kept her steady.

"Not sure." It was like they'd been caught in a storm, yet the sky was clear and the wind minimal.

Starboard, someone cried out, "What's that in the water?"

Trepidation sank its claws into him. He had a notion of what it could be and didn't want to be right. Still, he grasped Serena's hand and led her toward the railing. Blue-green light swirled deep beneath the surface, growing larger, spinning, twisting.

"A vortex." Serena took a step back, raising her free hand to her mouth and staring at him as though for the first time. "I saw that light before I met you. I thought it was from the fireworks..." She searched his face, as if hoping he'd tell her it was something, anything, but what it truly was.

Christophe recalled the loud bursts like gunfire and the bright explosions of colored lights when he'd opened his eyes. He'd heard of such things before by others who had traveled to the Far East, but had never seen them for himself. His gut ached like he'd been punched.

It had come back for him.

Everything he'd allowed himself to believe he could have, he couldn't. He'd been given a beautiful, caring woman and he wouldn't get to keep her. He'd brushed off every thought of this possibility because it hadn't suited him, but it was here. Why else would it have returned?

He believed Serena had accepted the truth of how he came to arrive aboard the ship. If not entirely, enough to be with him regardless. Now there was no doubt etched into her features as she stared over the railing. There was something disconcerting and startlingly
real
when witnessing that swirling abyss.

"Christ!" Josiah ran to the railing beside them and looked over and back at him. "You're for real?"

"Aye," he said sadly as the man gawked at the water and then him.

"I can't believe this." Someone shouted Josiah's name and he rushed away.

A chill swept over him as he looked over the railing. If he went back through, would it swallow him whole this time, or spit him back out in his own time? Something unseen tugged at him like a child seeking attention, and he gripped the railing tighter. The ship lurched closer to the maelstrom. "Looks like it's calling me home."

"Home?" Serena echoed, shaking her head. "No.
No!
You just got here. Why would it send you here and then take you away again?" Her voice was meek. It shredded him.

Heart breaking at the notion of leaving her, he hugged her close, keeping a firm hand on the railing as whatever tugged at him with ghostly hands did so a second time. Beckoning. Seeking. He'd not felt anything like it the first night, but he was not as far from the center then as he was this time. But that wasn't his biggest concern.

How would he survive without Serena back in his time? "I don't know. What I can say is life is often unfair. I'll treasure these days with you far more than you can ever imagine."

She pounded his chest, causing no great damage. "Stop talking like you're going to leave me." She shoved his shoulder again and again, then grabbed fists full of his jacket and yanked him close, trembling. He barely heard her next words, "Don't leave. Take me with you."

He wasn't even sure how or if that would work. What if she drowned? Besides, she was too precious for his time. Serena didn't belong there, as he didn't belong here. He'd fooled himself into believing it was possible to start over with her. To start anew. To love a woman who had conjured him to her through time.

A voice came through the things he'd been told were called speakers, but Christophe wasn't listening to what it said. People were panicking and running. Others were taking photographs over the railing on small, flat things called cell phones. He didn't know what was the most absurd: the items people carried in their pockets in this century or the whirlpool.

The tugging at him from the vortex became more urgent as the rushing water began to grow louder. Before, the tugs were whisper light, but the newest one had him crashing against the railing. Serena cried out as it jarred her against him.

"What just happened?" She blanched.

"I think it's trying to take me over."

Her eyes grew wide. "What?"

Below, the glow became brighter, larger, drifting closer. The ship started to turn with it, trapped in the current of its outer rotations. Screams erupted around them as the ship moved even closer to its center. Would it take them all or him alone? The longboat hadn't appeared onboard with him, which he'd found odd at first but had merely assumed the ocean had kept it.

And if it had...what did that mean for the ship? For Serena?
I can't let her die. Can't risk her life for unknowns.

Far below, a shark swam around the churning maelstrom, and he wondered if this was the third encounter with the same creature. Mrs. Baker's words about how things happened in threes made him shiver as he watched the shark glide past. Taunting him. Heralding his failure to keep the woman he was coming to love.

Or maybe it was still waiting for that lost meal.

Serena’s hair billowed around her, and she shook her head. Saying words he couldn't decipher. All he heard was roaring water twisting and turning and spinning and pulling. If he didn't let it have him, it would take all of them just to claim him. Christophe hoped she'd understand what he had to do to ensure she lived.

H
ow could this happen? Was she so unlucky that as soon as she opened her heart to a man, accepted the reasons of his being there that made no sense, he would be taken from her forever? The eerie glow in the water revealed a whirlpool, spinning like an emptying drain. The cruise ship struggled to maneuver itself out of the edge of it, but it the vortex was widening.

Christophe placed his hands around her wrists and pushed her away. He said something, but she couldn't hear over the deafening roar of water and the screams on deck.

"What?"

He leaned closer. His breath was warm against her ear, but she still couldn't hear him well. He leaned back and she shook her head, asking him to repeat himself. He didn't. Then he turned and placed a booted foot on the railing like he was going to climb over.

"What are you doing!" She pulled him back, but he gave her a sad look and didn't reply. He was freaking her out. He wouldn't jump into it; that was suicide...unless he thought it would take him home. But what if it didn't? Too many
ifs
.

"Christophe." She flung herself against him, nearly falling when the ship lurched again. "Please, don't leave me." She hoped he could hear her as she spoke loudly against his ear. "I'm so sorry I wasted so much time being so difficult and disbelieving." Everything he'd claimed had been true all along. The vortex in the Bermuda Triangle existed, and it was trying to take him from her. Christophe was a pirate from 1715. And she was falling for him. Completely.

He wrapped her in his arms and laid his cheek against the top of her head. She could only hear bits and pieces of what he shouted. "You ha...ight to... I messed...from the st...but don't. I don't wa...last memories...to be bad."

Serena fought the tears threatening to spill, and mascara stung her eyes, making it all the more difficult to accomplish. When she glanced toward the upper deck, she took a step back. Mrs. Baker stood there, watching them with a freakish calmness no one else around her possessed. She raised her palm and wiggled three fingers.

Three? What does that mean?
It didn't make any sense.

Christophe cupped her face in his hands, causing her thoughts to scatter. Tears were forming in
his
eyes. She knew then he didn't want to leave her either. It should help, but it made her despair worse. Why hadn't she believed him sooner. She'd wasted so much time she could have spent with him.

He was flung against the railing again, but the ship hadn't moved. The maelstrom fought to take him. Maybe to right the inconsistency of him crossing through in the first place. Or maybe she hadn't believed soon enough. Would it take the ship with him? Was that why he had tried to jump?
God, this hurts.
She needed to think. There had to be a way out of it.

Three
... What did Mrs. Baker mean by three?

And then it hit her. Three hundred years. Three nights. She knew that much, but that didn't help now. Had the older woman told her anything else about the number three?

Yes.

Stories of time travel among her people, like fairytales, always contained obstacles of three. What did that mean for her and Christophe though? What were they missing? Did they need to do or overcome something three times?

Christophe spoke to her, but the shouts of panicked passengers muffled his words. Crew members with serious expressions were running toward the employee stairs farther down. Not that she could focus on all that when she was trying to puzzle out Mrs. Baker's cryptic message. Time would soon run out.

Oh, God
. What if she'd meant there was only three minutes left and she'd wasted those too? It wasn't fair!

The ship lurched hard, and she hit the railing, rolling her ankle thanks to the heels. She cried out as stinging pain shot up her leg. Christophe clutched her against him and brushed the hair back from her face, his expression so full of hopelessness that her heart broke.

Think, Serena. What do fairytales do to break a curse or prevent a tragic ending?

True love's kiss usually did the trick, but she and Christophe had kissed already. He kissed her that first night before she realized he'd mistaken her for a whore—which still smarted, but she understood the reasons and couldn't hold him completely at fault for his eighteenth-century take on fashion of the present day. Then they kissed last night after the movie had ended, which had gone into full making out...