Vortex (Cutter Cay) (7 page)

Daniela shrugged. “Some of it.” All of it. It was one of the biggest disappointments in her life that she had no artistic talent or even technical ability herself. She’d spent most of her adult life nurturing and promoting the talent of others in her DC gallery, and on a slightly lesser level, in the retail space where she showcased Peruvian artists and artisans.

The room needed color, but perhaps Cutter thought the never-ending blues outside were enough. If this were her space, Daniela would hang an MM Beck over by the long sofa for a splash of crazy color, and place a Fredricks Sher bronze for warmth on that little glass table over there … And …

It wasn’t her space, she reminded herself with a pang that physically hurt her chest. The artwork that fueled her passion, and filled her life with color and purpose, might not be waiting for her when—if—she ever made it home again.

Don’t, she told herself as tears stung her eyes. She looked up at the ceiling and blinked them back. One thing at a time. One foot in front of the other.

Two weeks and four interminable days.

She could do it.

“Have you always worked on ships, Annie?” Logan indicated they stop at a lavish buffet set up near the door leading to the deck. Carafes held fresh-brewed coffee and various labeled fruit juices, and trays bore artistically displayed cut fruit. Chafing dishes held fluffy pale yellow scrambled eggs, thick slices of savory ham, crisp brown bacon, and several other dishes, while ice containers held chilled pink shrimp, bright white-and-yellow deviled eggs sprinkled with a rust of paprika, and pale green and pastel orange platters of sliced melons and fat red strawberries. Pretty fancy. A regular upscale restaurant brunch buffet. He fed his crew well. Daniela wasn’t hungry, but she knew she should eat something.

Beyond the windows a group of men sat under a black-and-white striped awning, their voices a pleasant bass blur accompanied by the susurrus and slap of waves against the hull. This deck was close to the waterline, and she was surprised at how noisy the calm water was.

A chill danced across her skin when she looked at all that water. It was a miracle she’d been seen. She rubbed the goose bumps on her arm, and turned her attention to the spread.

Grateful for the distraction, she poured fragrant, steaming hot coffee into a large, thick mug and added sweetener and a splash of cream. “For the last five years or so. It’s a great way to see the world, or rather, I’d always thought it would be a great way to see the world. I didn’t take into account that while my various bosses played, I’d be working. No weekends off.”

My God, she almost believed herself. Suppressing a smile, she helped herself to a plate of fresh fruit and a napkin, then added a container of Greek yogurt for some protein.

Logan waited while she made her selections, a mug of black coffee in hand. No sugar. No cream. Plain. Simple. Uncomplicated.

“And what did you do to keep body and soul together before that?” It was a casual question weighted with a challenge.

“Oh, odds and ends.” The look he gave her was unsettlingly direct, and nerves danced in her stomach. She reminded herself firmly that the man couldn’t read her mind. “Mostly temp jobs,” she told him vaguely, falling into step, taking a tentative sip of hot coffee as they walked, to hide her expression.

“But you have a home base?”

“I got bitten by the travel bug early. I’m kind of a nomad. I bunk on friends’ sofas between jobs, then take off on my next crazy adventure. I love it.” When this was over, maybe she’d become a fiction writer. The reality was that she’d always been pretty much a homebody. Her idea of a good time had been an evening with a good book, or an exciting movie, with her cat Piewacket on her lap—
Oh, damn. Don’t go there.
Had been.
Had.

Her idea of bliss, Daniela thought, feeling the acid of rising fury grind in her stomach, was to wake up early, and take her first cup of coffee down into the gallery before any of her staff arrived. To feel the coolness of the cement floor beneath her bare feet, and hear the hum of the forced air as she walked through the current exhibit, Pie winding around her ankles.

Not that she’d had a lot of nights at home in her apartment above the gallery in the past few months.

Then it had all gone to hell in a handbasket and crashed down around her.

Would she ever feel that sense of pride and accomplishment again? Or had Victor taken that from her, too?

Two weeks four days.

What had been done to her, how she’d been used, pissed her off no matter how often she told herself to stay in the now. She was safe. Now. All she had to endure, for now, was the passing of time. She wondered in what state she’d find her life when the dust cleared.

Logan touched her arm. The same zing she’d felt in his office earlier shot from her elbow into her fingers. “Maybe you should sit down a minute, you look a little flushed.”

Here. Now.
Don’t project.

Daniela forced her shoulders to relax, and loosened her stranglehold on her mug and small plate. “Just the hot coffee, I promise I’m feeling great.” She felt an unexpected lump in her throat, and tried not to let on how his consideration affected her. She hadn’t realized how much she’d missed simple human kindness in the last few months.

They walked out onto the deck. It was already in the mid-eighties, the sunlight brilliant as it bounced off the calm water and reflected off the white surfaces of the spit-and-polished ship. The fresh air smelled deliciously clean and salty, and she breathed in deeply, then let it out slowly.

The
Sea Wolf
was a terrific place to hide. She might as well enjoy the moments while she was here.

The animated conversation at the table stopped dead as they approached.

Two men sat on the dive platform below, removing their gear, and the others sprawled on the comfortable chairs surrounding an oval glass-topped table. As soon as they approached, the men all got to their feet. Like Cutter, most wore little more than shorts or swim trunks, and they were all deeply tanned and fit-looking. A glance at
their
legs and chests didn’t make her breath catch as it did when she glanced at Cutter.

“Dive team. Annie Ross,” he introduced her to the men as he pulled out a chair for her, and everyone rearranged themselves to accommodate them. “You remember Wes?”

Daniela smiled at Wes. “I do. Thanks for taking such good care of me last night.”

Wes grinned back. He had the thick neck and bulging muscles of a weightlifter, and a sweet, boyish smile set off by a dimple. “It’s not every day we pull a mermaid from the sea. Have the memories come back?” He gave her an inquiring look.

“In living color.” She smiled, then nibbled a slice of pineapple. The heat of the day was mitigated by a slightly cooler breeze that lifted her hair off her shoulders. The pineapple was sweet and juicy and tasted like tangy sunshine on her tongue. Just as she took another bite she glanced up. Cutter’s gaze was fixed on her mouth.

“Officially, I pulled the mermaid from the sea,” a bald giant of a man in his forties told her cheerfully. She had to divert her own glance when the guy held out a hand as big as a Christmas ham. “Steven Galt, ma’am.” His touch was gentle as he pumped her hand.

“Oh, God! Don’t smile at the man,” a tall, good-looking blond guy warned from across the table. He looked as though he should be carrying a surfboard under one arm and a bikini-clad blonde under the other. “He’s engaged to marry the exquisitely beautiful, kind, sexy—but not too sexy—Kym Fullen back in Murrysville, Pennsylvania, in a couple of months, and he’ll show you pictures of her from birth to the day they met in seventh grade and beyond. Ad nauseam. Fair warning.”

He raised a soda can, a cheer, as he teased his friend, then gave her a bright white smile. A charmer, Daniela thought, not affected one way or another. He knew he was ridiculously handsome, and very sexy with all that beachy blond hair and those broad, tanned shoulders. He did absolutely nothing for her. His type were a dime a dozen where she came from.

“Jedidiah Jones, the glue that holds this miscreant bunch together while Cutter works too hard moving his money around and being the boss of us.” Jones shot Logan a friendly sneer.

Logan just sipped his coffee and smiled, his eyes reflecting the color of the water behind him. In the sunlight, the faint scratches on his strong brown throat, and the faint purple skin beneath his left eye were more obvious than they had been when she’d first seen them. Her heartbeat thudded uncomfortably. The event itself was nothing more than a frightening blur, snapshots of watery terror. She didn’t really remember anything between being tossed overboard and being brought on board the
Sea Wolf
.

What she
did
remember was the heat of his touch on her cold body, and the unexpected sense of safety she had felt, hearing his steady breathing as he lay in the bunk just a few feet away from her all night.

Daniela drank her coffee, enjoying the camaraderie of the men. Earl Horner appeared to be the oldest. Early fifties perhaps, not quite as jovial as the others, he was pretty quiet as Logan and the others talked over each other. The men introduced themselves, adding bits of information like colorful confetti into the conversation.

Izak Vanek was from Czechoslovakia via Boston, and insisted on showing her a creased picture of his three little girls back home. She was more interested in how recently he’d
been
home.

“I’ve never been there,” Daniela lied through her teeth. The moment he’d said Boston, her heartbeat had sped up and her hands had gotten clammy. God, six degrees of separation? “I hear it’s very pretty. Do you manage to get home often?”

The unasked questions tasted bitter on her tongue, but she dared not ask them. They weren’t questions one could ask a total stranger. Like, are you following the election primaries? Who’ll get your vote?

“Not for the last six months, but for sure after this salvage.” He grinned. “But my family sailed with us recently, so I don’t get too homesick.”

He didn’t appear to recognize her, but her appearance had changed quite drastically since leaving DC. From blond back to brunette. Chances were that seeing her here would be out of context, and he wouldn’t recognize her.

The air she was holding in her lungs hurt, and she let it out slowly.
Don’t buy trouble.
She wrapped one hand around her mug.
Breathe. Smile.

Aaron Cooper introduced himself as the youngest member of the team. He was in his early twenties, with a surprising six-pack for such a thin guy. He wore his long dirty-blond hair in a long skinny ponytail down his long skinny back.

It was clear to Daniela that the men had all been friends for a long time. They joked with ease and finished each other’s sentences and teased like siblings.

A man dressed in white shorts and a white polo shirt with epaulets on the shoulders came outside and waited for a lull in the conversation. In his forties, he had short, sandy hair, and a deeply tanned, craggy face. Cutter introduced him as the captain, Piet Vandyke. He’d come out for his orders.

Daniela held her breath, her mug suspended between the table and her mouth.

Go south!

“We’ll stay put until tomorrow. I have something I want to check out before we move our location,” Logan told him easily.

Yes!

The captain went back inside, and Cutter gave her a considering look. “I suppose we can cobble together some clothes for you. This is an all-male ship, so it’ll be slim pickings, but I’m pretty sure we have some women’s odds and ends lying about, and everyone could contribute to your wardrobe. But perhaps we need to send someone into Lima to do a little shopping for you.”

The last damn thing she wanted was someone going into Lima and mentioning to the wrong person that they’d fished a woman out of the sea. “Thanks, but there’s no need to go to all that trouble. A pair of shorts and a couple of T-shirts will do.”

Wes met her eyes and gave a small nod before shoving his chair back. “I’ve got cabin fever, why don’t I make a port run? I can be back by late tonight.” He looked over at Logan for approval.

Logan nodded. “Who else needs some shore leave?”

A couple of the men got to their feet. “God, yes,” Aaron said fervently.

Izak tossed his empty soda can in a receptacle nearby and got to his feet. “I’m in. I saw a shop selling locally dressed dolls. The girls will love ’em.”

The beautiful brown-skinned, dark-eyed, black-haired dolls, dressed in Peruvian alpaca wool textiles, with their intricate designs and vibrant colors, were popular at the Blue Opal Gallery. With a lump in her throat, Daniela sipped her coffee.

Wes walked around the table. “We can leave in an hour. Annie, wanna come and give me a list of essentials?”

She glanced at Logan as she got to her feet, Dog beside her. “Are you sure…?”

“Use the company credit card,” he told Wes. “Might as well check with Hipolito to see if he needs anything for the galley. Hell, make an announcement. Anyone who wants to go, can go. Twenty-four hours.” Logan paused. “Wes—Annie doesn’t want anyone to know she’s on board. Tell the others. Come and see me before departure.”

“Well, one thing I can say.” Jed cupped his clasped hands behind his head and shot Logan an annoyingly cheerful smile across the table as Annie walked off with Wes. The two of them disappeared inside. “You don’t look bored to tears anymore.”

“I’ve never been bored a day in my life. I’m too busy to be bored,” Logan told his friend, his tone light.

“Our little mermaid is going to provide—days? Weeks? Of entertainment. I can’t wait. What’s her story?”

Logan took a sip of the steaming brew in his cup. The woman could say anything she wanted to, but he knew fear when he saw it, and could almost taste her desperation. “A story is probably exactly what it is—pure fiction. My bullshit meter is in the red zone.”