“Who wants to hurt you?”

Aiden waited expectantly for the woman to answer, but instead she merely shivered in his arms.

Eventually she sighed and relaxed, her slender body shifting against his and making his chest tighten—but pleasantly. The moment threatened to become intimate as a sexual charge started to build between them. He knew better than to indulge himself like this. He’d sworn off women. Turned over a new leaf … and apparently been lying to himself like a big dog about the fact that he’d actually changed.

“I’m a filmmaker,” she announced as if that answered everything. “I was collecting footage for a documentary on the commercial deep-sea-fishing industry.”

He frowned. “Are you sure it was fishermen who ran you down?”

“I’m not sure of anything except that my boat is gone, and I’m really glad you came along when you did and saved my life.”

So was he.

Dear Reader,

When my mother and mother-in-law were diagnosed with cancer within a few weeks of each other, it sparked a flurry of research about possible treatments. Along the way, I read a whole bunch about advances in modern medicine. I’m delighted to say that, five years later, both moms are cancer-free.

I continue to be fascinated by the latest ongoing medical research. As a writer, I can’t help asking myself what some of these technologies might mean for our future. Many of the ideas currently under development are highly controversial, perhaps partly because the misapplication of them could be truly terrible for mankind.

Of course, that got me thinking. While governments might restrict their own researchers from delving into some extreme experiments, a private company would be under no such restrictions. What do body-altering technologies mean for the individual field operative who volunteers for them? How do they change the person? Can such an altered person live any semblance of a normal life? How does a regular person attempt to love a quasi-superhero? Is it possible? Dangerous?

And voilà, the Code X project was born. Please join me on the breathless roller coaster that is loving a superhero. Who knows? Maybe you’ve already got one of your own, or maybe yours is waiting for you when and where you least expect it …

Happy reading!

Warmly,

Cindy Dees

About the Author

CINDY DEES started flying airplanes while sitting in her dad’s lap at the age of three and got a pilot’s license before she got a driver’s license. At age fifteen, she dropped out of high school and left the horse farm in Michigan where she grew up to attend the University of Michigan. After earning a degree in Russian and East European studies, she joined the US Air Force and became the youngest female pilot in its history. She flew supersonic jets, VIP airlift and the C-5 Galaxy, the world’s largest airplane. During her military career, she traveled to forty countries on five continents, was detained by the KGB and East German secret police, got shot at, flew in the first Gulf War and amassed a lifetime’s worth of war stories.

Her hobbies include medieval re-enacting, professional Middle Eastern dancing and Japanese gardening.

This RITA® Award-winning author’s first book was published in 2002 and since then she has published more than twenty-five bestselling and award-winning novels. She loves to hear from readers and can be contacted at www.cindydees.com.

Breathless Encounter
Cindy Dees

www.millsandboon.co.uk

I was thrilled to dedicate a book to my mother and mother-in-law during their simultaneous fights against cancer, and it’s my great joy to dedicate this one to them in honor of their double win against the beast. For all of you who have fought the good fight yourself, or who have watched a loved one go through it, win or lose, my heart is with you. You know the true meaning of courage.

Chapter 1

Ankle deep in salt water, Sunny Jordan stared in dismay at the silent diesel engine in her boat. It was dead, and all her plans were dead in the water with it. An urge to cry washed over her. Her documentary film was dead, her goal of exposing the more egregious operators in the commercial fishing industry was dead. She didn’t dare think about the porpoises and sharks and sea turtles that would die without her exposé to rouse the public to save them.

She yanked the hand starter on the bilge pump. At least it coughed to life, and sluggishly began to suck in water and spit it overboard. The New Dawn had a slow leak somewhere, but she’d been unable to locate it so far.

Wearily, she closed the engine cover and slogged over to the ladder. She climbed through the cramped cabin that contained all her worldly possessions and up on deck to stare at the horizon. A slow, three-hundred-sixty-degree check revealed nothing but water and more water stretching away to infinity along the earth’s faint curve. No wonder ancient sailors thought it was possible to sail off the edge of the world.

Not the smallest bump of land or even another boat marred the smooth line of the horizon. She was marooned in the middle of nowhere—literally. If she had half a brain she’d be worrying about her own life and not the helpless little fishies below. But no one had ever accused her of being overly bright when it came to matters of self-preservation.

She ducked inside and turned up the volume on the UHF radio. Static crackle filled the tiny space. She checked her position near the junction of the Arabian Sea and the Indian Ocean, not too far south of the Yemeni archipelago of Suqutra. She jotted down the location coordinates off her GPS before picking up the microphone.

“This is the New Dawn requesting assistance. My engine has failed and I need a tow. I am currently located at eleven degrees, twenty-five minutes, thirty-six seconds north latitude and fifty-four degrees, four minutes, seven seconds east longitude.”

She repeated the message twice more. Now she simply had to wait. Despite its desolate appearance, this stretch of water was crisscrossed by plentiful shipping lanes and fishing grounds. And it was the rule of the sea that any ship who heard a distress call must respond to it. Nobody might own these international waters, and nations might fight like dogs over them, but sailors stuck together.

The sun set in a brilliant splash of crimson and faded into the violet hues of twilight without anyone responding to her periodic radio calls. As the utter blackness of night at sea fell around her, she sighed and settled down to wait out a long, uncomfortable night. She needed to preserve her battery for radio calls and had turned off all unnecessary equipment, which meant no air conditioner or even an electric fan for her tonight.

She must have dozed off because the stars had wheeled around in the sky overhead and the night was balmy when she blinked her eyes open. The New Dawn bobbed on light swells, pulling against the sea anchor she’d deployed to keep from drifting too far from her reported position.

A faint rumbling caught her attention. She looked about eagerly for the running lights of her rescuer and gasped as a massive black shape loomed off her port side. The sharp point of a ship’s prow was bearing directly down upon her. Fast.

Yikes. That ship was really bearing down on her fast! Her sleepy mind exploded to full consciousness as the deadly danger of her situation registered.

“Hey! I’m here!” she shouted, waving her arms frantically over her head. As if anyone would hear her over the roar of the much bigger vessel’s engines. A white V of water sliced away from the black blade of the prow. The ship displayed no lights whatsoever as it raced at her like an attacking shark closing in for the kill.

Panicked, she scrambled backward, stumbling and falling over her waterproof camera bag. She hit the deck hard and her head smacked the cabin wall painfully. She flung herself toward the railing, every survival instinct screaming at her to get out of the way before that ship sliced the New Dawn in half. Clutching her camera bag in one fist as she rolled, she plunged over the side and into the icy water.

The Pacific Ocean closed in over her head, entombing her in a dark so cold and heavy, she felt as if she’d been buried alive.

Panic gave way to shock as every muscle in her body clenched at the frigid grip of the sea. She kicked hard for the surface, but it was as if she attempted to swim through concrete. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t seem to get anywhere. Assuming she was even headed in the right direction. She tried to feel which way the bubbles racing past her skin were headed, but who knew if she’d gotten it right. For all she knew she was kicking down toward Davy Jones’s locker with all her strength.

And then a new threat registered—a deep throbbing noise that pounded through her body rhythmically, growing in volume and intensity with every beat. Oh, God. The larger ship’s propellers. She kicked like a madwoman, praying her random swimming would carry her clear of the rotating blades before they made bloody chum out of her.

The water grew violently turbulent, tossing her head over heels in a chaotic swirl that left her so dizzy she wanted to throw up. Probably not a good idea with the single breath in her lungs already running painfully low on oxygen. Little sparkles of light erupted behind her eyelids.

The ocean calmed around her as abruptly as it had gone mad. She was farther than ever from knowing which way the surface and air might be. Perhaps her best bet was to quit fighting and let her natural buoyancy and lungful of air lift her to the surface. But would it be in time before she passed out?

In a few seconds she wouldn’t be able to hold her breath anymore and she would inhale a single, lethal lungful of salt water. And then in twelve to fifteen seconds, as the last oxygen in her brain was used, she’d lose consciousness. Without the buoyancy of air in her lungs, she would slip down into the depths of the sea, lost in its cold embrace forever. Vague curiosity about whether or not there was life after death passed through her mind. Guess I’ll know one way or the other pretty soon.

Who’d have imagined she would end up like this? It seemed like such a waste to die so young. She was only twenty-seven. She’d assumed she had so much more time. So much more to experience. Her parents’ faces flashed through her mind. Her sister’s face—Chloe was going to be furious at her for dying.

Sunny reached deep and fought one last time. It was simply not in her nature to give up. She’d go down trying to save herself. But her kicks were feeble now, and to no avail. As she used up the last of her strength and oxygen, the darkness claimed her.

Aiden McKay scanned the ocean through binoculars from the bridge of the Sea Nymph, one-hundred-forty feet of pure yachting luxury on loan to him from billionaire Leland Winston.

“Do you see her?” he asked the Nymph’s captain, Steig Carlson.

“Negative. We are exactly at the last coordinates the girl transmitted, though.”

Aiden frowned. The sexy female voice had been making periodic calls throughout the day asking for assistance with her marooned vessel. He’d been annoyed at having to break off his mission to respond to the call, but it wasn’t as if he had any choice. He was one of the good guys, after all.

“Large vessel off to port,” Steig announced. “Must have responded to the New Dawn’s distress call, too.”

Aiden snorted. Every vessel within a hundred miles had probably set course at full speed toward that girl’s sensuous voice coming across their radios. Sailors were nothing if not a lonely bunch.

He swung his binoculars around to port. It was a dark night, but he made out the bulk of a good-size ship. “That vessel’s moving fast,” he commented, frowning. Looked to be pushing twenty-five knots or more. Why would a ship searching for a small boat be tearing along like a bat out of hell? Wouldn’t they be trawling slowly like the Sea Nymph, searching the waters quadrant by careful quadrant?

He swung his binoculars to the next quadrant of his search, in front of the speeding boat, and lurched. He thought he’d caught a glimpse of—

He swore as the Nymph rolled and he momentarily lost his target. He scanned left and right with the binoculars and caught sight of it again. A small vessel bobbing like a helpless cork in the swells directly in front of the racing ship.

“Sweet Mother of God,” he breathed. “Those bastards are going to ram her.”

Steig swore beside him. “They’re going to smash her boat into matchsticks at that speed.” He reached for the throttles and threw the sleek yacht’s twin diesel engines to full power.

Aiden shouted into the radios, “Unknown rider, alter course! You are about to collide with a small craft. I say again, alter course immediately!” But the black hulk in front of him either didn’t hear or didn’t care. Or worse, it knew good and well that it was about to sink the disabled cabin cruiser that could only be the New Dawn.

Aiden watched in helpless horror as the blacked-out ship slammed broadside into the smaller boat. With a terrible grinding noise audible even from here, the big ship’s prow crashed through the New Dawn’s hull. The little boat lifted up in the air like a toy in a bathtub and then all of a sudden disappeared underneath the larger ship, dragged below the water like flotsam in the ship’s path.

The girl with the sexy voice was on that boat!

He kicked off his deck shoes frantically and reached for the swim goggles that were always in his pocket.

“Don’t do it,” Steig bit out. “The water will be full of debris and it’s too dark to find her.”

“This is what I do. Who I am.”

“But, sir—”

He was already shirtless, so he merely tore off his pants and dived directly off the bridge of the yacht to the sea below.

“Aiden!” someone shouted behind him as his body knifed through the air and into the welcome embrace of the sea that was his true home. He swam with powerful strokes toward the last position of the New Dawn. The silence and pressure closed around him, and with them came the peace he always found in the ocean. A jagged piece of white-painted timber came into view.

He surfaced near where the boat went down and shouted, “Hello! Where are you?”

No response. The Sea Nymph’s spotlights came on, illuminating the wreckage in harsh light. He made a quick visual search of the debris field. No sign of any human clinging to a piece of the New Dawn. He took a big breath and dived under the surface. His ears popped as he reached a depth of fifteen feet or so, but the rest of his body absorbed the crushing weight of the water with something resembling relief.

No sign of the girl. He swam in a wide circle that encompassed most of the debris field. She had to be here somewhere. He kept a time count in a corner of his mind. Two minutes. Three. He widened his search area, worry setting in. If he didn’t find her soon, it wasn’t going to be a search and rescue anymore. It would be a corpse recovery.

He kicked harder. Spotted a flash of white waving softly in the current like a piece of fabric. He pulled powerfully toward it. A shirt. A pale face flashed in the scant light from overhead.

The girl. Unconscious and drifting down toward the depths. Angling deeper, he came up underneath her, catching her slender body in his arms and kicking mightily toward the light above. Four minutes.

He swore mentally. If she’d been down here four minutes, she could be very close to brain death. He stopped kicking to plaster his mouth against hers tightly. Angling her head down so he was directly below her, he blew into her mouth enough to clear the water out. Then, he exhaled hard into the air pocket he’d created, forcing air into her lungs. Underwater mouth-to-mouth wasn’t exactly the ideal way to prevent drowning, but he couldn’t just hold her in his arms and let her die!

He closed her mouth with one hand, while his free arm went around her once more. He resumed kicking hard toward the surface and air.

After sacrificing his own oxygen reserves to the girl, he actually began to feel the burn of it in his muscles. Thankfully, his body was extraordinarily efficient at processing oxygen. Although he was getting close to his limit, he had enough gas left in the tank to save the girl.

They burst up out of the depths, and he took a long, gasping breath. He looked around frantically for something big and flat and buoyant, and spotted a portion of the destroyed boat’s hull not far away. Pinching her nose shut, he breathed another lungful of air into the girl’s mouth. Then he dragged her over to the hull and quickly up onto the makeshift raft. He clambered onto his knees beside her and commenced CPR.

“Come on,” he growled. “Don’t you die on me.”

He’d been compressing her chest for about thirty seconds when, without warning, she threw up a bunch of seawater. He rolled her over onto her side fast. She coughed and more water came out of her mouth. She drew in a rasping breath and coughed some more.

At least she was alive.

Steig had obviously seen him surface with the girl because the Sea Nymph was making painstakingly slow progress through the debris field toward them. Several of the crewmen were leaning down over the prow with long poles in the water, shoving debris aside as the yacht crawled forward. When the yacht pulled alongside, the crew lowered a backboard to him on a pair of ropes, and Aiden horsed it underneath the unconscious girl.

He was huffing hard by the time he got her strapped onto it. He swore. Not now. But he should have known. He’d just spent a long time underwater and then surfaced and exerted himself hard. That wasn’t how his gift worked. Now he got to pay the price of it. As the crew hoisted the girl upward, his chest tightened until it felt like a massive anvil was parked on top of him. He lay down on the makeshift raft.

Inhale slowly. Exhale fully. Relax. Don’t freak out. His nebulizer was just a few yards away aboard the Sea Nymph. He’d be fine in a few minutes. But in the meantime, he got to endure the mother of all asthma attacks.

He vaguely heard voices shouting from above.

“Aiden’s down!”

“… send a man to him …”

“… help him up the ladder …”

“… don’t think he’ll make it …”

And then all was darkness and silence around him.

He dreamed of a mermaid with warm brown hair streaked honey-blond. Her tanned skin was dewy and flawless, her eyes a golden-green hazel that matched the sensuous warmth of her voice. Her lips were bee-stung and rosy, her body slender but juicy enough to promise sinful delights. Her aquatic lower half was covered in golden-green scales that glittered exactly the color of her eyes.

She hovered easily in the water before him, her elegant tail fin waving just enough to hold her position. She reached for him with a dazzling smile, her slender arms beckoning him into her eternal embrace. She was the sea. And he loved it—her—more than earthbound life itself. He swam forward, surrendering himself to her.

Her arms closed around him with surprising strength, and she turned, kicking with controlled violence, shooting them downward toward the inky depths of the abyss. His lungs felt strangely tight, and the clock in his head ticked past six minutes. Seven. Eight was about his normal limit.

Nine minutes. Ten.

If she didn’t turn around pretty soon, his beautiful mermaid was going to kill him!

He struggled in her embrace trying to tear free. But she was too strong. Completely disinterested in his silent pleas to let him go. Down, down she went with him. The pressure was too much. Every cell in his body screamed for relief. For air. He thrashed violently. He had to break free or die!

“Wake up, Aiden. For God’s sake, quit flailing around! We just got your breathing settled back down.”

Disoriented, he opened his eyes. Bright lights blinded him and he squinted against the painful glare. Something plastic descended to cover his mouth and nose, and he sucked in the aerosolized bronchodilator medication desperately.

The pressure in his lungs eased. His panic receded. Exhausted mentally and physically, he sagged back against the pillows. Memory returned. “The girl?” he rasped.

The ship’s medical corpsman answered, “Alive. You got to her in time. Gemma doesn’t think she suffered any brain damage, but we won’t know until she wakes up. Gem’s got her sedated and on antibiotics.”

Aiden relaxed. Dr. Gemma Jones was the best. He took belated note of his surroundings and recognized one of the yacht’s cabins. As he recalled, it was outfitted with two twin beds. He turned his head on the pillow and spied the occupant of the other bed. He lurched.

His mermaid.

Except she was pale against the white sheets, her glorious hair dry and spread out across the pillow like honey-streaked silk. Her eyes—if they were the golden-hazel of his dream—were closed, her breathing light and slow.

He took the nebulizer off his face and sat up, swinging his legs carefully over the side of the bed. He felt as if he’d gone a few rounds in a boxing ring against the Champ … and lost.

He stood long enough to shift his weight to the edge of the girl’s bed. He couldn’t resist running his fingers through the soft strands of her hair. “Who are you?” he murmured. “What were you doing out on the open sea by yourself?”

Her eyelids fluttered slightly.

“Can you hear me?” he said more urgently. “Can you open your eyes?”

Her eyelids fluttered again and then opened. They were his mermaid’s eyes. Except right now they were confused. Frightened.

He spoke gently. “You’re safe. You’re aboard the Sea Nymph. I rescued you when your boat sank.”

The girl frowned. “Water,” she croaked. “Dark. Cold. Dying.”

His recent nightmare of nearly drowning vivid in his mind, he didn’t have to ask what she meant. “I dived for you and pulled you out,” he explained.

Her gaze filled with tears and her hand slid across the sheet to touch his. He jolted at the touch of human flesh against his. It had been so long. So very long …

She whispered hoarsely, “Thank you.”

“Sleep now. You need rest.”

“Be here? When I …”

As her eyes drifted closed he answered low, his voice rough, “I’ll be here when you wake up.”

Sunny drifted in a white world that was safe and warm and blessedly bright. And always her rescuer was there with her. Anytime she opened her eyes, his was the only face she saw before she drifted, comforted, back into her cocoon. But eventually the demands of her body began to intrude. Thirst. Hunger. An ache in her chest and raw soreness in her throat.

She opened her eyes. The small, mahogany-paneled room was familiar as if she’d seen it before, but she had no memory of it. She turned her head and spied another bed. With a person in it. More specifically, a man. The one who’d saved her from a watery death, apparently. A bronze and godlike hunk of a man with muscular arms and a sculpted chest above the white blanket. Wavy blond hair with the electric shine of a frequent swimmer fell back from a strong face. He wasn’t exactly beautiful—his face was more about character and strength—but it was a compelling face nonetheless.

She lifted her own blanket and looked down. Whose tank top and shorts was she wearing? At least she was decent. Startled at how wobbly she was, she climbed out of bed. How did she get here? She cast back for details, but it was foggy.

And then a piece came back to her. Something big and black bearing down on her. The shock of cold. And then darkness. Abruptly, she remembered the terror. Suddenly, she was in the water again, panicked, unsure of up or down, knowing that her time was running out and that she desperately wanted to live. She stumbled toward the door, bumping into the sleeping man’s bed, but not caring in her panic. She had to get out of here! Outside. Into the open air. Sunlight.

The man’s eyes opened. He asked sharply, “What’s wrong?”

“Have to get out,” she gasped. “Claustrophobic …”

He jumped out of bed quickly. Holy cow, he was tall. Even more imposing upright than he’d been in bed. He put a hand on her back and whisked her toward the door. A dim, narrow hallway beyond was no comfort, but the man moved down it swiftly, his big hand propelling her forward.

Up a short flight of steps, and then they were outside. Blessed sky, big and open and blue and bright, opened up above her. She breathed deeply as her pounding heart slowly returned to normal. She became aware of her surroundings and got her first good look at the vessel she was on. Good grief. This yacht was huge.

“Who are you?” she asked her rescuer. “Whose yacht is this?”

“I’m Aiden McKay. And the Sea Nymph belongs to a friend of mine. I’m borrowing it for a little deep-sea fishing expedition.”

“What are you fishing for … Moby Dick?”

He smiled briefly, and his face transformed from striking to mesmerizing. Wow. “Apparently, I’m fishing for mermaids.” He paused and then blurted, “What’s your name?”

“Sunny. Sunny Jordan.”

He nodded awkwardly. “How is it that ship ran over your boat last night? Was it an accident?”

She stumbled as last night’s terror rolled over her and she managed to practically fall into him. She didn’t plan it, honest. But all of a sudden, she was plastered against his chest as his surprised arms came up to catch her. He froze and went statue stiff. It was like cuddling up to the Rock of Gibraltar.

“Are you going to, umm, faint?” he mumbled.

“I never faint,” she retorted indignantly. But her whole indignation vibe was ruined by the quaver in her voice and trembling of her knees.

His arms tightened fractionally as if to say he had her now and she was safe. She snuggled deeper into his rigid, but somehow comforting, embrace.

A sobbing breath escaped her.

“Who was on that ship?” he persisted. “Did you get a good look at it?”

She glanced up at him and he was staring fixedly over her head at a distant point on the horizon. He looked acutely uncomfortable. And yet, his arms stayed wrapped around her.

“The ship was all black. And so big. It came at me so fast….” She shuddered.

He repeated more urgently, “Was it an accident?”

The answer scared her almost more than being run down in the first place. Almost more than nearly drowning. She whispered hoarsely, “I don’t think so.”

He drew back to stare down at her. “Who are you? Why would someone try to kill you?”

Chapter 2

Aiden waited expectantly for the woman to answer, but instead she merely shivered in his arms. “Who wants to hurt you?” he insisted.

Eventually, she sighed and relaxed, her slender body shifting against his and making his chest tighten—but pleasantly. Far too belatedly, dismay flowed through him. He knew better than to indulge himself like this. He’d sworn off women. Changed his ways. Turned over a new leaf … and apparently been lying to himself like a big dog that he’d actually changed.

“I’m a filmmaker,” she announced as if that answered everything. “I was collecting footage for a documentary on the commercial deep-sea fishing industry.”

An uncomplimentary portrayal, no doubt. But uncomplimentary enough to kill her over? He frowned. He didn’t recall seeing the giant cranes used for deploying and hoisting fishing nets protruding from the silhouette of the vessel that had sunk her boat. “Are you sure it was fishermen who ran you down?”

“I’m not sure of anything except my boat is gone, and I’m really glad you came along when you did and saved my life.”

So was he.

The moment threatened to become intimate as a sexual charge started to build between them. He was desperate to lean into it, to lose himself in the feeling he knew so well. But he wasn’t that guy anymore. He didn’t party his way into the bed of every hot chick he laid eyes on. He had a purpose now. Focus. At long last, he had some self-respect. Still. This particular hot chick felt pretty fantastic in his arms—

A voice intruded from behind him. “I see my patients are up and about.”

He stepped back hastily from the girl. Whether he was more chagrined at the interruption or abjectly relieved by it, he couldn’t say. “Hey, Doc,” he mumbled.

“Aiden. How’s your breathing?”

“Fine.” An awkward silence descended. It had been a long time since he’d had need for social niceties, but he roused his rusty skills to mutter, “Sunny, this is Doctor Gemma Jones. Gem, meet Sunny.”

The two women nodded at one another. “How’re you feeling today?” Gemma asked Sunny.

“Okay, I guess. My throat feels awful.”

“It’ll clear up in a few days.” The doctor added, “If you’ve got a little time later, I’d like to run some simple neurological tests on you.”

Sunny answered, “Give me a shout-out whenever you want to do it.”

“How about now, then?” Gemma responded briskly. Aiden scowled at the interruption of their time together. He was making good progress—

He cut off that train of thought sharply. He did not progress with seducing women anymore, dammit.

Gemma announced, “I’ll get my bag and be back in a few minutes.”

The doctor’s departure was apparently the cue for the ship’s captain to make an appearance. Aiden sighed. It was a plot to keep him from having any time alone with Sunny. Or more likely, they’d come to enjoy watching him squirm. It wasn’t often these days he interacted with women for this long. “Sunny, this is Captain Steig Carlson.”

“As in the ship’s captain?” she asked, eyeing the big blond Swede a little too appreciatively for Aiden’s taste.

Steig smiled and held out his hand to her. “That’s right, Miss Jordan.”

“Call me Sunny.”

“Only if you’ll call me Steig.”

Aiden managed not to roll his eyes, but it was a close thing. “So, Steig. I assume you tracked the ship that wiped out Sunny’s boat?”

“We followed it until it rounded an island and we lost radar contact. By the time we passed the headland, it had blended in with the other traffic in the shipping lanes. I can tell you one thing, though. It was fast. We had to push the throttles wide open just to maintain the gap between us.”

The Sea Nymph could run at thirty knots if she had to. And the other ship had been able to match that speed? Modern whaling ships could move that fast, but not too many other fishing vessels could do it. “Any idea who she was?” he asked.

Steig shook his head regretfully. “We never got visual on her again after we picked you and Sunny out of the water.”

“Did it look like a fishing boat to you?” Aiden asked.

“No. Wrong rigging for fishing. It looked more like—” the Swede frowned “—I’m not sure what. Research vessel, maybe.”

Aiden and Steig traded grim looks. They were both thinking the same thing. A surveillance ship of some kind. Why would some foreign government have it in for a lone, independent filmmaker? They both looked over at the woman leaning on the rail, eyes closed, face turned up to the sunshine. Who was she? And what in the hell had she really been doing out here?

Aiden asked in sudden recollection, “Sunny, what was in that bag you were clutching when I dragged you up to the surface?”

She frowned, then her eyes lit up. “Did my camera bag make it aboard with me?”

Aiden had no idea. He’d passed out shortly after resuscitating her. Steig answered, however. “Yes, it did.”

“Where is it?” she asked eagerly.

The captain was prevented from answering by the arrival of Doctor Jones to test Sunny’s brain function. Gemma shooed Aiden and Steig away with a promise to return their shiny new toy to them later.

As Sunny threw a startled glance in his direction, Aiden scowled at Gemma. The doctor had the social skills of an amoeba sometimes.

A sailor called for Steig to return to the bridge, and Aiden made his way belowdecks. It was a simple matter—track down the cabin where Sunny’s clothes, laundered and pressed, had been hung in a closet. Sure enough, her bag sat on the floor beneath the hangers. Steig’s crew was nothing if not efficient.

He should leave the bag alone. Let the poor girl have her privacy. The new Aiden didn’t pull stunts like this. And yet, he pulled the waterproof sack out of her closet. He needed to know if the reason she’d nearly been killed was something she’d recorded, right?

Armed with that thin logic, he dumped the contents of the bag onto her bed. A few dog-eared family photos. Cell phone. Wallet. A flash drive. An impressive array of high-tech camera gear, including memory cards for her digital movie camera. Dozens of them.

He loaded a random card into her camera and pushed the play button. The footage had been taken underwater. A school of dolphins was circling, playing with the cameraperson—presumably Sunny. Shafts of sunlight streamed down into the sea and various fish darted in and out of the light. It made him want to take off his clothes and dive overboard right now. But then, his longing for the water was never far from him.

He popped the memory card out and put in another one. The footage jolted him. It was of live sharks thrashing on the deck of a fishing vessel as their fins were sawed off. They were rolled into the ocean still alive, mutilated and bloody, to die. The waste of it was sickening. If they were going to kill a shark, couldn’t they at least harvest the entire animal for its meat?

He fast-forwarded to another set of footage, fuzzy images of ships at a distance. But the quality of the film was poor. It had been shot through rain and the visibility wasn’t great.

Without warning, the door opened behind him. “This will be your—” A steward broke off in surprise. “Oh! I’m sorry, sir …”

“That’s okay,” Aiden replied, hastily stuffing the camera back into the bag.

But he wasn’t fast enough. Sunny had spotted what he’d been doing. “Hey! That’s my camera. What are you doing with it? I didn’t give you permission to mess with my stuff.”

He winced. She was, of course, entirely right. He explained hastily, “Somebody tried to kill you. I’m trying to find out why.”

The steward backed out discreetly and closed the door as Sunny retorted angrily, “That’s none of your business.”

She was magnificent in her indignation. Her eyes sparked golden fire and her entire body vibrated with passion. Lord, to bed all that exploding energy—

Not. Happening. Chagrined on several levels, he made a lame attempt to justify himself. “If you’re going to be aboard this ship, anything that might bring danger to it is my business. I wanted to know what threat we’re dealing with.”

“If I’m such a danger, put me ashore. Sail for the nearest port and I’ll disembark. Or if you really want to get rid of me and my personal baggage, have a helicopter come get me. I saw a snazzy landing pad for one up on deck.”

His voice rose in frustration. “I’m not trying to get rid of you. I’m trying to protect you!”

“It looks to me like you’re trying to invade my privacy … and doing a pretty good job of it. I don’t need your protection.”

Was she completely without a clue as to how much danger she might be in? He snapped, “Right. That’s why your boat was run over and I pulled you from the water more dead than alive. Because you’re doing such a bang-up job of taking care of yourself.”

She snatched the bag out of his hands and clutched it to her chest in much the same way she had done underwater the night before. What was on those other memory cards she seemed so desperate to protect?

“If I’m not mistaken,” she said stiffly, “this is my room. That being the case, please leave.”

She was throwing him out? After he’d saved her life? Exasperation slammed into him. He was only trying to help, dammit. He surged to his feet and headed for the door. A citrus scent wafted to him as he passed by her. It was tart and sweet on his tongue and begged to be tasted more fully, and it only succeeded in making him madder.

He paused in the doorway and spoke, his voice sounding stiff even to him. “I’m sorry if I offended you. But since my help is obviously not welcome, I’ll leave you alone. I’ll have Steig arrange to put you ashore as soon as possible.”

Sunny stared at the door in dismay as it closed behind Aiden. She didn’t mean to make him get all angry and distant like that; she’d just been mad that he’d been rifling through her bag. Its contents were all she had left in the entire world. Literally. Everything she owned had been on the New Dawn and was now lying on the bottom of the ocean. She didn’t need some stranger—even if he was glorious to look at—pawing through what little remained of her life.

She was probably overreacting. And it didn’t help that she was already on edge. Spending more than thirty seconds in the company of Gemma Jones was enough to make any woman feel inferior and a little tense. The doctor was so intelligent it was hard to have a conversation with her; her mind worked so quickly that she leaped from subject to subject almost too fast to follow.

Not to mention, Sunny was a little jealous of the easy relationship Gemma seemed to have with Aiden. Which was silly because she herself barely knew him. But something funny happened to her stomach whenever he smiled at her. And after he’d saved her life, she’d thought they had some sort of special connection. Maybe in her semiconscious state she’d just imagined it.

Disappointment coursed through her. For a little while there, she hadn’t felt alone in the world. And it had been nice. But then he had to go and intrude in her life. What was left of it. Still, she did owe him her life, and she had snapped at him.

She left her cabin in search of Aiden to apologize, but he was nowhere to be found. At least nowhere the crew wanted to tell her about. He’d probably given them orders to keep her away from him. Maybe Steig could intervene on her behalf.

It was hard to believe a person could get lost on a yacht, but this one was huge. And plush. She’d never seen anything as luxurious in all her years of sailing. Eventually, she found her way to the bridge. She stepped into the high-tech space and stopped to stare.

A sailor in a crisp white uniform spotted her. “Can I help you, miss?”

“Is Captain Carlson available?”

The guy glanced at a closed door at the far end of the bridge. “If you’ll follow me?”

Steig stood up when she walked into his compact and very tidy office. “Is anything wrong, Miss Jordan?”

“I thought we agreed you’d call me Sunny.”

He smiled and ducked his head.

“I need your help. I think I made Aiden mad, and I want to make it up to him.”

Steig looked frankly shocked. “Aiden? Mad? Do tell.”

She explained quickly. “I snapped at him when I caught him going through my things, but I’d like to apologize. Make it up to him. I thought maybe dinner with him—” Why did Steig look so stunned? “Is something wrong?” she asked quickly.

“Not at all. Continue.”

“If I invite him to eat with me he might say no. But I thought if you were to ask him, maybe he wouldn’t refuse. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy. Something simple like a picnic, peanut-butter sandwiches on deck, would be fine. I just need to talk to him before he throws me off the ship.”

“Throws you off?” Steig exclaimed. “Just how angry did you make him?”

“I kicked him out of my cabin,” she confessed. “He yelled at me first, though.”

“Did he, now?” Steig was beginning to look amused. “He actually yelled? I definitely think I can help you. But my chef would not be caught dead serving peanut-butter sandwiches to a guest. I’ll take care of the arrangements. Say, seven o’clock tonight in the salon?”

“Uhh, okay.”

“Gemma will be delighted to help you with some clothes. Be sure to mention to her that Aiden yelled at you.” He waved her out of his office with one hand while an unholy smile spread across his face. “I’ve got some calls to make.”

What had she done? Had she just set up Aiden to be the butt of some horrible practical joke that would only make him more angry at her? She visited Gemma, who reacted just as strangely as Steig to the fact that Aiden had yelled at her. The doctor pronounced it excellent news and immediately agreed to set up Sunny with a nice dress for dinner.

What on earth? Why were they all so thrilled she’d made him mad?

The arrangements for her grand apology in place, Sunny made her way back to her cabin. She managed to take a fretful nap but woke to the memory of a giant black shark bearing down on her with the intent to kill. She jolted awake in a cold sweat.

Why would anyone try to kill her? Had she really made a bunch of fishermen that angry? It wasn’t as if deep-sea fishing practices were any big secret. Plenty of other documentaries had been filmed detailing their more outrageous behavior.

Someone knocked on her door, and Sunny opened it to reveal a steward holding a sexy little black dress on a hanger. He also held out a clear plastic bag that contained panty hose, high-heeled shoes that looked a little big for her but would probably work in a pinch, a curling iron, hair spray and makeup. Lots of lovely makeup. God bless Gemma Jones.

Sunny might happily sail all over the world for months on end and never see a tube of lipstick, but when she got a chance to doll herself up, she enjoyed doing it as much as the next girl. Sighing in delight, she took the offerings from the steward and retreated into her tiny bathroom to play.

At ten minutes till seven, another knock sounded on her door. After a quick spritz of some heavenly perfume, whose name she would have to get from Gemma, she opened the door. Steig, wearing a white dress uniform, looked smashing.

“I’m here to escort you to dinner, Miss Jordan.”

“Sunny.”

“It’s Miss Jordan tonight. And may I say, you look lovely.” He held out his forearm to her. Smiling shyly, she laid her hand on it and let him lead her up two decks and down a passageway to a massive living room. At the far end of it she spied a linen-covered table sporting red roses, tall candles and cut crystal.

“You’re not pulling some kind of joke on Aiden, are you?”

“Not at all. Why would you think that?”

“This isn’t exactly peanut-butter sandwiches on deck.”

“Please don’t disappoint the chef. He spent all afternoon working on making this meal perfect. He doesn’t often get a chance to go all out. The crew’s a bunch of crusty old sailors who don’t appreciate his finer gastronomic efforts.”

“You shouldn’t have gone to all this trouble,” she murmured.

“My pleasure. Aiden needs someone in his life who … inspires emotion.”

Now, what did that mean? Before she could ask, Steig made a formal little bow and announced, “I’ll leave you now. Bon appétit.”

“Uhh, thank you.”

The salon felt huge and hollow as silence settled around her. A subliminal rumble of engines was the only sound in the background. But then, out of hidden speakers around the room, quiet chamber music started. She was so not a violins-and-haute-cuisine kind of girl. But hey. If the captain thought this would work on Aiden, she could roll with it.

Promptly at seven, she heard movement behind her. She turned a little too quickly and stumbled in her heels, which were a tad loose. Strong hands caught her shoulders to steady her.

“What’s this all about?” Aiden demanded sharply.

She stared down at his Italian leather loafers in utter humiliation. So. The joke wasn’t on him, after all. It was on her.

“I’m sorry,” she mumbled. “I asked Steig to help me apologize to you. I told him a picnic and peanut-butter sandwiches would be fine, but he insisted on all of this.”

“Ahh.” He released her shoulders and took a step back.

She waited for the explosion, but none came. When she couldn’t take the suspense anymore, she risked a peek up at him. It was like looking at a painted portrait. It looked like Aiden, but nothing of the real man was there in his eyes. He looked … dead. Had she alienated him that badly?

“Gemma lent you a dress?” he asked neutrally.

She plucked at the clingy black fabric. “Yes.”

He nodded noncommittally. “The flowers and music?”

“Steig’s idea.”

“Hmm.”

Finally, she burst out, “Say something, will you? Yell at me and tell me how mad you are or what an ungrateful bitch I am.”

He replied politely, “You look lovely.”

She stared in equal parts confusion and frustration as he moved away from her and over to a leather-and-brass wet bar. “Drink?” he asked mildly.

“Sure,” she replied in utter confusion. What was up with him? He was treating her like a rather inconvenient bug.

He concocted something that involved a shaker and lime wedges and poured it into a pair of glasses filled with ice. He carried the drinks over to the picture window where she stood and handed one to her.

“To your health,” he commented wryly.

“Why are you being like this?” she demanded.

“Like what?”

“So … polite. Aren’t you furious with me for throwing you out of my room?”

“I was going through your things without your permission. You probably should have slapped me.”

“I don’t slap. I have a wicked right hook, but no slapping.”

“Check. Beware the right hook.” A pause, and then his voice thawed slightly. “Anything else I should know about you?”

“You’re really not mad at me?” she asked in disbelief. Her family had been full of passion. Lots of arguments and shouting, but also lots of laughter and love. His cool, unflappable demeanor was totally foreign to her.

“I’ll admit, I was … annoyed … earlier. But you were right. I’m just not used to anyone calling me out for my bad behavior. You surprised me. That’s all.”

“Oh.” She paused for a moment, then asked, “How come no one calls you out? Are you that rich?”

That made him smile. “I already told you this yacht doesn’t belong to me. I’m just borrowing it from a friend to use as bait.”

She glanced around in surprise. “This is bait? For what? A rich wife?”

His smile widened. “Hardly. I’m fishing for pirates.”

“Excuse me?”

“Pirates. This is exactly the sort of yacht they love to steal. They board the vessel, kill everyone and take the ship. After a few exterior modifications and a new name to disguise her, she’d go for millions on the black market.”

“Isn’t trying to attract pirates dangerous?”

“That’s why the Nymph’s entire crew is ex-military and heavily armed. Any pirates who mess with this boat are in for a nasty surprise.”

“Still. It sounds dangerous.”

“No more so than running around solo in a tiny cabin cruiser filming commercial-fishing outfits doing their worst.”

“Touché.” She raised her glass to him.

“Any new thoughts on who might have tried to kill you?”

She shook her head. “I wonder if I accidentally filmed something I shouldn’t have. Maybe something that has nothing at all to do with fishing.”

“That was my thought, too. That’s the only reason I was looking at your film, by the way. I was trying to spot whatever got you in hot water.”

“The way I remember it, the water was freaking cold.”

He winced at the mention of her near drowning. “Next time, don’t go swimming in the ocean alone.”

She shuddered at the idea of submerging herself in water of any kind ever again. Even the idea of submerging herself in a bathtub terrified her. Her hands and knees started to shake at the thought, in fact, and suddenly she felt more than a little nauseous. She swayed dangerously.

Aiden moved fast to her side and lifted her drink out of her nerveless, icy fingers. “You just went ghostly white. Are you all right?”

“Can we talk about something besides swimming?”

A look of dawning understanding lit his face. “Scared you, did it?”

“Wouldn’t coming within a whisker of drowning freak you out, too?”

“I wouldn’t know. I’m a pretty good swimmer. Haven’t ever come near drowning.”

“Lucky,” she muttered.

He shrugged and a shadow passed through his eyes. “That’s one word for it.”

“What word would you use to describe your swimming ability?”

He pursed his lips. “Spectacular.”

“Modest much?” she retorted.

He chuckled, thawing another few millimeters. Maybe the guy was a recluse of some kind. Or just shy. She got the feeling engaging in this much sustained conversation was unusual for him. He kept pausing as if searching for the right words.

“I’ll take you out swimming with me sometime. You’ll see what I’m talking about.”

“Not me. I’m done with fishing exposés and underwater anything, thank you very much.”

“It’s a little soon to declare yourself finished, isn’t it? Give yourself time to get over the shock of your accident.”

She shook her head resolutely. No way was she getting back in the water. The sea had taken her parents, and it had nearly taken her. She wasn’t dumb—she knew when it was time to quit and walk away. She opened her mouth to say just that but was interrupted by a male voice behind her.

“Dinner is ready, Miss Jordan. Mr. McKay.”

Aiden rolled his eyes. “A simple ‘chow’s on’ would have been sufficient, Jens.”

The steward cleared his throat. “With all due respect, you haven’t seen the meal Chef prepared. Chow is emphatically not the right word for it.”

Aiden sighed. Then, awkwardly, he held out his arm to her. She took it, eyeing the steward with new respect as Aiden guided her to the table. The sailor was burly beneath his white monkey suit and moved with the assurance of a soldier. How could she have missed that before? She must’ve been too besotted with Aiden to notice any other males on board.

She did notice, though, when Aiden gestured the steward aside and pulled out her chair for her himself. She glanced up at him in thanks and her breath caught at the way he was looking at her. As if she was the main course for dinner. Her stomach tumbled and she suddenly felt a little lightheaded. She was grateful to sink into her seat while she regained her bearings. Talk about a lady killer! The man was dangerous. He could knock her off her feet with a single glance. And she dared not even think about what his arms felt like around her.

As course after course of incredible continental cuisine came forth from the kitchen, she surreptitiously studied her companion. Aiden carried himself like a man used to wealth. Power. Having people do what he said. She didn’t care what he said. The man was definitely rich, or at least very powerful.

Not that she’d ever measured people by the thickness of their wallets. It was just interesting that he’d gone to such lengths to make sure she knew he didn’t own the Sea Nymph. If he was trying to lessen her intimidation factor at his suave sophistication, it didn’t work. It felt as if she was having supper with a movie star. He was perfectly polite, but there was a certain cool distance to him that was completely impenetrable. Of course, it was entirely her fault it was there, so it wasn’t as if she could hold his reserve against him. But it still got to her. Furthermore, it goaded her to try to break through it and find the warm, engaging man she’d glimpsed when she first met him.

“What’s your story?” she finally asked him.

“The men in my family all served a stint in the navy. My father was stationed at Pearl Harbor. I spent my youth in Hawaii. A rough gig, I know. But someone had to do it. When my father retired, my family moved back east. But I stayed in California to go to college at Stanford. I played hard, but I managed to get a degree in nanoengineering. That means I design and build tiny little robots. During my obligatory tour in the navy, I partied my way through every major port in the Pacific theater. Then Jeff Winston offered me a job in his grandfather’s company. And here I am.”

She considered the detachment with which he’d recited his life story. Beneath the lightness of the rendition, it all sounded very snooty and blue-blooded. No mention of friends, lovers, emotional connections to his family. Nor did he strike her as the party animal he’d described himself to be. She cast about for a neutral question. “How did you become a spectacular swimmer?”

Odd. He looked away evasively, but he did answer. “I’ve always lived near water. I suppose it came naturally. What about you? What’s your story?”

Trying to distract her. Weird. She supposed she owed him an answer, though, since he’d told her about himself. But she didn’t usually like to talk about her past.

She answered reluctantly. “My parents were environmental activists. And yes, they were raging hippies. We even lived in San Francisco when we weren’t be-bopping all over the world. I have a little sister, Chloe. She’s the ultimate anti-hippie, however. Don’t get me wrong. She’s awesome. But we have absolutely nothing in common. Most people who meet us don’t even think we’re related. At any rate, my family went to wherever the next big environmental crisis was brewing and tried to stir up public concern about it.”

“Where are your parents now?”

“Dead.” She was able to say it without opening the door to all the old grief and loss and anger, but she desperately hoped he’d get the hint and leave the subject alone.

He didn’t. “How?” At least he seemed to have sensed that he’d touched a nerve and was keeping this conversation brief and to the point.

“They went down at sea. No one knows how.”

“Where?”

“Not far from here, in fact. A couple hundred kilometers south of our current position.” She’d finally worked up the nerve to sail through the area a few days ago. It had been eerie, knowing she was following the last known coordinates her parents had reported before they disappeared.

For all she knew, she’d sailed right over their watery graves. She hoped she had, at any rate. She’d waited nearly a decade to say a proper goodbye to them. Although, she wasn’t at all sure that downing most of a bottle of cheap wine and going on a drunk crying jag had been much of a farewell. Yet another screwup in her life to live with.

She noticed that Aiden was staring at her. “What?”

“No wonder you freaked out at nearly drowning. It had to bring back thoughts of how your parents must have died. I’m sorry.”

Thank God she hadn’t thought about it when she’d been fighting for her own life against the sea. It would have done her in. Even now, thinking that was how her parents had spent their final moments was enough to choke her up. She laid down her fork with excessive care and stared unseeing at the china pattern wavering beyond her tears.

Hands reached down for her. Pulled her to her feet. A warm chest materialized against her cheek and awkward arms surrounded her.

A chagrined voice murmured in her hair, “I’ve gone and done it again, haven’t I? I’ve upset you.” A sigh. “I’m sorry.”

Why so many tears came, she had no idea. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t shed plenty over the years for her parents. They’d died ten years ago, for crying out loud. And yet, the wound felt as raw and unbearable as ever. Maybe it was being out here so close to where they’d died that brought out the old feelings of loss and abandonment.

She cried hard enough on Aiden’s chest that her borrowed mascara had no doubt ruined his shirt. She must look as bedraggled as a wet dog. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know what came over me. I never cry this much.”

“You had a pretty bad scare.”

“But I’m not normally a wimp.”

“I already gathered that. Any woman who’d come out here alone and take on big international fishing companies has too much courage for her own good.”

She swiped at her face. “I must look like a bad clown.”

He handed her a discreetly monogrammed handkerchief. “I think I like you better without makeup.”

She smiled gratefully. “You’re a gentleman for saying so, but it’s not necessary with me.”

“Why not? Don’t you deserve to be treated with respect? Like a lady?”

That made her laugh. “A lady? Me?” She was a hippie environmentalist wannabe following somewhat pathetically and entirely unsuccessfully in her family’s footsteps.

He looked her up and down in a way that stole her breath away. “Yes, you, a lady.”

“Brain’s a little waterlogged from all that swimming, huh?”

One corner of his mouth twitched up wryly. “I’ve been told that before.”

“By whom?”

“Gemma says so frequently.”

“Why is she out here helping you guys nab pirates? She doesn’t strike me as the type.”

“She’s a scientist,” Aiden answered cryptically.

She got the distinct feeling he didn’t want to say any more on the subject. “What’s she studying?” Sunny persisted.

“Aquatic stuff.”

Wow. That was descriptive. Was there some big secret around the doctor’s research? Maybe he was worried she’d film Gemma’s work or something. She was trying to figure out a delicate way to ask him if that was his concern when a male voice intruded sharply over a loudspeaker.

“Incoming pirate vessel. All hands on deck. Prepare for combat.”

Chapter 3

Sunny started as the man across from her transformed from an urbane, sophisticated host who wore this yacht with the same ease he wore his suit into … she wasn’t quite sure what. His face went hard, his eyes glittering with violent satisfaction.

“Go to your cabin,” he ordered her tersely. “Lock yourself in and don’t come out until Steig or I come for you.”

“What’s going on?” she demanded.

He shoved away from the table, already unbuttoning his shirt. What the heck? He ripped the fabric off shoulders that made her gulp as he kicked off his shoes and reached for his fly. Was he going to strip in front of her? Here? Now? Confused, she sat unmoving and stared at him. He peeled down his trousers, revealing powerful thighs. Thankfully, he was wearing some sort of compression briefs like a biker might wear.

“What are you waiting for?” he bit out. “Get out of here!”

“Where are you going?”

He reached into the pocket of his discarded pants and came up with, of all things, a pair of goggles like swimmers would wear. “I’m going fishing.” He moved across the room to a desk and opened a drawer. He pulled out a round disk about the size and shape of a smoke detector and stuck it inside the waistband of his shorts. Its circular outline poked out on his hip.

“What on earth are you talking about?” she demanded.

“Go.” He turned and raced for the door. He dashed out onto the walkway around the salon as he snapped the rubber strap of the goggles around his head. She heard someone shout—it sounded as if they were telling Aiden to wait for something—and then he jumped. Or dived, to be more precise. He soared out into space in a graceful swan dive reminiscent of a cliff diver. Or a complete nut job.

She didn’t hear the splash as he hit the water, for more shouting erupted. And then gunshots. A massive, noisy fusillade of them that sent her diving for the floor in panic. An overwhelming urge to run for her life made her tremble from head to foot. But where to go? No power on earth was convincing her to follow Aiden’s example and jump into the ocean. Cabin. Hide. Lock the door.

She jumped up on legs that felt too weak to hold her weight and too fast to belong to her. She bolted for the salon door, but skidded to a stop as gunfire exploded down the passageway. A man in white sprinted into view then ducked down a side passage. A second man, this one dark-skinned and dressed in green fatigues, barged around the corner and into view.

For the first time in her life, she froze. Her entire body refused to move. Not a single muscle would respond to her command to take cover. She just stared at the man’s ginormous gun and the wild look in his eyes. His weapon came up in front of him. The barrel swung toward her. An evil grin spread across his face. He took aim.

And then the entire right side of his body exploded in a fountain of blood and flesh as a barrage of automatic-weapon fire raked him from head to toe. The sweep of nausea through her gut, her stomach retching against the combination of rich food and incomprehensible gore, finally unfroze her.

Stumbling, she turned and ran back into the salon looking around frantically. She had to hide. But it wasn’t as if ships were rife with unused nooks and crannies that would conceal an adult. More gunfire erupted somewhere close and she dived for the oak bar, careening around its bulk and ducking down. She curled up in a little ball, hugging her knees like she hadn’t since she was a child. She rocked back and forth, more or less incoherent with fear.

Where was Aiden? Was he all right? What had he meant by going fishing? She prayed urgently that the Sea Nymph’s crew would win the fight. That they would be safe. That no one would die. But from the amount of gunfire out there, wholesale slaughter sounded more likely.

Did pirates still take female prisoners? Make them clean their cabins and warm their beds? Or force her to walk the plank? The very idea of plunging off a board into the ocean made her quake with terror.

Footsteps pounded nearby. It sounded as if someone was running down the hall in this direction. She swore under her breath and prayed they’d go away. But someone entered the room moving stealthily.

She had to find something to defend herself with. A weapon. She was not getting kidnapped by pirates, and that was all there was to it. She glanced around for something likely. Unopened bottles of liquor were stored on a shelf under the bar. She grabbed two with long necks. Then, tucking herself as far under the bar as she could, she cocked her arm back and waited grimly for the bastards to come.

Aiden sliced through the water cleanly, exhilarated that his plan was finally coming to fruition. He had faith Steig and his crew would have no trouble fighting off the pirates. Most of them in this part of the world were abjectly poor Somali with little to no education, ancient weapons and barely seaworthy boats.

But because of their small vessels and familiarity with the local coast, the pirates were slippery and hard to track. Various navies of the world had failed to find and eradicate their highly mobile and secret bases of operation. And that’s why he was out here. Several private shipping companies, fed up with government failures, had hired Winston Security to kick a little pirate ass.

He swam deep enough that he wouldn’t be readily visible from the surface but not so deep that he couldn’t see his target. There. Just ahead. The curving hull of a wooden boat. If the ramshackle underside was any indication of its overall condition, it was in grave danger of sinking momentarily. But then he spied the twin propellers—state-of-the-art and brand-spanking-new. He’d lay odds the engines turning those babies were in similar shape. The bastards knew where to put their ill-gotten money.

He knifed upward directly underneath the pirate boat. With one hand on the hull to steady himself, he pulled out the tracking device and pondered where to put it. A powerful magnet would hold it in place, but he had to find something metal to attach it to. He eased back toward the propellers, which were idling at the moment.

It would be dangerous, but if he could get his arm past the blades and stick this thing inside the hull, the odds of it being discovered anytime soon were nil. He approached the props cautiously. He happened to love his fingers—his entire arm, in fact. As long as the boat didn’t move while he did this, he should be fine.

He reached past the nearest prop carefully. There were only about six inches to spare between the turning blades and his biceps. He felt around with his fingertips and found a flat metal plate that was probably part of the engine mount. He slapped the tracker down onto the plate and then gave it a good tug. It didn’t budge.

He eased his arm out of the narrow opening. If he were above water, he’d breathe a big sigh of relief. Now that it was done, he had to admit it had probably been a stupid maneuver to attempt. But all was well that ended well.

A massive explosion of turbulence slammed into him as the engines on the pirate vessel were abruptly jammed into gear.

Crap! He pulled back against the suction of the props with all his might but couldn’t resist the force of hundreds of horsepower drawing him in. He got an arm against the hull a foot above the props, and then a foot on the other side of the twin blades. He gave a mighty shove and flung himself to the side.

Clear.

He swam down and away from the vessel as fast as he could go. Damn, that had been close. He searched in the gloom behind him for the white bulk of the Sea Nymph, but visibility was too poor to see it from here. He probably ought to head back to her before Steig got any bright ideas about giving chase to the pirates and accidentally left him behind. He hadn’t had time to tell the captain he’d gone overboard in the moments before the attack. Until Steig went looking for Sunny and she told the captain he’d jumped, he was on his own.

He estimated he had another two minutes worth of air. He swam for the Nymph, angling deep to avoid any stray bullets. Sure enough, as he drew close to the yacht, occasional white tracks zinged into the water where bullets penetrated the sea.

He surfaced on the far side of the yacht from the pirate boat. The smooth white curve of the Nymph’s hull loomed over him as he breathed deeply. How to get back on board? The ship would be in full security lockdown, which meant the swimming deck would be retracted and locked that way. Unless the crew deployed a ladder or rope down to him, he was pretty much out of luck. He could shout, but over the cacophony of the gunfight still in full swing, no one would hear him. Besides, he didn’t need to draw the attention of any armed pirates.

And then something alarming dawned on him. All the gunfire he was hearing was automatic. Since when did the local pirates carry heavy artillery like that? They usually used crappy World War II surplus M-1s and their ilk. A few pirates on any given crew would have modern weapons that could lay down a lot of lead fast, but it sounded as if they all were carrying AK-47’s or better up there.

What was happening? Was Sunny okay? Had she done like he’d told her and gone to her cabin to hide? Somehow, he doubted she would follow his orders. A bit of a … nonconformist streak clung to her. Darned hippie.

He swam around to the rear of the ship, tested the slit where the swim deck was stowed and was able to wedge his fingers in it. He pulled himself partially out of the water and reached up for a ring that a waterskiing line would normally be routed through. He hauled himself out of the water and got his toes in the slit. It was painstaking work finding finger and toe holds, and he had a few tense moments when he nearly lost his grip. But finally, he managed to pull himself onto the lower aft deck, where he lay panting for a moment.

No time to rest and recuperate, though. He had to join the fight. The crew would no doubt mount a pitched defense of the bridge and the engine room. He could hook up with Steig’s guys in the engine compartment, assuming they didn’t shoot him as he approached.

He pressed to his feet and moved cautiously toward the passage that would take him belowdecks. Nothing like strolling into a war zone armed with a Speedo and an attitude. This might possibly be dumber than sticking his arm past that propeller. Why was it he’d volunteered to become a superhero, anyway?

Quiet footsteps slid across the carpet, drawing near. Sunny tensed, waiting in an agony of impatience. And then a leg came into view. Clothed in ragged denim and terminating in scratched and unpolished combat boots. No way would any member of Steig Carlson’s crew get away with a crappy shoe shine like that. She swung the bottle with all her might, smashing it into the guy’s knee. The bottle shattered and glass and booze sprayed everywhere. The pirate collapsed, shouting, his weapon discharging wildly at the ceiling.

She pounced out from behind the bar, shifting her spare bottle to her right hand. She brought it down over the guy’s head fast and hard. It, too, smashed into smithereens with a satisfying thud.

The pirate lay still and unmoving, drenched in vodka. God bless those heavy Russian bottles. She didn’t stick around to see if she’d killed the guy. Not when she heard shouting and running feet headed her way.

She looked around the salon in panic and on a hunch raced for the built-in sofa under a picture window. A yank at the seat cushion and, sure enough, it lifted to reveal a storage compartment. She shoved aside a pile of blankets, climbed inside and was encased in stuffy blackness. Feet and voices came into the salon. But they were muffled enough that she couldn’t tell if they belonged to good guys or bad guys.

Frankly, she didn’t care. She wanted no part of this fight whatsoever. She just wanted to curl up and jam her fists over her ears until it all went away.

Aiden ducked back around the corner just in time to avoid a barrage of bullets flying out of the engine room. “Hold your fire!” he shouted. “It’s me. Aiden McKay.”

“Cease fire!” someone bellowed.

He poked his head around the corner cautiously, prepared to yank back again fast. But this time no rain of bullets peppered the wall above his head. He moved forward into the engine room quickly. Someone pressed an assault rifle into his hand and he slung the shoulder strap over his head.

“Is that your formal combat attire?” someone asked drily.

He grimaced and started to make a snappy retort, but incoming gunfire silenced him. Apparently, he was just in time for a breakout from the engine room because the chief engineer, coincidentally a senior Special Forces man, hand signaled for them to move out.

For once, Steig’s obsession with good order and discipline paid off. They’d practiced this drill a dozen times and every crew member knew exactly what to do. Aiden counted his position in line. Number five. Which meant his field of fire would be to the extreme left and high. He pointed his weapon in that direction as they burst into the first stateroom to clear it. Cabin by cabin they cleared the deck, leaving men behind to ensure this deck stayed cleared and no pirates snuck in behind them to hide.

“How’s the fight going?” he asked the chief engineer during a break in the action while they waited on instructions from Steig on the bridge as to where to go next. Coordination was vital in a fight like this with multiple skirmishes in separate locations.

“Rough. Bastards are numerous and well armed.”

“Do we have any prisoners?”

“They’re fighting to the death.”

Since when did pirates do that? Aiden frowned. The plan had been to capture a few of the pirates and lean on them for information. The more they knew about the pirates’ organization, tactics and logistics, the easier it would be to take them down. But if the pirates were dying rather than surrendering, that could be a problem.

Steig’s voice crackled over the radio, ordering their team to secure the mid-decks while his men cleared the topside. Aiden was just spinning into a tiny bathroom and clearing the empty shower when a shout went up outside. He poked his head out cautiously.

The chief engineer was grinning. “They just bugged out. Pirate vessel’s retreating at a high rate of speed.”

“Tell Steig I got the tracker set on that boat. We don’t have to follow right away. Let them get out of visual range.”

Roving teams of crewmen started clearing the yacht room by room. There was no way they were allowing a single pirate to stow away aboard the Nymph and sabotage it later. The six bodies of the dead pirates would be given a funeral at sea later, when the ship was fully secured.

The crew debriefing after the attack would be very interesting, indeed. Who in the hell had those men been, and who had trained and armed them? He’d lay odds they were no ordinary pirates. Or worse, they were a sign of times to come when pirates got a substantial upgrade in gear and training.

Aiden hurried toward Sunny’s cabin to give her the all clear. She must be scared out of her mind. He reached her door and knocked on it gently. “Sunny? It’s Aiden. You can come out now. We’re safe and the pirates are gone.”

Nothing. He waited for a few seconds and knocked a little louder. Still nothing. Panic blossomed in his gut along with a sick certainty that she hadn’t obeyed his order to come down here and lock herself in.

He checked the door handle. Unlocked. Swearing forcefully, he barged into her room. Empty. He was going to kill her when he found her. Assuming the pirates hadn’t found her first and—

Oh, God. Snatched her.

He raced out of the cabin, shouting for Steig. He tore onto the bridge, panting. Thankfully, every hand that reached for a sidearm recognized him in time not to blow his head off. “Sunny’s not in her cabin,” he announced. “Has anyone seen her?”

“I assumed she was with Gemma in the panic room,” Steig answered grimly. “When was the last time you saw her?”

“In the salon.”

One of the sailors piped up. “We found a pirate in the salon. Dead from a head wound. Looked like blunt trauma.”

Christ. His worst nightmare come true. A civilian, a woman he was responsible for, hell, a woman he was interested in and attracted to, made a victim because she’d been too close to him. This was exactly why he never got close to other people! Guys in the superhero business couldn’t afford any personal attachments.

Had the pirates seized her to use as a hostage? To ensure a safe getaway? What would they do to her after they were clear of the Nymph? With every new question, his gut twisted a little tighter. This was his fault. He’d gone back to his old ways, been wining and dining the hot chick instead of doing his job and watching out for pirates. When would he learn? Women and work—at least his work—did not mix. Ever.

Sick with worry, he listened as Steig gave terse orders over the ship’s public address system. All hands were to stop what they were doing and search for Sunny.

“How come we didn’t find her when we were hunting for pirate stowaways?” Aiden demanded.

“We’re not finished clearing the ship yet,” Steig replied. “Maybe she’ll still turn up.” But the Swede didn’t sound convinced.

“What’s left to be searched?” Aiden demanded.

“The upper decks.”

“I’m on it. Starting in the salon. I’ll see if I can find some hint there of what happened to her.”

He barreled into the same room where they’d been having a romantic dinner only an hour ago. It was impossible to miss the pool of blood, broken glass and the overwhelming smell of lemon vodka. Clearly, there’d been a fight by the bar. She’d put up a hell of a struggle if the damage was any indication. He spied bullet holes in the ceiling and his heart dropped to his feet. But then he registered that it looked like an uninterrupted trail of holes, as if the fusillade of bullets hadn’t hit anyone in its track across the room.

He worked his way outward from the bar, methodically searching for clues. It was nearly impossible to go slowly, to be thorough. But he dared not miss anything important in his panic. He’d almost finished searching the room when he got to the banquet-style sofa under one of the big windows. He lifted it and leaped back with a shout of surprise. The lid banged shut on whoever was hiding inside.

He grabbed for the pistol at his hip, yanking it clear just as the sofa seat raised up again.

“Jeez, Aiden, did you have to slam the seat down on me like that? You almost broke my nose.”

He jerked his weapon up and away from Sunny and holstered it, sagging in relief. “You scared the living hell out of me, woman.”

“Are the pirates gone?”

“Yes. The ship’s being cleared as we speak. What happened in here?” He glanced over at the stains by the bar.

“I, umm, clobbered a pirate.”

“You killed him.”

“Really? I just hit him as hard as I could.”

“With what?”

“A bottle. Vodka, I think.”

“Effective.” He might be speaking calmly, but his heart was pounding a mile a minute. His legs shockingly shaky, he walked to the intercom and pressed the button. “I found Sunny, Steig. She was hiding in the salon. She’s all right.”

A tinny “thank God” came back over the speaker.

He turned back to her. “Would you care to explain why you didn’t do as I told you and go to your cabin?”

“I tried to. Really. But a pirate was in the hall and then someone shot him and I backed in here. Then I heard someone coming and hid behind the bar and he had bad boots and I knew he was a pirate and I hit him with my bottle and I didn’t know what to do and …”

He pressed his fingers gently over her mouth to stop her babbling, which was becoming more hysterical by the second. “It’s over. You’re safe. The pirates are gone.”

And that was all it took. For the third time that day, she sobbed in his arms. They were starting to make a habit of this. At least this time he wasn’t wearing a shirt for her to ruin with her running makeup. He had to admit it wasn’t all bad having a soft, sexy, sweet-smelling female nestled in his arms as if he was a conquering hero who could defend her from the entire world.

“I was so scared,” she whispered. “And I was so worried about you—” She broke off and took a step back to glare up at him. “What in the world were you doing, jumping overboard like that? You could’ve been killed!” She smacked him across the upper arm with enough force to sting.

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