The dampness against her forearms reminded her she’d forgotten to change. With a sigh, Dar pushed off the counter and walked over to where their bags were still resting on the table. She unbuttoned her shirt and removed it, draping it over the chair, then pulled off her sports bra, wincing at its clammy dampness. Dry clothes felt good against her skin, and she felt a lot warmer as she crossed back over to the galley and poured the boiling water over the herbal tea ball she’d placed in Kerry’s cup. Steam rose, carrying with it the scent of blackberries. Taking a small jar of honey from the refrigerator, she drizzled some into the cup and carefully stirred it.
When she was satisfied that it was perfect, she picked up the Tylenol, tucked a water bottle under her arm, and secured the teacup. With a glance around the cabin, she headed back for the bedroom, entering the door and sweeping her eyes over the bed with badly hidden anxiety.
Kerry was right where she’d left her, curled on her side with her arm wrapped around her pillow. Her eyes were half open, watching the door, and they widened as Dar entered.
“Ah. There you are.”
170
Melissa Good
“Here I am,” Dar agreed, setting her burden down on the bedside table. “How are you feeling?”
“Feeling like I want my Dar.” Kerry reached out and fingered the soft cotton of Dar’s shorts.
Dar sat down on the edge of the bed and put her hand on Kerry’s forehead. It was warm to the touch, and her color was still definitely off. “Sit up a minute and swallow these.” She helped Kerry sit and handed her the pills, then uncapped the water bottle and held it while Kerry suckled a mouthful, then swallowed.
“Thanks.” Kerry leaned against her. “Jesus, I feel like hot boiled trash.”
“Hm.” Dar put her arm around her. “I bet.”
Kerry shivered. “That was really scary.”
“Oh yeah.” Dar picked up the cup of tea and offered it to her. “I was scared.”
Kerry cradled the cup in her hands, savoring its warmth. She took a sip of the sweet, hot tea and sighed. “I know,” she said. “I think that scared me the most.”
Dar eased off the bed and knelt in front of the dresser, opening the lower drawer and rummaging in it. She found the small case she’d tucked inside when they’d boarded in Miami and picked it up, bringing it with her as she resettled herself on the edge of the bed.
“What’s that?” Kerry watched her curiously. Her eyes followed the zipper as Dar unzipped it, then the eyebrows over them lifted sharply as she saw the blood pressure cuff inside. “Where in the hell did that come from?”
“Dr. Steve,” Dar replied quietly. “Gimme your arm.”
“Dar.”
Ignoring the mild protest, Dar fastened the cuff around her lover’s toned arm and started pumping it.
Kerry sighed. “Do you actually know how to use that?”
“I can manually reprogram the flash bios of an IBM mainframe; I think I can figure it out,” Dar replied, watching the small gauge on the gadget.
Kerry exhaled unhappily and her shoulders drooped.
Dar glanced up and caught the expression. “He made me bring it,” she explained gently. “I wasn’t gonna use it, but since I had to give you a damn bucket of stimulant…”
Kerry peeked at the gauge. “Hmph.” She tapped it with her other hand. “Damn.”
One sixty. Not good.
Dar released some of the pressure and checked again.
Over one hundred.
She unfastened the cuff from Kerry’s arm and rubbed it in attempted comfort. “Probably from the stimulant, sweetheart,” she offered. “Why don’t you lie down?”
Still visibly unhappy, Kerry meekly complied.
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171
Dar tossed the device onto the dresser and stretched out next to her partner, gently combing Kerry’s disheveled hair with her fingers.
“Bah,” Kerry muttered.
Dar gave her a sympathetic grin. “I bet when I check it later, it’ll be fine.”
Kerry eyed her dourly and then held out a hand. “Gimme that.”
She pointed to the cuff.
Dar reached over and snagged it, then handed it over, surprised when Kerry wrapped it around her arm and started pumping. “Um…”
“Ah ah.” Kerry continued her task. “Fair’s fair, Dar. I thought your heart was going to come out of your chest earlier.” She finished pumping and observed the results. “Hah.” She gave Dar a look. “Higher than mine, darling. Park your head on the pillow.”
Dar blinked in real surprise, looking down at her arm, then she gave Kerry a sheepish grin and wriggled into a more comfortable position next to her partner. “I was stressed,” she commented. “You matter to me.”
Kerry tossed the cuff into the corner and wrapped her arm around Dar as she put her head down on her shoulder. “I guess we’re letting DeSalliers go, huh?” she murmured. “Are we in this over our heads, Dar?”
Dar had her eyes closed, and she welcomed the easing of the headache throbbing across the back of her skull. She considered Kerry’s question for a few minutes. “I don’t know. Maybe.” Her body shifted a little and she pulled Kerry closer. “Let’s take it easy for a while, then head back to St. Johns.” She rubbed Kerry’s back.
“I’d like them to check you out, just in case.”
A green eyeball rotated up and fixed on her in faint accusation.
“I know, I know.” Dar sighed. “I’d be kicking and screaming at the mere suggestion.”
Kerry snorted softly. “Yes, you certainly would be.”
“Humor me,” the dark-haired woman requested. “Please?”
Having made her point, Kerry grunted. “Okay.” She closed her eyes again.
Dar put her arms around Kerry and hugged her. “Atta girl,”
she said, then paused as she heard the sound of a motor approaching. She exchanged a quick glance with Kerry. “Let me go see what that is.”
Kerry hitched herself up on an elbow and watched as Dar got up and left. She considered following her, but her body protested, unwilling to move. Instead she fluffed the pillow up behind her and settled back, tucking her feet up and picking up her teacup, inhaling the fragrant steam.
172
Melissa Good
DAR THREADED HER way through the cabin and went to the door, opening it and looking outside. A medium-sized fishing boat was approaching them, with two men on the flying bridge and several others standing in the stern. For a moment, she stared at them, and then comprehension dawned.
Pirates
?
Dar didn’t see any real fishing gear on the boat, and the men were clustering together, watching her. Her heart rate started to increase, and for a single brief moment she wished she and Kerry were back in the office dealing with a multiple-layered, international cluster fuck. With a soft oath, she pulled her head back inside and bolted for the bench seat, yanking it open and pulling out the case. “Ker!” she yelled. “Keep your damn head down!”
She opened the case and removed the shotgun, loading it hastily as she heard the engines outside throttle down. With a savage motion, she chambered a round, then jumped to the door and threw it open.
Two men were about to jump on board from the fishing boat’s bow. Dar braced herself and threw the gun up to her shoulder, sighting along the barrel as her finger curled around the trigger.
“Hold it!” she barked loudly.
The men in the stern had guns. She could see them from the corner of her eye. But her immediate problem was the men on the bow.
“All right, lady! Take it easy! Nobody gets hurt!” the man closest yelled at her. “You got one gun, we got ten. Now put that down, okay?”
“Fuck you,” Dar snarled back. “Touch the boat and I’ll blow your damn cock off!”
The man lifted his rifle casually. “I’m telling you, lady, put it down!”
Dar didn’t budge. She tightened her finger on the trigger, feeling the cold metal warm to her touch. “Back off!” she yelled at the man. “Get your asses out of here, you pieces of pirate shit!” A hand touched her back and she almost jumped through the bulkhead. “Grrrr!”
“I’m calling the Coast Guard,” Kerry told her in a low voice.
“Tell them that.”
“G’wan, jump! She won’t shoot you! All talk!” the man on the stern yelled. “Hurry!”
Dar felt her heart lurch as the man on the bow prepared to leap.
She trained the barrel of the shotgun on him and swallowed hard, not sure she was either willing or able to pull the trigger.
“Dar.” Kerry’s voice was tense.
I have to protect her
. Dar’s inner voice spoke quietly. “Stay back,” she called over her shoulder, and then faced forward. The
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173
man tossed a rope over to the deck and climbed up onto the railing.
Dar steeled herself, and pulled the trigger. The gun bucked powerfully, jerking against her shoulder. Yells erupted. Then she pulled it again. Splinters of white erupted all over the water as both shots blew through the hull of the pirate’s boat near the waterline.
She pumped the shotgun and loaded two more shells into the chamber.
“Crazy bitch!”
“Shoot her ass!”
“Look out!”
“Get the fuck back! Get back! Holy shit!”
“Next one’s gonna put chum in the water,” Dar bellowed,
“instead of fucking fiberglass!” She swung the shotgun toward the stern, since the two men on the bow had dived into the water for cover. One of the men facing her brought his gun up and sighted down it, and their eyes met across their gun sights.
And in that moment, with her life on the line, Dar felt her fear drop away as the predator inside her woke. Her eyes narrowed and a smile etched itself across her face, and she knew way down deep that she not only could pull that trigger…she would. Her finger tightened on the trigger.
“Get the fuck outta here, man! We’re fucking sinking!” One of the men from the bow had climbed over into the stern and grabbed the wheel.
“Coast Guard, Coast Guard, mayday, mayday.” Kerry’s voice came from behind her. “This is
Dixieland Yankee
, a US registered vessel being attacked just north of AVI B21.”
“Fuck! They’re calling the Coast Guard! Get moving!” The man pointing the gun at Dar dropped his muzzle and ducked behind the cabin. “Move! Move!”
The fishing boat wallowed in the water, then its engines cut in and the bow turned away from them. They gunned the motor and the bow lifted, two holes now visible against its white curve. As they left, one of the men on the stern lifted his rifle to his shoulder and pointed it at them.
“Shit.” Dar jerked back through the doorway, trying to get the door closed.
One of the man’s companions knocked the muzzle up, then cuffed the man in the back of the head. The gun carrier angrily smacked his crewmate with the butt of the rifle. They struggled, shoving each other as the boat retreated, curving widely toward the southern shore of the island just north of Charlie’s.
“We better get out of here,” Dar uttered tensely. “In case they come back.” She turned to find Kerry watching her with a pale face and widened eyes. “You okay?”
Kerry set down the microphone, leaned against the cabin wall, 174
Melissa Good
and exhaled. “Yeah.” Her voice held a rough note. “But heading back to some place where I can just…” she took a breath, “take a nap would be very cool.”
Dar guided her over to the couch and sat her down, then put away the shotgun. “Curl up here, sweetheart. I’m pulling up the anchor and we’ll dock over by Charlie and Bud’s,” she said. “Bud’s a medic.”
“Bet his bedside manner’s a peach,” Kerry muttered as she lay down on the couch. She watched Dar’s face as she closed the shotgun case, seeing the tension etched across it and the restless shift of her jaw muscles. “Hey, Dar?”
“Yeah?” Dar didn’t look up.
Kerry reached out to stroke Dar’s leg. “That was really impressive,” she said.
Dar’s hands paused in their work. The dark head turned and their eyes met. Dar closed the bench seat and sat down next to Kerry, resting her forearms on her knees. “Was it?” she answered softly. “It just sounded like a bunch of pompous yelling to me.”
Kerry smiled. “It worked,” she said. “That was a great idea to put a hole in their boat.”
Dar gazed at the floor between her bare feet. Her mind drifted back to the feeling she’d had when the gun had centered on the man on the bow. There had been no fear, no confusion in her. She’d centered the sights on his chest. Why hadn’t she pulled the trigger?
What had sent the muzzle lower, to target the boat instead?
“Dar?”
Dar lifted her head and turned. “Yeah? Um...thanks.” She managed a smile. “I’m not sure it was all planned, but I’m glad I ended up doing the right thing.” She pushed herself to her feet.
“Call me if you need anything, okay?” She ruffled Kerry’s hair, then walked to the door and eased through it.
Kerry felt her brow furrow. Her instincts told her something in Dar’s voice…in her manner...just wasn’t right. She heard the engines start up, followed by the clank of the anchor retracting, felt the motion as the boat headed toward the island. Later, they’d have time to talk. Kerry put her head down on the arm of the couch and let her eyes drift shut. Then she’d figure it out.
DAR WAS IN turmoil. The rain had stopped, and a weak splash of sunlight dusted her forearms where they rested on the control console of the boat. Things were just happening too fast, she decided. She was in a place where she was purely reacting instead of driving what was going on, and she wasn’t used to that.
“So I react like a freaking nutcase. Nice.” She stared glumly at the controls. “What the hell was that? A gun? Shooting people?
What the hell is going on with you, Roberts?” Shaking her head, she turned the wheel a little, arcing the boat toward the end of the island. “I think I’m losing it.”
“Honey?”
Dar jumped in startlement, and then picked up the microphone.
“Right here. Everything okay?”
“Well...” Kerry’s voice crackled through the intercom, “you’ve got the mic keyed open, and it’s kind of tough for me to listen to you yelling at yourself when I’m not there to kiss you and make it better.”
“Oh.” Dar felt herself blushing. “Sorry,” she muttered. “I’m just a little rattled, I guess.” Her eyes lifted to the horizon and adjusted their course again. “Be glad to be in port.”