In Too Deep (9 page)

His friend was no fool. Hands drifting upward in the “I surrender” sign, he backed away. “Sorry, Firecracker, no can do.”

She let out a disgruntled huff. “This is stupid. I can walk.”

“I’m sure you can, but I’m not idiot enough to get in Knox’s path when he’s made up his mind to be chivalrous. I suggest you stop fighting and let him take care of you. It’ll be faster that way.”

* * *

A
VERY
FUMED
THE
entire way back to the launch and then to the
Amphitrite
, which was anchored several hundred yards out from the island. Her mood was not improved when, after depositing her onto the seat at the back of the boat, Knox pretty much ignored her as he spoke with Asher.

The man wasn’t dumb. He knew he’d irritated her with that stunt as they’d left the island and was probably trying to give her space to cool off.

Fat chance.

Although, if she was honest, Avery would admit his high-handed tactics weren’t all that was stirring her emotions. She was frustrated that they’d been interrupted and apprehensive about returning to the ship.

What was it that Knox had said on the island? Something about returning to reality.

Her reality wasn’t precisely great. The pressure of McNair was back now that she’d survived being marooned. And the thought of damaging Knox and his business weighed even heavier than it had before.

Avery felt torn and restless. Achy and upset.

Things didn’t get any better when they returned to the ship—Knox walked off with Asher to speak to the captain.

It was what she’d needed, some space. So why did it bother her so much? Why did she suddenly feel dismissed and used?

She shouldn’t, considering she was the only one who’d had an orgasm, but that didn’t stop the emotions.

Shaking her head, Avery went to her cabin to wash off the dirt, sweat and sand that felt as if it had been imprinted straight on to her skin. Somewhere between shampooing her hair and pouring body wash onto her loofah, she came to a decision.

Knox might be irritating, but she was going to take her cues from him. She needed to get her head back in the game and off the man’s unbelievable abs.

Pulling on clean clothes from the tiny closet, she dried her hair, smoothed it back into a slick tail and fought hard to find the equilibrium Knox had driven away with his wicked tongue.

There was something soothing about the familiarity of the rolling deck beneath her feet when she emerged a little later.

The ship chugged steadily to the northeast, heading back to the dive site. They’d lost time, but that couldn’t be helped.

A deep voice startled her. “There she is.” Her heart kicked against her ribs before settling back down when she realized it wasn’t Knox who’d walked up, but Asher.

“Feel better, Firecracker?” Asher asked, stopping next to her.

“What’s with the nicknames? Can’t remember my name?”

Asher chuckled and winked, and she relaxed for the first time since they’d discovered that box floating in the middle of the Caribbean.

Why couldn’t she react this way with Knox? When Asher flirted and teased it seemed easy. Probably because she knew he didn’t really mean it. Something told her his banter was instinctive.

On the other hand, Knox didn’t even have to say anything to have every muscle in her body tightening with anticipation and a need she didn’t want.

“I know your name just fine, doc.”

Avery sighed. “I think I prefer Firecracker.”

His mouth curled up into a brilliant smile, the corners of his eyes crinkling with humor.

Taking her by the arm, Asher led her back to the stern. They both leaned against the railing there.

The engines churned, kicking up a foamy wake. At any other time, the view would have been brilliantly beautiful, a hot sun sinking into the sea, spilling pink, purple and orange across the sky and water.

Asher put one arm against the railing, getting nearer to her than was comfortable.

“What are you doing?”

“Conducting a little experiment. Why don’t you help me by scooting closer?”

“And why would I do that?”

He shrugged. “Because you’re a scholar searching for the truth.”

Something told her Asher was up to no good and that the last thing she should do was help him. But she felt compelled to do what he’d asked anyway.

Reaching out, Asher snagged the end of her ponytail dripping over one shoulder. “You wanna tell me what happened on that island, Firecracker?”

“Why don’t you get your hands off of her, Ash?”

This time the rough voice behind had her jumping and jerking away. Guilt rushed her. She was fairly certain it was written all over her face. Which just irritated her, because she had nothing to feel guilty about.

Asher leaned close, whispering, “Interesting,” so that only she could hear.

She wanted to ask him just what he meant, but didn’t have the chance. Knox wrapped a hand around her upper arm and urged her beneath the shelter of his arm. Her shoulder collided with his chest. Her hand landed on the soft curve of a well-defined pec.

And she had to fight against the urge to sigh and melt into him. It would be so easy to just...stay. To let Knox take the weight of not only her body but the pressure of everything she’d been dealing with the past few days.

But that wasn’t her. And it wasn’t fair to him.

Planting both palms on his chest, Avery pushed back. “Knox, let me go.”

He did, taking a deliberate step back. Her body swayed forward, instinctively moving to close that gap again.

Nope, wasn’t going to happen.

She turned, intent on pulling Asher back into the conversation, shamelessly using him as a buffer, but he was already gone.

9

K
NOX
HAD
NO
idea why he’d grabbed her close. It hadn’t been a conscious decision, but an impulse.

He’d looked out across the deck to find Asher cozied up to Avery, his head bent in her direction as they’d quietly talked, and something inside him had just...snapped. Again.

“So what’s the plan?”

Knox stared at Avery for several seconds before her question actually sank in.

“For the dive on the wreck? We’re heading back to the site right now. It should probably take us about three hours to arrive. Luckily we’d almost completed the sonar scan of the site before we were interrupted.”

Avery’s single raised eyebrow called into question his choice of words, but Knox chose to ignore her.

“The information we transmitted back to the
Amphitrite
has already been analyzed. We got enough data to verify the wreckage hasn’t shifted any more since Jackson was last down. I’m hoping to be diving on the site by tomorrow, late afternoon.”

Turning, Avery draped her arms over the railing and stared out across the empty water.

“Where exactly are we?”

Knox found himself standing beside her, mirroring her relaxed pose although he was anything but.

This close to her, that spicy-sweet scent of hers filled his lungs. It was stronger today, and made him want to lean the slightest bit closer so he could bury his nose in the soft cloud of her hair. Although first he’d have to pull it out of that damn tail. After seeing her hair down on the island, he didn’t like how she bundled it up, always trying to confine it.

He liked the silky texture, the way it swayed around her shoulders, curling against the curves of her breasts.

“The island we were left on was off the eastern tip of Cuba, between Turks and Caicos, and the Bahamas.”

“Why the heck did they take us that far?”

“I have no idea.”

At the time he’d known the drug runners were moving them in the opposite direction of the nearest islands, but he hadn’t known precisely where they’d been until Asher had rescued them.

It was only one of the things that didn’t make sense about the events.

He knew most criminals would have shot them and dumped their bodies rather than going to the trouble of taking them to a deserted island. And while the interruption had definitely knocked their dive off schedule, dropping them that far away must have also affected the drug runners’ own plans.

It made him uneasy. His time in the SEALs had taught him that when the pieces didn’t add up there was usually a reason. He just had no idea what it was in this case.

And he didn’t have a whole lot of time, with pressing issues to worry about—like the fast-approaching deadline for Avery’s report.

Avery frowned, leaning farther out over the water. She went up on her toes, her thighs and calves flexing beneath her creamy, smooth skin. He remembered having her legs spread wide for him...

“Did you contact the authorities?”

Shifting to hide the evidence of his arousal behind the railing, Knox tried to focus on the conversation.

“I called a couple contacts in the DEA.”

A shiver racked her shoulders. If he hadn’t been watching her he might have missed it. “I keep thinking about those guns pointed at us.”

He did too. “The entire situation could have been a lot worse.”

Avery closed her eyes and pulled in a harsh breath. “I need to put it out of my mind. Think about something else. I tried to look at the research Jackson and Loralei provided, but I couldn’t concentrate.”

If he knew Avery—and he was beginning to believe he might—she’d already gone over the information multiple times.

“You’ve read their notes. You’ve listened to them both. Explain to me how you can doubt that the wreckage is the
Chimera
.”

Avery’s shoulders stiffened. Gone was the woman who’d finally begun to relax around him; the ice queen was firmly back in her place.

“Loralei and Jackson are very obviously convinced, but it’s my job to find physical evidence that will prove or disprove their findings. The wreckage wasn’t found in any of the suspected locations. That, paired with McNair’s information about another ship that supposedly went down in the area, casts doubt upon its authenticity.”

“After one hundred and fifty years of searching with no results, it really isn’t that surprising that the wreck was somewhere no one had previously considered, is it?”

She made a humming noise that could have been agreement, but the frown on her lips suggested that wasn’t how she really meant it.

Gripping her arms, Knox applied gentle pressure until she turned away from the water and faced him.

She was so small. It was something he shouldn’t have easily been able to forget, and yet, until he towered above her like this he did. Maybe it was the air of authority she wrapped around herself like armor. It hid so much, more than he’d initially realized.

“Explain it to me, Avery.” He kept his words soft and coaxing. “Make me understand.”

There was a huge part of him that wanted her to say something—anything—to dispel the unease that filled him whenever he thought about her reasons for being on the
Amphitrite
.

She stared up at him out of those ice-blue eyes, sharp enough to cut straight through a man. Knox was beginning to fear the damage she could do to him.

“I’m just trying to do my job. Please, let me.”

Her words were a plea that had his heart thumping uncomfortably inside his chest.

And when she pulled away from him, he let her go. Because chasing her right now wouldn’t accomplish anything but leave him with more frustration and questions.

God, everything was
a jumbled mess. Instead of easing the tension between him and Avery, touching her, watching her come, had only jacked it higher.

But now there was an edge of desperation that he was intelligent enough to fear. He’d thought he could handle bringing her pleasure and walking away.

Apparently he’d been wrong. He wanted her now more than ever. Craved the taste of her on his tongue.

But that couldn’t happen, and the conversation he’d just had with her highlighted the reasons.

She was hiding something. He could sense it. While they’d been stranded it had been easy to push his concerns to the side and focus on survival.

But that was no longer the case.

Needing something to take the edge off, Knox grabbed a beer from the fridge in the galley. Asher walked in behind him, and it was obvious he wasn’t simply searching for a cold one.

Resigning himself to whatever shit was about to be flung in his direction, Knox popped the top off a bottle and offered it to his friend.

“So, do you want to tell me what happened on that island? The good doctor is being tight-lipped.”

“Nothing.”

Asher raised the bottle to his mouth, condensation sliding down the side as he leveled a stare at Knox. “Yeah, you can bullshit with the best of them. But don’t forget we’re practically family. And I know when you’re lying.”

Knox wasn’t the kind of guy to kiss and tell. Asher typically had no compunctions about sharing his sexual conquests over beer and burgers, but that just wasn’t Knox. Today, however, he felt the urge to unburden...mostly because he needed someone to talk him out of making things worse.

He was restless and itchy, the way he’d get right before a major mission. His skin felt tight, as if it was a size too small.

“We...had an interlude.”

Asher let out a laugh. “Seriously, man? Interlude?” He drew out the single word, making it sound idiotic.

“Shut it.”

Knox paced across the galley, pulling huge gulps of beer as he went. The alcohol wasn’t helping.

“Dammit! We didn’t even have sex. Not really.”

Asher snagged his arm, stopped him cold. He cut a hard glance at Knox, studying him for several moments.

Gone was the affable guy, replaced by the soldier who had covered Knox’s ass on multiple occasions. It wasn’t a side Asher showed the world often, at least not outside the pressures of combat.

“Please tell me you didn’t screw this entire thing for us by breaking your own rules. I told you to get close to her, but sleeping with her probably wasn’t smart.”

“We didn’t have sex...exactly,” Knox answered, his voice tight.

“Exactly?” Asher’s mouth twitched. “You losing your touch?”

“No! And she’d agree with me.”

Asher’s eyebrows rose. “Oh, that’s how it went, huh?”

Shit, he hadn’t meant to admit that much.

“When the hell are you leaving?” Knox asked. “Thanks for the rescue and all, but shouldn’t you be heading for the Great Barrier Reef about now?”

His friend laughed, the sound scraping against already raw nerves. “One of the guys is taking me to the mainland tomorrow so I can catch a flight to Australia.”

Knox seriously hoped the flight was long and uncomfortable.

“The real question,” Asher said, throwing him a pointed glance, “is what are you going to do?”

What could he do? They were on a deadline, with only a little over a week left for Avery to authenticate the wreck. Losing those two days had the potential to screw them royally. If they couldn’t provide the US courts with concrete proof by then, they were likely going to lose their permits and any chance of ever salvaging the
Chimera
.

That was his fault and something he’d have to live with. Not to mention bust his ass to make up for.

Avery had had a gun pointed at her head and they’d both lost days of work neither could afford.

Even counting all that, it was hardly the worst he’d ever messed up. No, that was reserved for the night his brother had died.

“Since you took the locating beacon from the boat, we can’t track it.” Asher mused.

“Hey, I made the best decision I could at the time.”

“Chill, man.” Asher held up both of his hands in surrender. “I’m not questioning your decisions—well, at least not that one. Just stating a fact. We can’t track the runners that way, or recover our equipment.”

He really didn’t have time to focus on catching the drug runners now, but he would eventually. It might take a while, but Knox was going to make damn sure those guys paid for threatening Avery and leaving them both stranded. He was a patient, patient man.

“They’ll make a mistake. Criminals always do.”

Though Knox had gotten the impression these weren’t your average criminals. In fact, the man in charge had been slick and confident, might even have a military background. It was definitely worth checking with some contacts.

In the meantime, he had bigger fish to fry.

As much as it pained him, they were going to have to call it in and let the proper authorities handle tracking down their boat. It wasn’t as though he ever expected to see the thing again. Losing the boat hurt, but not nearly as much as losing the expensive sonar equipment that had been on board.

Knox swore, then drowned the rest of the foul words he wanted to let loose with another huge swallow of beer.

“So, Romeo, did you at least uncover something interesting about the good doctor?”

Knox’s shoulders stiffened. Asher wanted intel. It was understandable. He’d been alone on a tropical island with Avery for over twenty-four hours. They’d been in a high-stress environment, which tended to bond people quickly. He’d seen it time and again with soldiers in the field.

Was that what was going on between them?

He didn’t think so. He’d been attracted to Avery Walsh long before that island. Being stranded had simply forced them both into a position where they couldn’t ignore the attraction anymore.

But it rubbed him the wrong way that Asher assumed he had ulterior motives for what he’d done with Avery. And he certainly didn’t want her to think that.

“She told me quite a lot,” he said slowly. She’d revealed pieces of herself, both by words and actions. Especially once alcohol had entered the equation. She’d shared deeply personal stories about her past, her sister. “Nothing relevant to our situation, though.”

Or he didn’t want the details she’d given him to be useful. His stomach turned at the thought of taking such a tragic incident, her sister’s struggle with addiction and subsequent OD, and using it to wiggle his way into the truth.

With anyone else, he wouldn’t have thought twice about the ethics involved. But with Avery...it was clear she didn’t let many people close. He wasn’t ready to twist the trust she’d placed in him for his own gain.

Not yet.

But he was afraid that’s what he would have to do eventually.

“It’s clear she’s hiding something,” Asher said.

Knox frowned. “Yes.”

Asher sent him a pointed look. He knew what his friend was going to say before he even opened his mouth, and there was a part of Knox that wanted to hate him for the suggestion.

He didn’t want to use sex to get the answers they needed.

But it bothered him that he cared so much about protecting her. She should have been nothing more than a means to an end. A quick way to get what Trident needed so they could all move forward with this salvage and make enough money to keep them going for years.

Luckily, they were interrupted by Ben, their captain, before Asher could make the suggestion he anticipated.

“There you two are. I’ve been looking for you everywhere. Thought you’d want to know. They’ve issued a hurricane watch for Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic and Haiti. Depending on the track of the storm, they expect to upgrade that to a warning within the next twelve hours.”

Brilliant. He was seriously starting to believe this dive was cursed. Maybe he could blame Jackson for removing the bracelet he’d recovered from the floor of the
Chimera
and given to Loralei.

“How is this storm going to impact us?”

“Well, it might not at all. It’s possible the system could shift.”

Knox didn’t like the deep grooves marked into Ben’s face.

“If it doesn’t...?”

“It looks to pass right over the
Chimera’s
location.”

“How long?”

“A few days, depending on the storm’s speed.”