The Dark-Hunters (403 page)

For that matter, he knew what he was doing.

Geary paused at the first dive station to let her body adjust to the pressure and depth. “How’s everyone doing?”

Scott grinned. “Great, boss lady.”

Kat nodded. She looked at Arik.

He inclined his head to her. “Fine.”

But something belied that. It was an instinct she had, and she didn’t know why. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah. I’m just having a vision of what would happen if someone were to jerk one of our helmets off at two hundred feet down.”

Geary screwed her face up in distaste.

“Ew,” Kat snapped.

Geary concurred. That was the kind of thing that no one wanted to think about.

Scott cleared his throat. “Is it too late for me to go back? I’m not sure I want to be down here with Freddy Krueger having these kinds of visions. What’s to keep him from having an experiment?”

Geary shook her head. “Arik was just kidding. Weren’t you?”

“Absolutely. But—”

“No buts,” the three of them said in unison.

Geary patted Arik on the shoulder. “Let’s just think happy thoughts, shall we?”

“You know,” Tory’s voice filled their heads from the link. “Now that Arik mentioned it. At two hundred feet, given the pressure on the human body—”

“Tory!” Geary snapped. “Please don’t give me odds or stats right now, ’kay?”

“You’re such a spoilsport.”

Ignoring the pout in Tory’s tone, Geary started down to the next station. She’d factored in four stops to help them adjust. But honestly, she wanted to be able to dive straight to the site.

If only.

It took them a little bit of time to get to the area and then to stake it out. They had to be careful to anchor the grid but not accidentally damage something that might be hiding under the silt and sediment.

Geary’s father had drilled into her head that much of the historical Troy had been lost because of Heinrich Schliemann’s fervor to find proof of it. He’d damaged as much as he’d salvaged.

She didn’t want to make the same mistake.

Once the datum was set and photographed, they regrouped.

“How’s everyone doing?” she asked them.

They each gave her a thumbs-up.

“Everyone’s air supply is steady?” she double-checked.

Scott nodded. “Doing great, boss.”

“I’m good,” Kat chimed in.

Arik grinned at Geary. “Let’s dig.”

Something hot pierced her at his eagerness. He really did seem to mirror her enthusiasm. Geary headed for the first section she wanted to explore. They carefully suctioned the area until they could find what appeared to be an encrusted wall.

Her hand actually shook as she touched it. She just wished she weren’t wearing gloves, so that she could have the tactile sense of it. “This isn’t a natural object,” she said, looking at Scott for verification.

“No. It’s too precise.”

Geary took a picture of it while Scott scraped a sample of the sediment.

“I see you.…”

She froze at the sound of the low, seductive female voice in her head.

“You’re so close, little rose. Playing with the wall. But that’s not what you want, now is it?”

Geary looked at the others, but they didn’t appear to hear the voice.
Who are you?
she asked in her head.

“I am what you seek, Megeara. I am Atlantis. Move closer to me, child. Three feet over. Dig down below the silt. There’s a box waiting for you.…”

It was crazy to even entertain the idea of obeying the voice. What could it know?

And even as she told herself to ignore it, she found herself doing what the woman had said.

“Geary?”

She ignored Kat’s voice as she dug into the silt. It swirled around her in a hazy blur. As she dug deeper, she found nothing.

I am insane.

“Geary!” Tory’s voice was sharp through the intercom. “Stop moving.”

She froze.

“Move the camera half an inch right.”

Geary did as ordered. “Why?”

Before Tory could answer, Geary saw what her cousin had seen on the feed. It was the corner of something that appeared to be a box.

No …

Geary held her breath as she gently pulled it free. It was encrusted with funky deposits from the sea. But that wasn’t what fascinated her.

The box was ancient, with a clear design of lions pulling a chariot where a tall god holding a staff stood, directing them. It, like her necklace, held that strange indecipherable writing.

Her hands shaking, she carefully pried the lid off to see what the box contained.

“What is it?” Tory asked, her voice filled with anticipation. “I can’t see it, Geary. What’s inside?”

Geary let out her breath in frustration as she realized the box was empty. “Nothing, Tory. But the box is old.”

She handed it off to Scott so that he could preserve it for examination topside later.

Hoping to find something even better, Geary had bent down to continue her search when she heard what sounded like Tory dropping something. There were muffled voices in the background like someone was arguing, but Geary couldn’t tell what was going on.

“You okay, bud?”

There was no answer.

“Tory? Christof?”

Two seconds later, something popped loud in her ears. It was followed by nothing but empty static.

CHAPTER 12

There was no worse feeling for Geary than to think that someone she loved was in danger and to not be able to get to them. Geary was hysterical as she forgot about her quest and swam as quickly as possible through the dark water.

“Geary!”

She ignored Kat’s call. The only thing that mattered was getting topside to see what was going on.

Suddenly Arik was there, pulling Geary back. “You’ve got to calm down. You’re breathing too rapidly.”

She shook her head at him. “That sounded like an explosion. I have to get up there.”

“All we heard was a pop.” His tone was level and calm as those blue eyes haunted her. “It could have been anything. All we know is the intercom is malfunctioning. You don’t want to die over that, do you?”

He was right and she hated him for it. Nodding, she pressed her hand against her helmet to listen more carefully. “Tory? Are you there? What’s happening?”

There was still no answer.

“Tory? Christof? Justina? Thia? Dammit. Someone answer me … please.”

Arik held his breath, wishing he could ease her mind. But as the silence stretched on, he knew what she did. Something had to have—

His thoughts stopped as a piece of twisted metal shot past him on the right. It was followed by more pieces that rained down around them through the water.

And it was obvious what the metal was.

“Uh, folks,” Scott said, his voice shaking. “I think that’s our boat trying to kill us.”

Yeah. Arik had a bad feeling the kid might be right. Shit.

Arik looked at Kat and could tell she had no more information than he did.

He closed his eyes and summoned his brother with his mind. “
Solin
…”

There was no answer from that end, either, which boded even more ominously than their exploded boat.

Arik let go of Megeara. “All right, let’s head up. Safely.”

“Okay.” But he could hear the panic and fear in Megeara’s voice.

He hesitated as Megeara and Scott went first so that he could swim beside Kat. “Any clue?”

She shook her head glumly. “You know if the boat’s gone, so’s our air supply.”

He’d thought of that himself. So far their air was holding. Which was another reason they needed to get up immediately. They didn’t have much reserve, and since he was human, he could die here, which was the last thing he wanted. Kat was the only one of them who didn’t have that fear. Lucky bitch.

As they swam for the first decompression station, Arik tried his best to reach Solin repeatedly while Megeara continued to call through her intercom for the others.

And repeatedly there was nothing from above, except for a few pieces of metal that continued to float by as they headed for the floor of the sea. Yeah, nothing like watching your life pass you by, knowing you were even more sunk than it was if you didn’t get to air soon.

They reached the first tank, which held two breathing hoses. The women went first, then he and Scott. They traded the lines back and forth as they waited for their bodies to adjust to the new depth before they swam any higher.

But each of them was rattled by what could have happened to the boat and the others.

“Arikos…”

He hesitated as he finally heard Solin’s voice in his head.
“What’s going on?”

“The boat was blown up.”

“No shit. We rather got that, as parts of it almost crushed us in the water. What happened and why didn’t you stop it?”

“Yeah, right. Stop it, my ass. I’m not messing with this one.”

Arik cursed at Solin’s selfishness.
“Dammit, Solin. There’s not enough air in the line for us. We might not make it back.”

“Is that supposed to mean something to me? You’re all going to die anyway, right? What’s the point? I still have to live here after you’re all gone.”

If Arik could lay hands on Solin, he’d kill him.

“This isn’t a game, Solin.”

“No, it isn’t. And you’re on your own. Good luck.”

Arik ground his teeth as he took the hose from Megeara so that he could take a turn breathing.
“You better pray I don’t make it up there to you.”

“Praying’s for amateurs and you got much bigger problems than me.”

Arik felt Solin drifting away from his thoughts. Megeara took the hose and breathed deeply before she swam upward again. Arik and the others followed her.

They were halfway to the second station when more debris started falling through the water. What the hell? Had another boat blown up?

Arik swam up to Megeara as she started moving even faster.

“Megeara. Stop. We have to breathe slowly. You know that. Stay calm and focused.”

Geary wanted to shove him away from her, but she knew he was right. She couldn’t afford to fight him in the water. Right now, they had reserve air at the stations. They could stay there until their bodies readjusted. Then they could hold their breath and move to the next. But this was taking too long for her tastes.

She had to know what was going on. What had happened to the others.

Her heart heavy, she looked at Scott, who had tears in his eyes. “We’ll be okay, Scott.”

The doubt he held burned through her. “Yeah, right.”

“No more talking,” Kat snapped at them. “We have to preserve what air we got.”

Arik took Geary’s hand and squeezed it before he urged her up through the water. Geary obeyed, but as she swam, a thousand thoughts went through her mind. Her brother had died over a malfunction in his tank.

She’d always wondered what had gone through Jason’s mind in those last few minutes as he realized his life was about to end. She had to say it sucked. Memories and unfulfilled dreams poured through her with a burning intensity.

She didn’t want to die. She was young and though she hadn’t dated much, she still held on to the dream that one day she’d meet a great guy and have kids. That she would grow old with someone who treasured her as much as she treasured him. Was that too much to ask?

There was so much she wanted to do. And now she might never even see daylight again. It wasn’t fair—to come so close to her goal and die before she could finish her quest.

But the worst thought was that Tory and Thia might be dead. Justina, Teddy, Christof, and all the others …

And it would be her fault.
All
her fault. God, how had her father lived with the guilt? No wonder he’d become an alcoholic. In that moment, she had an understanding of him that she’d never had before. She’d spent so much time blaming him that she hadn’t even considered the blame he’d reserved for himself. The gnawing pain of knowing he’d endangered his family and the memory of them dying because of his actions.

I am so sorry, Dad.

If she got out of this and if the others were okay, it was over. She would never jeopardize other people again. This was just a stupid dream that wasn’t worth another drop of blood. Another life. Atlantis didn’t want to be found.

She was through.

Suddenly Geary realized that the water was getting lighter. Looking up, she could see the sunlight refracting in the waves over her head.

Not much farther … Her joy was tempered by the fear of what she would find there waiting for her. Of what had happened to the rest of their crew. Horrific images haunted her. Thoughts of Tory and Thia lying facedown in the water. Or disfigured … of them calling out to her for help …

Please, please, please be okay.

Her throat was getting tighter as she neared the top. The pain of having no air in her lungs was oppressive and painful. Her lungs burned like fire as even more panic tore through her. How tragic to die this close to their destination. Just a few feet more and she’d reach the surface.

She began unfastening her helmet as she kicked up. Her limbs felt so heavy. Her heart was pounding from the strain. She wanted to take a breath so badly but knew that she couldn’t.

Please.…

By the time she reached the top, she had the helmet off. Geary tossed it aside as she finally gulped air. She was shaking and cold as water rushed into her suit. But it was so good to be breathing freely again that she didn’t even care.

She turned a circle in the water trying to get her bearings. The first thing she saw was the smoldering remains of their boat—not that there was much of it left.

Hysterical, she started swimming for it, only to have someone pull at her. She turned to find Arik there.

“They’re dead,” she sobbed, pulling away from him. “I have to go find them.”

“They’re not dead.”

Anger tore through her and as she opened her mouth to tell him not to patronize her, he pointed in the opposite direction of the boat.

She looked to find the small life raft that held Tory, Justina, Solin, Althea, Kat, Thia, Christof, and Brian. Relief tore through her with such ferocity that she sank back under the waves.