Going Dark Read online

  Julien gave him that superior “carry my man purse, you peon” look Dean already hated. “We aren’t paying you to think, Mr. Warren.”

  “Captain,” Dean corrected.

  “Captain,” Julien repeated snidely. “We hired you to drive the boat, not ask questions.”

  Dean was about to tell him to go to hell, but a third man spoke behind him. For someone whose life often depended on his ability to detect someone sneaking up on him, it was disconcerting as hell. Four weeks of sitting on his ass watching the waterways for something that didn’t exist was catching up to him.

  “It’s camera equipment,” Jean Paul said with an admonishing look to Julien. “We are planning to make a short film to aid in our protest against the drillship.”

  “Is that right?” Dean said. He hadn’t thought much of their ringleader that first night in the bar—and his opinion hadn’t changed. Julien was a douche bag but harmless. This guy? Not harmless. He was pure thug. “Sounds interesting. I’ve done some filming myself,” Dean lied. “What kind of cameras do you use?”

  “Is something wrong here?”

  Dean turned at the sound of his boss. MacDonald was standing on the dock with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth and glaring at him something fierce. Old MacDonald had better be careful or he was going to burst a blood vessel.

  Unfortunately he wasn’t alone. Annie stood beside him, looking a little concerned but otherwise pretty damned incredible. Dean wasn’t happy to see her—he didn’t want her involved with these clowns—but he had to admit the view was stunning.

  She had incredible legs—of which he could see every endless inch in her very short cutoff denim shorts. Not that he was complaining. Short was good with legs like hers. Really good. Long, tanned, and toned worked for him.

  She wore a plaid shirt over a white tank top and had it tied at the waist. Her hair was loose around her shoulders, but she had on a pink Red Sox hat—that needed an explanation—and tan leather flip-flops with that little rainbow tag on them. Both the hat and the flip-flops were well-worn.

  She looked quintessentially American, as if she had just walked off a beach in Honolulu or San Diego, and something about that hit him. If he were inclined toward sentiment, he would say it was a longing for home.

  Shit.

  He turned away to look back at his boss. No getting sentimental there.

  “Nothing is going on,” Jean Paul replied smoothly. “The captain just had a question about our camera equipment.”

  MacDonald turned Dean’s question back on him. “Is that right?”

  Dean heard the challenge. He wasn’t supposed to be asking questions. MacDonald had told him to mind his own business.

  Dean was tempted to tell them all to go to hell and walk away. But something stopped him. Something that he didn’t want to examine right now. He needed the job, but he knew that wasn’t the only reason.

  “Aye,” he said, adapting MacDonald’s verbiage. “Jean Paul was just telling me all about the little movie they are planning to make.”

  Dean didn’t believe for two seconds that they just wanted to get close to the drillship to film something. Those boxes looked way too heavy and big for camera equipment. Ten to one they were planning to board the ship via the fancy inflatable they were bringing along and stage some kind of sit-in like those nutjobs from Greenpeace.

  His gaze met Annie’s, and he let her know that he didn’t buy any of it. But it wasn’t his business—nor could he make it his business. If she wanted to get herself thrown in jail, he wasn’t going to stop her. She could take care of herself—she’d made that clear, hadn’t she?

  He was just the taxi. He and the boat would be long gone before any police showed up. They might eventually track the charter company down, but he’d deal with that if he had to. Besides, that would happen whether he captained the boat or MacDonald did. But he suspected the cops wouldn’t have much interest in them.

  She looked away, her pink cheeks all the admission he needed.

  Dean had been so focused on Annie that he hadn’t noticed MacDonald carrying a hot pink duffel over his shoulder until he held it out to him. Although how the hell he’d missed that, he didn’t know. “Take the lady’s bag to the sleeping quarters.”

  He would have sworn the old buzzard didn’t have a gallant bone in his body—especially for Americans whom he thought loud, brash, and demanding—but apparently MacDonald had a weakness for drop-dead gorgeous and sweet.

  Dean couldn’t blame him.

  He reached for the pink monstrosity, thinking it was a damned shame to ruin such a nice bag—it was the one with backpack straps frequently seen on expeditions to Everest and cost a couple of hundred bucks—with such a ridiculous color.

  “That’s all right. I can carry it,” Annie started to say.

  But Dean had already grabbed it and was heading downstairs. He opened the door to one of the two small rooms that had been made passenger sleeping quarters when the tug was converted into a dive charter and put it on one of the berths.

  He would have left, but Annie was standing in the doorway. To get by her, he’d have to brush up against her, which after the other night he knew was not a good idea. He’d been hurting half the night: hot, restless, and guilty. He’d sensed that she was looking for someone to talk to, maybe even someone to confide in, and it wasn’t—couldn’t be—him.

  “Nice bag,” he said instead.

  She looked embarrassed—which, seeing as he was growing really fond of those little blushes, wasn’t a good thing. “My mom gave it to me for the trip. She thought the color would be easier to spot in baggage claim.”

  “She’s right about that. Not likely to get stolen, either.” He paused and gave it another look—maybe more of a shudder. “Especially by a guy.”

  She rolled her eyes and laughed. “Does it offend your manly sensibilities? Real men don’t get bothered by something as silly as a color.”

  Dean gave her a long, lazy shake of the head. “Sweetheart, if that’s your criterion, then I have to think that you don’t know too many real men.”

  She laughed. “You do a good Texan drawl. All you’re missing is the hat, a piece of straw to chew on, and the boots.”

  Shit. Dean controlled his expression—barely. He’d slipped and he knew it. This girl did something to him. Made him forget his defenses. Made him forget his damned head.

  He needed to stay away from her. She was too easy to talk to.

  “Customers,” he said flatly by way of explanation, and then moved past her. He was so angry with himself that he didn’t even need to steel himself when their bodies brushed against each other.

  Or so he thought, until every nerve ending in his body seemed to jump into overdrive.

  Cool down, old man. He was thirty-three, for fuck’s sake, not a horny teenager.

  Well, not a teenager, at least.

  “Thanks—for the help with the bag,” she said, clearly confused by his abruptness.

  He nodded, trying not to notice that expression on her face again. It was the same one she’d had when he left her at the guest house a couple of nights ago. Wounded. As if his curtness and eagerness to leave had hurt her.

  But it couldn’t be avoided. He was attracted to her—too attracted to her. And worse, he actually kind of liked her.

  Which didn’t make a damned lick of sense. He had lines that he didn’t cross, and bleeding-heart liberals—a protester, for Christ’s sake—who probably sat around the campfire wearing Birkenstocks and eating granola while singing “Kumbaya,” and burning the flag that he’d spent his life defending were definitely over that line. Way the hell over the line.

  But politics aside, she was sweet. Young—probably too young for him—and undoubtedly a little “I can change the world even though I’ve never been in it” naive, but undeniably sweet. And even if he couldn’t get be