Lola Carlyle Reveals All

“Because I won’t have sex with you, that makes me irrational?”

“No, that makes you a-”

“Don’t say it Max,” she interrupted.

He did anyway. “Cock tease,” he finished.

Lola’s gaze narrowed. “That was crude.”

“Yeah, well, I’m in a crude mood. And if you stay out here, I’m liable to get a lot cruder.” He blew out a breath and dropped his hands. “So, do me a favor and go in the cabin. Unless, of course, you want to come over here, stick your hand down my pants, and finish what we started.”

Lola had been born blond, but she hadn’t been born stupid. She turned on her bare heels and walked into the galley.

Chapter 7

Lola slid between the sheets of the king-sized bed and turned onto her side. She wasn’t a tease. He’d kissed her, and she’d responded, kissing him back. He was the one with the fast hands. He was so slick, she’d hardly felt him work the buttons on her blouse. She hadn’t even known what he was doing until he’d shoved it down her arms. No, she wasn’t a tease. She was sensible.

She hadn’t exactly kept her hands to herself, though. But, she told herself, his shirt had already been unbuttoned. She’d had no other place to rest her hands but on the hard muscles of his chest… and stomach. Okay, she’d let her fingers do a little walking, but that didn’t make her a tease. Max was delusional.

She rolled onto her back and placed her arm over her eyes. After the previous two nights, a regular bed with clean sheets was pure heaven. She forced thought of Max from her head, and lulled by the constant rocking of the yacht, within a very short time she was pulled into a deep sleep. But even in sleep, she could not escape Max completely. She dreamed of him, of his mouth and hands sending her on a wild roller coaster of sensation.

“Lola.”

She opened her eyes within the dark stateroom, saw nothing, and shut them again.

“Wake up, Lola.”

“What?” she groaned. Light from the salon flowed through the open door and lit up the corner of the bed and the bottom half of Max from the knees down. He’d changed into his black jeans and boots and his feet were spread wide.

“You have to get up.”

“What time is it?” she asked, then realized he would have no way of knowing.

“You’ve been asleep for a few hours.”

Lola sat up and immediately noticed the deep pitch and roll of the yacht.

“We’re being hit by a storm,” he explained. “You need to put on a life jacket.”

“Is it bad?”

“If it wasn’t, I wouldn’t have woken you up.”

“Where’s Baby?”

Max leaned forward and set the dog on the bed. Baby jumped into her arms as the Dora Mae’s bow dipped and water smashed against the portholes. Lola glanced at the small round windows but could see nothing. Alarm shot up her spine to the top of her head. “Is the yacht going to sink?”

He didn’t answer and she threw back the covers. “Max?”

From the other side of the room, he flipped the light switch. His hair was wet and plastered to his head and he wore a yellow slicker. “Do you want the truth?”

Not really, but she guessed she’d rather know the worst than speculate. “Yes.”

“The seas are at about seven to ten feet, and I estimate the winds at about fifty knots. If I had a way to steer the yacht, it wouldn’t be so bad, but we’re getting tossed about like a cork.” As if to prove his point, a wave slammed into the port side. The Dora Mae rolled starboard and the lights flickered. Max grabbed hold of the doorjamb and Lola and Baby slid to the edge of the bed.

“If water floods the engine room, we’ll lose power,” he added to the already grim news.

When the yacht righted itself, Lola stood. “What are we going to do?”

“Nothing to do but ride it out.” He moved toward her and held out a life jacket. “Put this on.”

She took it from him and threaded one arm, then the other through the red and yellow jacket. “What about you?”

He opened his slicker and showed his bottle-green preserver. She handed Max her dog and snapped the straps across her abdomen and stomach. Across her breasts, the straps didn’t quite reach, so she left them hanging open.

“What about Baby? He needs a life jacket.”

“There isn’t one small enough for the little rat,” he said, and moved from the stateroom.

She followed close behind, droplets of water slid from the ends of his hair and down the back of his neck. “You checked?” Except for a few sofa pillows that lay on the floor next to the magazine Lola had been reading earlier, the interior of the yacht was battened down tight.

“Yep.”

The Dora Mae dipped to the left, and Lola felt her stomach weave right. “He might drown.” She grabbed the back of Max’s slicker. “Max, we have to do something.”

Max felt the tug on the back of the coat and looked over his shoulder into Lola’s frightened brown eyes. She expected him to do something to save her dog. It was all there in her beautiful face. She expected him to save her, too. The burden of it felt like a noose around his neck. He was nobody’s savior. The work he did for the government was never personal. Other than information from a brief, he didn’t know the parties involved. He didn’t know whom he helped, or whom he helped eliminate. He didn’t want to know.

Lola grasped hold of his arm as the yacht tilted starboard. She was starting to look a bit green. He knew the feeling. He’d already lost his dinner over the side an.hour ago. “Sit down on the couch before you fall down.”

Instead, she wove her way to the bathroom as fast as she could. The pounding rain and the ocean’s fury covered up any sounds from the head. Max didn’t need to hear it to know she was sick. During a storm, everyone got sick.

With Baby in one arm, he moved to the galley, where he’d gather the survival kit, life buoy, and folded self- inflating raft. Given the 1989 inspection date of the raft, he doubted the thing would even inflate. The survival kit, like the other emergency equipment on board, sucked. There was a small fishing tackle box and two waterproof lamps-complete with dead batteries.

Max set the dog on the bench seat in the galley, tossed his slicker on the table, then reached for the fishing knife he’d stuck in the top of his boot. He cut off two four-inch chunks of Styrofoam from the life buoy, then dug around in a duffel bag he’d filled with provisions they would need if they had to abandon the Dora Mae. He pulled out a roll of the silver duct tape he’d used earlier around the door of the cabin to help keep out the seawater. As the bow rose, he reached for Lola’s dog. Max raised his gaze to the windows that ran the length of the galley and salon, but he could see nothing of the chaos outside. What he did see was his reflection holding Lola’s dog against his chest, as if he had the answers to all their problems. Only he didn’t have the answers. During his naval career, he’d been through rough seas and tropical storms, but he’d been aboard destroyers. In 1998, he’d ridden out Hurricane Mitch aboard a Seawolf-class attack submarine. Safe and sound below the surface.

Baby licked Max’s chin and he looked down into the dog’s beady black eyes. Even Lola’s dog looked at him as if he were capable of providing a miracle. As if he could pull it out of thin air and save them all, adding to his burden. Tightening the noose.

He placed the Styrofoam on both of the dog’s sides. Then he wound the tape around Baby’s belly and back and the hunks of foam. When he was finished, the little dog looked like a silver tray with legs. It probably wouldn’t save Baby’s life, but it would keep him afloat.

The door to the head opened and Lola staggered out. Her face was as white as paper, and her lips were almost without color. She glanced toward the galley as she moved to the couch. The yacht swung hard to port, and she