for stupidity. Dinner had turned into an award-winning feast, which was ridiculous. She’d created way, way too much to do for a woman recovering from a nasty headache and major bruises.
In the next life, she was going to
She carted plates and silverware to the dining room, then went back to her galley. She glanced at the clock, thinking she had just enough time to hustle down to the crew quarters, and make sure the captain was still alive. Her last trip below, Ivan had yelled that he was dying and anyone who bugged him would die with him-which seemed a good sign. If he was strong enough to yell, he couldn’t be too bad off.
She stirred, checked, piled used pots into the dishwasher, opened wine to breathe, pulled the herbed tomatoes from the oven. On the intercom, she heard Hans. “Some rough weather building,” he warned her. “Shouldn’t get here for another three hours, but then we’ll all want to batten down the hatches, get things sealed up tight. Afraid it’s going to slow up our return run into Juneau.”
“You need help, you just say,” Cate said. “You out of coffee up there?”
“Don’t need coffee, but I’m sure hungry.”
“It’ll be ready in another twenty,” she promised. Maybe all her flying around wasn’t such a bad idea. She couldn’t dwell on her hurts, on obsessing about who had pushed her last night, on fear for her life. Fear for Harm. Fear
Falling in love just wasn’t in her game plan.
Yet her heart sprinted the instant she saw Harm, his face and jacket splashed from the temper-prone sea. He had his hand on the door to her galley when he was interrupted. Yale had just walked into the dining room. Harm changed course and entered the side door into the dining area.
Cate told herself to quit mooning and concentrate. She tasted, almost burning her tongue. It wasn’t easy to get the exact ratios of horseradish and Tabasco and Worcestershire sauce and onion and lime just right. For darn sure she didn’t have time to eavesdrop…but it wasn’t her fault that voices carried clearly from the open dining area.
From the sound, she suspected Yale had just poured himself something to drink from the liquor cabinet. “I didn’t think I’d get a chance to talk to you alone,” he said to Harm. “Everyone’s going to be coming up for dinner, so maybe this isn’t the time, either. But I’ve got something to say.”
“So go for it,” Harm encouraged him quietly.
“I found Arthur going through my stuff. And if you want the truth, I went through Purdue’s things when we first got here. This is killing us all. We’re turning into animals instead of the team players we used to be. I need to be cleared of this. So I want you to…”
“What?”
“I want to give you access to my bank accounts, my personal records, everything. I want you to investigate me. I want you to verify that I haven’t come into any sudden wealth, that I have no change in circumstance. I’ll sign anything you want, to give you permission to find out anything you need to about me.”
Cate held her breath, wanting to hear Harm’s answer…only she couldn’t. The risotto cakes had turned crisp and she still had to prepare the last-minute dishes. She carted dinner up to Hans in the pilothouse, checked one last time on Ivan below-who was still only communicating in swear-speak-then started to serve.
By then, Arthur and Purdue had joined the group. There was no joking at dinner about anyone falling in love with her. They ate. In fact, they devoured everything she put in front of them, which should have fed an entire platoon. Several times, Harm ordered her to sit down and relax and eat herself.
Several times, she tried.
Outside, clouds had blown in, darkened the sky, started pitching rain, which only added to the gloomy mood of the guys.
“We need to go
And that became the general mantra. As soon as they got home, everything would be better, they’d figure it all out, they’d do this, they’d do that. Arthur suggested publicly at dinner the same thing Yale had cornered Harm about just an hour before.
“I’ve thought relentlessly about the disappearance and loss of our project,” he said to Harm. “And I think one thing you need to do…you must do…is look into all of our circumstances. Check out financial records. Our homes. Whatever you need to do to make all of us more transparent.”
“I already offered that,” Yale said.
“I’m not hot to have anyone in my private life,” Purdue said uncomfortably. “But you can look at my finances and taxes and all that crap for sure.”
Several times, her gaze locked with Harm, even though she was running around between the galley and dining room. But the conversation seemed extraordinary, considering someone had to be guilty of theft-and likely murder and assault, as well. All of them sounded so innocent. All them appeared more than willing to prove there’d been no financial or any other kind of gain or change in their lives.
Only the formula was gone.
And Fiske was dead.
And she’d been pushed off the top deck.
And now Ivan was sick as a dog-maybe not poisoned, but it seemed beyond coincidental that a man with a cast-iron stomach would suddenly get ill, particularly because his illness proved to be a catalyst, the one thing that guaranteed they’d all call off the trip and head for home.
After dinner, Harm announced he was going up to the pilothouse. “Hans must be exhausted. I don’t know when he plans to drop anchor for the night, but I’ll spell him until he chooses to hang it up. If the captain’s still sick tomorrow, I think we should all take turns.”
Everyone agreed to that. By the time she’d sanitized the galley, the ship was pitching and tossing. The guys all claimed they were turning in early. She checked on Ivan one more time, then headed below deck to her claustrophobic cabin.
Internet connection was sporadic, but she still managed to connect with both sisters. Startling her no end, there were a series of notes from both. Who is this Harm? demanded Sophie several times, and Lily echoed the same kind of comments. You never mentioned a guy since I can remember. Call immediately when you get back on dry land.
Cate couldn’t remember saying a word about Harm. Weirder yet, her sisters must have forgotten that she was the caretaker and question-asker, the nosy one who watched out for the two of them-not the other way around.
She didn’t need watching over.
After turning off the computer, she stared at the wild seas through her porthole…and then moved. There was something she still needed to do tonight. Something more important than anything she’d done in a long, long time.
Possibly it took some traumatic accidents and disasters to make her rethink about what really mattered.
Harm prowled the circumference of the boat one last time-a pretty senseless thing to do in the rain, but he couldn’t rest. Everyone had long gone below, holed up in their cabins like squirrels on a dark winter day. He’d spoken with Ivan, gotten his own key to the pilothouse so he could continue sending and receiving messages through the night. It was still late afternoon in Cambridge, so it was possible more information could still come through from home base.
He’d accumulated information from the radio tonight nonstop. He had information and evidence of all kinds coming out of the woodwork-but nothing that had settled his mind. He’d never needed their permission to investigate his three men, but the P.I. firm he’d hired had dusted every closet in their lives.
None of them appeared guilty of anything. He’d found a few unpaid parking tickets. Years before, Arthur was guilty of a personal indiscretion when he’d been briefly separated from his wife. Yale and Purdue had smoked a few funny cigarettes in their college years. Purdue’s father had kicked his son around, causing a divorce and likely some scars on Purdue’s soul.
But there wasn’t one thing to indicate all three men weren’t bright, decent men who’d primarily been honest most of their lives. Certainly there was nothing pointing to guilt-much less guilt of the dangerous, reckless crimes going on.
Harm hated intrusively prying into their lives, and by the time he went below, he was damp-cold and his head
