Hell or High Water (Deep Six #1)(38)

“That’s up to you guys,” she said after she’d tried to light his eyebrows on fire with her gaze alone.

“Pros and cons, men?” Leo asked, and the question was so familiar that Bran experienced a strong sense of nostalgia. That’s how Leo had begun the planning for each and every op they’d ever run. And it was just one more reason why Leo had been perfect for the job of commanding officer. It took an incredibly intelligent and thoughtful man to be humble enough to know he didn’t always have the right answer and to solicit as many opinions as he could before making any decision.

Of course, Bran would never tell Leo how much he admired him. Where’s the fun in that?

“If those tangos are still on site,” Wolf began, “it’d be better to wait for the…ah…A-Team.” One corner of Wolf’s mouth twitched and Bran slapped him a high five. Olivia rolled her eyes.

“True.” Leo nodded, running a hand over his beard—if you considered the current trend to maintain what amounted to a slightly longer than a five-o’clock shadow an actual beard. “But if they’re not on site, if they went down with their boat, we could be twiddlin’ our dicks out here for hours for no good reason.”

Bran opened his mouth to take a swing at the dick-twiddling softball Leo had lobbed his way. But Leo beat him to the punch by flicking him a look that promised untold misery should one word of what had happened belowdecks escape his lips. Bran wisely clamped his teeth together.

“Or we could always alter course and go pick up the contractors,” Wolf suggested, adjusting the throttle when a larger-than-normal wave caused Wayfarer-I to list slightly. “But if they get that propeller repaired in the meantime, we’ll have wasted a lot of time and fuel.”

Fuel. The way Wolf spat out the word almost made it sound dirty. And, in a way, it was. Because even though that half a million dollars Olivia was paying them for this gig would go a long way in helping them search for the Santa Cristina, every dime—which translated into every drop of fuel—still counted.

“I vote we keep heading toward the package,” Mason said. “We can always stop a few miles out and glass the area to see if there are any un-f*ckin’-friendlies floating thereabouts. If there are, then we can pull back and wait for the contractors to arrive.”

“Bran?” Leo asked. “Thoughts?”

“You know me, LT.” He shrugged. “I like it best when we do things Han-style, so I say we keep on keeping on.”

“Han-style?” Olivia asked.

“You know, Han Solo? So, solo?”

She lifted a brow.

“Oh, for shit’s sake. You really need to get a subscription to HBO or Netflix. It loses its oomph when I have to explain it.”

“Olivia?” Leo turned to her, or more like he’d never turned away from her. “Which side of the argument are you comin’ in on?”

“Well, of course I want to go retrieve those chemicals as quickly as possible,” she admitted. “So I vote for doing it”—she turned to smile at Bran—“Han-style.”

He slow-winked at her.

“Something in your eye, Brando?” Leo asked. And even if his best friend hadn’t used his full name, the warning in Leo’s tone was clear. She’s mine, it said. So, ix-nay on the irting-flay.

Bran sighed. Twitterpated. Totally, completely, annoyingly twitterpated…





Chapter Eight


1:43 p.m.…

“No good deed goes unpunished.”

Maddy glanced over at Captain Harry and frowned, her heart so heavy it was a wonder the thing hadn’t sunk down to slide out of her ass. “I’m so sorry I got you into this mess,” she told him, wishing with all her might she’d taken a minute, just one stinking minute, to consider the possible repercussions of approaching a boatful of strange men. There she’d gone again. Leaping before she looked.

That phrase should be tattooed across my forehead.

Although, in her defense, even if she had taken the time to consider the possible downsides to her decision, she never would have envisioned…well…this. Whatever the hell this was—she had yet to determine if it was a hijacking, a kidnapping, or just plain being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Regardless, she had to admit, “I should have listened to you and called in the Coast G—”

“You couldn’t have known who they were,” Captain Harry interrupted her, parroting her thoughts back to her. “Neither of us could have. And I’m the captain. Ultimately, all decisions concerning the Black Gold are mine. So I should be apologizing to you.”

Sweet man. Sweet wrongheaded man.

“How ’bout we agree to disagree?” She gave him a friendly nudge with her shoulder. “Because you know damn well had I not been on board pleadin’ the case of destitute Cubans riskin’ life and limb in trying for the good old U.S. of A., you would have called in the authorities and none of this would be happenin’.”

“Perhaps,” he admitted, then added, “or perhaps not. How do you know my bleeding heart wouldn’t have gotten the better of me?”

She shook her head at him. “Well, can we at least share the blame?”

“Deal,” he told her with a sharp bounce of his head. “I’d shake your hand but…” He used his chin to gesture over his shoulder to his wrists, zip-tied behind his back.