Hot as Hell (Deep Six 0.5)(20)

“So?” Alex asked, turning back to Bran.

“So what?” He scowled at her, picturing all the ways he could strangle her where she sat. Twelve…maybe thirteen. After that, his imagination failed him.

“Are. You. Going. To. See. Her?”

“No.” He hoped the one word, spoken with finality, would put a period on the end of the conversation.

He should have known better.

“But you like her, don’t you?” There was a line between Alex’s eyebrows. “I mean, there was that time one of her emails came in while I was using the laptop. I thought you were going to tear my arms off if I didn’t hand over the machine.”

“That’s not exactly how I remember it happening,” he muttered. Then, because he knew she would continue to press him, he added, “And I do like her. But that doesn’t mean I wanna drag my ass all the way to the Dry Tortugas to entertain a trio of teenagers.”

Alex narrowed her eyes. And there was another look he didn’t like. He firmed his jaw and prepared himself to patiently withstand whatever bit of irritation was about to come out of her mouth. He didn’t have long to wait.

“I call bullshit,” she said. “My woman’s intuition tells me there’s more holding you back.”

Of course there is. It was the same thing that had held him back since…well…forever. But talk of the * who’d supplied Bran’s Y chromosome and left him with a terrible legacy was strictly off-limits.

Bran glanced at Mason. The look they exchanged spoke a thousand words. And since Alex was nothing if not observant, she pursed her lips. “Why do I get the feeling I’m missing something here?”

“Can we change the subject?” Bran asked, but really it was more of a demand. “I think I might be breaking out in a rash.”

The look Alex leveled at him said she suspected he had the emotional maturity of a kumquat. “What is it with you men that you can’t talk about your feelings if—” The slam of the screen door stopped Alex mid-sentence.

Good. Bran wasn’t kidding about that rash. Talk of Maddy—or more precisely, talk of his feelings for Maddy and why he could never allow them to blossom and grow—made his skin crawl.

“Where the hell is everyone?” LT’s deep voice blasted from the front of the house.

Since LT’s craggy old seaman of an uncle, John, and the other three members of Deep Six Salvage had sailed their new salvage ship to Key Largo so a renowned mechanic could retrofit some specialty items onto the vessel, Bran assumed by everyone LT meant the three of them.

“In here!” he called.

Alex shot him a to be continued look.

He answered her with a false smile that said, Not on your life, then sobered when LT and LT’s fiancée, former CIA agent Olivia Mortier, traipsed into the kitchen. They were both in swimsuits, hair drenched, bare feet leaving puddles on the worn wood floorboards. Their expressions fell into a category one might call Quintessential Kid in the Candy Store.

“Would you two stop being so damned happy all the time?” Bran harrumphed, exaggerating a headshake. “It’s sickening.”

Even though Mason muttered an agreement, neither of them meant it. Bran, Mason, and the rest of their teammates were overjoyed that their former CO had met his match and fallen head over heels in L.O.V.E. If any of them deserved happiness, it was LT.

“So we were out spearfishing off the reef,” Olivia said, ignoring them. Bran cocked his head at her twinkling eyes and rosy cheeks. His sixth sense told him something was up.

“When I saw somethin’ that at first just looked like another piece of coral,” LT added, his Louisiana drawl peeking through even though he’d spent most of his formative years in the Keys.

“But it wasn’t coral,” Olivia said, nearly vibrating. Bran imagined he could actually see those wavy cartoon lines rippling through the air around her body.

“No sir.” LT shook his head. “It surely wasn’t.”

“When we broke off the crustaceans, you’ll never guess what we found,” Olivia said.

“Not in a million years,” LT added.

“Not in a bazillion years!” Olivia crowed.

“For chrissakes! What was it?” Alex demanded.

“The hilt of a cutlass!” LT boasted, whipping the artifact from where he’d hidden it behind his back.

For a couple of seconds no one moved, no one dared breathe. Then it was like someone had pressed an ejector button. Bran, Mason, and Alex all scrambled to get a look at the relic balanced in the center of LT’s open palm. The thing was black with corrosion, but its shape and markings were unmistakable.

“Stop shoving, you big lummox!” Alex complained when Mason jostled her. The first two words held just a hint of a lisp, which Bran had noticed grew more prevalent when Alex became agitated.

“Mmmph,” Mason said, bending forward to inspect the hilt.

“Mmmph,” Alex parroted again, rolling her eyes.

“Cut the shit, you two,” LT said. “And while you’re at it, Mason, fire up a kerosene lantern. I want to get some good light on this thing. Alex, you run upstairs and grab the translation of the Santa Cristina’s manifest. Let’s see if I’m lucky or just good.”

Despite the excitement of the find, Bran felt his eyes pulled over to the laptop as if by some invisible force.