Burn

"I’d love to," Jenner said, too enthusiastically. Cael gave her arm another squeeze, one she interpreted to mean that she wasn’t here to make new friends or do a lot of socializing. As far as he was concerned, she was here for one thing and one thing only, and that was to provide cover for him. If he thought he could keep her locked in the suite for the entire time, then he was in for a rude awakening.

"Ladies, we should be moving," Cael prompted, because neither Jenner nor the two older women seemed inclined to do anything other than stand there and talk.

"Do we take a left?" Linda asked, her expression confused as she looked first one way and then the other down the passageway.

"Yes, ma’am, you do," he said, holding out his hand to indicate they precede him.

"I’ll take your word for it," she said as they began walking down the passageway. "I usually have a good sense of direction, but so far this ship has me completely confounded. If we really needed to get on a lifeboat, then I’d better have an angel on my shoulder whispering in my ear and telling me how to get there, or I’ll never make it."

Behind them another door opened. Cael glanced briefly over his shoulder at the sound, and Jenner did likewise, driven by nothing more than simple curiosity. Two men exited the suite with the double doors, PFDs in hand, and followed them down the hallway. It only made sense that they would all be at the same Muster Station.

One of the men behind them had the look of a sentient tank. He was just medium height, but so powerfully built he looked almost as wide as he was tall. His hair was so blond it was almost cotton white, and cropped very close to his head. He had restless eyes that continuously swept forward and back, noting anything and everything around him. Hired muscle, Jenner thought, but smart hired muscle.

So the target of Cael’s surveillance must be the other man. He looked fiftyish, with graying hair, but toned and fit, with a tan of the particular hue that said it was the best tan money could buy. She didn’t have time to see more than that, because Cael hustled her forward with more speed than grace.

"Hurry," he said. "We shouldn’t be late." Linda Vale and Nyna Phillips obediently picked up their paces, too, though Jenner was pretty sure he hadn’t been talking to the older ladies.

He didn’t want her anywhere near the man, Jenner realized. She still didn’t know who he was, but at least she knew what he looked like.

"So," she whispered conversationally, "that’s him?"

"Not your concern."

"You made it my concern, numb-nuts."

He slanted a glittering blue glance down at her. "It’ll be a miracle if we make it to Hawaii without you getting tossed overboard."

THE LIFEBOAT DRILL WAS UNEXCITING. All Jenner learned about escaping from a sinking ship was how to put on her PFD, and where to go in case of an emergency, though she supposed that was basically all she needed to know. She’d have liked to see a lifeboat actually launched, but when she thought about it realized the difficulty involved in getting the lifeboat back in place, considering they were secured to the ship at least two stories up from the water line, maybe even more, and the ship was cutting through the ocean at a pretty fast clip. Being inside one of those suckers when it was launched was probably a trip, too, one she hoped she never took.

The man who had come out of the double-door suite was sitting two tables over from them at the Muster Station, which was actually one of the indoor cafes. Cael tried to position his chair so he was blocking her view, but he was thwarted by Nyna Phillips, who pointed toward the man and said, "That’s one of the co-owners of the ship. He’s hosting the Cruise for Charity, so we’ll probably see more of him than we will of the captain."

"Really?" asked Jenner, delighted by this opening. "I had no idea that’s who he is. What’s his name?"

Nyna thought for a moment. "I’m sure I heard, but I can’t recall. Memory’s the second thing to go, you know."

"What’s the first?" Linda Vale asked, leaning forward with a grin that said she expected something salacious.

"I don’t remember," said Nyna, completely deadpan, and they both burst into laughter.

As soon as the drill was concluded, the gray-haired man and his bodyguard disappeared. Jenner forestalled being hustled back to the suite and handcuffed to a table or chair by exclaiming how hungry she was, and inviting both Linda and Nyna to eat lunch with them on the Lido deck, in one of the outdoor cafes. The two women accepted with pleasure, and Cael had no choice but to go along, though the look he gave Jenner when the other two weren’t looking said he wasn’t taking this lightly. He fished his cell phone out of his pocket, called someone, and spoke very briefly before closing the phone.

The outdoor cafes were buffet-style so lunch was very casual. Jenner sucked down some more coffee, ate enough to make up for not having had breakfast, and in general did everything she could to postpone going back to the suite. Linda and Nyna, however, soon excused themselves because of some classes they’d signed up for. Jenner watched them walk away, giving a little sigh of regret. She wished they could have stayed longer. Not only did they seem genuinely good-hearted, now she was once again alone with Cael.

Despite his reluctance to have lunch, now that it was over he didn’t seem to be in any great hurry to return to the suite. He lounged in his chair, somehow managing to look elegant, indolent, and dangerous all at the same time. For all his surface sophistication, there was something predatory about him that lingered just below that layer of gloss. He was the type of man women noticed, she thought again, but not just women. She caught several men, perhaps more aware than others, giving him slightly wary, sidelong glances as if they wanted to make certain they knew exactly where he was.