Donovans 01 - Amber Beach

back into her didn’t appeal to him. Instead of testing the Tomorrow’s seaworthiness the first time out as he had planned, maybe they should do something nice and calm and easy, like trolling for salmon. The local grapevine said fish were biting in Secret Harbor.
    Normally the idea of salmon fishing would have made Jake eager, but at the moment things weren’t exactly normal. He decided to head for more open water, where he could find out if Kyle’s SeaSport performed the way it should.
    Besides, if his employer was going to fall apart, they both should know it now, when everything else was calm.
    Jake changed the course forty-five degrees and simultaneously kicked up the throttle.
    “What are you doing?” Honor asked.
    She knew her voice was sharper than it should have been, but she couldn’t do anything about it. She was feeling as edgy as broken glass. Going for a ride in a small boat was turning out to be much harder on her nerves than she had expected. She was thirty, but the overwhelming fear she had felt as a child was scraping her emotions raw.
    “I was thinking about fishing,” he said mildly, “but—”
    “Good.”
    Surprised at what could have been mistaken for enthusiasm, Jake glanced across the narrow aisle to the pilot seat. “Good, huh?”
    “Yeah. Thinking about fishing beats actually doing it.”
    He shook his head. “You’ve got to work on your attitude.”
    “Believe me, I have.”
    “Scary thought.”
    She didn’t respond. Her hands gripped the bench seat as though she expected it to be yanked out from under her.
    He said something under his breath. Using Honor was one thing; tormenting her was another. He was discovering that he simply didn’t have the stomach for it. That was one of the reasons he had left Ellen to her spider games and never looked back. He hadn’t enjoyed watching living things flutter in his sticky web.
    With a muttered curse, Jake spun the wheel hard, turning the boat back toward the distant dock.
    “What are you doing?” Honor asked quickly.
    “Going back.”
    “Why? Is something wrong?” Her voice was as thin as the line of her mouth.
    “Yeah.”
    “What?”
    “You.”
    Her head snapped toward him.
    “What are you talking about?” she asked through clenched teeth. “There’s nothing wrong with me.”
    “And I’m the Easter Bunny.”
    “Wrong fairy tale. You appeared with the girl in the red coat.”
    Smiling slightly, he shook his head. Even scared white, she kept the keen edge to her mind. And tongue.
    “Turn the boat around,” she said. “We’re going fishing.”
    He kept heading toward the dock, which was now about five minutes away. She gave him a sideways look.
    “I mean it,” Honor said. “Turn around.”
    “A little bit of fear is a healthy thing,” Jake said matter-of-factly. “It keeps you alert. Too much fear is no good at all. It gets in the way of doing what has to be done.”
    “Such as fishing?” she retorted.
    “Such as surviving.”
    Honor looked at his eyes. “What does a man like you know about fear and survival?”
    “More than I ever wanted to.” The flatness of his voice didn’t invite questions.
    She didn’t even hesitate. “What happened?”
    He gave her a sideways look. “The usual random violence.”
    “Oh. Six o’clock news stuff.”
    “Bar brawls don’t make headlines.”
    “Bar, huh? Did you—”
    “No,” he interrupted.
    “How do you know what I was going to ask?”
    “I don’t.”
    “Oh. None of my business, is that it?”
    “That’s it. Turn loose of the seat cushion before your hands go numb.”
    Very carefully she unlocked her fingers. Blood returned, changing the skin from white to pink. She sighed, swallowed, and licked her lips nervously.
    “How did you know my fingers were aching?” she asked.
    “Been there.”
    Afraid to take her attention off the water for long, Honor gave Jake a quick sideways look. He didn’t look a bit scared. His left hand was curled over the top of the wheel. His right hand rested near the control levers and something baffling that he called trim tab switches. Every line of his body was relaxed, confident, utterly at home on the unpredictable surface of the sea.
    “You, afraid?” she asked. “Pull my other leg.”
    “Don’t tempt me.”
    “I wouldn’t know how.”
    He gave her a disbelieving look. Without warning he moved the gas lever back to idle.
    The boat stopped rushing through the water. Honor made a startled sound and braced