Donovans 01 - Amber Beach

distant dawn. The Tomorrow ’s navigation lights burned colorfully against the slowly fading night. He cast off the bow and stern lines, stepped aboard, and took the aft controls. As soon as the boat was headed in the right direction, he ducked back into the cabin and took the helm seat.
    “Any company?” Honor asked.
    “Not yet.”
    “Do you suppose Captain Conroy is going to show up and board us again?”
    “It wouldn’t surprise me.”
    “I don’t think much would.”
    Jake gave her a swift glance, wondering what she meant. She was licking the tines of her plastic fork. Not a scrap of omelet remained after her tongue passed over. He looked away, but not quickly enough. His pants were getting tight. He concentrated on the water and cursed his body’s quick response to Honor’s agile little tongue.
    “Wonderful,” she said.
    He grunted.
    “No, I mean it,” she said. “That was a great omelet.”
    “It’s the cilantro. Gives it just enough edge to be interesting.”
    “You’re sure you’re not married?”
    “Positive. It’s not the kind of thing a man would forget.”
    “Good grief. Talk about people who should spend a week watching daytime television . . .”
    She licked the fork again and sighed.
    “It’s a fork, not a sucker,” Jake muttered.
    “What?”
    “Did you bring binoculars?” he asked clearly.
    “Yes.” She stuck her hand into the leather backpack she had brought aboard and pulled out a small pair of glasses. “Right here.”
    He glanced at the dainty glasses. “Use mine. They’ll do a better job in low light. Check out the boat coming up on our right.”
    “Port,” she said promptly. “See? I learned something nautical yesterday.”
    “You learned it wrong. Port means left. Same number of letters in each word.”
    “What about right and starboard?” she asked, smiling slyly.
    “What about it?”
    “Never mind. You aren’t up to my speed yet.”
    For an instant Jake thought of telling her to put a hand in his pants and check out just how up he was. Then he saw lights approaching from another quarter.
    “Use the binoculars on those boats,” he said, pointing.
    “What am I looking for?”
    “Names, registration numbers, model of boat, anything you can see.”
    “Let me drive while you look,” she said. “You know what you’re looking for.”
    Jake noticed that Honor didn’t say it as an accusation or even ask him why a fishing guide was curious about the other boats. Probably because she wanted to know who was in those boats for the same reason he did—Kyle and missing amber.
    “Right now I’m looking for logs,” he said.
    Honor’s eyes widened. She stared at the darkly shimmering water. “Is that why we’re creeping along at eight knots?”
    “Only a fool or someone with a life at stake races around the San Juans in the dark in a small boat.”
    “Right. You look at logs. I’ll look at boats.” She took Jake’s binoculars from the rack just above the table and fiddled with the focus until she found the first boat. “I can’t be positive, but it looks like the name is Bay Timer. ”
    “Bayliner. It’s a name brand, like Ford or Honda. How many people aboard?”
    “Can’t tell.”
    “Try the starboard boat.”
    “That’s the one on our right, right?”
    “Yeah, yeah.”
    She smiled. “It looks a little smaller than the first boat. That’s about all I can tell right now.”
    “Probably the other Bayliner.”
    “What?”
    “There were two of them yesterday. Any other boats?”
    “I’m looking.”
    Slowly Jake brought up the speed, pushing the limits of visibility. Dawn was coming on hard now, a silent explosion of color and light sweeping across the arch of the sky.
    “A bright spot of orange just popped up,” Honor said. “Must be Conroy.”
    “Probably. Anyone else?”
    “I can’t be sure, but I think there’s a fourth boat way off to the left—port.”
    He looked in that direction. “I don’t see any lights.”
    “Neither do I. But there’s something out there against the dawn and it’s shaped like a boat.”
    “Keep an eye on it.”
    Jake killed the Tomorrow ’s spotlight and navigation lights. Then he shifted course and headed for the mysterious boat.
    “Let me know when we’re close enough to make out the features of the folks on board,” he said.
    “Won’t they see us first?”
    “Look behind us.”
    She did. It looked a lot darker in that direction. “Clever.”
    “Thank you.”
    “Are we looking