Risky Business

Isn’t fishing supposed to be luck and skill?”
    “For some people it’s a matter of whether they’ll eat or not.” She turned the wheel a fraction, scanning the water for unwary snorkelers. “For others, it’s a matter of another trophy for the wall.”
    “I’m not interested in trophies.”
    She shifted to face him. No, he wouldn’t be, she decided, not in trophies or in anything else without a purpose. “What are you interested in?”
    “At the moment, you.” He put his hand over hers and let off the throttle. “I’m in no hurry.”
    “You paid to fish.” She flexed her hand under his.
    “I paid for your time,” he corrected.
    He was close enough that she could see his eyes beyond the tinted lenses. They were steady, always steady, as if he knew he could afford to wait. The hand still over hers wasn’t smooth as she’d expected, but hard and worked. No, he wouldn’t play bridge, she thought again. Tennis, perhaps, or hand ball, or something else that took sweat and effort. For the first time in years she felt a quick thrill race through her—a thrill she’d been certain she was immune to. The wind tossed the hair back from her face as she studied him.
    “Then you wasted your money.”
    Her hand moved under his again. Strong, he thought, though her looks were fragile. Stubborn. He could judge that by the way the slightly pointed chin stayed up. But there was a look in her eyes that said I’ve been hurt, I won’t be hurt again. That alone was intriguing, but added to it was a quietly simmering sexuality that left him wondering how it was his brother hadn’t been her lover. Not, Jonas was sure, for lack of trying.
    “If I’ve wasted my money, it won’t be the first time. But somehow I don’t think I have.”
    “There’s nothing I can tell you.” Her hand jerked and pushed the throttle up again.
    “Maybe not. Or maybe there’s something you know without realizing it. I’ve dealt in criminal law for over ten years. You’d be surprised how important small bits of information can be. Talk to me.” His hand tightened briefly on hers. “Please.”
    She thought she’d hardened her heart, but she could feel herself weakening. Why was it she could haggle for hours over the price of scuba gear and could never refuse a softly spoken request? He was going to cause her nothing but trouble. Because she already knew it, she sighed.
    “We’ll talk.” She cut the throttle so the boat would drift. “While you fish.” She managed to smile a bit as she stepped away. “No chum.”
    With easy efficiency, Liz secured the butt of a rod into the socket attached to a chair. “For now, you sit and relax,” she told him. “Sometimes a fish is hot enough to take the hook without bait. If you get one, you strap yourself in and work.”
    Jonas settled himself in the chair and tipped back his hat. “And you?”
    “I go back to the wheel and keep the speed steady so we tire him out without losing him.” She gathered her hair in one hand and tossed it back. “There’re better spots than this, but I’m not wasting my gas when you don’t care whether you catch a fish or not.”
    His lips twitched as he leaned back in the chair. “Sensible. I thought you would be.”
    “Have to be.”
    “Why did you come to Cozumel?” Jonas ignored the rod in front of him and took out a cigarette.
    “You’ve been here for a few days,” she countered. “You shouldn’t have to ask.”
    “Parts of your own country are beautiful. If you’ve been here ten years, you’d have been a child when you left the States.”
    “No, I wasn’t a child.” Something in the way she said it had him watching her again, looking for the secret she held just beyond her eyes. “I came because it seemed like the right thingto do. It was the right thing. When I was a girl, my parents would come here almost every year. They love to dive.”
    “You moved here with your parents?”
    “No, I came alone.” This time her voice was flat. “You didn’t pay two hundred dollars to talk about me, Mr. Sharpe.”
    “It helps to have some background. You said you had a daughter. Where is she?”
    “She goes to school in Houston—that’s where my parents live.”
    Toss a child, and the responsibility, onto grandparents and live on a tropical island. It might leave a bad taste in his mouth, but it wasn’t something that would surprise him. Jonas took a deep drag as he studied Liz’s profile. It just didn’t fit. “You miss