THE PERFECT TEN (Boxed Set)

hand clenched on his open door. “That’s becoming my least favorite word. No, what?”
    “I want to come with you, please.”  She smiled to sweeten her request.
    Zane’s eyes took in the marina lot. Two empty late model pickups and a rusty Jeep sat in the desolate parking area.
    She could see his line of thought, but there were no massive black sport utilities hovering nearby. Not much more activity in the marina than the last time she’d been here. “I’ll be fine. Don’t you think someone would have shown their face by now if they knew I was with you?”
    “Yeah, but...”  He scratched his chin, and appeared to reconsider. “Now that I think about it, I’d rather not leave you alone here anyhow.”
    Sold! She hopped out and hurried around the front of the truck. “Don’t worry. I’ll stay close.”
    It took all her discipline not to run down the dock.
    The young man from the day before had obviously finished washing “Wet Dream” because slip seventeen was empty.
    Next to it, in slip eighteen floated a wooden cabin cruiser Noah had probably passed over before he built his own ark. The ancient teak deck was sun bleached gray. What little varnish that still covered the mahogany trim along the sides of the cabin had sprung loose in peeled tufts.
    Now she’d find out what had happened to the boat curtains.
    Zane stepped down onto the deck of the archaic vessel appropriately named “Hard Luck.” 
    “Should you be walking around on that boat?” Angel asked.
    Zane grinned up at her. “Sure. I own it.”
     
    Chapter 23
     
    Angel couldn’t believe her ears.
    Zane owned that floating wreck in Slip 18?
    The custom curtains were for his boat?
    “Don’t look so shocked.”  Zane stood with hands on hips, grinning at her. “Pilots like the water, too. I plan to restore it. Bought it in Miami and hired a captain to bring it up here for me.”
    Still, she was speechless.
    Casting an admiring glance at his ark, he said, “I won’t be able to work on it for another couple of months, but she’ll be ship shape by next spring.”
    Angel caught half of what he’d said. Where was that package of new canvas enclosures? This boat wasn’t anywhere near ready for side curtains.
    Zane stared up at her expectantly.
    She realized he was waiting for her to say something about the boat. “It’s, uh, nice. Lot of potential, roomy.”
    Right answer. He grinned even wider. Like a man who’d won the lottery.
    He’d need a big jackpot to make this thing into a usable watercraft.
    Zane opened the cabin and stepped down into what appeared to be a living area. “Stuffy in this cabin.”  He opened small windows, pushed them out from the inside and lifted the hatch. She’d squatted down on the dock to watch him, hoping to see a brown paper package miraculously lying around in the open.
    No such luck.
    She stepped around on the walkway extension from the main dock that had been built between the slips. Putting her fisted hand against the sidewall of the hard top that covered the cockpit, she used it for support and jumped down onto the deck. At the cabin door, she found Zane digging through a small cabinet above a compact kitchen area. He pulled out two key rings, each with an orange plastic float attached.
    She moved out of the way when he climbed out to the deck.
    He stuck the keys into the dual ignitions then dropped down on one knee in the rear center of the deck to raise a hinged section. With a flip of his wrist, he switched a silver toggle.
    After standing up he explained. “Have to switch the battery on.”
    Sounded reasonable. She had no clue what he was talking about, having never been on a pleasure boat, but he said it with such authority she assumed he was correct.
    Zane stepped over to the wheel, gripped the control handles mounted against the wall on his right and shoved them forward a couple times then returned them to the middle position. After several attempts, the right motor cranked with a throaty rumble. The left one started up on the first try, eliciting a triumphant grin from Zane.
    Men and their toys.
    He tinkered with the controls for a few minutes, then tapped one of the gauges and frowned.
    She leaned in to see what concerned him. “Something not working?”
    He shook his head, more to himself than to her. “No, the problem is that it does work.”
    “I don’t understand.”
    Zane studied the dash. “These are the gas gauges. Both tanks are too low on fuel. I had a message from