Treasures Lost, Treasures Found

the summer treasure hunting.
    Though the tanks on her back reminded Kate not to take the weightless freedom for granted, she thought she could stay down forever. She wanted to touch—the water, thesea grass, the soft, sandy bottom. Reaching out toward a school of bluefish she watched them scatter defensively then regroup. She knew there were times when, as a diver moved through the dim, liquid world, he could forget the need for the sun. Perhaps Ky had been right in limiting the dive. She had to be careful not to take what she found again for granted.
    The flattened disklike shape caught Ky’s attention. Automatically, he reached for Kate’s arm to stop her forward progress. The stingray that scuttled along the bottom looking for tasty crustaceans might be amusing to watch, but it was deadly. He gauged this one to be as long as he was tall with a tail as sharp and cruel as a razor. They’d give it a wide berth.
    Seeing the ray reminded Kate that the sea wasn’t all beauty and dreams. It was also pain and death. Even as she watched, the stingray struck out with its whiplike tail and caught a small, hapless bluefish. Once, then twice. It was nature, it was life. But she turned away. Through the protective masks, her eyes met Ky’s.
    She expected to see derision for an obvious weakness, or worse, amusement. She saw neither. His eyes were gentle, as they were very rarely. Lifting a hand, he ran his knuckles down her cheek, as he’d done years before when he’d chosen to offer comfort or affection. She felt the warmth, it reflected in her eyes. Then, as quickly as the moment had come, it was over. Turning, Ky swam away, gesturing for her to follow.
    He couldn’t afford to be distracted by those glimpsesof vulnerability, those flashes of sweetness. They had already done him in once. Top priority was the job they’d set out to do. Whatever other plans he had, Ky intended to be in full control. When the time was right, he’d have his fill of Kate. That he promised himself. He’d take exactly what he felt she owed him. But she wouldn’t touch his emotions again. When he took her to bed, it would be with cold calculation.
    That was something else he promised himself.
    Though they found no sign of the Liberty , Kysaw wreckage from other ships—pieces of metal, rusted, covered with barnacles. They might have been from a sub or a battleship from World War II. The sea absorbed what remained in her.
    He was tempted to swim further out, but knew it would take twenty minutes to return to the boat. Circling around, he headed back, overlapping, double-checking the area they’d just covered.
    Not quite a needle in a haystack, Ky mused, but close. Two centuries of storms and currents and sea quakes. Even if they had the exact location where the Liberty had sunk, rather than the last known location, it took calculation and guesswork, then luck to narrow the field down to a radius of twenty miles.
    Ky believed in luck much the same way he imagined Hardesty had believed in calculation. Perhaps with a mixture of the two, he and Kate would find what was left of the Liberty .
    Glancing over, he watched Kate gliding beside him. Shewas looking everywhere at once, but Ky didn’t think her mind was on treasure or sunken ships. She was, as she’d been that summer before, completely enchanted with the sea and the life it held. He wondered if she still remembered all the information she’d demanded of him before the first dive. What about the physiological adjustments to the body? How was the CO 2 absorbed? What about the change in external pressure?
    Ky felt a flash of humor as they started to ascend. He was dead sure Kate remembered every answer he’d given her, right down to the decimal point in pounds of pressure per square inch.
    The sun caught her as she rose toward the surface, slowly. It shone around and through her hair, giving her an ethereal appearance as she swam straight up, legs kicking gently, face tilted toward sun and surface. If there were mermaids, Ky knew they’d look as she did—slim, long, with pale loose hair free in the water. A man could only hold onto a mermaid if he accepted the world she lived in as his own. Reaching out, he caught the tip of her hair in his fingers just before they broke the surface together.
    Kate came up laughing, letting her mouthpiece fall and pushing her mask up. “Oh, it’s wonderful! Just as I remembered.” Treading water, she laughed again and Ky realized it was a sound he