she pressed her hand to her stomach in an effort to calm the nerves there. “You aren’t sending anyone in after him, are you?”
“I had some inquiries out a few days ago,” he admitted. “I learned nothing.”
She winced at the news, but if anything it made her more determined. “Then it’s not going to hurt for me to poke around a bit.”
Silence stretched, so long that she began to wonder if they’d been disconnected. When Sterling spoke again, there was a note of resignation in his voice. “It has to be done discreetly, or you could jeopardize his position if he’s still on the island.”
Analiese clutched the phone more tightly, aware that she’d just received as clear a go-ahead as she was going to get. “I can do discreet.”
Had she been talking to anyone else she would have sworn she heard a snort in the man’s voice. As it was, she attributed the sound to a cough. “Quite so. Listen carefully, then. You are not to swerve one iota from my directions….”
It was more than twenty minutes later before she pressed the button to end the conversation. Twenty minutes of directives, dire warnings and commands. She was on a fact-finding mission only, Sterling had repeated again and again. And the scope of her investigation centered solely on the whereabouts of her brother.
When the man wasn’t issuing orders, he was filling her in on a bit of history that might or might not affect her brother’s case. She’d listened because she thought it wiser not to mention what she’d discerned from Sam’s files. She had a pretty good idea of what her brother’s mission had been and, despite Sterling’s silence on the subject, an even better idea of the reason behind it.
She tucked the phone back into her purse and noted, a bit distantly, the unsteadiness of her hand. Among the details she’d failed to share with Sterling was the fact that Jones’s name had figured in her brother’s files for the past several years. And that she had reason to believe that Sam had used the man’s charter service to cross to Laconos. It was clear from his notes that the two had some sort of relationship, and she was concluding that her brother trusted Jones on some level.
What she didn’t know was the exact nature of their relationship. Or just how far she could trust Jones.
Chapter 2
Analiese went to the island’s largest bank the next morning and arranged to transfer money from her newly established account in the States—the one in Ann Smith’s name. As she completed the transaction she regretted more than once her agreement to a higher fee. Jones had been taking advantage of the situation, but she was no pushover. No, it had been her own guilty conscience that had led her to pay the inflated price.
It really hadn’t taken that much effort to convince the men in the fishing charter that Jones’s drinking habits made him an unreliable captain, and that they’d be better off with another service. And once she’d seen Jones at the tavern last night, there had seemed to be more truth in the story than she could have imagined.
The dock was within walking distance of the bank, so she strolled toward it, enjoying the sight of the brilliant white ships rocking gently in the water. She’d arranged to have the hotel send her bags over, so she took her time, loitering at the market and dickering with a local merchant over a necklace made of tiny shells. Minutes later, the necklace around her neck, she headed toward the docks at a brisker pace. She didn’t want to be late and give Jones something to snipe at her about. She had a feeling he’d already been regretting their venture before she’d left the bar last night.
Or maybe, she thought with a slight sneer as she headed in the direction of the Nefarious, he’d regretted only the necessity that had kept them talking long enough to have his skimpily clad girlfriend throwing glares his way every few minutes. The woman hadn’t looked like the type to suffer competition gladly, although she certainly hadn’t had any in Analiese. When she was interested in a man, she tended to pick ones who shaved on a regular basis and didn’t drink themselves stupid on their time off. Of course, that interest, if returned initially, usually died a sudden violent death as soon as the male in question found out who she was. Or rather who her brothers were.
Thoughts of her brothers brought a stab of guilt. She couldn’t blame them for their cautious attitude toward her safety. It had been forged by events two decades earlier. But understanding that didn’t change her feelings. As much as she loved them, she often felt like she was slowly suffocating under their heavy-handed interference. Her work for Sterling had been the first breath of freedom she’d ever known. It seemed oddly ironic that those experiences just might end up affording her the best chance of finding Sam.
Her bags were in a neat pile on the dock next to the Nefarious but Jones was nowhere in sight. His ship differed from some of the others anchored nearby, appearing to be as much pleasure craft as it was fishing boat. Ana looked up and down the docks and considered the risk of going aboard while he seemed to be absent. At some point she wanted to thoroughly check the ship for any evidence that Sam had been there. Although it was a remote possibility that he would have been careless enough to leave signs of his presence behind, she had to start somewhere. All she had was her brother’s planned itinerary, which had included the charter to Laconos with Jones, and Sterling’s certainty that Sam had docked at the neighboring island before his disappearance.
Analiese sent one more glance around, still seeing no sign of Jones. Tucking away a thread of trepidation, she went to the ladder on the side of the ship and climbed up, balanced precariously at the top. Turning carefully, she began to descend the other side.
“It’s customary to wait for an invitation before boarding someone’s ship.”
The sound of that sleep-roughened voice startled her. She twisted around in the direction it had come from, and her foot slipped. Arms windmilling wildly, Ana toppled from the step and had a moment’s view of the ship’s deck rushing up to meet her before two hard arms broke her fall. Her breath rushed out of her anyway, as she found herself staring into Jones’s enigmatic gray gaze.
He was very close. Near enough for her to note, with a degree of fascination, that his gray eyes were the color of smoke today, without the flinty hardness that had been apparent yesterday afternoon. Close enough to observe the freshly shaven jaw, with just the smallest nick below his chin. And definitely near enough to appreciate the effortless ease with which he held her against his bare chest.
“I was just…”
“Making a hell of an entrance.” He set her on her feet on the deck and took a step away. “I noticed that. Very graceful.”
Really, the man lacked even basic rudiments of civility. Giving a small sniff, she straightened her sleeveless striped top and made a point of brushing off her white shorts, wishing she could brush away the memory of his touch as easily. “I didn’t expect to see you about this early.”
He moved past her, climbed the ladder to the dock beside them. “Don’t know why not. We discussed the time we’d leave last night.”
With an interesting display of muscle rippling across his bare back, he hefted her bags and heaved them carelessly over the side of the ship. But it wasn’t the ease with which he’d lifted the bags that held her attention, it was the scar in the center of his shoulder blades. Even to her untrained eye, it looked suspiciously like a bullet wound. She didn’t know how she’d missed noticing it the day before.
He was beside her in the next moment, and she strove to recover thoughts that had become strangely fragmented. “From your state last night I thought you might
