The Sooner the Better

  The last laugh, however, was all hers.

  Madder than a mean-tempered wasp, she agilely heaved herself out of the water and into the boat. Her wet underwear left precious little to the imagination. Jack’s humor quickly faded, and his throat went dry. He’d been too long without a woman, he decided, if Lorraine was affecting him like this.

  With a wedding band on her finger, she was strictly off-limits. He wasn’t interested in an affair, however brief. His love life had been robust for a number of years, with only one hard-and-fast rule.

  No married women.

  Ever.

  Jack was a good-looking guy and he knew it. Girls had started flocking to him from the time he was in junior high. There’d never been a shortage of single women, and frankly, he wasn’t interested in creating unnecessary enemies. Like husbands. In addition, this was the daughter of a friend. A good friend, who trusted him to get her safely back to the United States.

  One look at Lorraine’s full breasts and the shapely curve of her hips glistening in the light from the setting sun, and the hard-and-fast rule was becoming merely a guideline. He couldn’t make himself turn away. Damn, she was beautiful. It wasn’t that he hadn’t noticed earlier. Anyone could see that, prissy attitude aside, she was gorgeous. But Jack had forced himself not to respond…until now. He’d done a convincing job of pretending he wasn’t aware of her, hiding the attraction behind a barrage of insults. The questions about her love life had been an ill-advised attempt to remind himself that she was off-limits.

  Then it hit him. Hard. He wanted her. Without any trouble whatsoever, he could envision her in his arms…and his bed. It was so easy to imagine her smiling up at him….

  A cold sweat broke out on his brow. He rubbed his eyes to dispel the image of Lorraine in his bed while he struggled to breathe evenly. He instructed himself to remember the nameless woman in Belize and Catherina Efrain, a woman he’d had a brief fling with a year or two earlier. He’d met her when she was on vacation in Campeche and was later surprised to learn she worked for the Mexican government. Thinking about Catherina helped—but not enough.

  Being stuck with Lorraine in the close confines of the boat wasn’t going to make things any more tolerable. Jack had to forcefully—and repeatedly—remind himself of something that, until now, had been instinctive.

  Lorraine was hands-off.

  Squinting and muttering, she swept her shampoo-coated hair away from her face and glared in his direction. The effect was somewhat undermined by the rapid blinking of one eye. “There aren’t any piranhas here, are there?” she demanded.

  She stretched out her arm, groping for a towel. Apparently she’d brought it from belowdecks before she entered the water.

  “How’d you guess?” he returned, his voice rough. Whatever wit he’d once possessed had vanished while he struggled to disguise the effect she’d had on him.

  “Oh-h-h,” she groaned, stumbling blindly around.

  He couldn’t figure out what she was doing. It took all his self-control not to stare openmouthed while she paraded half-nude in front of him. He finally realized she was searching for a bucket. Now that she’d found one, she leaned over the gunwale, presenting him with yet another blood-stirring view….

  Jack slammed his eyes shut while she lowered the bucket over the side, then opened them just in time to watch her pour the water directly over her head. Lather and suds cascaded down her body.

  “I hope you’re happy,” she shrieked. She reached for the towel, burying her face in it.

  “Ecstatic.”

  Furious, she whirled around and in her rush stubbed her toe. She gasped in pain, then grabbed her foot, hopping madly around on the other. “Darn, darn, darn!” she cried between small intermittent groans.

  “Darn?” Jack couldn’t believe his ears.

  “What’s wrong with darn?” She scowled at him as if he’d purposely dropped an anvil on her precious foot.

  “You stubbed your toe, right?”

  She nodded, biting down on her lower lip. She leaned against the side of the boat and carefully examined her big toe for damage.

  “Darn’s the best you can do?”

  She looked up at him, her eyes questioning. “Do?”

  “That’s your strongest swearword?”

  She frowned at him.

  “Sweetheart, I’m gonna have to give you lessons.”

  “I don’t need you to teach me anything,” she said furiously.

  “Darn?” He didn’t know why he found this so hilarious. Probably because he needed something to take his mind off how incredibly sexy she looked. She continued to frown at him. The longer she frowned, the more amused he became.

  His laugh began as a small sarcastic chuckle.

  Lorraine’s eyes narrowed with outrage. “You’re extremely rude, do you know that?”

  He laughed harder. “Darn?”

  “In fact, you’re impossible.” She wrapped the towel around her waist and walked away from him.

  “Don’t worry, I’m a good teacher,” he called after her. “We’ll start off with the basic four-letter words, then work our way up to the more complicated phrases. By the time you’re back in the States, I’ll have you saying things that would make a longshoreman blush.”

  “I hope you enjoy making fun of me.”

  “More than you’ll ever know.” Still grinning, he wiped the mirth from his face. His reaction was way out of proportion, but it was either laugh or risk kissing her—which was the one thing he couldn’t do.

  Lorraine paused and glanced at him over her shoulder, then sadly shook her head and disappeared belowdecks.

  Jack heard her rummaging around. Thinking he’d made a narrow escape, he settled down in his chair and congratulated himself on his restraint.

  Lorraine didn’t understand Jack Keller. Furthermore, she had no intention of trying. As far as she was concerned, he was a Neanderthal. She waited until her underwear was almost dry before she put her linen suit back on. Then she ran a comb through her tangled hair, wincing as she encountered one snarl after another. The man was impossible. Impossible! He’d purposely terrified her with that comment about piranhas. Like an idiot, she’d believed him.

  Apparently just scaring her wasn’t enough. He’d taken great delight in ridiculing her, as well. And then offering to teach her to swear! Her mother had claimed swearing was the sign of a poor vocabulary; Lorraine herself considered it in bad taste.

  The way he’d laughed made her clench her hands and yank the comb hard, bringing tears to her eyes. Just when she was beginning to have kind thoughts about him, too. Still, she had to admit she didn’t know what would’ve happened if he hadn’t intervened with that horrible man. He’d helped her even knowing she’d taken his money.

  Jack, being Jack, had made sure she knew that he knew what she’d done. But he hadn’t gone on and on about it. She almost wished he had; it would make hating him easier.

  One moment she was feeling warm and generous toward him, the next she felt outraged by his obnoxious behavior. The man was puzzling, and her reactions to him equally so. She hated him, despised him, and yet she’d deliberately flaunted herself in front of him, making sure he got a good look at her body. Her skin went hot, then cold, as she owned up to the truth of what she’d done. She’d actually wanted him to kiss her. Touch her. She disapproved of flirting with a man this way, and it really wasn’t like her. While she wasn’t married as he believed, she was engaged and she owed her loyalty to her fiancé. Lorraine didn’t understand her own behavior any more than she understood Jack’s. Perhaps it had something to do with what had happened back at the cantina. He’d saved her in a situation that might have been life or death. A shiver ran down her spine whenever she thought about it.

  Had she been able to find a means of making herself comfortable, Lorraine would have remained below. Spending any additional time in Jack’s company was too risky, in too many ways. But once she’d gathered her courage, she climbed back to the main de
ck to discover Jack poring over sea charts by the light of a gas lantern.

  “Where are we headed next?” she asked.

  “Pucuro.”

  Lorraine glanced down at the table, hoping to find the place Jack had mentioned.

  “Here,” he said, pointing his finger at the notation on the map. “We need supplies. Remember?”

  Seeing that he’d already purchased supplies twice, this probably wasn’t a good time to complain that he never consulted her regarding their plans. If it hadn’t been for his rather unappetizing leftover fish and the plate of food he’d brought on board in La Ruta Maya, they’d be starving by now.

  “We’ll leave at first light and reach Pucuro around noon tomorrow. I need your word of honor that you’ll do exactly as I say when we get there. I want you to stay out of sight this time.”

  “All right.”

  “I’m serious, Lorraine. I can’t have you sneaking off again. Not in Pucuro.”

  “I already gave you my word. What more do you want?”

  “I want you to spell it out.”

  He sounded as if he distrusted her, which offended Lorraine—but then again, she’d given him ample cause. Speaking slowly and clearly, she said, “I promise I will stay belowdecks. I will not come up until you tell me the coast is clear.” Literally, she thought. For the first time in her life, that expression described the actual truth.

  “Pucuro isn’t like La Ruta Maya. I’ve been there once before and…” He paused, leaving the remainder unsaid.

  “And?” she urged, wanting him to continue. She needed to know what they were getting themselves into.

  He shook his head. “It’s dangerous there. Pucuro is the last place I’d normally take a woman,” he said, “but we don’t have any choice. We need to stop somewhere, and soon.” He sounded none too pleased by that fact.

  “How long will it take you to get what we need?” she asked.

  “Half an hour, tops,” he replied, then tagged on a question of his own. “Have you ever fired a weapon?”

  Her breathing went shallow at the thought. “You mean…a gun? No, never.”

  His response was an irritated sigh.

  “There’s no need to get mad about it. I’ve never even held a gun.”

  “That’s what I was afraid of.”

  “I have no desire to learn, either.”

  Jack’s eyes were cold and serious. “You’re going to have to learn.”

  “This is a joke, right?”

  “I might make light of a great many things, but I don’t joke about guns.”

  He hurried belowdecks, returning a moment later with a small gun. “This is an automatic Glock .22. You might need to defend yourself when we’re in Pucuro. I want to step off this boat knowing that if anything goes wrong, you can take care of yourself. Understand? When we finish with that, I’ll show you how to run the boat on your own.”

  “You’re overreacting,” she said stiffly. “First, I don’t need a gun to defend myself, and second—”

  “You need the gun.” His voice left no room for argument.

  “Jack, this is ridiculous!”

  “You’re going to learn how to fire this weapon, and that’s all there is to it.”

  “Fine,” she said, looking down at it distastefully.

  Under protest, she listened as he explained the inner workings of the gun. When he’d done that, he demonstrated how to load the thing. Then he expected her to do it herself.

  Lorraine finally complied, but not happily. He ignored her complaints, making her repeat the procedure until he was satisfied that she’d learned what he wanted her to know.

  “Next I want you to fire it.”

  “No way!” The idea of actually shooting was repugnant to her. Besides, she didn’t even have a target to aim for.

  “Raine, this isn’t open for discussion.”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake,” she muttered. She stepped back and waited for him to reveal the finer techniques of handling a gun.

  “Hold it,” he insisted.

  “I already did.”

  His jaw tightened and, sighing heavily, she reached for the weapon.

  “I want you to get the feel of it,” he explained. “Balance it in your hands, get accustomed to the weight of it.”

  “I did that earlier.” She hadn’t, not really. She wasn’t usually so disagreeable, but Jack seemed to bring out the worst in her. The fact that he was standing this close bothered her, too. Her heart beat a loud thudding tattoo; she was sure he could hear it. And she was so hot. Even with her hair piled on top of her head, sweat trickled down the back of her neck. Jack was sweating, too. His skin glistened with it in the moonlight. She found him far more provocative than she wanted. Now that he’d shaved she recognized that he was far too attractive for his own good—or hers.

  “You ready to fire?” he snapped, cutting off her musings.

  “Oh, all right, if it’ll make you happy.” She stretched out both arms and took aim at the dark ocean.

  Jack moved directly behind her. His arms came around hers and his hands supported her wrists. Lorraine drew in a deep breath at the way her body reacted. For one mad second she actually forgot about the gun in her hand. Instead, she felt the warmth of his body against hers, his taut muscles and solid strength. She had to struggle to pay attention to what he was saying. He seemed to be losing patience with her, because his directions became clipped and short.

  “Now,” he said, “pull the trigger.”

  Lorraine gently squeezed.

  Nothing happened.

  “Harder,” he said close to her ear. Too close.

  She shut her eyes and squeezed the trigger again.

  “Keep your eyes open,” he barked.

  She opened them at precisely the moment the automatic fired. Lorraine reeled with the unexpected force of the discharge. She might have toppled if not for Jack, who stopped her fall. His hands caught her sides, shockingly close to her breasts—and lingered far longer than necessary.

  “I…I did it,” she announced breathlessly. She cleared her throat and spoke again. “That wasn’t so bad.”

  “Do you want to fire it once more just to be sure you’re comfortable with it?” Jack didn’t sound like himself, either.

  “No…I’ve got the hang of it.”

  “You’re positive?”

  Lorraine nodded and had the inexplicable feeling that she’d had more than one lucky escape.

  It was almost noon the next day when they approached Pucuro. Jack ordered Lorraine belowdecks long before they reached the harbor. He didn’t want to take the slightest chance of anyone’s seeing her. He hadn’t come right out and said it, but Pucuro was full of cutthroats and thieves. However, it was either stop here or waste another day searching for some other little out-of-the-way port.

  “Jack?” Lorraine stood on the steps below, the wind tousling her hair. Jack was hard-pressed to remember any woman looking more beautiful than she did right then.

  “What?” He made himself sound short-tempered.

  “Would it be possible…for you to pick me up a few clothes while you’re in town?”

  “Any particular color?”

  “Yellow’s my favorite.”

  “I’ll do what I can.”

  “Thank you.” She disappeared, closing the door behind her.

  Jack maneuvered the boat toward the docks, which were old and ramshackle. A number of small boats were tied up there. He noticed a couple of disreputable-looking young men who studied him as though trying to estimate how easy it would be to take him on. Jack met their stares until both glanced away. An edgy feeling came over him as they hurriedly left.

  With no one in the vicinity to hear, Jack knocked lightly on the bulkhead and told Lorraine, “I’m going now.”

  “Be quick, okay?”

  “Like I said, I shouldn’t be more than thirty minutes.” He was well aware how uncomfortable it was for her belowdecks. Soon it would be stifling.

  He
was about to leave, then decided to give her one last warning. “You need to be quiet.”

  “I know that. Just go, okay?”

  He hesitated. The feeling was back, and experience had taught him not to ignore his gut. Unfortunately he had to go into town; there were few other alternatives. It’d been many hours since they’d eaten and they couldn’t go much longer without supplies.

  “Is something wrong?” Lorraine’s loud whisper came up from below.

  “Not a thing. Just sit tight.” He didn’t like leaving her, but he had no choice. “One final reminder. Don’t fire the gun unless it’s absolutely necessary. Understand?” The last thing he needed was her using it as a signal to remind him to pick up coffee.

  When he’d jumped onto the wharf, Jack had to watch where he stepped. The wood had rotted in quite a few places. As quickly as he could, he headed in the direction of the town’s only store. Supplies were outrageously priced, but for once Jack wasn’t going to quibble. He wanted in and out of Pucuro, no questions asked.

  It went without saying that he wasn’t fond of the town. His first and only visit to Pucuro, a number of years ago, had nearly gotten him killed. He’d been part of Deliverance Company, and Murphy had sent him on a fact-finding mission. Fool that he was, Jack had gotten the information he needed, then lingered in the cantina. That had been his first mistake.

  He’d decided to stay for a glass of beer when he noticed a woman across the room. The look she gave him wasn’t unfamiliar. She was interested and frankly, after several months of celibacy, so was he. Cain had insisted that when his men were on a mission, they keep their pants zipped. Only Cain wasn’t in charge anymore, Murphy was. Jack had made a classic mistake. He’d gone home with the pretty señorita.

  Not until it was too late did he realize he’d walked into a trap.

  Jack shook his head, hoping to rid himself of the memory, although he carried the scars of that mistake on his body. By the time Deliverance Company found him, he was half-dead. The half that was still alive wasn’t pleased.

  Now he kept his eyes focused straight ahead, talked to no one and hurried down the dirt road to the store. He finished buying his supplies in record time and paid an exorbitant amount to make sure they were immediately loaded onto the boat. That done, he walked into town to visit the open-air market. Instead of purchasing clothes that were expressly female, he bought a couple of shirts and a pair of cotton pants. He had to guess at size.