Siren's Treasure

She’d thought they really had something, until Shelly and her fiancé, Tillman, became a couple. Their trust and acceptance of one another had been a revelation. Jet realized that all along she’d wanted something Perry was incapable of giving—love.

She got out of her truck, hardly noticing the rain pelting her body as she strode to the door and rapped loudly. Deep inside came the muffled sound of a television. The volume lowered and footsteps approached. The door creaked open and there Perry stood.

White teeth flashed as he gave an easy grin, leaned his tall, sculpted body against the doorframe and crossed his arms. Jet reluctantly drank in the familiar image. Being near her former lover, with all their physical history, churned up memories and feelings she’d rather forget.

Don’t even think about it. Jet lifted her chin and met his amused smile. Conceited ass. Perry’s shoulder-length brown hair curled in waves, while a faint bit of stubble lined his jaw.

He gave a slow, knowing wink. “You are as beautiful as ever.”

“Prison seems to have suited you,” Jet snapped.

Perry’s smile didn’t falter. “Direct as always.”

“Aren’t you going to ask me in? I’m getting soaked out here, in case you haven’t noticed.”

“Since when has water ever bothered you? I remember you love rain.” He stepped aside and waved an arm. “But do come in,” he added, as if offering the keys to the palace.

She swept past, careful not to brush against him. Still, she caught a whiff of his designer aftershave, which smelled of male skin warmed by the sun. Unable to pronounce the Italian product’s name, Jet had dubbed it Aqua de Sexy. It tugged at memories of them together, her face pressed against his chest.

But the memory didn’t devastate her as she expected. Instead, Jet recalled Landry Fields’s soapy after-shower scent: simple, unpretentious and casually masculine. No use dwelling on that. Fields was not potential boyfriend material. Besides, getting seriously involved with anyone would mean again confiding that she was a mermaid, which compounded the risk of their secret race being exposed to scrutiny.

Jet drew a deep breath. “I’ve just come from the IRS office. The auditor asked all kinds of questions about my investments with Gulf Coast Treasures and Salvage.”

Perry shrugged.

“Has anyone from the IRS contacted you?”

“Nope. The only good thing about prison is that there’s no paperwork to file. I haven’t had an income to report in years, so there’s nothing they could question me about.”

“You were sentenced to ten years. Why did you get released early?”

“Good behavior.” He lowered his chin and waggled his eyebrows. “You know how good I can be.”

He crossed the distance between them, but Jet turned away and walked to the window. She was too unnerved to handle the closeness. “How well do you know the owners of that company?”

He scowled. “Who said I knew them?”

“You did. When we first started selling stuff we pulled from the ocean, you claimed to know a company willing to accept our merchandise with no questions asked.”

“I heard about them from other divers and met up with a couple of them a time or two.” Perry laid his hands on her shoulders and guided her toward him.

Jet clenched her jaw, willed her body not to respond to the steady pressure of his palms.

“We have far more interesting things—” he gave a smoldering once-over gaze from the top of her body to the bottom “—to discuss.”

“Like how you tried to screw me over three years ago?”

He ran a hand through his long brown locks. “Yeah, that.”

Jet shook off his hands and paced. The cottage was sparsely furnished, like most rentals, but clean despite a dirty dish on the kitchen table and a newspaper spread out on a coffee table.

“I only told the police you were a mermaid to protect you.”

Jet stopped in her tracks. Somehow, he always managed to catch her off guard, like he had since they met five years ago. He’d reeled her in like a dumb, hungry fish. She’d been so lonely, so damned grateful he accepted her shape-shifting body. And when Perry went away, Jet was left gasping and flailing on land, like the same stupid fish she’d been all along.

Her jaw dropped and she snorted in disbelief. “You did it to protect me?”

Perry clasped her arms in one swift movement, his eyes a mask of concern. “I knew if I didn’t piss you off, you’d stay with me out of stubbornness. No sense both of us going to jail.”

She found herself drawn into an embrace. “Stop it.” She pulled away and inhaled deeply. “If I’d been captured and interrogated, my fate would have been far worse than your jail time.”

“Nobody would have believed me.”

“Not at first. No. But if they probed enough, saw holes in our story of how we accidentally found treasure, ran background checks on our enterprises...”

“I wouldn’t have told them anything else,” Perry insisted.

“And what if I’d gotten sick and they had a doctor find freaky things in my medical tests? Or what if the police had thrown me into the sea to test if I changed? You didn’t put only me in jeopardy. You put my entire race at risk of exposure.”

He gave a disarming grin. “Ah, come on, sweetie. Don’t get melodramatic on me now.”

Of all the nerve. “You really are a son of a bitch, you know that? You knew about my nightmare.”

His brow crinkled, then cleared. “The aquarium thing?”

Jet dug her nails into her fists, concentrated on the painful half-moon indentations in her fleshy palm, recalling one of the few times she’d shown her vulnerability to Perry. She’d awakened one night from that recurring nightmare, gasping for air, and spilled all about it. “Yeah, that thing,” she snapped.

“Never going to happen. But if it does—” he flashed a grin “—I’ll rescue you like a knight in shining armor.”

Right. Perry would be a hero only if it suited his own purposes. Jet sucked in the pheromone-filled air of the tiny room. The man grinned so confidently, as if the past three years had never happened. As if he’d been some noble person when he’d ratted her out.

“Why are you here?” she asked.

“Why wouldn’t I come back?” He ran a hand down her hair and neck, pausing slightly as his fingers brushed the trace of her gills. “I missed you.” His lips brushed her forehead. “Missed this.” His lips dropped to her mouth.

Jet gasped as Perry’s hands cupped her ass and drew her against his body. It would be so easy to surrender, enjoy the moment before—

“No.” Jet tore away and drew in a few ragged breaths, unexpectedly grateful for the IRS meeting earlier. Landry Fields’s questions served to make her more wary of Perry’s lies and manipulation. “I need to set you straight on a few things.”

Perry scowled and flung himself onto the sofa. “I explained why I told the police you were a mermaid. What else do you expect me to say?”

“For starters, how come I didn’t hear from you the whole time you were locked up?”

“They wouldn’t let me post mail.”

“Bull. And you’ve been out for weeks before showing up here.”

Perry narrowed his eyes. “How do you know when I was released?”

“You don’t know?” No reason not to tell him. “The deputy sheriff, Carl Dismukes, told me. You remember him.”

Perry slapped his palm to his forehead. “Of course, the crooked cop. But how did he know I got out?”

“I’m not sure. Maybe because your last driver’s license listed you as living here in the bayou and they notify law enforcement when an ex-felon is released.”

“Well, we aren’t paying him shit anymore. He had a lot of nerve, blackmailing us for his silence. I don’t know how he figured out what we were doing.”

Jet bit her tongue. Dismukes might be despicable, but distant merblood ran in his veins, and she wouldn’t betray his secret to a human. The deputy knew everything that happened on land and guessed a great deal about what happened undersea.

Perry narrowed his eyes. “Do you hear me? Dismukes gets nothing.”

“Obviously. There won’t be anything to split. You and I are history.”

“Come on, baby.” His voice grew husky. “Let’s do one more job together. Give me a chance to prove I love you.”

Her stomach clenched in response to Perry’s gruff, low tone and his familiar declaration of love. Stay strong. “After what you’ve pulled, I’d be crazy to do it.”

“I told you, babe! I honestly thought it was the only way to get you to jump ship and save yourself.”

Liar. Could he learn to love someone other than himself? Her thoughts shifted from Perry’s dark brown eyes to the ice-blue eyes of the IRS agent. Those penetrating, no-bullshit eyes that cut through her defenses. Landry Fields would burn through Perry’s charming facade like dry ice on tender skin. Too bad her eyes didn’t have a similar effect on Perry.

And why was she thinking of Landry Fields anyway?

“Please, Jet,” Perry wheedled in that tone he used when he wanted something. “One last big haul to help me get back on my feet.”

Her mouth widened in surprise. “What do you mean? You should have plenty of money socked away from all we’ve collected.”

He hung his head. “I, um, had lots of lawyer bills and stuff.”

“What about your fancy Mercedes-Benz? Your jewelry?”

“Gone.” His face tightened. “I bought everything on credit and when I got thrown in the slammer, everything went to shit with my finances. All that stuff got repossessed.”

Jet gave a low whistle. This was the real reason Perry had returned, of course. The guy was broke and needed her. Angry as she was, Jet couldn’t help feeling a little sorry for him. “Maybe there is some way I can help,” she answered evasively. Perhaps she could buy him off and get him to leave her alone. “What did you have in mind?”

He brightened and Jet tried to ignore the gleam of triumph in his chocolate-brown eyes.

“There’s a site with a huge potential profit at Tybee Island, Georgia,” he answered promptly.

“Never heard of any shipwreck there.”

“It’s an old Spanish ship supposedly loaded with gold and silver colonial coins.”

Jet frowned. “Seems I would have heard about it. What’s the ship’s name? Do you have the cargo manifest?” It always amazed her that Perry got such great tips on treasure sites.

Perry waved a hand dismissively. “Leave all the research and details with me.”

“I’ll think about it.” Jet bolted for the door. She had to get out quick, before he suckered her into a commitment. That would be colossal stupidity on her part.

Perry overtook her and laid a hand on the door. “Don’t make me beg. All I’m asking for is one more job.”

Jet swallowed hard and stiffened her spine. He’d left her hanging for years with no word. She could make him wait a day or two. Let him be the one to sweat it out. She had to get out of the cottage and think over everything rationally. Despite the years of silence, Jet knew Perry wasn’t finished with her—she was much too valuable for him to completely abandon. Without her, he’d be back in the same boat he’d been in before they met, living a hand-to-mouth existence with the few treasures he could scavenge alone.

There must be some way to get Perry out of her life without agreeing to another treasure excavation. If she turned him down flat, there was no telling what he’d do for spite. “I said I’d think about it.” She yanked the doorknob, sending Perry stumbling back a few steps. “See you around.”

She stepped into the swirling rain and made her escape.

* * *

Jet was no fun anymore.

Perry kicked over the coffee table. She was playing a game. Trying to show who was boss, especially when he’d tried to stop her from leaving. Damn her abnormal mermaid strength.

But that freaky bitch still wanted him, would eventually cave in, and they could pick up where they’d left off.

Or maybe not. Sylvester Vargas claimed this Tybee Island thing was BIG. Enough money in it for all of them to live easy the rest of their lives. With enough dough, he’d move far away to someplace that didn’t stink of bilge and shucked oysters like this bayou.

And then he wouldn’t need Jet. At first, it had been fun, an ocean salvager’s dream come true. She knew where the nearest, best stuff lay on the ocean floor. And once he got over his initial revulsion about touching a mermaid creature, the sex had been great. But slowly, Jet had changed, had begun to stifle him like any other woman he’d slept with more than a few times.

That woman-animal-sideshow-thing believed she had the upper hand. But he was the one with the contacts to sell the shit.

The sharp trill of his cell phone went off and he glanced at the screen: Sylvester Vargas.

Damn. The timing couldn’t be worse.

“I see your girlfriend just left,” said a heavily accented Spanish voice. “When can we set the date?”

Wow. Are they watching everything I do? Perry cleared his throat. “She’s a little miffed at me right now. But she’ll come around,” he added quickly.

An ominous silence settled on the connection.

“I’m getting impatient.”

“Yes, sir.” He should have contacted Jet long before now but he’d had so much fun reacquainting himself with post-prison pleasures. The days had sped by with his indulgence of booze, women, gambling and partying.

“My company paid to get you out of that hellhole prison in South America. I’m beginning to think you’re stringing us along with your wild tales.”

“No, no. Not at all. Haven’t you checked out what I told you?”

“That’s the only reason I agreed to get you out of jail. I don’t believe in that mermaid shit, but I can’t deny how incredibly lucky you’ve been with sea finds. I contacted the managers of my salvage company you used as a front. They said you were their most reliable supplier.”

“Told you so.”

“No doubt something fishy is going on down there.” Sylvester barked out a laugh at his own pun.

“And don’t forget the police report.”

“All it stated was that a female went missing during the arrest and is presumed dead.”

“She jumped off the damn boat! That’s why she went missing.”

“From that I’m supposed to believe that your Jet grew a tail and swam hundreds of miles to some backwater Alabama bayou?”

Perry swallowed an angry retort. Sylvester was not a man to antagonize. He forced himself to speak with respect. “I need another week or so to convince Jet to go along with us.”

“You have until the end of this week. If she doesn’t agree by then, we’ll have to use force.”

Perry’s mouth went dry. He wasn’t sure if Sylvester was threatening him or Jet.

Or possibly both of them.

“Jet will come willingly. No need for force,” he said with false confidence.

But the line was dead.

* * *

The library was quiet and musty-smelling with an antiquated vibe only punctuated by the sparse number of elderly people at reading tables with magazines. All eyes turned to him. Landry gave a rusty smile that he suspected looked more like a grimace. Where was that woman? She’d entered ahead of him just minutes ago. Surprisingly, she had not stayed long at Hammonds’s rental.

“May I help you?” a middle-aged librarian asked, tilting her head slightly downward to examine him better with her bifocals.

“No, um...” He noticed the stairs to his right. She must have slipped up there. “I’m fine.”

The carpeted steps muffled the noise of his entrance. Despite the room’s small size, he couldn’t see her. But she was there. Ripples of energy stirred his senses, just like in the office earlier. Landry walked to the rows of bookshelves and spotted her running a finger over the spines of several titles. Time to up the pressure on Jet today and ask more direct questions.

“Find what you’re looking for?” His voice boomed like a firecracker in the muted space.

She jumped and nearly dropped a load of books cradled in one arm. “What are you doing here?” Dark eyes narrowed. “Are you following me?”

“Why would I do that?” He folded his arms and leaned against a shelf. “I mean, you’re not a criminal or anything.” Landry arched an eyebrow. “Are you?”

“Of course not.” Red flushed her pale cheeks. “What do you want from me?”

He wanted... Unbidden, he imagined the woman in his bed, naked skin against naked skin. Something about her stirred him deeply, in ways he didn’t understand. “Answers,” he said. “I want answers.”

“I’ll get those stupid papers to you.”

Landry leaned in close enough to read the book titles clutched against her like a shield—Treasure Hunting in the Gulf, Shipwrecks in the Panhandle, History of Tybee Island and— He snorted at the last title. “Little Women? Aren’t you a little old for that one?”

Her chin lifted an inch. “Never. It’s a wonderful book about family sticking together through hard times.”

“A fairy tale.”

“You’re a cynical man, Mr. Fields. Got family issues, huh?”

To put it mildly. His family was a disaster, had been since The Incident when he was five years old. Not that home had ever been exactly harmonious, but at least it had been stable up until that time. Landry pushed down the bitter taste of those childhood memories. “Doesn’t everyone have family issues?” he said with elaborate casualness. He didn’t talk about that past with anybody. No sense rehashing something he was powerless to change. All he could do now was try to prevent it from happening to anyone else.

The tight set to her lips relaxed a fraction. “I suppose you’re right, to some degree. But in the end, family’s all we have.”

Then I am so screwed. “I depend on myself and nobody else.”

“Guess you’re never disappointed, then.” She lifted a shoulder. “But it sounds a bit lonely if you ask me.”

“Hardly.” Landry stiffened. He had his share of women, had a few male acquaintances from work that he got together with for the occasional beer and football-game parties. Sure, a family would be nice, but you could live a perfectly fine life without them. He was proof of that.

“If you say so,” she said in a tone that conveyed she didn’t believe it.

Landry shook his head. Wait a minute. This conversation had taken a turn into the unexpected. He was supposed to shake her up, rattle her composure, not the other way around. He pointed at the book on shipwrecks. “You said you were through with the salvage business. But it looks like you’re still interested in treasure hunting.”

“It’s a hobby. You should get your head out of your ledgers and find one.” She turned and stormed toward the end of the aisle.

“A hobby?” He overtook her, blocking the exit. “So you didn’t meet with your ex-partner today after you left my office?”

She drew her breath in sharply. “How did you— You are following me.”

The flash of fear in her eyes made him want to pull her to him, to kiss her until she couldn’t even remember Perry Hammonds’s name, to protect her from her own dangerous impulses.

What was wrong with him? She crackled with spirit and a unique beauty that was downright unnerving. He’d never felt such a strong pull to a complete stranger. Especially a woman clearly on the wrong side of the law. But just how far had she gone? And was all that truly in her past?

Her eyes hardened. “Not that I have to explain anything to you, but my ex-partner is just that. An ex. I’m done with him.”

He wasn’t used to hostile female suspects. Most fell over themselves to be cooperative and friendly in the hopes of being left alone. Then again, Bosarge thought he was an IRS accountant.

Those people sure got no respect.

“I hope that’s the truth,” he said, meaning it. Bugged the hell out of him that he couldn’t pin Miss Jet Bosarge into his usual tidy categories of good or bad. He wanted to believe she had no involvement with a ruthless criminal like Vargas. But if she knew something, a cooperative informant in the investigation would be useful before the agency closed in.

“You don’t believe me,” she said flatly.

Landry shrugged. “Time will tell.”

“Look, whatever you may think of my past business dealings—”

A clamor erupted behind her and they both stared at the pile of books that had fallen and lay helter-skelter on the floor.

“I must have accidently knocked them off the shelf,” Jet said, forehead scrunching in confusion.

She bent down to pick them up at the same time he did, their hands touching as they picked up the fallen books. He glanced up, startled, and Jet’s face was mere inches from his own. He didn’t move—couldn’t if he wanted to anyway. Their breath joined and he felt absorbed in her impossibly dark, wide eyes. If he believed in magic—which he most certainly did not—he’d swear she was a witch casting a spell.

She broke contact first, swooping up the books and piling them haphazardly on the shelf. He stood, resisting the impulse to reshelf them in the correct Dewey decimal order. Keeping his own world in tight order was work enough. No need to take on librarian duties.

“As I was saying,” Jet said, standing with her arms crossed. “I’ve been out of that line of work for three years. Maritime salvage is a cutthroat business filled with lots of gray areas about what is and isn’t legal. I’m done with it. I’ve dabbled in a few other ventures since quitting and now I’m reopening my shop.”

Must be nice to dabble for years, courtesy of a wealthy family. He sure hadn’t had that luxury. Landry shoved the thought aside. It wasn’t her fault she’d been born into a family with advantages unimagined by his parents and siblings. Sometimes life just screwed you that way.

“Tell you what,” he said, as if coming to a quick decision. “I’ve got some photographs I want you to look at.”

Her brow wrinkled. “Right now?”

“Yes. While digging into your finances, my audit has broadened to other people and companies.”

She followed him to the unused computer in the corner and watched as he logged in and uploaded a photo from his personal email account. It wasn’t the greatest picture. Too bad he couldn’t display the mug shot on the FBI site. Landry scrutinized the photo along with Jet. Sylvester Vargas was standing with a group of men by the docks and wore a hat, but the lower half of his face was fairly visible. If she’d met him before, she’d recognize him in the photograph.

“This guy look familiar to you?”

She leaned in and he inhaled her scent—fresh and invigorating like cooling rain after a long drought. Except her closeness felt anything but cool. His gut clenched at the fierce stab of longing that washed through him.

“No,” she said, her breath sending tempting wisps of desire by his ear. Her arm brushed against his shirt, and even through the cotton fabric, heat spread over his entire body.

Landry fought not to squirm. If just being near her and not touching got him this aroused, what would it be like to have her in his arms? In his bed? He cleared his throat. “Are you sure?” Damn, his voice sounded husky and strained.

“I’m sure.”

He glanced up in quick surprise. She sounded out of breath.

Bosarge straightened and patted her black hair in place about her long, slender neck. Must be a nervous habit, because she did the same thing this morning when he questioned her.

So much for getting anywhere with a photo identification. Landry signed off the computer with a sigh and stood. He hadn’t gained a thing in this second meeting. All it had done was reemphasize the strange attraction to this woman. She met his gaze head-on, direct and unflinching.

“Your name matches your eye color,” he blurted. Hell, what a stupid remark.

“Really?” Her upper lip curled. “Thanks, I didn’t know that.”

Sarcastic witch. “Is that any way to talk to the man auditing your tax records?”

“It’s about as appropriate as a government employee commenting on my personal appearance.”