Blue Moon (32 page)

“Jeanne, if by some chance we don't get out of this . . .” Gabe stopped, as if foundering for words.

“God is with us, Gabe. Somehow He's—”

“I love you.”

Her words of assurance, words she needed to hear herself, fled her mind. “What?”

“I said
I love you
.”

Here she was, in danger of her life, and yet three little words had her heart doing backflips in her chest. Gabe loved her.

“Oh, spare me,” Remy groaned, before she could summon a reply.

“Put a plug in it, Prim,” Gabe shot back.

“Do you think that
you
are the only one who harbors feelings for Jeanne?” the professor challenged, emboldened by their circumstances.

Heavenly days, Ann and Mara were right!
Remy's confession shocked her obvious reply to Gabe from the tip of her tongue— that she loved him too. And she did. How and when it had come to this, she wasn't sure. Perhaps she was lost the first time she saw him, rising like a dark lord from the poker table at the cantina. She'd known even then that, against all logic, something about the man was irresistible. But she couldn't say it now.

“I love
both
of you.”

The men swung their heads her way.

Heavenly Father, not now.
“Remy, I adore you, you know I do. You're like fam—”

Goya reentered the galley, pocketing a gold coin that had been dropped during the looting, a pleased look on his drawn brown face.

“A job well done,
señores y señorita
. So much treasure . . .”

Jeanne gathered her nerve. “
Señor
Goya, you have no blood on your hands yet. It isn't too late to take the gold and spare us. Your revenge will give you no more peace than the hatred you've held all these years. It takes a courageous man to forgive.”

“Give it up, Jeanne. His likes wouldn't know courage if it bit him,” Gabe muttered.

“
Señorita
. . .” Goya leaned close to Jeanne's face, touched her, and sighed. “Perhaps I might take you with me . . . for pleasure.”

“No!”

“Absolutely not,” Remy added to Gabe's protest.

Jeanne shriveled under the Mexican's suggestive scrutiny. Suddenly, his squinted eyes slid to Gabe. “That would bother you, no, Gabriel?”

The answer in Gabe's eyes was murderous, but his voice was almost a whisper. “
Think
, Goya. Arnauld knows you were stalking us. Not even he will be an accomplice to murder.”

“Arnauld?” Jeanne echoed in astonishment. “He's involved?” So Gabe had been right all along. He hadn't been paranoid. The truth pricked at her conscience.

“Arnauld hired Goya to watch us,” Gabe informed her, “but when Pablo aced him legally, Arnauld gave it up.”

“And I signed his book,” Remy snorted in disgust. “The fraud.”

“But he knows about you, Goya,” Gabe said.

The scrawny man shrugged. “What do I care? I say that he hires me . . . and it is true. I am not as foolish as he thinks me to be. I have his voice on tape . . . everything. He will not say a word.”

One of the other men came down from the bridge, thick-bodied with a broad, low forehead and wide nose. “
Vamanos
, Raul. It is time.”

In his hand were two bundles of plastic, each with a timing device of some sort. At least that's what Jeanne assumed the wires were. She'd give anything if Tex had remained on board. Even if she could get loose, and she thought she could . . .

“Leave enough time for us to clear the reef.” He gave Gabe a humorless smile. “Although, thanks to our friends, the markers are back in place.” At Gabe's glower, he chuckled. “Only a little fun, no?”

“We laughed our heads off,” Gabe quipped dryly.

The man placed one of the charges in the kitchen sink and then headed forward with the other. When he came out, it was at a jog. “
Vamanos
, Raul,
vamanos
,” he ordered.

Jeanne thought Goya was leaving them when he turned way, but upon reaching the stairwell, he appeared to have a second thought. He spun on his heel and headed straight at Gabe, a small knife in hand.

“No, don't—” Before she could finish, the madman slashed Gabe across the cheek.

“
Adios, amigo
,” Goya said, wiping the blade on his white pants as he turned and sprinted up the steps.

“Gabe . . .” Jeanne's stomach curdled at the sigh of blood seeping from the gash on Gabe's jaw.

“Barbarian!” Remy shouted after him. “A cowardly one at that!”

Without so much as a glance for her compassion, Gabe began to scoot away from Remy. “Come on, Prim, work with me. I need to let Nemo out.”

“The dog?” Remy was stupefied. “You want to let that worthless dog out?”

“To fetch my knife,” Gabe snapped at the man. “Now, move.”

Remy fell in, grunting and complaining with each scoot. “Some fix . . . we're . . . in.”

Jeanne focused on relaxing, not an easy task given they were about to blow to bits at any second. And why didn't she hear ticking. “Don't bombs usually tick?”

“Remote,” was all Gabe managed in explanation.

As the men reached the hall, the gun of engines outside heralded the exit of the their prospective murderers.

“Now lean forward, Prim, as far as you can so that I can ease back and get my feet up to the handle.”

“If that dog fetches a knife, I shall personally buy him a prime filet,” Remy gasped, following directions.

It had been years since Jeanne had done the Houdini act that had often enabled her to escape from her brothers' games of cowboy and Indian. Being the youngest, she'd always been the Indian by default. It required extending her arms fully and scrunching up her body so that she could pull her bound hands beneath her bottom and over her feet just . . . like . . .

Except she'd been shorter of limb then. The length of her legs gave her trouble. She contorted her bare feet in ways they were not designed to go, but by the time Nemo bounded out of the bathroom, right over Gabe and Remy, she was working on the duct tape with her teeth.

“Nemo, fetch the knife, boy,” Gabe called after the dog, as he shot up to the deck, barking ferociously.

“Wonderful,” Remy drawled. “He's let them know he's escaped.”

“Something tells me they won't come back to see.” Gabe raised his voice. “Nemo! Fetch . . . play fetch!”

Remy dropped his head to his chest in exasperation. “Something tells me he can't carry a knife and bark at our retreating murderers at the same time.”

“Why didn't they duct tape your mouth?” Gabe lamented in exasperation.

Fortunately the thugs hadn't done a seamless wrap. The twisted, wadded tape made it easier for Jeanne to unwrap. There was one layer left when the barking stopped. Just as Nemo descended the step with the large sports knife in his mouth, Jeanne pulled the last of the tape away.

“Here, Nemo,” she called out, extending her hand for the blade at the same time that Gabe hailed the animal.

“Nemo, here boy.”

The dog paused, confused. Jeanne scooted across the short distance and retrieved the knife. “Thank you, Jesus, and Nemo.”

“How did you—” Gabe stared, incredulous, as she cut through the duct tape binding her ankles.

“Tell you later.” She made short work of setting Gabe and Remy free, praying the whole time.
Father, just give us a little time. Just a
little more . . .

“We could toss the bombs over the side,” Remy suggested.

Gabe grabbed Jeanne and hauled her toward the companionway. “No time, Prim. Move it. Come on, Nemo.”

Jeanne reached back for Remy, who clearly preferred the alternative of tossing the bombs over the side. “Remy, hurry. There are two bombs at opposite ends of the vessel,” she reminded him.

Gabe practically pulled her off her feet as he dragged her across the bridge to the side rail. “Over you go,
now
!”

It was hardly the most graceful water landing she'd ever made. She came up in time to see Gabe toss Nemo over the side.

“Come on, Prim!” With that, Gabe leapt into the water a few feet away.

Jeanne started swimming away from the boat for all she was worth. Her jog suit slowed her down, but she kept on, stroke after stroke. Suddenly, it felt as if the world exploded, driving her under the water. Or had someone shoved her under . . . someone with a fist of concrete? Dazed, she struggled with the current, air burning in her lungs, air she dared not let go . . . not yet. Not yet.

CHAPTER THIRTY

Gabe crawled up on the beach, dragging Jeanne by the hood of her jacket. Although disoriented, she'd managed to keep her head above water as they'd shot over the reef and made their way toward landfall a few hundred yards away. Now, beaten by the surf and slashed by the coral, he fell onto the sand just beyond the tidal wash and with his last ounce of strength, drew Jeanne to his side.

“Made it, sweet.” He didn't know which burned the most, his limbs or lungs.

Jeanne laid her head against his arm. “R-Remy?”

Prim had just emerged on the bridge when Gabe dove into the water. As he came up for air, the whole sky lit up. He honestly didn't know if Prim had made it to the water. And there hadn't been time to look for him—or Nemo, for that matter.

“Don't know.” His arm felt like lead as he dropped it over her shoulder. “Don't know.”

All he knew was that Jeanne was safe, here at his side. God forgive him for the relief he felt, but one man couldn't save everyone.
God, Prim is in Your hands. I pray for his safety.

A sob shook Jeanne, tearing from her throat. “It's all my f-fault.”

Gabe had no idea what she was talking about. It took a considerable effort to even think about it. What he did know was that they couldn't remain here at the water's edge. If Goya thought they survived, he'd come looking for them.

Give me strength.

Gabe drew his knees up beneath him, knees that obeyed his mental command to rise as if they belonged to someone else, someone reluctant to abandon the rest.

“Get up, sweet. We have to hide in the brush.”

He ran his hand over her forehead, brushing wet hair away from it. At the contact with something warm and wet, alarm penetrated his fatigue. Drawing his fingers away, he examined them in the whitewash of moonlight.

Blood. Not a lot, he reassured himself, checking once more.

She must have been struck by debris from the explosion. “Jeanne, do you know who I am?”

Her body trembling from the cold and emotion tearing at her, she looked at him as if he was the one who'd been knocked in the head. “Gabe.”

“Where are we?”

She glanced around. “I don't know . . . the beach?” Her expression firmed with consternation. “I'd rather know where Remy is.”

Gabe pulled her hood up over her head and tightened the elastic drawstring. “Something struck you in the head. You're bleeding a bit. Maybe this will take care of it until . . .” Until what? Until morning when the others arrived? “Come on, sweet. Get up.”

“Did you see him?” she asked, battling weariness to get to her feet with Gabe's help.

“He was topside when I dove over the side. That was the last I saw of him.”

Her face contorted in anguish, one that ripped at Gabe's heart. “It's my fault. I should have t-told Blaine.”

Gabe ushered her toward a stand of low growing shrub. “Your brother couldn't have done a thing to prevent this.”

Winter nights on the Yucatán could be brutal when one was wet and exposed. A drop in temperature to the fifties or sixties could feel like freezing.

“We could have had a—a guard boat assigned.”

“Then blame me. I'm the one who wanted to avoid the publicity hounds that would have accompanied it.” And in his effort to maintain secrecy, he'd left them wide open to the very villains he'd suspected were lurking about. Although not even he suspected the likes of Goya was out there. “But looking for fault won't help us now. Didn't someone in the Bible turn to salt for looking back? Isn't it against the rules?”

She almost smiled. The corners of her lips twitched. “Lot's wife.”

“Well, if the Lord's turning us to salt, He's starting from the inside out. I feel like my tongue has been pickled.”

He could drink a keg of water then and there. Gabe wondered if there was a cenote on the island. The Yucatán was well-known for the freshwater wells formed by sinkholes in the limestone-based landscape.

“I didn't tell Blaine because I wanted this to be
my
project, not my big brothers'.” Jeanne heaved a shaky sigh. “I feel so selfish.”

Gabe gathered her to him, wishing he could surround her with his body warmth . . . with his love. His heart felt like the rope in a tug-of-war, torn between searching for Remy and Nemo, and taking care of Jeanne. And he would look, once he was sure that she was okay.