Deadly Gift

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Epilogue

Narragansett Bay, Rhode Island

T
he sea was a beautiful thing, and being on the water was absolute heaven.

Eddie Ray felt the air on his cheeks and knew that they would be turning red soon with windburn. It was a winter’s day, but off the coast of Newport, Rhode Island, the seas were deceptively serene. He loved the sea in winter, with its changeable moods. He wasn’t a fool. He didn’t intentionally run out into dangerous storms, but he’d brought more than one boat through a heaving nor’easter, and he loved the churning waves, the wind, and even the cold that came with the driving rain and stole into a man’s bones.

But today was sweet! Crisp, cool air, the temperature hovering near forty degrees. A soft breeze, just enough to fill his sails and power the
Sea Maiden,
who rode the water as if she floated on air. She was his favorite of all their boats. He even had her name tattooed on his arm.

He hadn’t needed to take the
Sea Maiden,
of course. She was a sixty-footer, and none of those nouveau riche boys who earned their money in the city and came to Rhode Island to flaunt it would have taken her out for one passenger.

One strange passenger.

Eddie sat at the helm and glanced around. He had taken the man on at twelve o’clock sharp, just as the guy had asked, and they were going to be back at the marina by two-thirty, because his partner Sean and his wife would be heading out at four to Ireland, and Eddie intended to be there for the send-off. It was a big deal; Sean hadn’t been back to the country in which he’d been born for years.

And not since his honeymoon to the Caribbean had he been on a trip with Amanda.

The new wife. The “trophy” wife, as Kat, Sean’s daughter, called her. Well, if a man was going to marry a woman less than half his age, he had to expect some backlash. Then again, Sean O’Riley had always reminded Eddie of an old-fashioned kind of pirate. Not a real pirate. The kind in the movies. Captain Blood. Heroic, bold and determined. Sean would manage to keep peace in his own house by facing it the same way he faced the wind: legs firmly spread on the deck for balance, hands on his hips.

Kat was off chasing her music career most of the time these days. She was good, and they were all as proud as they could be. But Sean wasn’t good at living on his own. He needed someone else around the place, preferably a woman to take care of all the details he had no interest in handling himself. Kat’s mother had died long ago, and now that Kat wasn’t around, Sean needed company. Company other than his old maiden aunt, as sweet a woman as Bridey might be. Company other than Clara and Tom, who looked after the big old house. Marni, who was married to Cal, their newest and youngest partner, was always willing to play hostess when Sean needed to entertain for business, but Sean had needed more than that, ergo Amanda.

Whatever made Sean happy was, in Eddie’s mind, good. And if Amanda made Sean happy, then Eddie was happy—though, God knew, he couldn’t figure out
why
she was enough for Sean. He’d finally decided she must be a dynamo in bed, because she didn’t have the brains of a clam, and she barely pretended to be nice to Kat, who was the light of Sean’s life. But Sean was his best friend, as well as his partner. They’d traveled life’s seas together, the rough and the calm, the good and bad, the happy and the tragic. So if Sean was enjoying this particular voyage, then Eddie was glad for him.

This Christmas, though, Eddie had already arranged to give Sean the one thing he’d been hunting for as long as he could remember.

They had read all the books, reliving history from before the Revolution, looking for clues, all the while building up their charter business together, and on top of that, Sean had fought to keep up the big old house his grandfather had built.

Eddie smiled suddenly. Yes, they were friends.

And he was pleased, pleased as all get-out, to think that he’d gotten the best Christmas gift in the world for Sean.

But for the moment…

He was happy to bask in that knowledge and wait for the holiday, only a few weeks away now.

For now, he was glad he’d accepted this charter, even if his passenger was more than a bit strange, all muffled up in a huge sweater, and wearing a trench coat that looked like it was at least one size too big. John Alden, he’d said his name was, without so much as a smile. It was certainly a damned good name for a New Englander, and Eddie wondered if the guy was descended from his Pilgrim namesake. You certainly wouldn’t think so from his appearance. Short, with a funny mustache, oversized heavy-framed glasses and a husky way of talking, he reminded Eddie of a terrier. The kind of feisty little dog that wouldn’t accept the limits of its own size and would challenge a mastiff. But the terrier’s money was as good as anyone’s, and Alden had wanted a two-hour cruise around the little islands out past the sound and into the bay. No problem.

Eddie knew those islands like the back of his hand.

Knew the secrets of those islands.

He wondered if this strange little man knew anything of the history. If he was familiar with any of the old Rhode Island tales of daring revolutionaries.

He certainly didn’t seem to know much about sailboats. You chartered a boat like the
Sea Maiden
because she was a beauty, because she was sleek, because you could unfurl her sails on a day like today, with this gorgeous breeze, and fly.

And what the hell had this guy wanted?

For Eddie to drop the sails and run the motor.

Oh, well. It took all kinds to make the world.

Eddie glanced at his watch. He’d been cruising slowly around the islands for a while now, and it was time to get back. He meant to see Sean off and enjoy the party. Kat was already home, in preparation for Christmas. It was sweet to imagine her pleasure when she saw the gift he had for Sean come Christmas. Kat would play the piano and sing the traditional Christmas songs, along with some she’d written herself. They would all join in, him with his worse-for-wear baritone and Sean with his tenor. And Bridey, despite her age, with her clear soprano. They would make hot Irish coffee, slathered with whipped cream, and Sean and Amanda-the-trophy-wife would regale them all with tales of their trip to Ireland.

But first he had to get back for the big send-off party.

Where had his passenger gotten to? Eddie figured he would just start back, since the guy must have gone forward for the view and the helm was aft. The guy wasn’t in the cabin, that much he knew, because he’d locked the forward hatch. He might have taken the
Sea Maiden
out by himself, but he wasn’t a fool. No stranger was getting into the cabin by himself. There were too many official papers and personal belongings in there, since the
Sea Maiden
was the favored vessel for most of them.

“I’m heading back now!” Eddie called, hoping John could hear him. “Like I told you, I have someplace to be tonight!” He needed to get back, take a shower. This was going to be a proper bon voyage party, and he planned to show that uppity trophy-blonde that he cleaned up well.

“Hey! Did you hear me?”

Nothing.

He squinted. The blue was already leaving the sky. Night came early to New England in winter. Like a massive bird’s wing, it swooped in, a single shadow falling silently across the sky.

He started to rise, then sank back in his seat, a perplexed frown knitting his brow.

“What the hell?” he muttered.

At first he was confused.

Hell, yes, the guy was strange, but…

“What…?” Once again, he began to stand.

Eddie wasn’t a small guy. He wasn’t muscle-bound, but he’d worked the sea all his life, and he was no weakling. He even carried a small gun.

Which was in the cabin.

And nothing—nothing—had prepared him for this.

He felt the air move as the man did, but he didn’t have even a split second to brace himself against the onslaught. He had barely begun to rise before he was falling.

The icy chill of the water numbed the searing pain. He was falling, falling into the darkness of the ocean, but something was billowing up in front of him, like a shadow, only…

It was red.

It was his own blood, he realized with a strange sense of calm, and it was pouring from his chest, spewing out like a geyser.

He was numb, frozen; only his mind was capable of functioning at all, and then only to realize sadly that he was dying.

What a fool he’d been. He should have seen.

But he hadn’t, and now it was too late.

Yes, he was dying. He couldn’t feel his hands or feet. His lungs were burning, and his blood was still spreading through the water, clouding his vision. He thought his lungs had probably been punctured, not that he’d ever known much about anatomy.

He knew enough to know that he was dying, though.

Being on the water was absolute heaven. Wasn’t that what he’d been thinking earlier? How about being
in
the water, and praying that it would indeed be heaven when the dark and the numbness and the red pool of blood were no longer a part of him?

I had so much more to do, to see, to live,
he thought. Too late.

What a fool he’d been.

Blackness began descending, tamping out the streaks of light that flashed through his head. The darkness was oddly gentle. The last of the light began to fade, so quickly. Seconds passing, milliseconds…

A lifetime. His lifetime.

Death was a certainty. He was a strong man; he thought he had been a kind man.

But he was afraid.

A strange sound roared through his ears, one that was oddly out of place in this watery realm. It was like the whip of the wind, and horses racing across wind and waves, horses as black as night, yet somehow silhouetted against an even greater darkness. There was something terrifying about it, and yet also beautiful…calming.

And then, through the darkness, a hand reached out….