Her Sworn Enemy (Men of the Zodiac) (10 page)

Jackson frowned. “Oh. That’s kind of disappointing. The way my dad was talking about it, you practically had your hands on it.” He stabbed at his cake and took another mouthful.

Bella cut off a bit of the cake with the edge of her fork and took a bite, very aware of the pulsating heat radiating from Tuck.

“You’ve got a bit of frosting on your lip,” Tuck said. She glanced at him, their gazes locking, the same moment he brushed his thumb slowly and gently against the corner of her mouth, and Bella’s body throbbed in response. Who knew eating cake could be an invitation to seduction?

She swallowed hard. “Thanks.” Her voice sounded breathless to her ears.

Silence penetrated the room for a moment. Bella could hear nothing but the pounding rush of her heartbeat.

The corner of Tucker’s mouth lifted a little in a knowing half-smile and he turned back to Min and Jackson. “In fact, we’ve got to be getting back soon. They should have completed the scans we need, and I can’t wait to see where they’ll lead.”

“Yes, we should be getting back,” Bella echoed.

“Thank you for the fantastic dinner, Miss Dupré.” Tuck stood, and taking Min’s hand, kissed the back of it.

Min smiled and rose to see them to the door. “I’m so glad the two of you could come.”

“Nice meeting you, Jackson,” Tuck said over his shoulder.

“So I’ll see you. We’ll make plans for later then,” Jackson called out as they headed to the front door.

“We’ll see,” Bella said.

The front door had barely shut behind them when Tuck pinned her against the cool brick wall with his arms braced on either side of her. “What are you playing at?” His eyes were bright and intense.

“Who said I was playing?”

“Admit it. You were trying to throw Jackson off. I could tell something had changed the minute you came back from the kitchen.”

“Maybe at first it was to give Jackson a reason to back off, but then he couldn’t see under the table, so that part had nothing to do with him.”

“Do you know what you’re asking for?”

Did she? Her heart was thumping hard against her ribs and her breasts aching to be touched. Hell if she knew. Maybe for once she’d put things in fate’s hands and see what happened. “Let’s find out.”

Chapter Eight

A
pparently he was done flirting with her. Tuck leaned in and kissed her hard. Bella’s entire body responded to the heady invasion with a raw, needy edge. He wrapped strong hands on either side of her waist, then skimmed them down to trace her hips, drawing her closer until her belly pressed against the hot, hard length of him, and the core of her throbbed in response.

She could sense the hunger in him, the need to be her sole focus, the reason she breathed. And regardless of her uncertainty, she couldn’t help sinking into the sensation and letting it wash over her. Even as his teeth grazed over her bottom lip and his tongue slid against hers, she still wanted more. Bella wrapped her arms around his neck, fingers tangled in the hair at his nape.

Only the sound of footsteps from inside the house coming toward the door made them pause. Both of them were breathing hard, air sawing in and out. “This way,” she said breathlessly as her heart pounded erratically, and her lips buzzed from the kiss.

Grabbing his hand, Bella pulled him along the street to the far end of the house. The streetlight illuminated the street but didn’t reach beneath the balcony, leaving them in the dark. Fortunately, she didn’t need the light to tell her where she was. She undid the wrought iron gate that had once been the passage for horses and carriages to get to the stables at the back of the property. She refastened the gate. They hid in the shadows, his body, solid and warm pressed against hers as they stood face to face.

The night air was humid and warm, scented with the jasmine that grew up and over the garden walls at the other end of what she’d always called the tunnel. Built for carriages, not cars, it was as narrow as a parking space, which meant Tuck seemed to take up even more room. The plinking, repetitive sound of dripping water from the air conditioner at the back of the house echoed off the brick tunnel walls.

This close and personal, Tuck’s signature scent of clean male, ocean, and sunshine, blended with a hint of coconut sunscreen, surrounded her. The scent reminded her of the open sea, big blue skies, and beaches of powdered sand.

“Shh.” Bella pressed an index finger to his lips. The blue depths of his eyes filled with a spark of mischief. His mouth twitched.

“What would you do if I made you scream right about now?” he whispered.

“Never let you touch me again,” she said. The edge of her tone was pretty much lost because she was trying not to be heard. “Quiet!”

Right around the corner, not five feet away, the front door opened, and the voices of Jackson and Min punctuated the hot, humid night air. Tucker bent down farther, nuzzling her neck with his soft lips. His kisses made her knees weak, and she had to grab his upper arms to hold her upright. Her aunt and Jackson carried out a prolonged version of pleasantries as they said their good nights. Bella wished they’d get done already. She didn’t like the idea of being discovered by Jackson. It would be both embarrassing and probably wound him unnecessarily.

“You smell so good, and you taste even better.” Tuck’s barely audible words were hot in the shell of her ear.

Bella tried to pay attention to what was going on around the corner, she honestly did. But with the onslaught of Tuck’s kisses and the sweep of his hand beneath the edge of her shirt, his work-rough thumb grazing against the edge of her ribs, she couldn’t focus on anything but him.

The only thing that snapped her out of the sensual haze was seeing Jackson walk by out of the corner of her eye. Her brain finally engaged long enough to take back her body.

“I think he’s gone,” she whispered.

“Good.” He pulled back a fraction. “All the better to kiss you.”

She put her hands flat against his chest. “We ought to be getting back to the ship.”

He grumbled something under his breath, closed his eyes and nodded. When he opened his eyes again the fire of desire had faded to a smolder. “You’re right. I let myself get carried away. It won’t happen again.”

His words stung. She hadn’t meant she wasn’t interested, rather that here was not the time nor the place for them to get so carried away that they didn’t pay attention to what was happening around them. “I didn’t mean—”

He cut her off and pulled away from her. “Look, I get it. You were putting on a show for Jackson, and I got carried away. No harm, no foul.”

“You know, if you could let me finish my sentence before you finish it for me, it would really help.”

He stared at her for a moment. “What else is there? You already told me you don’t intend to get involved with something that’s just temporary. I knew it. But when you offered, I thought you’d changed your mind. Now I know better.”

She nibbled at her bottom lip. Half of what he was saying was the truth, but the other half wasn’t. “It’s a woman’s prerogative to change her mind.”

He leaned in, enough to make her heart beat harder in response. “And have you?” he asked, his voice raspy and hushed, the sensual words of a lover.

Her natural instinct was to dig in, shut him down, prove she didn’t need him or any other man, unlike the Dupré women before her. But the temptation he offered was almost impossible to resist. What would it hurt if she changed her mind? She could always change it back again, couldn’t she? “I’ll let you know once we get back to the ship.”

He insisted on driving her car back to the dock and drove much faster than she normally would. With minimal conversation, they took the helicopter back to the
Discovery
bringing with them some supplies the crew needed, as well as a cargo load of uncertainty for both of them.

Bella was still all jumbled up inside. Tuck hadn’t been wrong about the inherent chemistry smoldering between them, but it still didn’t mean getting together was the
smart
thing to do, at least not in the long term. Bella knew if she slept with him, she would give away a small piece of her heart. She couldn’t help it. It was how she was wired. She also knew he would walk away. That’s what the men in her life always did, and Tuck was on track to be no exception. Sleeping with him meant inevitable heartache, but sitting next to him in the helicopter, she had to admit that perhaps the pros outweighed the cons. She was beginning to care less and less about the heartache and more about satisfying the real ache of need he’d teased out of her.

Dusk was taking over the sea and skyline, casting the world into a play of light and shadow. She stared at his profile, the straight line of his nose, the strong edge of his jaw, and the tempting curve of his lips. Falling hook, line, and sinker for Tuck was the easy part. Surviving it when it all fell apart was the part she wasn’t sure about. And yet, why had she had the dream? It had to mean something, didn’t it? Her aunt certainly thought so.

Tuck didn’t wait for the helicopter to fully touch down before he hopped out. Seconds later when she felt the skids hit the helipad, he was there so she could hand him the supplies they’d brought along with them and offer her a hand out of the helicopter once everything was unloaded. He shielded her from the wash of the props as the helicopter took off again, all but disappearing into the night sky, except for the flashing green and red light that identified the craft.

“How was dinner?” Toneau asked as he began to pick up their supplies from the deck where she and Tuck had stacked everything.

“Really good. Doctor Dupré’s aunt is an excellent chef.”

“Glad you made it back, Cap. We got the cannon brought up from the site as ordered.”

The news was like an electrical shock of excitement—a combination of Christmas, birthday, and New Year’s expectations all rolled into one. She clutched her hands together and bounced up to the balls of her feet. “Where is it?”

Toneau nodded toward the stern. “Down in the lab on the conservation deck, prepped and waiting for you. We’ve had it in a plain water tank for the last three hours to help begin desalinization, and Guereaux has already photographed it for you.”

She thrust her packages into Toneau’s already laden arms and dashed off the helipad to the stairs to the decks below, taking the steps two at a time. There wasn’t a moment to waste. The second an artifact was brought up, especially a metal one exposed to the corrosive salts in seawater, the clock to stabilize it and prevent damage started ticking. True to his word, Rory Guereaux was already there.

“Doctor Dupré, glad you’re back. Isn’t she exquisite?” He gestured toward the cannon.

In all honesty, it looked like a crusty gray, oddly shaped log with a rough surface and misshapen rounded bits, but he was correct—even in that state it was a thing of beauty.

“I’ve already taken measurements and recorded it photographically.”

“By the look of it, you haven’t started cleaning off any of the larger encrustations.”

“I thought you’d want to see it first.”

She nodded. “Your instincts are absolutely right.” She walked around the cannon looking it over, absorbing the details for her notes. It was on the small side for a cannon at less than three feet long. Two small rounded hubs on either side of the back of the cannon, which would have rested in the fork, helped her identify it. It was the
peterero
, or swivel gun, mounted in a fork on the upper deck so it had more movement and a broader range. “Has the electrolytic solution been prepped?”

He smiled. “Added the sodium carbonate myself, and the anodes are ready to go when you are.”

She preferred the sodium carbonate method to sodium hydroxide, especially on a moving ship where the alkaline solution could harm someone if it wasn’t handled properly. By running a current through the water, they’d neutralize the corrosion of the metal happening from the exposure to salt water. Metal objects were always a crapshoot as far as Bella was concerned. If the desalinization process happened too slowly, you could end up with something so fragile it would simply fall apart into rusty flakes. If you did it too fast, well, then you had a whole other set of problems.

She made sure the stainless steel anodes were set in the right place on the electrolysis tank and the end wires prepped to attach to the cannon, then flipped the switch to turn the electric current on, and let the solution sit while she gently and carefully removed some of the larger buildups of material on the cannon that would slow the whole process down. Using small hammers and wooden picks, they tapped off some of the larger bits of foreign material that had accumulated over the centuries, and used wire brushes to get to the metal. She and Guereaux worked quickly, his large hands moving just as deliberately and sure as her own.

“How soon do you think we’ll be able to determine if this is from the
Rapid
?” he asked while he worked.

“Depends on if the foundry stamp is still legible or if we can make out other identifying markers. Could take a few days, might take a week or more. It all depends how thick the encrustation is on the cannon and how long it takes to neutralize it and clean it up.”

They worked together for a long while, the radio playing county music in the background, until the cannon was ready to be submerged into the electrolysis tank. They put on gloves, goggles, and rubberized lab aprons to protect themselves from the solution, and Guereaux carefully hooked up the hoist to the cannon, using straps designed not to mar it, but still sturdy enough to bear the weight.

Slowly it lifted, swaying slightly as the hoist stopped over the tank, then began its descent. Little bubbles rose up from the surface as it was submerged.

Bella slipped the goggles back over her head. “A good night’s work, Mr. Guereaux.”

“It’s Rory. No need for the formality if we’re going to be working side-by-side in the lab for hours on end.”

She smiled. He was right. Once they started bringing up other artifacts, this lab would be home for the duration of her trip. She’d hardly see Tuck, except perhaps at meals. She thought about The Kiss, and decided that would probably be a good thing. “Okay, Rory it is.”

“If you’d like to look at the photos and archive information, it’ll be on the main computer system. You should be able to access the data from your laptop or from the computers on board.”

She smiled. Having someone assist who actually knew what they were doing when it came to proper preservation technique was unexpected and welcome. She’d been dreading having to keep the crew from being ham-fisted with the finds and potentially damaging them with beginner’s mistakes. “Well, Rory, you’re not just a pretty face. You know your stuff, I’ll give you that. Where’d you study?”

He smiled at the compliment. “Master’s in Maritime Studies from East Carolina University.”

She nodded. “It’s good to have someone I can trust in the lab.”

“You didn’t think I’d leave you to do all the brainiac work alone, did you?”

She turned at the sound of Tuck’s voice. He stood in the door to the lab with his arms crossed, which showed off the muscles of his arms to their best advantage. “I’d had my suspicions,” she said.

He nodded toward the cannon. “Happy?”

She couldn’t stop the smile that stretched from ear to ear. “Deliriously happy! In a day or two, hopefully, we’ll be able to confirm if it came from the
Rapid
.”

“So that means you have some free time at the moment?” he asked, a teasing grin making her instantly recall exactly what his lips had done to her earlier, and how much she’d been anticipating it happening again. Her skin tightened in response. She glanced back at Rory. “You’ll turn out the lights and make sure the lab is locked?”

He waved her off. “Go on. If I can’t babysit a big iron cannon, then I’m not much use.”

She stepped out of the lab past Tuck. As soon as they were out of sight of the lab, she felt the weight of his hands on her hips, pulling her back and into the warm, solid heat of his body.

“So what did you decide? Have you changed your mind about short-term relationships?” he said softly in her ear, his breath caressing her neck and making her shiver.

Her pulse picked up. What had she decided? The tattoo had to be a sign, didn’t it? Why else would she have dreamed of it? And while she had no illusions about Tuck staying for anything other than the short term while they worked together, should that completely keep her from enjoying herself?
Make a decision, girl.