Mesmerizing Stranger

Chapter 7

Cate couldn’t have passed out because she wasn’t some fluttery wimp who went around fainting. But when she opened her eyes, she seemed to be in Harm’s stateroom, flat on his bed, with his blankets snuggled to her neck. Harm was leaning over her with a warm washcloth.

“Did I take a little nap?” she asked bewilderedly.

“Let’s put it this way. If you hadn’t conked out, I’d have had to hit you over the head with a frying pan. My God, you’re trouble.”

“I think something like a frying pan did hit me on the head. Holy kamoly, do I ever have a headache…” She tried to sit up and failed.

“I’m almost done. The wound’s clean. I’m going to put on some antibiotic first-aid cream and cover it up, and then we’ll put ice on it. Then we’ll check out the rest of you.”

“Hmm. I haven’t played doctor since I was somewhere around five or six.”

“I never gave it up. It was always one of my favorite games. Especially with girls.”

“I never played it with girls.”

“That’s why you probably gave it up. Playing with girls is fun.”

“Why in God’s name are we joking around?”

“Because,” he said, “I almost had a heart attack when I saw you on the deck. And I’m trying to get past that so I can start thinking straight.”

“Let’s not rush into thinking,” she agreed. Consciousness was coming back. Enough to be aware of Harm’s bare chest. He’d gotten blood on his shirt. Her blood. She could see the stain on his shirt from the top of the bureau. More relevant, she could see the patches of blond hair on his chest, the cords of muscle in his upper arms, the intensely passionate fury in his eyes. You didn’t hurt people Harm cared about, she mused. He just wasn’t the kind of man you’d want to rile. “Your bed is significantly more comfortable than mine.”

“I’m glad you like it, since you’ll be bunking in here from now on.”

“I’m pretty positive my boss isn’t going to like that.”

Harm pleasantly suggested what Ivan could do to himself if the captain raised any objection whatsoever. After that, he leaned over her, so close she could breathe in the scent of his warm, warm skin. Unfortunately, his only intent was to put a bandage on the back of her head-a project that had as much chance of succeeding as a frost in the Amazon.

“Harm. It won’t stick. Besides which, I want to wash my hair.”

“Of course it’ll stick. It has to stick. How else am I going to put ice on it? Obviously, I can’t put ice on the direct sore.” He motioned to where he’d clearly fetched a bowl of ice from the galley. She wondered how the Sam Hill long she had been knocked out.

“You could put a couple cubes in a plastic bag. Then put the washcloth between my skin and the bag.”

He looked annoyed-probably because she used the same patient tone she’d use with a small child. But he did it. “I guess that’ll do, Ms. MacGyver. So on to the next problem. Your hip. It sounds as if it was one of your crash connection points.”

“Afraid so. I’m just thankful I was so covered up in sleeping bags and blankets that the fall was cushioned. Still, I have to admit it hurts like hell.”

“Cate.” His tone turned gentle, serious. “I want to see it. No funny business, no joking. I’d just feel better if we both saw how bad it is. I also think we should make sure there are no other breaks or injuries that need attention.”

She looked at him. “You know…I’ve been thinking about being naked with you.”

“Have you?”

“But not in this context.”

“I think we should put it in that other context as soon as possible. But right now, I’m worried you’re a lot more hurt than you’re letting on. When you fall that distance, you’re talking a major clunk, Cookie.”

“Don’t call me Cookie. And believe me, I’d be baying at the top of my lungs if I had anything serious to complain about. I’m an A-grade whiner.”

“No, you aren’t and no, you wouldn’t,” Harm said patiently. “You’re tough as nails. Strong as a rock. And stubborn as a hound.”

“Didn’t your mother teach you any better than this? If you want to seduce a woman, you need to use sweet talk, not insults.” She was looking right at him, and he was looking right back, but Cate felt what he was doing. Peeling off the blanket. Finding the drawstring of her sleeping pants. And then she felt his big, bare hand on her flesh. She slapped her own hand over his to stop him.

“My mom tried to teach me manners. You’d love her. She kept this little switch on the top of the refrigerator, something on par with a tree twig. Threatened me with beatings my whole childhood, but never once laid a finger on me.”

“She should have,” Cate said darkly. With infinite gentleness, he’d lifted her hand. With even more infinite gentleness, that intrusive, intimate hand slowly stroked down her body, from the sides of her breasts to her ribs to the start of her bony hip and around. His touch, his tenderness, was the lovemaking of a fantasy-the big, strong guy able to melt for and with the right woman.

Only this wasn’t lovemaking, and there was no fantasy. The glaring overhead light blinded her and made her feel overvulnerable.

Damn it. She hated feeling vulnerable. Even with a lover, she picked the time, the place, the circumstance. She chose what happened and how.

“You can tell my mom that she should have smacked me when I was a kid. She’ll totally agree with you. I can remember having an argument with her when I was in high school-something about using the car. Anyway, she got on a footstool so she’d be tall enough to shake her finger in my face. Beats me why. She won every argument we ever had anyway-damn it, Cate.”

His soothing tone and gentle tenderness abruptly disappeared. He didn’t yank or tear, but once he discovered the mighty bruise on her hip, he forgot that she might have some serious modesty issues. It wasn’t as if the location of the injury was any surprise to her. She already figured it was going to be the mother of all bruises.

From the way Harm was swearing, it was already the mother of all bruises times ten. And unfortunately, once he’d discovered that lumpy bruise, he turned dead serious about checking every inch of the rest of her right then, in detail, fast, no arguing with him. “This hurt?”

“Of course it hurts. You’re poking my shoulder.”

“Shut up, Cate. Answer the question. How about here?”

It was that “shut up” that made the tears well. She squeezed her eyes closed so the stupid things wouldn’t fall. It was downright silly to get all buttery over a “shut up” when no woman in the universe would think of it as a love word. But it was. With him, it was. She saw it in his eyes, heard it in the gravel-roughness in his voice, felt it in the rage in his careful, careful hands.

“Okay. The spot behind the shoulder. And the hip. And my head. But nothing’s broken-I can tell and you can tell. So I think you should cover me up with some warm blankets and bring me some wine and be nice.”

“I think I should find who did this to you and…” His breath caught. “It’s my fault this happened to you, Cate.”

“It certainly is. You should have been up on the top deck, waiting for the bad guy to show up and stop him from pushing me off. Talk about dereliction of responsibility. You’re a cad through and through.”

“I’m going to the galley for more ice. Lots and lots of ice. And more bags or something to put it in. You’re getting ice on the hip as well as on your head. We’re getting that swelling down. And you’re getting woken up every couple hours just to be sure of the concussion business. Now. Try giving me a hard time.”

She considered it. He was obviously enjoying turning into Mr.-Own-The-Universe-Bossy. But for a couple of minutes, she was increasingly feeling like a battered kickball. A little silence and rest might help her get a better grip.

But Harm seemed to return to the cabin in three seconds flat, carrying heaping bags of ice and a dark scowl. “It’s got to hurt darned bad if it’s making you cry.”

“I wasn’t crying! Sheesh!” She watched him turn down the lights, flick on the one in the master head, dimming the room. If the damned man was going to be considerate enough to let her hide her expression in the darkness, he really was going to make her cry. The ugly, loud kind of crying. “Harm-”

“Yeah?” He’d covered the makeshift ice bags in towels, eased the one between the headboard and the goose egg on her head, then cushioned one against the monster bruise on her thigh. Then started covering and tucking.

“I think Yale overheard me telling the captain about the peppermint.”

If he added any more blankets, she was going to roast. But he looked at her so sharply, she changed her mind about complaining.

“You think so, hmm?” Finally, he pushed off his shoes and eased down on the mattress next to her, barely taking any covers, careful not to jolt her in any way. “My first reaction to that is to go kill Yale, Cookie. But on second thought…he could have passed that information on to the other two. So there’s no guarantee he was the pusher, only that he was probably the catalyst to your getting hurt. If he did pass on your death-by-peppermint theory to the others, I’d think you’d be prey to some teasing tomorrow. That is, if any of them are brash enough-or smart enough-to bring it up openly.”

He’d spooned around her so protectively that, hurts or no hurts, she started to feel snuggly and safe. And turned on-which struck her as a completely lunatic response, considering how beat-up she was. “Harm?”

“Okay. You get to say one more thing. But then you’re closing your eyes and getting some rest.”

“I was just thinking that tomorrow morning, I should tell everyone at breakfast how I fell asleep top deck, fell off, and got really bruised. Make a point of saying how stupid and careless I was. Not imply in any way that I believe someone deliberately pushed me.”

He thought. “That’s a great idea, Cate. It’s much safer if no one thinks we’re on to them. In fact, I can bring up your death-by-peppermint theory and make out like I think it’s funny-for the same reason-to make the culprit think he’s safe. However…”

“However what?”

“However, you won’t be making breakfast tomorrow, Toots. You’re going to be in here. Safe and sound.”

“You call me Toots or Cookie again, Harm, and that’s it. I won’t sleep with you, no matter how much you beg me.”

He scooched down, just another notch, pressed the softest whisper of a kiss on her brow. “Aw, yeah, you will.” And then, “What a fabulous little body you’ve got. Perfect. Curved in all the right places. Strong and sweet.”

“Yeah. I know,” she said, and damn the man, but he forced her to fall asleep on a smile.

She slept, but Harm couldn’t. First off, he couldn’t rest because he had to check on her every few minutes-to make sure she was covered, to make sure the ice packs were still cold and not leaking. And obviously, to make sure she wasn’t hurting.

And since he was stuck not sleeping, he kept turning over the last two days of events in his mind. It seemed petrifyingly likely that someone had tried to kill Cate-probably the same someone who’d killed Fiske, who was the same someone at the source of the formula disappearance.

That was easy enough to conclude. But it didn’t help him any more than it had before to identify the culprit.

He woke Cate every two hours to check her pupils, kiss her brow and order her back to sleep. By 5:00 a.m., though, he gave up trying to sleep himself. The only thing he’d gotten from the long, endless night so far was an evocative long, endless hard-on from sleeping next to her.

The pervasiveness of that hard-on made him aggravatingly aware that he was becoming more attached to that woman than a thorn on a rose. He barely knew her, yet here he was losing sleep, feeling responsible, feeling a sense of connection and pull and hunger to be around her.

Groggy-eyed, he headed up on deck and went straight for the elegant, old-fashioned coffee urn. It looked awful to him, but when push came to shove, it was just a machine. He’d made coffee in tougher spots in the army, so he wasn’t worried he couldn’t figure it out.

He prowled around Cate’s galley for coffee beans, something to measure water, then paced around, waiting for the others to wake up. The sky was blurry, a mix of doughy clouds and murky light, and didn’t discernibly change over the next hour. By then he’d worn holes in the deck, pacing around and realizing-not for the first time-that he was really good at doing, and really bad at having to wait and not act.

Finally, though, Ivan emerged from the crew quarters. Harm didn’t leap on him like a rabid dog, but the captain had barely gotten out a yawn before he barked, “Is it okay with you if I get into the pilothouse? Use the radio?”

“Sure.” Ivan filled a mug, carted it with him outside to unlock and step into the pilothouse. The captain hadn’t shaved, had sucked down his share of whiskey the night before and had the swollen eyes to prove it. Still, he was no one’s fool. He set him up with the radio, then plopped in the captain chair, out of the way. “What happened?”

“Cate was hurt last night.”

Ivan’s eyes sharpened. “How, when, where and what?”

Harm talked; Ivan started up the engines, and both of them took turns at the radio, communicating to the mainland and Baranof Springs. By then, Arthur showed up, holding a mug, saying, “Who in God’s name made this sludge? Where’s Cate? What’s going on?”

His three guys all looked as if they’d had a rough night, but none had a guilt sign tattooed on their foreheads, nothing to give away any more information than Harm already had. The story he told them-while serving a bunch of fruit in a bowl and army oatmeal-was that Cate had fallen the night before. She’d apparently headed topside to do some stargazing, dozed off and then fell.

The men all expressed concern that sounded sincere. Purdue eventually tried to lighten the atmosphere by lifting his cereal spoon, trying to make a joke. “I’ve never had much religion, but I’m willing to fall to my knees and pray that she’s feeling good enough to make the next meal. Are you sure this is oatmeal and not cement?”

Arthur was in no mood for humor. “Harm, I think we should cancel this trip completely and go home. There’s just too much going wrong. It’s as if we’re jinxed.”

Yale immediately backed up Arthur. “It doesn’t matter what the authorities said. They can’t keep us here. If they have any more questions about Fiske, they can call us or something. No one can stop us from going home.”

“It’s not that simple,” Harm said.

“Sure, it is.”

Harm said, “There isn’t a doctor, but there is a PA in Baranof Springs, and we can be there in just a couple more hours. The lump on Cate’s head is one big slugger. I really believe a medical person should check her out before going anywhere else.” He exchanged glances with Ivan. Both also knew, from the radio transmissions earlier, that the Juneau pathologist had returned from his fishing trip, and they could possibly hear more about Fiske’s autopsy later that day or tomorrow. Harm’s priority was Cate. But he was wary of making any sudden moves without all the information he could gather first.

“So we stay through today,” Arthur agreed, but his tone still reflected tension. “I just think we should head home right after that. I’m really uneasy with all this. We still don’t even know what happened to Fiske.”

“I know what Cate thought happened,” Purdue piped in. “Yale told me he heard her talking to the captain. Said she went to make more peppermint cookies for us and found all her peppermint oil-or extract, or whatever it is-gone. She was worried Fiske got into it. Might have gotten sick from it somehow.” So Yale had overheard that conversation, Harm mused. Just as Cate thought. But if both Purdue and Yale knew about Cate’s theory, neither still had a motivation to push her off the top deck-at least none Harm could think of.

Arthur edged back his chair. “Actually, using peppermint on a toothache is an old-fashioned remedy. Maybe that was what Fiske was doing in the galley. We all know how he was addicted to sweets. Maybe a tooth started going bad on him.”

Harm finished the oatmeal and had another coffee. Neither tasted that bad to him. Of course, he wasn’t concentrating on food. He was studying his men, and suffering enough frustration to claw walls. None of them showed any sign of guilt. There were no hidden looks, no apparent nerves. The whole mood of the guys was darker than gloom, though, until Cate suddenly showed up in the doorway.

She looked like something the cat dragged in out of the rain. Her hair, never styled at the best of times, stuck up in ragamuffin spikes around a blue-scarf bandage. She’d pulled on big, droopy sweats over big, droopy socks, and could barely traverse the room without limping. Panic buzzed his heartbeat. “What the Sam Hill are you doing up here?” he demanded.

She shot him a look reserved usually for puppies who’d piddled. “Well, I’ll be. Did you suddenly turn into my boss?” She shot a scandalized look at the table’s contents. “Are you boys trying to eat this? And who burned the coffee? I could smell it all the way below deck.”

“Cate-” He thought she’d agreed to stay in his cabin, locked up tight, where she’d be safe.

“I was just en route to the head when some of the conversation filtered downstairs. I thought I heard that y’all were going to postpone going home because of me. That’s silly. I’m fine.” She limped over to the coffee urn. “I don’t need a doctor. You guys should do whatever it is you want or need to do. I admit, I may not be up to much cooking today…but honest to Pete, even if I were bedridden in a body cast, I can keep you guys fed better than this.”

Harm was about to get testy about all the slurs to his breakfast making, but abruptly he realized what she was doing. The men immediately took his side, bullying her into the necessity of having someone medical check her out in Baranof Springs. Even if they all wanted to go home, it wasn’t as if a few hours’ difference was going to matter.

She poured a mug of his “burned” coffee and made it all the way around the table to the seat next to him. She never winced, never outwardly showed how much she was hurting. But she still eased down next to him like a kitten next to her lion. He realized abruptly that the damn woman was making all this effort for his sake-playing his team, her way, to help him get what he wanted, which was more time here in Alaska.

Actually, what he wanted was to scoop her onto his lap and hold her indefinitely. He wanted to soothe those bruises away, make her feel safe and warm, yell at her for being such a numbskull for climbing the stairs.

He could hardly do any of those things-particularly when she took another sip from her mug, and spouted further gross, effusive insults about his inability to make coffee.

“We could kill rats with this, I guess. But…I don’t think we have any. Possibly we could clean all the sinks? I’m pretty sure this swill would kill even the most optimistic germ nature ever created-”

“Sheesh. You think that’s enough ribbing?” Harm played up that his feelings were hurt. Maybe they even were, a little.

“I don’t know, guys. You think that’s enough ribbing?”

Of course the guys didn’t think it was enough ribbing. They’d never teased him before. Cate was egging them on. And in the meantime, Hans was edging into the dock at Baranof Springs. At which time, Ivan announced orders to all passengers to bring a towel and their bathing suits.

“Right,” was the standard incredulous response.

Ivan said, “I mean it. Follow the road through town, up the hill. On the right side of the waterfalls-which are colder than a witch’s tit in a brass bra, pardon my French, Cate-are hot springs. All bigger than hot tubs. Think we’d all benefit from an hour’s soak. And that sure includes Cate.”

“Sounds great,” Cate said.

She looked him straight in the eye when she said it. Harm let out an internal sigh of relief. At least one thing was going right. She’d get off at the Springs, get the medic to check her out, and at least he could know she was physically all right before dealing with the next crisis.

Cate barely made it back below deck before collapsing on her bunk. For the first time, the cabin didn’t strike her as claustrophobic. She just plain didn’t care. Her head hurt. Her hip hurt. She felt whipped and battered and weak as a baby bird.

It was intolerable. But she was pretty sure she’d put on a good show for the guys-especially for Harm-and if they’d all just get off the damned boat, she could get some rest and peace. Yes, of course, she expected they’d notice she didn’t join the shore group…but she also suspected none of them particularly wanted to infringe on her female bastion/boudoir.

She should have known that wouldn’t work for Harm. Heaven knew how much time had passed before she heard his knuckles rapping on her cabin door.

“I’m sleeping,” she called out.

“You’re going to get checked out.”

“All I need is rest. Go on with the group.”

“I could tear down the door, but that seems awkward. It looks to be made of steel. That won’t stop me, but I’m afraid it’ll make a lot of damage-”

She hurtled off the bunk, across the cabin, and yanked open the door with one hand on her head. “Go away.”

“You are such a faker. Making everybody believe you’re just fine, just a little bruised. Did you think you were going to fool me, too?” He entered the cabin, which meant there wasn’t enough oxygen for one, much less for two people trying to move around. She sank back on the bunk, since Mr. Busybody seemed determined to paw around, locate her jacket and shoes. “You’re not only seeing this medic, but if I don’t like the medic, I’m getting a plane in here and getting you to a hospital on the mainland.”

“You and what army?”

“I don’t need an army.”

She opened her mouth to give him what for-and it was a what for that was going to include a blistering set down-when his tone softened to rough gravel.

“Cate, if you need me to carry you, I can and will.”

Damn him. It was that tone that made her want to melt. And she wasn’t the melting type. “I really want to just sleep. And this is a great chance for you to be alone with the men. Push their limits. Dig until you find out stuff.”

“Yup, it would be. But there’s a time to worry about murder and larceny. And a time when a guy needs to take care of his girl. It’s a no-brainer which counts more.”

He didn’t actually carry her. She climbed to the main deck, walked strong as an ox off the boarding ramp. The air was brisk, eagles perched on high spruce boughs, watching the fish in the harbor. A dozen other yachts and fishing boats were docked close by. The yachts looked as if they cost millions and millions. The fishing boats looked as if they’d survived two world wars and then some. A slope of land showed a scattering of buildings stretched on what was clearly the only road. And a silver-diamond waterfall bounded down a rock crevice. All of it took her attention…at least until she caved.

Harm caught her before she fell, swooped her up in his arms as if she were a damned baby. And she held on, head snugged against his neck, as if she’d have fallen if she hadn’t.

“I’m not your girl,” she said.

“No?”

“We haven’t even slept together.”

“Yeah, we did.”

“We haven’t made love. That kind of sleeping.”

“That isn’t sleeping. Trust me, if you didn’t know that before, you will after I get through with you.”

“Harm. Get serious.” She couldn’t seem to keep her eyes open, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t fully serious. “We’re not a pair. Can’t possibly be. You’re a conservative guy. You need a wife who’s into a house in the suburbs, commitment, an intrepid Volvo for the kids, responsibility. I could live out of a carpet bag and have space left over. I don’t have a clue how to be a wife. I don’t even like money. I wouldn’t work for you. Trust me.”

“I probably wouldn’t work for you, either. I’ve had two divorces. Don’t be forgetting that.”

She frowned, confused. “I haven’t forgotten that. But like I told you, it’s irrelevant. I don’t doubt you married women who couldn’t handle you. You’re a complete pain.”

“So that’s settled,” he said, with such a tone of satisfaction that she was confused.

“What’s settled?”

“That you’re my girl. And that we seem to be at the, um, clinic now.”

Clinic? When Cate turned her head, she saw a cedar door open, and a small boy emerge with his dog. The kid was a scrapper, skinny, ragged cap, but healthy-looking. The dog looked like a sled dog, beautiful and elegant and soft-eyed, with a giant white bandage on his left paw.

“You’re taking me to a vet?” she asked disbelievingly.

Harm didn’t look any happier. “Beats me. Captain said it was the third building, go upstairs to the second floor. That’s where we are.”

The place seemed to be an apartment, not a clinic, where a big bear of a man lumbered through a living room to greet them. Toys littered the floor. A toddler was pulling a noisy push toy. The big bearded guy scooped up the squirt and bellowed for his wife, who showed up in the doorway, wiping her hands on a dish towel.

“So you’re the one who had the fall on the boat?” she said. “Come on in. Let’s have a look.”

The laundry room had a stretcher, which apparently doubled as an exam table. Harm came in with her-not that she asked him-but he clearly didn’t think much of the setup. She did. Cate could see intelligence and common sense in the woman’s eyes, her whole no-nonsense demeanor. “We usually have a doctor around here, retired from Anchorage, but in the summer, he’s hit or miss, off on a fishing trip anytime he can find someone to go with him.”

“I hear there’s a lot of that going around,” Cate said.

The woman chuckled. “Anyway, I’m what’s left over. Used to be a surgical nurse on the mainland, picked up credentials as a P.A. No fancy degrees, nothing extra, but I know enough to get you flown out of here if we think there’s a reason.”

“I just took a fall,” Cate said. “I’m fine. Just going to be bruised up and sore for a little while.”

“It was a serious fall,” Harm interjected. “From one deck down to the next.”

“But I was asleep. And covered with blankets, really cushioned.”

“Aha. You two are doing a lot of talking. How about if I do a lot of looking?” Ten minutes later, she said, “You took a good fall and you’re going to be bruised and sore for a little while.”

“See? What’d I tell you?” Cate said immediately to Harm once they were outside. “So I’m going to those hot springs. Sounds like a good place to soak. And the lady the same as said I’m totally okay.”

“What the lady didn’t realize was that you’ve got a head harder than rock and can’t be trusted to show good judgment.” But Harm was back to ribbing her. His whole mood eased after she’d been given a decent bill of health. He hooked an arm around her shoulder as they strolled up the street toward the waterfall and springs.

“So now we can concentrate on murder and madness,” she said with satisfaction. “Now I can concentrate on murder and madness.”

Cate didn’t argue. Right then, although she’d never admit it aloud, she felt too darned weak to walk all the way back to the boat. She figured the short trek to the springs was all she could handle.

That didn’t mean she wasn’t going to help him, though.

He didn’t have a choice in the matter.