Wonder what that's all about?"

The bartender nudged one of the waitresses, who had just come to pick up a bar order. "Another one?"

"Yeah." The girl shook her head. "Crazy pirates. Devils, I think." She picked up her tray and walked off.

Kerry leaned forward, projecting her voice. "Pirates?"

The bartender jumped a little, then turned. "Oh, it's nothing, ma'am. We were just-"

"Just not wanting to scare us, yes, but what about the pirates?"

Kerry interrupted.

He looked like he'd been caught in headlights that rarely appeared on St. Johns. "Ma'am..." His eyes shifted around, but most of the patrons were eating at tables; Dar and Kerry were the only ones on that side of the bar. With a second careful look, he sidled over. "We're not supposed to talk about it," he explained.

"Sure," Dar said. "You don't want to scare off the tourists."

"Yeah." The boy grinned. "Glad you understand."

116*

"We're not tourists," Kerry smiled at him, "so don't worry about it. Tell us about the pirates."

Rea.s.sured, the bartender leaned on his elbow near them. "Been six hijackings this month," he told them. "Boats comin' in, they get pulled over by these guys, and whap. No more boat, no credit cards, no cash; you name it."

Dar and Kerry exchanged glances. "Wow," Kerry said finally.

"No wonder you don't want it to get out."

"Big money, you know?" The boy shrugged. "They just been lucky. n.o.body's got hurt so far." He looked up as his name was called. "S'cuse me."

Kerry let her wrists rest on the bar. "Good grief, Dar!"

Dar watched the group cross into the resort building, a concerned look on her face. "How in the h.e.l.l can they not tell people?" she said in outrage. "There should have been a G.o.dd.a.m.ned travel advisory at least!"

"Six hijackings in one month?" Kerry shook her head in disbelief. "I know it's tough on the economy, but...Jesus!"

Dar interlaced her fingers and leaned her chin against them.

Her eyes flickered rapidly over the interior of the bar, a sudden intensity to her demeanor that had been absent moments before, yet very familiar to Kerry. "Those people could have been us." She frowned.

"Well," Kerry took a bite of her burger, "it almost was, Dar, except it was you they were chasing, and you don't put up with pirates, right?"

"Mmph," Dar muttered. "Doesn't make sense. That guy's too public to be a pirate, and Charlie said..." She stopped speaking for a moment. "What was he trying to say?" she continued softly.

"Maybe he was wrong. Maybe this guy's really running the pirates."

Kerry nibbled a fry. "Why?" she asked. "Dar, if that data is right, this guy's worth millions. Why run a bunch of boat hijackers in the Caribbean? I mean, yeah, okay-the boats are worth a lot, but can you imagine what it takes to do one over so you could sell it?

And how much cash or jewelry could these guys be carrying anyway? It doesn't add up."

Dar scowled.

"Well, it doesn't," Kerry murmured.

"I know, I know," Dar said. "But what are the odds that we get chased down by someone who isn't part of the lowlife sc.u.m chasing down other expensive boats in the area?"

"Hm." Kerry sighed. "Yeah, that is kind of a coincidence." She lifted her mug and took a few swallows. "Do you think we should tell the police about what happened, though? Especially since we know who did it?"*117 Dar took a few minutes to finish off her cheeseburger before she answered, which also gave her time to consider the question. "I don't know," she finally admitted. "If the word's out not to tell anyone, how reliable are the police?"

"Maybe they're not the ones who are putting the lid on."

"Maybe," Dar murmured. "If we do tell them, then what? We're not going to press charges, not out here at any rate."

"He could buy them off anyway," Kerry replied with a hard- earned skepticism. "But at least if the police know, and if they are really trying to find these guys, they'll have the information."

"Would it make you feel better?" Dar queried. "Telling them?"

Kerry nodded, then her lips quirked a bit. "Besides, while we're telling them what happened to us, maybe we can get them to tell us what's going on."

Dar's eyebrows lifted and she gave Kerry an approving look.

"Good point," she conceded.

Kerry blew on her nails, then buffed them on her bare shoulder.

"Besides, they have something else in common," she added seriously, "those guys and the pirates. According to our friend the bartender, no one got hurt in the hijackings."

"Just like with us," Dar mused. "Once they had the boats, they could have just killed the owners."

Kerry nodded. "Not left any witnesses alive," she said. "Who knows, Dar, maybe this guy's got some angle on all this. Maybe he..." Her imagination kicked in. "Maybe he's taking these boats, revamping them, and selling them for twice what they're worth to the same guys buying that art stuff from him."

"Hm." Dar sucked on her straw as she considered the possibility. "It would be the right market," she said. "More money than brains."

Kerry chuckled. "You know, I've got relatives like that," she said. "In fact, you've met most of them." A ripple traveled through her at the words, as she recognized a certain sense of distance on hearing them. She realized that the rawness she'd felt over her father's death and the ugliness she'd faced with her family afterward were easing.

"S'okay." Dar gazed at her quietly. "You've met my contributions to the four-bit gene pool, too."

True. Impulsively, Kerry reached across the top of the bar and clasped Dar's hand, squeezing it briefly then letting it go. "Our family doesn't have that problem. Even our dog is a genius."

Dar chuckled. "I'll remind you of that the next time she steals your socks." She glanced around the bar. "You done?"

Kerry nodded. "Let's go find some trouble." She slid off the stool and followed Dar out of the tiki bar, toward the main resort building.

118*

DAR UNLOCKED THE door to their room and pushed it open.

"Might as well get changed first," she commented. "I hate talking to cops in a sandy wetsuit."

Kerry slipped past her and walked right out onto the porch, stripped completely out of her wetsuit, and left it on one of the chairs, inside out. "Give me yours and I'll rinse it," she called back over her shoulder.

"Sure." Dar pulled off the neoprene suit and slung it over her shoulder, then she stopped and looked around, warned by a faint p.r.i.c.kling of her senses. The room was neat, as they'd left it, only the freshly made bed an indication that the maids had been in to tidy up. Neither she nor Kerry tended to leave things laying out, and before they'd left, they'd both tucked things away either in the drawer or in their bags. So, nothing was out of place. And yet...

Dar frowned, then looked up as Kerry stuck her head back inside.

"Here." She walked over and handed her the wetsuit. "Something's bugging me about this place."

Kerry ducked outside, then eased her entire body back in the room, standing inside and watching Dar curiously. "What is it?"

Dar turned in a circle. "I'm not sure." Her eyes swept the room, searching for whatever it was that was bothering her. Nothing was missing; everything was right where she'd left it, including her laptop sitting on the table, its theft warning label bold on the outside.

Curious, she walked over and flipped up the top, breaking the log-in sequence and rattling off a series of commands to the operating system. No, the machine hadn't been touched since they'd left. It wasn't the computer; it wasn't their things... Then she realized that it wasn't something visual at all. Her nose twitched, and the alien scent she'd detected came back to her as her mind tried to identify it. "You smell that?"

Kerry stepped inside and shut the outside door. "Smell what, hon?"

Dar waved her hand vaguely. "In the room. Something that isn't us."

Resisting the urge to walk over and check Dar for fever, Kerry dutifully sniffed at the air. "Well, I can smell salt water, neoprene, and sunscreen. I guess that's us, right?"

Dar nodded.

Kerry walked around near the bed. "Sorry, Dar. I don't..." She paused. "Wait, you mean that sort of roseish, alcoholy kind of smell?" It seemed vaguely familiar, but nothing immediately popped into her mind as to why.

"Yeah." Dar circled near the dresser. "It's strongest here," she stated positively.

"What is it?" Kerry asked. "It's not cleaning solution; I know*119 what that smells like. All hotels use the same kind."

"Perfume," Dar replied quietly. "Our little friend Christen's perfume."

Kerry stared at her. One blond eyebrow lifted slightly. "Are you sure?" she asked. "I didn't even notice she was wearing any."

"I noticed," Dar replied. "Because I hate the brand. It's the same one Eleanor uses."

"Ah!" Bingo. Kerry slapped her head. "No wonder it seemed familiar." She paused. "Are you saying she was here in our room?"

Dar sat down on the bed, letting her elbows rest on her knees.

"Can't think of any way for her perfume to get here without her, so yeah."

"Ew."

"Yeah." Dar frowned. "I'm going to go check the boat." She got up and headed for the door.

"Dar." Kerry unzipped Dar's overnight bag. "Here. Not that I mind you storming around like an escapee from the swimsuit compet.i.tion of the Ms. Aggressive America, but..." She tossed her lover a long black T-shirt with a snarling tiger on it.

"Thanks." Dar pulled the shirt on over her bathing suit and picked up the pouch in which she'd carried their keys. "Be right back."

"Be careful," Kerry called after her, watching as the door shut behind Dar. For a moment she just stood there, then she put her hands on her hips and shook her head. "Boy, this sucks." She opened her own bag and riffled through its contents, wondering what the creepy woman had been looking for. They'd only packed a few shirts, their swimsuits, and some other casual wear, and even the most avid of detectives probably couldn't have gotten much information from their choice of bathroom toiletries, other than the fact that they had a preference for mint toothpaste and apricot body scrub.

Of course, the laptop was a mine of information, but it might as well have been in Fort Knox for all the good its presence could have done anyone. The security on the machine that held the keys to the company was so a.n.a.lly extensive, even Mark couldn't break into it.

Even removing the hard drive wouldn't do a thing for the potential hacker. Without Dar's encryption algorithms, the data was scrambled past recovery, and she never kept much locally anyway.

So, if not information, what were they looking for?

Another thought occurred to her. What if they weren't looking for anything? What if they planted a bug? "Son of a b.i.t.c.h." Kerry sat down and flipped open the laptop, and waited for the log-in to come up. When it did, she logged in, waited for it to validate her, then started up the broad spectrum data a.n.a.lyzer program Dar kept on the drive.

120*

Bugs weren't really that complex, and one of the first things Dar had taught her was how to find them. She'd felt a little funny knowing how frequent their use was in their particular trade, but compet.i.tion was fierce, and salesmen were not above using them to get any advantage they could.

Dar, she'd been told, never bothered with them. Sometimes when she knew a bug was there, she'd have fun with the planter by pa.s.sing along the most outlandish information, then waiting for it to come back in a bid meeting-which it sometimes did.

The program started up and she configured it, setting it to scan using two specialized ports for all frequencies across the bandwidth used for radio transmission. She started it running and propped her chin on her fist, waiting. You could do that with cell phones, too, and anything else that used electronic signals that went through the air-like wireless networks, which was what the program had really been designed to a.n.a.lyze.

It showed nothing until she started reciting the pledge of allegiance. Then the program picked up scans on two frequencies, and Kerry shook her head in irritation. She left the program running and slowly walked around, continuing her oration and watching the screen. Near the ornate lamp, the signal peaked.

Kerry regarded the lamp, then she simply unplugged it, picked it up, and carried it outside. She set it in the far corner of the porch and went back inside.

Now the program showed a clean scan again. Kerry gave it the acid test-she started singing. Even at her top volume, the scan remained quiet. With a nod of satisfaction, she went back outside and picked up the small hose attached to the spigot, turned the water on, and rinsed off their wetsuits with careful thoroughness.

There is nothing, Kerry sprayed the inside of the suits, nothing on earth that smells worse than a dirty wetsuit.

After a moment, she glanced over, then sprayed the lamp for good measure. Except scuzzy, rose water wearing, obnoxious detectives, that is.

DAR HEADED FOR the docks, conscious of a growing anger.

She hadn't been asking for trouble out there; in fact, she'd gone out of her way to avoid it, but d.a.m.n it, the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds kept coming after them and now she was starting to get really p.i.s.sed off about it. She made her way down toward the slip in which they'd docked and used the key she'd been given to unlock the steel gate that blocked off the slip. It appeared undisturbed, but so had their hotel room door, and Dar wasn't stupid enough to think whoever got paid off to let the slimebags in there hadn't also done the same for the gate at the marina.*121 The boat was floating quietly, tied to its pylons-the umbilicals plugged into dockside power to run the few things they'd left on, like the refrigerator. Dar stepped onto the deck and dropped down onto the stern, looking around carefully before she went to the cabin door.

It was a small bra.s.s lock, not really intended for serious security, and Dar fitted her key in and turned it without encountering any resistance. She peered at the bra.s.s plate, then pushed the cabin door open and slipped inside, quickly closing the door after her.

She relaxed at once. Just as the faintest hints of strange perfume had triggered her senses in the hotel room, the absence of anything she hadn't expected rea.s.sured her here. Dar inspected the interior anyway, moving into the very front of the bow, then checking the master bedroom where the scent, since the hatches were closed, was definitely very familiar to her. "Well," she spoke into the silence, "as long as I'm here, might as well shower and change."

She went to the dresser and took out a pair of stone-washed shorts overalls and a dark blue shirt, leaving them on the bed as she went into the bathroom and flipped on the water. She slid out of her swimsuit, ducked under the water, and quickly scrubbed the salt off her skin. A moment more, and she'd rinsed the soap out of her hair and was stepping out of the shower, turning off the water, and grabbing one of the towels draped over the holder in the small s.p.a.ce. She dried herself off and wrapped the towel around her, then emerged and headed back to the bedroom.

Now that she was sure the boat was secure, she started considering both what had happened, and her options. She dressed as she thought, tucking the shirt into her overalls and buckling the shoulder straps. When she finished, she reviewed the results in the mirror. "Cute and conservative. You're starting to look like Kerry."

Dar sighed, then unsnapped one of the shoulder straps and let the front of the garment rakishly hang half down. "That's better." She added her wraparound sungla.s.ses, then grunted, satisfied with her changes.

As she pa.s.sed back out through the living area, she paused, then sidetracked to the equipment locker. She opened the top, moving Kerry's shotgun aside to get to a blue milk crate underneath. Inside there was a thick piece of hardened steel chain and a padlock. She pulled out the chain and looped it around her neck, then picked up the padlock, hefting it as she left the cabin and locked the door behind her.

On the deck, she paused, acknowledging her territorial reaction over the boat. It wasn't as if they had anything truly valuable on board-or even that personal, but she regarded this vessel as part of 122*

their private s.p.a.ce and the thought of anyone invading it made her hackles stand right up.

With a slight snort, she stepped up onto the side of the boat, then leaped to the dock, landing lightly and padding barefoot back up to the gate. Hearing voices on the other side, she slowed as she approached it, then stopped when she recognized one of the speakers as Juan Carlos. He was standing with a security guard on the other side of the gate, and they both stopped speaking when they looked through the bars and spotted Dar.

Dar leaned on the gate and stared steadily at them from behind her sungla.s.ses. "Something I can do for you?" she asked in a tone usually reserved for budget meetings.