Jokes? He was making jokes about theirplane crash?
Well, two can play that game.
Scooting into a seated position with her back against the raft’s rubber side, she gave a shrug she hoped came off as nonchalant. “You know what they say. What doesn’t kill you gives you a warped sense of humor and post-traumatic stress.”
His lips quirked, but just for an instant before his brow furrowed. “Last thing I remember, I was headed to the back of the Otter for some water. How’d I end up strapped into the seat?”
“That would be thanks to me and Mia,” she told him.
One dark blond brow winged up his forehead. “I bet that was fun.”
“Like a carnival ride and mud wrestling an unconscious gorilla all rolled into one.”
He laughed and bobbed his chin. “Well, thank you. Thank you both.” He turned to include Mia, who was wrapped tight in Romeo’s arms.
No. That wasn’t right. It wasRomeowho was wrapped tight inMia’sarms.Romeo’sarms hung at his sides like he wasn’t sure what to do with them.
Cami wondered if it was the crash, the near drowning, or Mia’s reaction that had him looking like his world had gone topsy-turvy. But before she had time to reach a conclusion, he shook his head like he was coming out of a trance. Placing one broad-palmed hand flat against Mia’s back, he used the other to gently brush a finger down the side of her face.
“It’s okay,cariña.” His deep voice was nothing but a whisper. “I’m okay. We’re okay. Just breathe.”
Cariña, is it?
Cami had wondered if there was something between the flyboy and the marine archeologist. The way Mia had spoken of Romeo’s piloting skills had been blatantly admiring, almost reverential. And Cami haddefinitelycaught Romeo sneaking a peek at Mia’s backside at the airport.
Well, good for you, sis,she thought. Because Spiro “Romeo” Delgado was onefinespecimen of man. The kind of guy Carlotta would have called an Adonis—all GQ features and granite-hewn body.
Not Cami’s taste. She preferred her men a little rough around the edges. And if he was grumpy on top of that?
Be still my heart.
“The Dirty Harry type,”Carlotta had teased her. To which she’d always replied,“So sue me for enjoying a face with a little character. Give me a crooked nose or a chin scar any day of the week and twice on Sunday.”
Speaking of faces with character...
She glanced over at Doc, at the water sheeting off his wild head of hair that hadn’t decided what color it wanted to be, and so had become a fascinating mix of twenty different shades of blond and brown. He had a small, flesh-colored mole beside his nose—the male equivalent of a beauty mark. And his full, masculine lips twisted into a disgruntled moue when he pulled out from under his denim-clad butt one of the water bottles Mia had dumped out of her shirt and into the bottom of the raft.
Cami remembered spying him from across the bar the night before, all tall and lean and a little mean-looking with that toothpick sticking out of his mouth. No crooked nose or chin scar. But the crinkles at the corners of his eyes had spoken of a life staring at the horizon. And the stubble on his cheeks had been days old, as if he hadn’t bothered to shave because he’d had more important things to do.
High cheekbones. Thick eyebrows. Eyes that were cool and green and reminded her of the ferns that grew in the forests of the Adirondacks where her father had taken her and Carlotta hiking as kids.
All of that had been enough to pique her interest. But it’d been the slightlybrokenexpression on his face that’d completely disarmed her.
Before she’d known what she was doing, she’d hopped from her barstool and headed in his direction.
She hadn’t been able to explain it then. She couldn’t explain it now. She wasn’t the type for one-night stands. Yet, that’s exactly what she’d known she was getting herself into after he plucked the toothpick from his mouth, let his gaze travel over her body, and asked to buy her a drink.
He’d been a neutron star. She’d been helplessly, hopelessly pulled into his orbit.
“Are you okay?” she asked him again, pointing to his head and then nonchalantly folding the halves of her linen suit jacket over her thin blouse, hoping to hide that it’d turned see-through after getting wet.
“Depends on your definition of okay,” he grumbled, digging into the front pocket of his jeans. He pulled out a toothpick that was a little bent, but it went straight into his mouth anyway.
“For real, though, Doc.” Romeo kept a strong arm wrapped around Mia’s waist when he asked, “How bad is it?”
Cami expected Doc to check his head again, so she was confused when he touched his left arm. There was no mistaking the flicker of suffering in his eyes when his fingers pressed on a certain spot. Her stomach roiled in sympathy.
Or maybe it roiled because the life raft kept rising and falling. Rising and falling. Rising and—
