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“Did what needed to be done? What does that mean? What did you do, Father?”
“I found them.”
“From the kidnappers?”
“Yes! What has gotten into you?”
“Hmm. Your men were the kidnappers. That is what I think.”
“You think I kidnapped my own family? Drugged them and dragged them out on some ship in the Arabian Sea? Sent ransom demands to myself? Why would I do such things?”
“No, I think Zamarad was escaping you and you stopped her. Your men boarded that ship, your men killed my wife, my sister. They didn’t rescue Mira, they were the ones who traumatized her. Put a bag over her head, drugged her! Your men, under your orders!”
“You’re in shock and saying these sinful things. You’re ungrateful, Mal, always have been. I’ve given you everything, just like I gave my girls everything. Are you really going to accuse me of kidnapping?”
“Your actions killed them. You killed them!”
“I’m a murderer now? What else? If you’d done your job as a father and husband your wife would be alive today.”
I charged into the room, wedging between my father and grandfather. “Stop! Stop fighting!”
Jadd grabbed my wrist. “What lies have you been telling your father?”
I wrenched my arm, but he yanked it so hard I felt the pain all the way up into my shoulder. “You’re hurting me! Let me go! Let me go, Jadd!”
He lifted me until I flailed in the air. I struggled to kick, but I might as well have been a desert mouse being dangled by its tail.
“Let her go!” my father demanded.
“You’re not able to protect your child.”
“Like you’ve protected yours? By putting one in a cage and another in a grave? I will not stand by and let it happen to Mira, too.”
Panting, I scrambled out of bed before my trip down nightmare lane came to its inevitable conclusion. I should’ve known the Ozma Emerald wouldn’t be the only thing brought up from the depths on this job.
I had to get out of this room, breathe in some fresh air. But as soon as I threw back the covers, I felt naked. Thinking Coop might steal into my bed once he’d cooled down from his fight with Leo, I’d worn a silk cami and matching sleep shorts. Shorts? The way they were slit up the sides they fit more like a loin cloth.
What had I been think— Okay, scratch that, I knew exactly the erotic thoughts ripping through my mind when I’d chosen to wear the overly revealing, pathetic excuse for pajamas. No wonder I couldn’t sleep. With every movement the exquisite fabric teased across my skin, titillating all the places that burned for Coop’s touch.
I snagged a kimono-style robe made from the finest silk from the closet and slipped it on. The covering was emblazoned with the OZ logo, which helped to snuff some of my arousal and remind me again of the flashbacks and why I was really here. It wasn’t to get laid. The fire and ice waring within my thoughts only served to confuse me.
Still breathless from my hurried movements, I padded, barefoot, topside for fresh air and to clear my head. We were expecting scattered storms, but directly over the ship the sky was cloudless, like a path up to the stars and clear to heaven.
“Mira, you’re going to love it here,” Zanji had told me when she’d learned I was coming with Am’maty Z. “The night sky from Marakata is even more beautiful than in the desert. You’ll think black velvet had been laid out and all the diamonds in the world scattered upon it.”
Little had I known Zanji had never even seen the night sky, not directly anyway. She’d only viewed the island from her computer screens. Now that I’d escaped, even for just a day, I realized how similar Zanji and I had become. But I didn’t want our fates to be the same.
I drew in a long breath of ocean air. Tonight it was infused with the sharp aroma of chlorine from the hot tub and the wet, cool scent of approaching rain. To the east, a cluster of puffed-up clouds sporadically glowed and flickered. The lightning hovered too far away to worry about for now.
Leaning on the rail, I tried to let the rhythmic splash of waves against the yacht’s hull and the rippling play of silvery moonlight soothe my anxiety down and center me in the present.
On Marakata, I had things like work and riding horses and skydiving to help distract me. And for a time, I’d even used sex. Keeping it impersonal, the men never even knew my name. I’d wear wigs, outfits, pretend to be someone, anyone else. Whoever I thought the man of the hour’s fantasy woman would be. It was easy, and fun, but eventually I’d realized fulfilling their fantasies had done nothing to fulfill mine. The trysts were merely a series of illusions. Mirages. Lies.
I’d been chasing false freedom, same as Am’maty Z.
As time moved on, my desires had become clear and focused, and tonight I needed nothing more than to disappear into the only real thing I had—Michael Cooper.
He’d been on the deck with me the whole time. My guardian. My ghost.
I kept my focus on the water, the surface of the sea, glazed in moonlight. My nerves sizzled, as alive and charged as the distant lightning.
For a long time now, sex had been solely me and my very active imagination. I’d been able to predict exactly what would happen to my body, because like everything else in my world, I regulated it. But I’d never been adept at controlling Coop, nor could I predict what he would do to me next.
My heartbeat sped in wicked anticipation as I invited him over. “Are you just going to look or do you want to touch?”
His gritty voice came from the shadows. “You owe me a secret first, Presh.”
