15. Caro

"It's okay. You'll be okay."

I'd treated the turtle's wounds with Betadine and named her Lucky, because we'd all been lucky today. When hawksbills were sleeping, their metabolism slowed, and they could hold their breath for several hours underwater, plus they did this weird butt-breathing thing where they could absorb oxygen through their cloaca, which sounded like the kind of bullshit a turtle would spout if it played "two truths and a lie," but was actually a thing.

When they were awake, though, they could only go forty-five minutes without breathing, so Lucky had a close call this afternoon. If I'd taken a few extra minutes to squeeze into my wetsuit, she could have died. And if Knox hadn't reacted as quickly and as calmly as he did, then I would have joined her, just the way he said.

And how had I thanked him for saving both of us?

I'd basically accused him of not caring.

Way to go, Caro.

Three hours had passed since we came up from the worst dive of my life, and I was still shaking. I held a hand out in front of me and stared at it. Yup, shaking. I'd seen dead turtles before, but never so many, and never just…just hanging there like that. Franklin had always suspected that bait lines were being set around the islands, but this was the first time we'd been able to prove it.

After I called Franklin, I'd called Vince. Although he was based on Ilha Grande—all the detectives were—he covered Malavilla and Valentine Cay too. The San Gallicano Department of Emergency Services was small, only seven hundred people, and that included all the civilian employees, the fire department, the coastguard, and San Gallicano's paramilitary force. There were only a dozen detectives for the whole nation. That didn't usually matter because serious crimes were rare—other than the drama out at Skeleton Cay two years ago, there hadn't been a murder for three years, and that time, Vince had found the guy's wife still holding the knife. But it did mean nobody had ever gotten a proper handle on the poaching. And maybe they never would? Budget cuts meant the police department was no longer as proactive as it once had been, and there were bigger problems to deal with, drugs and domestic violence being just two of them. Some officers didn't even see the occasional bit of poaching as a problem, despite the government ban. Turtle meat had been eaten for generations, and who were they to tell islanders to change their way of life?

Vince cared, though. He'd shown up with Officer Roy and cordoned off the beach while we waited for Franklin to arrive with the boat. When I described the baited line, both Vince and Franklin thought it was the work of professional poachers and not a hungry local fishing for his supper. There was discussion about leaving the line in place and mounting a surveillance operation to catch the culprits, and Officer Roy was in favour, but Vince pointed out the small crowd that had gathered to watch the drama and said that word of the discovery of the dead turtles would spread like wildfire. If the poachers had local connections, they wouldn't be back. As for Franklin, he said the turtles deserved a dignified burial, that the spirits wouldn't be happy if they were treated as bait. Yes, he believed in the spirits, and I tried to humour him even though I thought the whole thing was a bunch of hokum.

Franklin had taken Lucky, me, and Knox back on the boat while Vince kept watch on the beach and Jason Roy went home to fetch his dive gear. Then Knox had traded places with Ryder, and Ryder went to recover the bodies with Jason while I treated Lucky.

Now? Now Franklin and Ryder were on their way back, and I just felt drained. And sad. And guilty.

My phone pinged with a message.

Stacey

Any idea what happened at Coconut Cove today? I heard it was something about turtles?

I took a couple of deep breaths, trying to keep my emotions under control. Bad enough that Knox had seen my tears earlier without blubbering through the phone at Stacey. I'd managed to hold myself together while my life fell apart the first time, so dealing with it a second time should be easier, right?

She answered on the first ring. "Oh, hey, how are you?"

"Honestly? I'm not good."

"The turtles…?"

"Four of them died. Four hawksbills. We managed to save a fifth, and I nearly ran out of air, and—" So much for not crying. I sniffled and wiped my eyes with the bottom of my T-shirt. "It was h-h-horrible."

"I'm so sorry. Did the shark get them?"

"No, not the shark. This was all the work of humans." I told her about the baited line, how four turtles had been hooked and drowned, how Lucky had gotten tangled and nearly died too. That she was in the tank beside Gilbert, her belly full of sardines, alive and safe. For now. "If only we'd gotten there sooner, we could have saved the others too."

"How long had the line been down there? I thought Coconut Cove was a popular diving spot?"

"A day or two? I don't know. There was still bait on several of the hooks."

"Putting the line there was a big risk for the poachers. They must have known there was a chance a human would spot what they were doing."

"Maybe they just don't care? The turtle population has declined, but there are always sightings at Coconut Cove. That's partly why it's a popular diving spot. Or maybe they heard about the shark sighting and figured the cove would be quiet for a day or two?"

"Are there many sharks around here?"

"There never used to be. In the past several years, they've begun coming closer to shore because we're stealing all their food sources through commercial fishing. Locals who rely on tourists for income are worried it'll scare the foreigners away."

Franklin said that in his first twenty years on Valentine Cay, sharks near the beach were almost unheard of. Then occasional sightings were reported, mainly Caribbean reef sharks, blacktip sharks, and the occasional tiger shark. Last year, someone even claimed to have spotted a great white, but they'd probably gotten it confused with a bull shark. The water here was too warm for great whites.

"We destroy their habitat and then complain when they visit ours?" Stacey said.

"Exactly."

"That happened with the elephants too."

"More and more often, I feel ashamed to be a human."

Although there were a few decent ones left. Knox's face popped into my head. Without his quick thinking, Vince would have had a hella busy week ahead. A part of me wondered whether it might have been easier to drown. The San Gallicano PD would take the death of a human far more seriously than the deaths of several turtles, and I was living on borrowed time anyway. If Aiden caught up with me, he'd do a lot worse than leaving me to become fish food.

"I know how you feel," Stacey said. "I still have nightmares about what I saw in Africa."

"Do you think the turtles in Coconut Cove could be connected to your smuggling ring?"

"Honestly, I don't know. Nobody much wants to talk. Some of them blow me off, and others seem…scared. It's strange—in Africa, it was a clear case of good versus evil, rangers versus poachers. But here… It's more like evil versus apathy. You care, and a handful of the cops care, but nobody's really doing much. There's no organised anti-poaching effort other than the occasional beach patrol during nesting season."

"Which gives the poachers more power." A chill ran through me. "Just watch your back, okay?"

"I always do."

* * *

The boat came back. I heard the engine and then Franklin's heavy footsteps on the dock. Knox went out to assist, and Luna and Jubilee must have followed him because I heard a scream followed by retching. For once, I couldn't criticise the girls for overreacting because that was pretty much how I felt too.

I should have gone to help, but I couldn't bring myself to look at the dead turtles again. I only had to close my eyes to see them hanging there. Not only was it a reminder of their loss, but of my own mortality as well. When that line caught around my ankle, I'd panicked, and that had only made it tighter. Then I'd tried to cut myself free, but my hands were shaking so much that I'd dropped my knife.

This was never meant to be my life. I'd only taken the minor in biology because I had a crush on one of the teaching assistants, and then he'd broken my heart by getting engaged to a girl who wasn't me. No, finance was my jam. I'd been a good accountant. So good that I'd managed to unravel the fraud at AquaLux Yachts and report it to the IRS as part of my plan to escape Aiden. But then the slippery son of a bitch had wriggled out of the charges, and I'd had no choice but to run permanently.

I'd grown to enjoy working with turtles, and the conservation of an endangered species was vital, but they weren't my first love. More and more often, I missed my fancy coffee and my air-conditioned office. My beautiful shoes and my BMW. I missed sex, but I didn't miss being mind-fucked by Aiden. Never fall for the pretty ones, ladies. At best, they were too good to be true. At worst, they were deadly.

"Hey."

Speaking of pretty ones… I turned to find Knox standing in the doorway, dressed in board shorts and a faded T-shirt two sizes too small. Either he'd taken a shower, or he'd been in the sea again because his hair was wet, tied back in a messy bun on top of his head. The man had better hair than I did. When I didn't answer, he came to sit beside me on the edge of Lucky's pool.

"How's she doing?"

"The cut on her flipper is deep, but it should heal in time."

"And how are you doing?"

Don't cry, Caro."I got scraped by a hook, but I put Betadine on it."

"That wasn't what I meant."

"Oh, really?"

"Don't play dumb, Caro. You're not dumb. You have to know that people are worried about you. Why don't you let them in rather than pushing them away?"

Yes, Knox was too good to be true, and he was definitely dangerous. He saw through me. Saw the vulnerability I tried so hard to hide. Earlier, I'd managed to avoid his question about why I was always checking behind me, but he'd ask it again. He'd ask until I answered. Knox wasn't the type of man to let something drop.

"Are you saying you're worried about me? You've known me for less than a week."

"I wasn't aware there was a set timescale for caring."

I was about to make a snarky retort when I realised I was being horrible to him again. And Knox didn't deserve that. No, he deserved an apology, no matter how hard it was for me to make it.

"I shouldn't…" I paused to breathe. "What I actually meant to say was ‘I'm sorry.' I'm sorry I've been such a bitch. It's been a hellish day, but that's no excuse."

"Apology accepted. Do you want to talk? The problem goes deeper than Luna and the dead turtles, doesn't it? You're running from something."

I nodded. There was no point in trying to lie. Knox had already picked up on my fears, and I felt as if I owed him the truth for saving my life.

"What are you running from?" Knox asked. "I know it's not anything criminal—that would have shown up on the background check."

The…what? "You background-checked me?"

"Standard procedure for anyone a principal will be spending time around."

"That's…that's so invasive."

"We only use publicly available information." When I didn't lose my scowl, Knox flashed a grin. "Relax, it was only a basic once-over. Not the comprehensive probe where we turn your colon inside out."

Sheesh, I hoped they didn't find a photo of the real Caroline Menefee. She was six inches shorter and sixty pounds heavier than me. And if Knox had been checking through criminal records, now he thought I'd been busted for smoking pot when I was seventeen. Great.

"I came here after a breakup, okay? My ex was a real jackass."

"You think he might try to find you?"

"He swore he would."

In an email after I left, before I panicked and deleted the whole account.

"And you believed him? Harsh words can be said in the heat of the moment."

"Oh, he had time to think about it." Several days in jail, in fact. "He holds grudges like no other, and he says I ruined his life."

"Didn't like being told it was over, huh?"

"No, he didn't."

Especially when the news was delivered by a criminal investigator. I'd used the time before he got released on bail to pack up my things and disappear. Oh, and get into a fight with his mistress when she showed up unexpectedly. Then I'd flown to England, to Italy, to Mexico, reluctantly returned to the US after six months to get pulled apart on the witness stand, and finally ended up in San Gallicano.

"How long ago did it happen?"

"Nearly three and a half years."

"Maybe he'll have gotten over it?"

"No, he definitely won't." Not when his daddy was still in prison for tax evasion and he'd been forced to sell off most of the family's assets to pay the fines. I'd read about it on the internet. The Malibu mansion, the house in the Hamptons, the Florida beach house, they'd all gone. Most of the yachts too, and the AquaLux brand was a shadow of its former self. I wasn't even sure if Aiden was involved with the company anymore. The new CEO was Carlos Davila, who'd been a mere salesman when I worked there, and it looked as if he was shopping around for outside investment. Unsuccessfully, so far. "Can we please stop talking about this?"

"Sure. So you're just going to stay here at the sanctuary for the rest of your life?"

I shrugged. "Probably. Somebody needs to care for the turtles, and as long as Little Miss Social Media over there"—I jerked my head toward the bunkhouse where I assumed Luna had gone to avoid any actual work—"doesn't blow my cover, I'm safe where I am."

"Safe as long as you don't decide to disregard safety protocols and get tangled in nylon cord again. Don't you carry a dive knife?"

"I dropped it," I admitted. "Thank you for helping me."

"Get a new one. And if you ever pull another stunt like today's, I'll tie you up myself."

"Why? Do you enjoy that kind of thing?"

The words fell out of my mouth before I could bite my tongue. Think before you speak, Caro. Hot guys were trouble.

Knox leaned in. Not touching, but closer than was generally polite. "What kind of thing do you mean?" Another inch. "Are we talking bondage? Or merely discipline?"

I swallowed hard. "Can you forget I asked that?"

"Nah, baby. Do you like being spanked?"

"Stop!" I pushed him back, and was it my imagination, or did he flinch when I touched his chest? "Are you hurt?"

"You caught me with your foot earlier. It's nothing."

Nothing? Really? For a man like Knox to wince, it had to be more than that.

"Show me."

He stared at me for a beat, then lifted the hem of his shirt. Damn, the man had abs. A six-pack. No, an eight-pack. I was so busy counting muscles that I almost missed the huge purple bruise on his pec. It was roughly the size and shape of Ilha Grande.

"Shit! I'm so sorry."

"As I said, it's nothing."

"You and me, we have very different ideas of nothing. Do you want ice? Acetaminophen?"

"How about you just don't press on it when you want to avoid answering my questions?"

"How about you stop asking dumb questions?"

Knox smirked. "Don't think I'm gonna do that."

"Why not? Because you have a brain the size of a fairy shrimp?"

Slowly, slowly, he lowered his shirt. "Because I like getting you riled up."

"You're a real asshole, did anyone ever tell you that?"

"And I think you like it too."

"Why the hell would you think that?"

His gaze dropped to my chest, and…oh. Dammit! Why were my nipples hard? Those traitorous tips were pressing against the fabric of my T-shirt as if they were begging Knox Livingston to suck on them. Urgh. I crossed my arms, but that only made him laugh.

"It's not funny."

"Beg to differ, babe."

"I'm not your babe."

"Not yet, but I'm working on it."

"Don't you ever stop?"

"Most women like my stamina."

Was Knox genuinely hitting on me? I wasn't sure whether to be flattered or annoyed or strip off my clothes and drag him behind the storage shed. Certainly the ache between my thighs suggested the third idea was popular. It had been a really, really long dry spell.

"Don't you have a poor, long-suffering girlfriend waiting at home?" He wasn't wearing a ring, so I was going to assume no woman had been fool enough to marry him.

"Outside of work, commitment has never been my thing." He ran a finger down my arm. Just one finger, and heat flooded through my veins. "If you need that itch scratched, you know where to find me."

"What itch? What are you talking about?" More accurately: how did he know?

He took a step back. "And try not to throttle Luna. She's a pain in the rear end, we get that, but there's enough shit going on without having to pull the two of you apart every five minutes."

"I…"

"And if you're trying to keep a low profile, I should probably warn you that Jubilee's offered to take over the sanctuary's Instagram account while they're here, and Baptiste went for the idea. If you see her coming with a camera, duck."

Knox threw me a salute, and then he was gone.