Ghost Night

Slicing them might have been a mercy, if they were drowning, Sean thought, but he kept silent.

As he cleared the channel, Vanessa came and took the companion seat by the helm.

“Ah, but she looks lovely there!” Bartholomew commented.

She did. She was relaxed, enjoying the wind that whipped around them as they sped through the water. The Conch Fritter wasn’t new, but she was a thirty-eight-foot Sea Ray custom Sundancer, and Sean loved her. She did twenty knots with amazing comfort—she wasn’t going to outrun a real powerboat by any means, but she could move. The cockpit was air-conditioned and equipped with two flat-screen TVs, and there were three small sleeping cabins, the captain’s cabin at the fore and two lining the port and starboard sides. There was a small galley and main cabin as well, and the helm sat midway through the sleek design with a fiberglass companion seat that offered plenty of storage. He’d had her outfitted with a helm opening and an aft boarding ladder with a broad platform, and portside and starboard safe holds for dive tanks.

“Yes, yes, you love your boat,” Bartholomew said, rolling his eyes. “And she is a thing of beauty! But then again, can anything rival the gold of that young woman’s hair, the sea and sky that combine in her eyes?” he asked with an exaggerated sigh.

Sean thought, I will not look at you, you scurvy spectral bastard.

“Where are we going?” Vanessa asked above the hum of the motor.

“Pirate Cut—it’s a close, easy dive,” Sean said.

“We don’t even need tanks,” she commented.

“Ah, she knows the reef!” Bartholomew said. “Frankly, it seems that everything this young woman has said to you is true.”

“If you want to stay down and film we need tanks and equipment,” Sean said pleasantly to Vanessa.

She flushed and looked away, but it was obvious that she knew the reef, and probably knew it fairly well.

She did. She knew exactly where they were going, and how long it was going to take to get there. When they were still five minutes away, she stood and dug into her bag. She worked with a dive skin, not a suit, but a skin, light and not providing warmth. He actually liked a skin himself—a skin protected a diver against the tentacles of small and unseen jellyfish.

But he hadn’t brought one.

By the time he’d stopped the motor and dropped anchor, she had on her skin and dive booties. Dive booties could be good, too, he had to admit. He’d brought neither his skin nor booties, but he didn’t always wear them. She’d attached her regulator to a buoyancy-control vest and tank—the one next to the tank he’d prepared for himself. She wasted no time.

“What are we using?” she asked him.

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