CHAPTER 11
Love. Kate had read hundreds of poems about that one phenomenon. She’d read, analyzed and taught from countless novels where love was the catalyst to all action, all emotion. With her students, she’d dissected innumerable lines from books, plays and verse that all led back to that one word.
Now, for perhaps the first time in her life, it was offered to her. She found it had more power than could possibly be taught. She found she didn’t understand it.
Ky hadn’t Byron’s way with words, or Keat’s romantic phrasing. What he’d said, he’d said simply. It meant everything. She still didn’t understand it.
She could, in her own way, understand her feelings. She’d loved Ky for years, since that first revelation one summer when she’d come to know what it meant to want to fully share oneself with another.
But what, she wondered, did Ky find in her to love? It wasn’t modesty that caused her to ask herself this question, but the basic practicality she’d grown up with. Where there was an effect, there was a cause. Where there was reaction, there was action. The world ran on this principle. She’d won Ky’s love—but how?
Kate had no insecurity about her own intelligence. Perhaps, if anything, she overrated her mind, and it was this that caused her to underrate her other attributes.
He was a man of action, of restless and mercurial nature. She, on the other hand, considered herself almost blandly level. While she thrived on routine, Ky thrived on the unexpected. Why should he love her? Yet he did.
If she accepted that, it was vital to come to a resolution. Love led to commitment. It was there that she found the wall solid, without footholds.
He lived on a remote island because he was basically a loner, because he preferred moving at his own pace, in his own time. She was a teacher who lived by a day-to-day schedule. Without the satisfaction of giving knowledge, she’d stagnate. In the structured routine of a college town, Ky would go mad.
Because she could find no compromise, Kate opted to do what she’d decided to do in the beginning. She’d ride with the current until the summer was over. Perhaps by then, an answer would come.
They spoke no more of percentages. Kate quietly dropped the notion of keeping her hotel room. These, she told herself, were small matters when so much more hung in the balance during her second summer with Ky.
The days went quickly with her and Ky working together with the prop-wash or by hand. Slowly, painstakingly, they uncovered more salvage. The candlesticks had turned out to be pewter, but the coin had been Spanish silver. Its date had been 1748.
In the next two-week period, they uncovered much more—a heavy intricately carved silver platter, more china and porcelain, and in another area dozens of nails and tools.
Kate documented each find on film, for practical and personal reasons. She needed the neat, orderly way of keeping track of the salvage. She wanted to be able to look back on those pictures and remember how she felt when Ky held up a crusted teacup or an oxidized tankard. She’d be able to look and remember how he’d played an outstaring game with a large lazy bluefish. And lost.
More than once Ky had suggested the use of a larger ship equipped for salvage. They discussed it, and its advantages, but they never acted on it. Somehow, they both felt they wanted to move slowly, working basically with their own hands until there came a time when they had to make a decision.
The cannons and the heavier pieces of ship’s planking couldn’t be brought up without help, so these they left to the sea for the time being. They continued to use tanks, rather than changing to a surface-supplied source of air, so they had to surface and change gear every hour or so. A diving rig would have saved time—but that wasn’t their goal.
Their methods weren’t efficient by professional salvor standards, but they had an unspoken agreement. Stretch time. Make it last.
The nights they spent together in the big four-poster, talking of the day’s finds, or of tomorrow’s, making love, marking time. They didn’t speak of the future that loomed after the summer’s end. They never talked of what they’d do the day after the treasure was found.
The treasure became their focus, something that kept them from reaching out when the other wasn’t ready.
* * *
The day was fiercely hot as they prepared to dive. The sun was baking. It was mid-July. She’d been in Ocracoke for a month. For all her practicality, Kate told herself it was an omen. Today was the turning point of summer.
Even as she pulled the wet suit up to her waist, sweat beaded on her back. She could almost taste the cool freshness of the water. The sun glared on her tanks as she lifted them, bouncing off to spear her eyes.
“Here.” Taking them from her, Ky strapped them onto her back, checking the gauges himself. “The water’s going to feel like heaven.”
“Yeah.” Marsh tipped up a quart bottle of juice. “Think of me baking up here while you’re having all the fun.”
“Keep the throttle low, brother,” Ky said with a grin as he climbed over the side. “We’ll bring you a reward.”
“Make it something round and shiny with a date stamped on it,” Marsh called back, then winked at Kate as she started down the ladder. “Good luck.”
She felt the excitement as the water lapped over her ankles. “Today, I don’t think I need it.”
The noise of the prop-wash disturbed the silence of the water, but not the mystery. Even with technology and equipment, the water remained an enigma, part beauty, part danger. They went deeper and deeper until they reached the site with the scoops in the silt caused by their earlier explorations.
They’d already found what they thought had been the officer’s and passenger’s quarters, identifying it by the discovery of a snuff box, a silver bedside candleholder and Ky’s personal favorite—a decorated sword. The few pieces of jewelry they’d found indicated a personal cache rather than cargo.
Though they fully intended to excavate in the area of the cache, it was the cargo they sought. Using the passenger’s quarters and the galley as points of reference, they concentrated on what should have been the stern of the ship.
There were ballast rocks to deal with. This entailed a slow, menial process that required moving them by hand to an area they’d already excavated. It was time consuming, unrewarding and necessary. Still, Kate found something peaceful in the mindless work, and something fascinating about the ability to do it under fathoms of water with basically little effort. She could move a ballast pile as easily as Ky, whereas on land, she would have tired quickly.
Reaching down to clear another area, Ky’s fingers brushed something small and hard. Curious, he fanned aside a thin layer of silt and picked up what at first looked like a tab on a can of beer. As he brought it closer, he saw it was much more refined, and though there were layers of crust on the knob of the circle, he felt his heart give a quick jerk.
He’d heard of diamonds in the rough, but he’d never thought to find one by simply reaching for it. He was no expert, but as he painstakingly cleaned what he could from the stone, he judged it to be at least two carats. With a tap on Kate’s shoulder, he got her attention.
It gave him a great deal of pleasure to see her eyes widen and to hear the muffled sound of her surprise. Together, they turned it over and over again. It was dull and dirty, but the gem was there.
They were finding bits and pieces of civilization. Perhaps a woman had worn the ring while dining with the captain on her way to America. Perhaps some British officer had carried it in his vest pocket, waiting to give it to the woman he’d hoped to marry. It might have belonged to an elderly widow, or a young bride. The mystery of it, and its tangibility, were more precious than the stone itself. It was…lasting.
Ky held it out to her, offering. Their routine had fallen into a finders-keepers arrangement, in that whoever found a particular piece carried it in their own bag to the surface where everything was carefully catalogued on film and paper. Kate looked at the small, water-dulled piece of the past in Ky’s fingers.
Was he offering her the ring because it was a woman’s fancy, or was he offering her something else? Unsure, she shook her head, pointing to the bag on his belt. If he were asking her something, she needed it to be done with words.
Ky dropped the ring into his bag, secured it, then went back to work.
He thought he understood her, in some ways. In other ways, Ky found she was as much a mystery as the sea. What did she want from him? If it was love, he’d given her that. If it was time, they were both running out of it. He wanted to demand, was accustomed to demanding, yet she blocked his ability with a look.
She said she’d changed—that she was just beginning to feel in control of her life. He thought he understood that, as well as her fierce need for independence. And yet… He’d never known anything but independence. He, too, had changed. He needed her to give him the boundaries and the borders that came with dependence. His for her, and hers for him. Was the timing wrong again? Would it ever be right?
Damn it, he wanted her, he thought as he heaved another rock out of his way. Not just for today, but for tomorrow. Not tied against him, but bound to him. Why couldn’t she understand that?
She loved him. It was something she murmured in the night when she was sleepy and caught close against him. She wasn’t a woman to use words unless they had meaning. Yet with the love he offered and the love she returned, she’d begun to hold something back from him, as though he could have only a portion of her, but not all. Edged with frustration, he cleared more ballast. He needed and would have, all.
Marriage? Was he thinking of marriage? Kate found herself flustered and uneasy. She’d never expected Ky to look for that kind of commitment, that kind of permanency. Perhaps she’d misread him. After all, it was difficult to be certain of someone’s intention, yet she knew just how clearly Ky and she had been able to communicate underwater.
There was so much to consider, so many things to weigh. He wouldn’t understand that, Kate mused. Ky was a man who made decisions in an instant and took the consequences. He wouldn’t think about all the variables, all the what-ifs, all the maybes. She had to think about them all. She simply knew no other way.
Kate watched the silt and sand blowing away, causing a cuplike indentation to form on the ocean floor. Outside influences, she mused. They could eat away at the layers and uncover the core, but sometimes what was beneath couldn’t stand up to the pressure.
Is that what would happen between her and Ky? How would their relationship hold up under the pressure of variant life-styles—the demands of her profession and the free-wheeling tone of his? Would it stay intact, or would it begin to sift away, layer by layer? How much of herself would he ask her to give? And in loving, how much of herself would she lose?
It was a possibility she couldn’t ignore, a threat she needed to build a solid defense against. Time. Perhaps time was the answer. But summer was waning.
The force of the wash made a small object spin up, out of the layer of silt and into the water. Kate grabbed at it and the sharp edge scraped her palm. Curious, she turned it over for examination. A buckle? she wondered. The shape seemed to indicate it, and she could just make out a fastening. Even as she started to hold it out for Ky an other, then another was pushed off the ocean bed.
Shoe buckles, Kate realized, astonished. Dozens of them. No, she realized as more and more began to twist up in the water’s spin and reel away. Hundreds. With a quick frenzy, she began to gather what she could. More than hundreds, she discovered as her heart thudded. There were thousands of them, literally thousands.
She held a buckle in her hand and looked at Ky in triumph. They’d found the cargo. There’d been shoe buckles on the manifest of the Liberty. Five thousand of them. Nothing but a merchantman carried something like that in bulk.
Proof. She waved the buckle, her arm sweeping out in slow motion to take in the swarm of them swirling away from the wash and dropping again. Proof, her mind shouted out. The cargo-hold was beneath them. And the treasure. They had only to reach it.
Ky took her hands and nodded, knowing what was in her mind. Beneath his fingers he could feel the race of her pulse. He wanted that for her, the excitement, the thrill that came from discovering something only half believed in. She brought the back of his hand to her cheek, her eyes laughing, buckles spinning around them. Kate wanted to laugh until she was too weak to stand. Five thousand shoe buckles would guide them to a chest of gold.
Kate saw the humor in his eyes and knew Ky’s thoughts ran along the same path as hers. He pointed to himself, then thumbs up. With a minimum of signaling, he told Kate that he would surface to tell Marsh to shut off the engines. It was time to work by hand.
Excited, she nodded. She wanted only to begin. Resting near the bottom, Kate watched Ky go up and out of sight. Oddly, she found she needed time alone. She’d shared the heady instant of discovery with Ky, and now she needed to absorb it.
The Liberty was beneath her, the ship her father had searched for. The dream he’d kept close, carefully researching, meticulously calculating, but never finding.
Joy and sorrow mixed as she gathered a handful of the buckles and placed them carefully in her bag. For him. In that moment she felt she’d given him everything she’d always needed to.
Carefully, and this time for personal reasons rather than the catalogue, she began to shoot pictures. Years from now, she thought. Years and years from now, she’d look at a snapshot of swirling silt and drifting pieces of metal, and she’d remember. Nothing could ever take that moment of quiet satisfaction from her.
She glanced up at the sudden silence. The wash had stilled. Ky had reached the surface. Silt and the pieces of crusted, decorated metal began to settle again without the agitation of the wash. The sea was a world without sound, without movement.
Kate looked down at the scoop in the ocean floor. They were nearly there. For a moment she was tempted to begin to fan and search by herself, but she’d wait for Ky. They began together, and they’d finish together. Content, she watched for his return.
When Kate saw the movement above her, she started to signal. Her hand froze in place, then her arm, her shoulder and the rest of her body, degree by degree. It came smoothly through the water, sleek and silent. Deadly.
The noise of the prop-wash had kept the sea life away. Now the abrupt quiet brought out the curious. Among the schools of harmless fish glided the long bulletlike shape of a shark.
Kate was still, hardly daring to breathe as she feared even the trail of bubbles might attract him. He moved without haste, apparently not interested in her. Perhaps he’d already hunted successfully that day. But even with a full belly, a shark would attack what annoyed his uncertain temper.
She gauged him to be ten feet in length. Part of her mind registered that he was fairly small for what she recognized as a tiger shark. They could easily double that length. But she knew the jaws, those large sickle-shaped teeth, would be strong, merciless and fatal.
If she remained still, the chances were good that he would simply go in search of more interesting waters. Isn’t that what she’d read sitting cozily under lamplight at her own desk? Isn’t that what Ky had told her once when they’d shared a quiet lunch on his boat? All that seemed so remote, so unreal now, as she looked above and saw the predator between herself and the surface.
It was movement that attracted them, she reminded herself as she forced her mind to function. The movement a swimmer made with kicking feet and sweeping arms.
Don’t panic. She forced herself to breathe slowly. No sudden moves. She forced her nervous hands to form tight, still fists.
He was no more than ten feet away. Kate could see the small black eyes and the gentle movement of his gills. Breathing shallowly, she never took her eyes from his. She had only to be perfectly still and wait for him to swim on.
But Ky. Kate’s mouth went dry as she looked toward the direction where Ky had disappeared moments before. He’d be coming back, any minute, unaware of what was lurking near the bottom. Waiting. Cruising.
The shark would sense the disturbance in the water with the uncanny ability the hunter had. The kick of Ky’s feet, the swing of his arms would attract the shark long before Kate would have a chance to warn him of any danger.
He’d be unaware, helpless, and then… Her blood seemed to freeze. She’d heard of the sensation but now she experienced it. Cold seemed to envelop her. Terror made her head light. Kate bit down on her lip until pain cleared her thoughts. She wouldn’t stand by idly while Ky came blindly into a death trap.
Glancing down, she saw the spear gun. It was over five feet away and unloaded for safety. Safety, she thought hysterically. She’d never loaded one, much less shot one. And first, she’d have to get to it. There’d only be one chance. Knowing she’d have no time to settle her nerves, Kate made her move.
She kept her eyes on the shark as she inched slowly toward the gun. At the moment, he seemed to be merely cruising, not particularly interested in anything. He never even glanced her way. Perhaps he would move on before Ky came back, but she needed the weapon. Fingers shaking, she gripped the butt of the gun. Time seemed to crawl. Her movements were so slow, so measured, she hardly seemed to move at all. But her mind whirled.
Even as she gripped the spear she saw the shape that glided down from the surface. The shark turned lazily to the left. To Ky.
No! her mind screamed as she rammed the spear into position. Her only thought that of protecting what she loved. Kate swam forward without hesitation, taking a path between Ky and the shark. She had to get close.
Her mind was cold now, with fear, with purpose. For the second time, she saw those small, deadly eyes. This time, they focused on her. If she’d never seen true evil before, Kate knew she faced it now. This was cruelty, and a death that wouldn’t come easily.
The shark moved toward her with a speed that made her heart stop. His jaws opened. There was a black, black cave behind them.
Ky dove quickly, wanting to get back to Kate, wanting to search for what had brought them back together. If it was the treasure she needed to settle her mind, he’d find it. With it, they could open whatever doors they needed to open, lock whatever needed to be locked. Excitement drummed through him as he dove deeper.
When he spotted the shark, he pulled up short. He’d felt that deep primitive fear before, but never so sharply. Though it was less than useless against such a predator, he reached for his diver’s knife. He’d left Kate alone. Cold bloodedly, he set for the attack.
Like a rocket, Kate shot up between himself and the shark. Terror such as he’d never known washed over him. Was she mad? Was she simply unaware? Giving no time to thought, Ky barreled through the water toward her.
He was too far away. He knew it even as the panic hammered into him. The shark would be on her before he was close enough to sink the knife in.
When he saw what she held in her hand, and realized her purpose he somehow doubled his speed. Everything was in slow motion, and yet it seemed to happen in the blink of an eye. He saw the gaping hole in the shark’s mouth as it closed in on Kate. For the first time in his life, prayers ran through him like water.
The spear shot out, sinking deep through the shark’s flesh. Instinctively, Kate let herself drop as the shark came forward full of anger and pain. He would follow her now, she knew. If the spear didn’t work, he would be on her in moments.
Ky saw blood gush from the wound. It wouldn’t be enough. The shark jerked as if to reject the spear, and slowed his pace. Just enough. Teeth bared, Ky fell on its back, hacking with the knife as quickly as the water would allow. The shark turned, furious. Using all his strength, Ky turned with it, forcing the knife into the underbelly and ripping down. It ran through his mind that he was holding death, and it was as cold as the poets said.
From a few feet away, Kate watched the battle. She was numb, body and mind. Blood spurted out to dissipate in the water. Letting the empty gun fall, she too reached for her knife and swam forward.
But it was over. One instant the fish and Ky were as one form, locked together. Then they were separate as the body of the shark sank lifelessly toward the bottom. She saw the eyes one last time.
Her arm was gripped painfully. Limp, Kate allowed herself to be dragged to the surface. Safe. It was the only clear thought her mind could form. He was safe.
Too breathless to speak, Ky pulled her toward the ladder, tanks and all. He saw her slip near the top and roll onto the deck. Even as he swung over himself, he saw two fins slice through the water and disappear below where the blood drew them.
“What the hell—” Jumping up from his seat, Marsh ran across the deck to where Kate still lay, gasping for air.
“Sharks.” Ky cut off the word as he knelt beside her. “I had to bring her up fast. Kate.” Ky reached a hand beneath her neck, lifting her up as he began to take off her tanks. “Are you dizzy? Do you have any pain—your knees, elbows?”
Though she was still gasping for air, she shook her head. “No, no, I’m all right.” She knew he worried about decompression sickness and tried to steady herself to reassure him. “Ky, we weren’t that deep after—when we came up.”
He nodded, grimly acknowledging that she was winded, not incoherent. Standing, he pulled off his mask and heaved it across the deck. Temper helped alleviate the helpless shaking. Kate merely drew her knees up and rested her forehead on them.
“Somebody want to fill me in?” Marsh asked, glancing from one to the other. “I left off when Ky came up raving about shoe buckles.”
“Cargo-hold,” Kate murmured. “We found it.”
“So Ky said.” Marsh glanced at his brother whose knuckles were whitening against the rail as he looked out to sea. “Run into some company down there?”
“There was a shark. A tiger.”
“She nearly got herself killed,” Ky explained. Fury was a direct result of fear, and just as deadly. “She swam right in front of him.” Before Marsh could make any comment, Ky turned on Kate. “Did you forget everything I taught you?” he demanded. “You manage to get a doctorate but you can’t remember that you’re supposed to minimize your movements when a shark’s cruising? You know that arm and leg swings attract them, but you swim in front of him, flailing around as though you wanted to shake hands—holding a damn spear gun that’s just as likely to annoy him as do any real damage. If I hadn’t been coming down just then, he’d have torn you to pieces.”
Kate lifted her head slowly. Whatever emotion she’d felt up to that moment was replaced by an anger so deep it overshadowed everything. Meticulously she removed her flippers, her mask and her weight belt before she rose. “If you hadn’t been coming down just then,” she said precisely, “there’d have been no reason for me to swim in front of him.” Turning, she walked to the steps and down into the cabin.
For a full minute there was utter silence on deck. Above, a gull screeched, then swerved west. Knowing there’d be no more dives that day, Marsh went to the helm. As he glanced over he saw the deep stain of blood on the water’s surface.
“It’s customary,” he began with his back to his brother, “to thank someone when they save your life.” Without waiting for a comment, he switched on the engine.
Shaken, Ky ran a hand through his hair. Some of the shark’s blood had stained his fingers. Standing still, he stared at it.
Not through carelessness, he thought with a jolt. It had been deliberate. Kate had deliberately put herself in the path of the shark. For him. She’d risked her life to save him. He ran both hands over his face before he started below deck.
He saw her sitting on a bunk with a glass in her hand. A bottle of brandy sat at her feet. When she lifted the glass to her lips her hand shook lightly. Beneath the tan the sun had given her, her face was drawn and pale. No one had ever put him first so completely, so unselfishly. It left him without any idea of what to say.
“Kate…”
“I’m not in the mood to be shouted at right now,” she told him before she drank again. “If you need to vent your temper, you’ll have to save it.”
“I’m not going to shout.” Because he felt every bit as unsteady as she did, he sat beside her and lifted the bottle, drinking straight from it. The brandy ran hot and strong through him. “You scared the hell out of me.”
“I’m not going to apologize for what I did.”
“I should thank you.” He drank again and felt the nerves in his stomach ease. “The point is, you had no business doing what you did. Nothing but blind luck kept you from being torn up down there.”
Turning her head, she stared at him. “I should’ve stayed safe and sound on the bottom while you dealt with the shark—with your diver’s knife.”
He met the look levelly. “Yes.”
“And you’d have done that, if it’d been me?”
“That’s different.”
“Oh.” Glass in hand, she rose. She took a moment to study him, that raw-boned, dark face, the dripping hair that needed a trim, the eyes that reflected the sea. “Would you care to explain that little piece of logic to me?”
“I don’t have to explain it, it just is.” He tipped the bottle back again. It helped to cloud his imagination which kept bringing images of what might have happened to her.
“No, it just isn’t, and that’s one of your major problems.”
“Kate, have you any idea what could have happened if you hadn’t lucked out and hit a vital spot with that spear?”
“Yes.” She drained her glass and felt some of the edge dull. The fear might come back again unexpectedly, but she felt she was strong enough to deal with it. And the anger. No matter how it slashed at her, she would put herself between him and danger again. “I understand perfectly. Now, I’m going up with Marsh.”
“Wait a minute.” He stood to block her way. “Can’t you see that I couldn’t stand it if anything happened to you? I want to take care of you. I need to keep you safe.”
“While you take all the risks?” she countered. “Is that supposed to be the balance of our relationship, Ky? You man, me woman? I bake bread, you hunt the meat?”
“Damn it, Kate, it’s not as basic as that.”
“It’s just as basic as that,” she tossed back. The color had come back to her face. Her legs were steady again. And she would be heard. “You want me to be quiet and content—and amenable to the way you choose to live. You want me to do as you say, bend to your will, and yet I know how you felt about my father.”
It didn’t seem she had the energy to be angry any longer. She was just weary, bone weary from slamming herself up against a wall that didn’t seem ready to budge.
“I spent all my life doing what it pleased him to have me do,” she continued in calmer tones. “No waves, no problems, no rebellion. He gave me a nod of approval, but no true respect and certainly no true affection. Now, you’re asking me to do the same thing again with you.” She felt no tears, only that weariness of spirit. “Why do you suppose the only two men I’ve ever loved should want me to be so utterly pliant to their will? Why do you suppose I lost both of them because I tried so hard to do just that?”
“No.” He put his hands on her shoulders. “No, that’s not true. It’s not what I want from you or for you. I just want to take care of you.”
She shook her head. “What’s the difference, Ky?” she whispered. “What the hell’s the difference?” Pushing past him, Kate went out on deck.