“A wonder to behold, is she not?” a lilting voice said in his ear.
Marcus practically jumped out of his skin. How the hell had the guy snuck up on him like that? For a moment, his heart beat wildly as he flashed back to a scorching-hot alley in Afghanistan—to a man with glinting black eyes and a viciously curved knife sliding silently out of a doorway, the smell of garlic and exotic spices and the dust underfoot, the sound of his own blood spattering onto the ground as they fought. Then he clenched his fists and jerked himself back to reality. He was home and safe. More or less.
“Yes, she is,” he said, his tone even. But he had a feeling the other man could sense how much he’d rattled Marcus, and was enjoying it.
You’re being an idiot, he scolded himself. You just don’t like him because he’s interested in Beka. That’s hardly fair, since you’re not.
“It is kind of you to allow her to accompany you and your father out on your ship,” Kesh said in the same casual voice Marcus had used. His eyes were aimed at the sea, and Beka, but his attention was firmly rooted onshore. “I find her current preoccupation misguided, however, and I think it might be best if you no longer encouraged it.”
Marcus folded his arms over his chest. “I think that’s up to her, don’t you?”
Kesh turned his head and gazed into Marcus’s eyes. Despite the fact that Marcus had about forty pounds on the other man, and was at least three inches taller, a slight chill ran down his spine. Not fear. Kesh didn’t intimidate him, no matter how much he might be trying to. More like that feeling he got when he saw a scorpion or a coiled snake or a great white shark; that visceral gut reaction that said predator.
“You would be wise to tread carefully where Beka is concerned,” Kesh said. “She belongs to me.”
The HELL you say, Marcus thought. But out loud, he merely said, “She doesn’t seem to know that. And Beka strikes me as a girl who makes her own decisions.”
Kesh made a low sound in his throat, almost like a growl, as the woman in question bounded up the beach, grinning madly at them both as she rode the high that came from catching a great wave.
“Did you see that?” she yelled, still a few yards away. “I owned that wave! It was amazing! Unbelievable!”
“Leave her to me, fisherman. Or you will regret it.” Kesh strode off toward Beka and pulled her into an exuberant hug.
“Definitely unbelievable,” Marcus muttered to himself. This was not how he’d planned for his morning to go.
THIRTEEN
BEKA SPENT THE next couple of days trying to find answers and getting nowhere.
She called her friend from the university to check in, and see if any of his students could remember whatever results they’d turned up before the fire. That was a frustrating phone call.
“Everything,” Bran said, unhelpfully.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” she asked. “How could they have found everything?”
She could practically see the shrug through the phone. “The ocean is a dirty place these days, Beka,” he said. “They found traces of pesticides, petroleum distillates, heavy metals, even radiation.”
“Radiation!” Beka had a vision of herself suddenly glowing in the dark.
Her friend laughed. “They’ve been detecting small amounts of radiation for the last year or so, washed across the Pacific from the Fukushima explosion in Japan. It’s nothing to worry about. My guess is that you haven’t found your ‘ground zero’ yet.”
His voice grew more serious, as he added, “Be careful, Beka. Whatever is causing this, it is clearly capable of creating serious damage in plant and animal life. You may be tougher than the average girl, but that doesn’t mean you’ll be immune to its effects. Maybe you should report this problem to the government and let them take care of it.”
She thanked him, then put the phone down with a bang. If only she could. Unfortunately, the government she reported to had already called in their supposed expert—and she was it.
To make matters worse, both Marcus and Kesh were acting weird. Well, weirder, really.
She’d thought the morning out surfing had gone really well, and Marcus seemed to have a great time. But ever since, he’d been even ruder and more distant than usual, barely speaking to her when they went out on the boat to dive.