The Right Bride

Chapter Eighteen


MARTI FLEW UP the steps and out onto the deck. Jack and Sam saw the look on her face before she took control of her wild emotions. She sat with them at the table and plastered on a fake smile.

“Everything all right with Cameron?” Jack asked.

“I’m sure Shelly took good care of him.” She shook her head and waved her hand to brush away her rude statement. “How about a poker game?”

Jack and Sam exchanged identical concerned looks.

Sam sighed and shook his head in disgust. Cameron was an idiot if he couldn’t see how much Marti loved him and how good the two of them could be together. Sam thought about his own wife and how lucky he was to have her. He hoped Cameron fixed things in his life before it got worse. Sam had a sinking feeling it was going to get a lot worse before it got any better.

“Let’s play. I warn you, though, I cheat,” Sam confessed.

“You’re an FBI agent. You can’t cheat.”

“I’m an undercover agent. I’m paid to lie and cheat.” He gave her a cocky grin and winked.

He got a half smile in return and thought it better than nothing. She’d recover in a little while and be back to her old self.

Emma sat with her Uncle Jack and helped him play. They were losing badly, but Emma thought the game was a lot of fun. Before long, Marti was laughing and joking again.

“I want to go fish.”

Marti set her cards on the table facedown so Sam couldn’t see them. Poor Emma. Everyone had caught a fish but her. She was too little to use one of the big poles her dad and uncles used to catch the big fish.

“I’ll take you in back, honey.” Shelly came up the steps and swayed, but caught herself with a hand on the railing. “Oopsy.”

Marti didn’t want to let her go, but Shelly walked off and Emma followed. Marti, Jack, and Sam continued their card game. Two of Marti’s crew walked forward from the back deck. Whenever Shelly was on deck, her crew disappeared. Captain Finn stood at the bow watching the sea. She liked to stand up there and do the same thing. It had a calming effect on her.

Emma had only been gone for a few minutes when Shelly sauntered up to the table where they were playing poker. Marti hadn’t noticed Cameron come up on deck. Alarms went off in her head.

“Where’s Emma?”

“Oh, I gave her one of those poles and got her set up. She’s fishing. She’s fine.”

Marti jumped up and ran for the back of the boat. She passed Shelly and yelled, “You stupid, drunken bitch!”

By the time she reached the back deck, Emma was becoming just a speck of bright orange in the water. She rang the hanging bell and yelled, “Man overboard! Come about, Captain!”

She dove off the back of the ship, landing hard in the water due to the height.

Her head crested the water. She dragged in a deep breath and swam hard and fast to get to Emma.

Cameron came up the steps in time to see Marti rush by toward the back of the ship. She rang the bell and yelled to the captain to come about. To his horror, she dove off the back of the ship, a good twenty-foot fall into the water.

He rushed to the railing. Horror and dread filled him when he saw Marti swimming toward his daughter, nothing but orange life vest floating in the far distance. The ship turned quickly and at a steep angle. Everyone held on and tried to keep an eye on Marti and Emma, not wanting to lose track of either of them in the choppy waves.

He never took his eyes from them. Marti grabbed Emma. Relief washed over him seeing Emma safe in her arms.

Fear gripped Marti’s heart like a vice. “Emma, open your eyes.”

Emma didn’t respond. The edge of her lips turned blue in the fifty-four degree water. Marti saw blood in the water and did her best to lift Emma up and out of the water to see where she was hurt. A long gash across her palm bled profusely. Cut by the fishing line.

“I lost the fishing pole. He got away.” Emma’s bottom lip wobbled and turned into a deep frown.

“It’s okay, sweetheart. We’ll get a new pole, and we’ll catch a hundred fish.”

Marti took her hand and held it up out of the water. She kicked her legs hard to keep them both from going under as the waves bobbed and pushed them around. Her legs burned with exertion, but she had to keep them afloat and Emma’s hand out of the water.

She pictured what happened, furious Shelly had left her alone. The little girl had snagged a fish and been pulled overboard by its weight and tug. She tried to hold on to the pole, and the line sliced open her palm.

She wanted to kill Shelly. Emma could have been killed. She wasn’t in good shape right now. Marti needed to get her out of the water and warm.

She checked for the direction of the ship. They’d made the turn. Captain Finn would be there soon to scoop them up. One of her crew threw the rope ladder over the edge. No time to stop the ship and launch the zodiac. She’d have to grab on and hold tight to the rope ladder until they grabbed Emma.

Marti wanted to panic. The little girl’s teeth chattered. Marti felt the cold sapping her own energy. She struggled more and more to keep their heads above the crashing waves. Without a wet suit, she’d freeze and drown in no time at all, especially trying to tread water and hold on to Emma.

Blood and the open sea were not a good mix, especially near the shark-infested waters surrounding the Farallon Islands. Marti was concerned every shark in a fifty-mile radius had caught the scent of blood in the water. She and Emma were sitting ducks.