Wicked Nights (Men of Discovery Island 2)

She followed her nose into the kitchen.

Someone had left a covered plate of food on her counter, clearly the source of the bacon goodness filling her house. When she popped off the tinfoil, she discovered bacon, muffins, crispy slices of ham and a slice of chocolate cake as out of place as it was welcome. Oh, yeah.

She read the note and smiled.

Lock your door, Piper....

Her navy rescue swimmer definitely had a soft side, after all.

11

PIPER HATED NOT pulling her weight. So since the mountain—the mountain here being Mount Brennan—didn’t come to Piper on Monday, she went to the mountain. She barged through the door of Deep Dive, carrying a messenger bag stuffed to the gills with notes, dive-site descriptions and her laptop.

Tag was manning the counter. “He’s in the command center,” he said without looking up from his laptop.

Apparently word had gotten around about their partnership. Hopefully, that was all it was, because she’d decided the best way to handle her hookup with Cal was to pretend publicly that it hadn’t happened. Business first, bedroom second. If she was looking forward to her next night with Cal, well, no one else on the island needed to know that.

She went around the counter, opened the door to the backroom and—holy moly—stepped into an entirely different world. She’d assumed “command center” was a male euphemism for “place where we keep all our toys” or “fancy name to make ourselves feel important.” Nope. Cal really had built a command center. Floor-to-ceiling monitors displayed the latest weather information and all sorts of interesting dots and blips. A bank of computers and screens took up most of the floor space.

Cal and Daeg were bent over a screen at the far end.

“Are you planning to take over the world?” It actually appeared to be a viable option.

Daeg grinned. “Are you volunteering to assist?”

“It looks like you’ve got it covered.” They stocked some serious hardware.

Cal straightened up and came over to her. She wasn’t sure if she should stick out a hand, slap him on the back, like one of the guys, or French kiss him. He looked tired, though, so she decided to cut him some slack. Or going easy on him could have had something to do with how his big, suntanned body looked in a ragged T-shirt and another pair of white-at-the-seams blue jeans. He wore his usual steel-toed boots, as well, which was a look that definitely worked for her.

“What do you want, Piper?”

“Hello? Joint presentation and hands-on demo for Fiesta? I wanted to get started.” On Saturday.

“Right.” He stared at her, and she wondered if she had food on her face. Or magic marker. A second nose. Something, anything to explain the intensity of his gaze. “You want to work on our demo.”

Why else would she be here?

“We have a week,” she pointed out. “Seven days minus a few hours. We need to get going.”

She dumped her bag on one of Cal’s desks and fished out a list. “I’ve got a short list of dive sites to check out. My boat is gassed up and ready to go. So get your butt in gear, and we’ll be out of here. Alternatively, feel free to drop out of the competition at any time, because I can handle it.”

“I’ll bet you can,” he said drily.

She met his eyes and found humor and—wait for it—a side of irritation. Too bad. He hadn’t suggested a plan and she had. Since she appeared to be the only one with a viable one, they went with her idea.

“Maybe I’m busy right now.”

“I’ll survive,” Daeg tossed out. “If you and Piper have a prior date.”

They both turned and glared at him. Out of bed, this had to be the first time the two of them had ever been in sync on anything.

“The ideas are great,” he said. “But you don’t get to waltz in here and decide our plan of attack.”

“I texted. You didn’t respond.”

“And you interpreted nonresponse as permission to do things your way?”

Well, yeah. The lines on either side of his nose got deeper, however, and she recognized that look as the one Cal got right before he told her precisely why he disliked her current course of action and everything that could go wrong.

And...bingo.

“Fiesta asked us to work together. That’s not code for ‘give me an ultimatum.’”

“You didn’t respond. I took charge.” She shrugged. “I don’t have a problem with that.”

“I do,” he gritted out.

“Then, you should have answered my texts.” She grabbed her bag and turned toward the door. “Move it.”

She ignored the muttered curse behind her. He didn’t have to like it—or her—as long as he got his butt in gear. He must have gotten the memo, because he fell in step with her.