Chapter Two Hunter
Chapter Two
Hunter
The woman crouched in front of me stared at me with her big brown eyes. I already knew her pale skin was soft from having held her hands, and she had long dark hair. I had always been a sucker for brunettes, and if we’d been at a club, I would have hit on her. There was something endearing and vulnerable about her that spoke to me, and I wanted to know more about her.
I wanted to help her.
It probably wasn’t the best way to start out at a new job. If I was going to get my parents to believe in me, I had to impress them. I couldn’t let myself be distracted.
Which meant I probably shouldn’t have been ogling her long, lean legs.
She’d just had a major panic attack. My sister used to have them all the time. My heart twinged a little at thinking about her, like it always did.
“Does this happen pretty frequently?” I asked.
The woman stared at me for a moment before she answered. “I haven’t had one in a long time. Not since my mother died two years ago.”
That twinge in my heart expanded, became a dull throb of pain. I recognized the loss I heard in her voice. She let go of my hands suddenly and folded her arms against her chest.
I’d liked holding her hands but realized this would be a weird thing to admit. “I’m sorry about your mother. I lost my sister a couple of years ago, too.”
There was so much sympathy in her eyes that the pain became sharper. “I’m sorry for your loss.”
“Thank you,” I said. Her cheeks were tearstained and it was having a strange effect on me. I reached into my pocket and handed her a handkerchief. “Here.”
She held it between two fingers, like I’d just handed her a rotting carcass. “What’s this for?”
I gestured at her cheeks and she flushed. I had to suppress a smile because I found her expression adorable. She mopped delicately at her face and then put the handkerchief into her own pocket. She stood up, wobbling, and I wanted to reach out and help her. I got the sense that she wouldn’t have welcomed the assistance.
“Can I help you with something?” she asked. She was trying to be professional and it also struck me as cute.
I stood up as well and her eyes followed me, widening, and she took a step back. She was only a few inches shorter than me. I’d always liked taller women. “I’m Hunter Smith.”
I clenched my teeth at the lie and wondered if she’d noticed. That had been part of my dad’s conditions. I couldn’t tell anyone my real last name. I had to be anonymous. Just part of the crew.
She cocked her head to the right, as if trying to recall something while also sizing me up. I wondered if she liked what she saw.
“Captain Carl is expecting me,” I said, trying to keep the amusement out of my voice. She was attracted to me but was trying to keep it under wraps. She seemed the skittish type, though—like if I pointed it out she would jump overboard and swim away.
“Hunter Smith. Right,” she said. “You’re the new deckhand. Welcome. The captain is on the bridge. I’ll take you to him. But you need to take your shoes off. We wear boat shoes or go barefoot on the deck. We don’t want to ruin the teak.”
It must have been obvious how green I was. I slipped my shoes off. “Right. Sorry.”
Her gaze wandered down to my feet and then traveled up the entire length of my body. She let out a little happy sigh and I wondered if she was even aware that she had done it. Then she shook her head, as if trying to refocus. “This way.”
I walked behind her and tried very hard not to notice the sway of her hips. We arrived at the bridge far too soon for my liking. I saw the captain standing in front of a navigational console, muttering to himself.
My father had explained everything to him. I hoped he wasn’t about to blow my cover and ruin everything before it even started. “Hunter! You made it.”
“I did.” We shook hands briefly.
“Welcome aboard,” Captain Carl said. “We have some rules. The first is that you don’t do anything to embarrass me or embarrass the ship. I will not bail you out of prison and will only show up with a one-way plane ticket to send you back home. There is no drinking during charter, and no hookups with guests. And the new owner has instituted a rule that there won’t be any sort of romantic relationship or fraternizing with your fellow crewmembers.”
The last bit surprised me. I was going to have to call my father and ask what he’d been thinking. I turned around and glanced at the woman, regretful that I couldn’t ask her out on a date.
“Understood,” I said. I hadn’t been this attracted to someone in a long time and disliked the idea that I wouldn’t be able to explore the connection I felt.
“Good.” The captain turned toward the girl. “You’ll give him the tour, introduce him to everyone?”
“Yes. I’ll do that right now.” She stepped out of the room and I followed behind her. I told myself to stop looking at her but my eyes weren’t obeying me.
She was off-limits and that had the unfortunate effect of making me want to pursue her even more. “You didn’t tell me your name.”
“Lucia Salerno. But everybody calls me Lucky,” she said, glancing over her shoulder at me.
Lucky? Oh, that was just rife with possibilities for teasing. But before I could say as much, she said, “Please don’t say anything about getting lucky. I’ve heard it all a million times before.”
From this crew, no less.
“Wasn’t going to.” I absolutely had just been about to, but she didn’t need to know that. I couldn’t keep the smile off my face. “I don’t think I can tease you. Especially since the captain just said that you’re forbidden.”
She tripped a little over her own feet, another adorable thing to add to the list. “Yes. Forbidden. As is everyone else.”
I didn’t care about anyone else. No one else on this ship could be anywhere near as interesting.
My dad had done this just to screw with me.
We went up to the top deck, where crewmembers were cleaning. Lucky explained that they had to chamois every surface and keep the exterior pristine because of how much damage the salt water could do.
One of the men stopped and immediately leered at Lucky. She looked disgusted and took a step away from him. It had been a long time since I’d wanted to punch someone but if he didn’t stop looking at her like that I might not be responsible for my own actions.
He spoke with a French accent so thick that he sounded like a cartoon character when he said, “Belle Lucky, have you come to help us? I have an itch that I cannot quite reach. Maybe you can.”
Lucky turned to me and said, “This is Francois. He’s the first mate and sometimes engineer. He’s from France and acts like he’s not married with a child even though he is. He might be the reason for the new rule.”
I could hear her distaste for him and hoped he was smart enough to keep his hands to himself. I had three sisters and it had always been my instinct to protect. I didn’t have any right to protect Lucky but having come across her in such a vulnerable state ... that response kicked in. I wanted to keep her safe.
Two other crewmembers joined us and Lucky continued the introductions. “This is Pieter and he’s from South Africa. Kai is from New Zealand. Everyone, this is Hunter.”
While I was shaking their hands, knowing I wasn’t going to remember any of their names, a third man came over. “And this is Thomas, the bosun,” she said.
I had no idea what a bosun was and didn’t ask.
“From London,” Thomas said, while pumping my hand enthusiastically. “Pleasure to meet you, mate.”
I didn’t get the same bad vibe from him, or the other two, as I did from the French guy.
“Where are you from?” Kai asked me. Where had Lucky said he was from? I couldn’t quite place his accent.
“New York,” I said.
“Another Yank! You must be happy about that,” one of the crewmembers said to Lucky. She gave him a tight smile and I wondered what that was about.
I shifted my knapsack on my shoulders and Lucky said, “I should have let you put that down first thing. Let’s go stow it and I’ll show you to your cabin.”
The bosun guy said, “Come find me after you’ve settled in and I’ll show you the actual ropes.”
That probably meant he was my boss. “I will.”
Lucky took me through the ship, telling me about the rooms like I was a guest. I had to smile to myself that she couldn’t appreciate the irony. But I didn’t want to hear about Ming vases. I also didn’t want to embarrass myself as I started this new job and sensed that she would be helpful if asked. “I’m terrible with names. Can you tell me the names of the crew again, and who is who?”
My memory had always been terrible, as had my ability to refrain from being distracted.
“Francois is the wannabe adulterer, short with dark hair. Pieter is the lanky guy with light brown hair. Kai is the one with the tattoos on his arm and black hair. Thomas has curly brown hair,” she said.
I repeated the names to myself as we went down some stairs.
“Do I need to remind you of my name?” she asked, the teasing lilt in her voice unmistakable.
“Lucia Salerno. Lucky. It’s not a name I’ll ever forget.” I didn’t mean to flirt with her and so I felt bad when she missed the bottom step and nearly smacked into the opposite wall.
“Careful!” I said, again pressing my lips together so that I wouldn’t smile. She was interested. I wouldn’t be having this effect on her if she weren’t. I couldn’t see her face as I was behind her, and I wondered if she’d flushed that attractive shade of pink again.
We went into a tiny kitchen. She said, “This is the galley and that’s our chef, Andre. He’s from Brazil and makes the most incredible food you’ll ever eat.”
Another name. The chef glared at us and nodded as I said hello.
When we left the room, I couldn’t help but lean in and whisper into her ear. “He seems pleasant.”
She audibly gulped and then said in a tight, breathy voice, “He’s your stereotypical temperamental culinary genius. And he’s constantly aggravated because the captain won’t allow him to have his parrot in the galley.”
Interesting. Lucky was trying not to respond to me and couldn’t seem to help herself.
“Understandable,” I said with a nod, wanting to make things more comfortable for her. “That would be unsanitary.”
“His parrot is named Preacher, and his favorite sound is a ringtone. He loves when he gets someone to fall for it and come into his cabin. So don’t be fooled.”
She was babbling just a bit. I probably shouldn’t have enjoyed that, especially after the captain had explained the rules. So I tried to change the subject to something more neutral so that I wouldn’t think about the curve of her neck. “Our crew is very international.”
I heard the relief in her voice. “That’s pretty typical for superyachts.”
Lucky showed me the crew mess, where we would eat and the snacks were kept. There was a small living room that the crew shared. She turned to the right and went down a tight hallway and opened a door. “This is our room. You are on the top bunk.”
Our room? That just seemed like cruel and unusual punishment. I was expected to share a room with a beautiful woman that I couldn’t ever be with?
I threw my knapsack onto the top bunk and turned to face her. The room was incredibly small. Like a shoebox. It felt like if I leaned too far to one side my shoulders would hit the wall. We were practically touching just standing here and that was going to make things very difficult for me.
“We’re sharing a room?” I asked. It was like locking a kid in a candy store and telling him he couldn’t have any of it.
She nodded, looking a bit anxious. “I have the only empty bed. Which makes us bunkmates.”
The desire to tease her, to make this not so awkward, returned. I smiled a little. “Bunkmates?” That made it sound like summer camp.
“Like I said, you on top, me on the bottom.”
The image that created was like a swift kick to the gut.
Something she realized a beat later as she rushed to add, “I mean, you are in the top bunk and I’m in the bottom bunk. Separate. Not together. ‘Bunkmates’ doesn’t mean sharing one bunk.”
“Of course.” Such a shame.
Lucky cleared her throat and said, “We share the closet, and the top two drawers are yours. That’s the bathroom. The door locks. So you can have privacy and keep me out.”
I wanted to tease her, ask her if I needed to keep myself safe from her, but sensed now was not the right time. I looked around and said, “I thought you had to be convicted of a crime to be put somewhere like this.”
“It’s not ... ideal,” she said and I wondered what specific part wasn’t ideal for her. “I’ll let you unpack. I’ll be in the laundry room if you need anything.”
She left in a hurry and I let out a small chuckle. The new rule probably existed because of me and my past but Lucky seemed to be taking it personally. Like I was some kind of temptation for her that she wasn’t sure she could resist.
As I began emptying my knapsack, I realized two things.
One, that if she told me she was interested, I suspected that I wouldn’t care about rules.
And two, these were probably going to be the longest and most frustrating six months of my life.