Page 136 of Her Reluctant Hero
Before he could turn to inspect the damage, Mallory was beside him, squeezing the wound closed. His blood drifted into the water in a dark cloud. Mallory’s brow furrowed in concern as she realized they were in danger.
Sharks.
With his free arm, he motioned to Toney and Jacob, then to Mallory, and pointed up. They needed to get out of the water in case a nosy shark came to investigate. Mallory looked at him a moment before she took his other hand and clamped it over the wound on his triceps. He didn’t dare look to see how bad the damage was; he couldn’t risk letting more blood into the water.
Mallory swam to the others, signaled what had happened and motioned them to go up. The two men exchanged a glance, then nodded before ascending to the first decompression stop.
And Mallory swam to him. What the hell was she doing? He gave her his worst scowl, but she merely pushed his hand away and covered the wound with her own. So she squeezed a little harder than she should have—her way of getting revenge?
She gave him a questioning look and mimed swimming. He nodded. With her hand firmly on his arm, they swam up to where Toney and Jacob dangled near the decompression line. Mallory scanned the water, before looking at him again. He made a half-assed okay sign and her frown deepened.
He hated to admit he was getting weaker. His arms felt like lead and he could barely keep his eyes open. But whether it was from loss of blood or the poison moray eels were said to have, he didn’t know. He did know that Mallory’s grip kept him focused.
She tugged and they swam up the line to the next stop. He shook his head, as if that would erase the effects of the bite. Mallory hung on, scanning the water. The good thing about the Caribbean at this depth—clear as a bell. They could see sharks coming from a long way off.
He lost his grip on the line. She caught him with her legs, wrapping them around his, holding him to her. He tried to give her a leering grin as his hips nestled intimately against hers, but couldn’t manage an effective one with his regulator in his mouth and the muscles in his face refusing to obey his command.
Finally they reached the barge. The three of them worked together to haul Adrian up on the platform. Mallory shed her gear with amazing efficiency before she tugged at his torn sleeve to see the damage.
Her face paled above her bloodied nose, and he turned to look. The skin over his triceps was shredded. Blood oozed down his arm, coating his skin.
“He took quite the chunk out of me, yeah?” he asked and blacked out.
He came to with a start when Mallory spilled some liquid fire on the wound, and he sat up with a scream.
“I’m sorry.”
Her tone was unapologetic. She’d stripped her wetsuit down to her waist and leaned over him in a bright bikini top. That could do for some distraction from his present pain. Someone had peeled his suit off as well. “The bacteria in those eels’ mouths are bad. We have to kill the germs.”
“I am not a germ.” The slur in his voice surprised him.
Mallory ignored him and took a syringe from Robert. Adrian barely opened his mouth to protest when she jammed it into his arm.
He swore. “Is this payback? Geez, Mal, I didn’t know you had a vindictive streak.”
She gave a small smile, her attention still on the wound. “I can’t say I’m not enjoying this a little. But you’ll be glad for the shot. I’m going to stitch you up.”
“Why don’t you give that job to someone I wasn’t married to?” He glanced around the barge and saw Jacob and Robert back away. He cast Toney a pleading glance before turning his attention to Mallory.
Her eyes sparkled as she threaded the blunt-looking needle with coarse black thread. “Why, don’t you want it to be pretty?”
“I’m afraid you’ll make me look like Frankenstein’s monster.”
She smoothed her hand over his skin. “I’m very proud of my work. Don’t worry.” She prodded his skin near the injection. “Numb yet?”
“No. Look, I don’t know how good of an idea this is,” he added as she edged closer, parting her legs around his hips as she inspected the wound. Okay, maybe not such a bad idea.
“It’s a four-hour drive to get to a hospital. And I let you stitch me up when I fell and split my chin in Mexico.” Tilting her head back, she showed off the thin white scar.
He brushed his thumb over the scar and sighed. “All right. I’m ready.”
Sucking her lower lip between her teeth, she placed a damp palm on his arm, pulling the skin taut. “Hold still.”
She scooted closer, surrounding him with the smell of ocean and sunshine beneath the coconut scent of her sunscreen. He would focus on that and not on the effect of her body wrapped around his as she tried to get a good angle to stitch his wound.
“Don’t take this the wrong way,” she said, and stuck the needle in his arm. Yeow.
The thread tugged at his skin and he winced, but the pain wasn’t enough to kill his growing desire. Soon the whole crew would know it.
