Page 44 of Knot for Sale

Elijah’s fingers fumbled on the last buckle. He steadied them and pulled the life vest off, tossing it aside. “Thanks,” he rasped, settling beside me in my protected corner.

Drawn to his coolness in the face of my raging fever, I burrowed under his arm and let him pull me close, until I could press my nose against the crook of his neck and breathe in his familiar scent.

TWENTY

Gabriel

“NOT EXACTLY HOW you thought you’d be spending the week, eh, Boss?” Onyx asked wryly. The little boat we were in bobbed on the sea’s gentle swells its outboard engine letting out a low, monotonous growl.

“That’s putting it mildly.” I’d been trying to convince myself that there might be unseen opportunities here, and I wasn’t simply abandoning my hunt for proof against my sister’s abductors. It might even be true, but it didn’t change the fact that I’d bailed on the investigation solely to keep Emma Hope and Elijah Bardot from succumbing to the same fate.

“And she’s Huntwell’s niece,” Onyx continued. “That could be useful. Maybe she knows where some of the bodies are buried.”

As though just realizing how that would sound to someone who’d lost a sister, Onyx’s dark gaze flicked to me to gauge my reaction.

“So to speak,” I said evenly. It was unlikely I’d ever find out where Theresa was buried... assuming she’d been buried at all.

Onyx had enough sense not to dig the metaphorical hole any deeper, and I didn’t blame them for the slip. The dinghy eased up to the ladder at the back of the rented sailboat. I climbed up to the deck of the ship and unbuckled my life vest, not waitingfor Onyx to finish stowing the little three-person craft on its davits before I headed toward the cabin.

The sloop appeared utilitarian rather than fancy—quite a contrast after the gaudy display of riches aboard the Titania. I located the stairs leading down to the interior, which someone, and by ‘someone’ I meant Curran, had turned into an approximation of an omega nest. The scent hit me an instant later, my own pheromones mixing with four others in a way that had my feet stuttering to an unplanned halt. My unhelpful dick leapt to attention, straining toward the pair huddled in the far corner of the room.

Suddenly, I couldn’t seem to get enough of that scent. Or enough air in general. Both omegas stiffened. Elijah’s eyes went wide in a way that I suspected mirrored my own, and Emma leaned forward with a low-pitched whine that went straight to my balls.

“Oh, good. You’re here.” Curran broke the moment by grabbing my arm and unceremoniously rolling up my sleeve. I blinked and tore my gaze away to frown at him. “Stay still while I give you this jab.”

I didn’t protest when he lifted a small hypodermic syringe and pressed the needle into my upper arm, dispensing its contents into the muscle.

“Should I ask?” I said afterward, rubbing the sore spot.

“Just a dampener,” Curran replied, already dumping the used syringe in an empty plastic milk container he was apparently using to store sharps for later disposal. He turned to a small refrigerator in the galley area and started rummaging inside. “Onyx and I already took ours. Our guest is understandably ambivalent about an unplanned heat with strangers, so I’m making sure no one on our side goes into rut. We’ll still be able to help her out, but we won’t lose control.”

“Oh,” I said. The impact of the mingled scents in the cabin began to dull as the drug slipped through my bloodstream.

Curran straightened with another syringe in hand. “This one’s birth control. Elijah, have you got any experience giving intramuscular injections?”

Elijah stared at him like a deer in the headlamps. “Absolutely none.”

Curran nodded, wading through the piles of pillows and blankets strewn over the floor. He approached slowly, crouching in front of the pair. Far from seeming frightened, Emma listed forward, into his space. Elijah helped him roll up her sleeve, and she barely seemed to notice the prick of the needle. She was too busy scenting Curran’s neck.

Christ.

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