Stranded With The Captain. Sharon Hartley

shook Cat’s hand, he winked, and heat warmed her cheeks. Damn. He must have noticed her drooling.

      “Come on,” he said. “Let’s grab a dock cart to transport your provisions.”

      Telling herself to quit leering at the captain, Cat and her friends followed him down the dock toward land where he helped them transfer their grocery bags from the car into a wooden cart and wheeled the cart back to Spree, where they passed their provisions to the captain on deck. The process took three trips.

      Maybe they’d bought too much food.

      “Come aboard and I’ll show you where to stow your food,” the captain said with a glance at Debbie’s feet. “Tell me you brought deck shoes.”

      Deb looked down at her stilettos. “They’re in my suitcase.”

      “You have to put them on before you come aboard.”

      “Seriously?” Deb asked.

      “Didn’t you read the preboarding instructions?” Javi said.

      “Don’t worry about it, Deb,” Joan said. “We’ll put away the groceries. Go wait in the shade.” To Javi, she said, “She burns easily because of her fair skin.”

      “Then I hope she brought sunscreen. You, too,” Javi said to Cat, holding out his arm to help her aboard. “Redheads burn quicker than blondes.”

      Landing on deck, Cat silently moaned when she couldn’t stop heat from flooding her face again. The curse of a redhead. What was she, thirteen? He helped Joan onto the boat, then said to Cat, “Come with me.”

      She followed him into the cockpit, through the opening and down four steps to a cooler shaded area below deck. Wow. Spree was gorgeous, all varnished wood and neatly arranged pastel cushions.

      “This is the main saloon,” Javi said.

      “It’s lovely,” Cat said. Light flooded the area through an open hatch overhead and porthole windows on the side.

      “I’ll give you the grand tour once your food is stowed, but this is the galley,” he said with a sweep of his arm.

      “That’s the kitchen, right?” Cat asked.

      “Right. This is a top-loading cooler, which runs off the ship’s generator. Freezer is one side, refrigerator on the other.” He removed a hatch that cleverly folded to cover one side or both, and then moved to the front of the boat where there was another opening to the deck.

      A hatch, Cat reminded herself.

      “Start passing the bags through,” he yelled up to Joan.

      “Pack items you’ll use first last,” he instructed.

      After the perishables, he helped Cat and Joan store dry goods into overhead cabinets. Despite being out of the April sun, they were all sweating by the time they finished.

      Fanning herself, Joan plopped onto the sofa. “Is it always this hot down here?”

      “There’s not much air circulation in the marina, but under way, it stays fairly cool below deck,” Javi said. “When we’re at anchor, I’ll put up wind scoops on the hatches to help ventilate below.”

      “No air-conditioning?” Cat asked with a glance at Joan.

      “Just the wind,” the captain said.

      “Right. Let’s go find Debbie,” Joan said, avoiding Cat’s gaze.

      The captain nodded, and Cat followed him into the cockpit where they discovered Debbie waiting on the dock with her luggage.

      “What the hell is that?” Javi demanded.

      Cat followed his gaze to Debbie’s large, hard-sided suitcase.

      “What does it look like?” Deb asked.

      “Something that’s not coming on this boat,” the captain said.

      * * *

      “DID YOU EVEN bother to read your contract?” Javi demanded. Maybe he sounded sharp, but his thigh ached. He’d been on his leg too long helping the charterers load their provisions, something definitely not in the captain’s job description, but he’d wanted to smooth over the rough start.

      “The contract specifies soft-sided luggage only, preferably duffel bags,” Javi said.

      “But this isn’t any bigger than Cat’s duffel,” the blonde on shore protested.

      “A cloth bag can be stuffed into a small space, but not that thing,” Javi stated. “And it can’t stay out. If we hit weather, it’ll go flying and damage the boat.”

      “Is there any solution?” Cat asked softly. “Maybe lash it to the deck somehow?”

      Javi turned to the stunning redhead beside him on deck. She was trying to be reasonable, but he wasn’t in the mood. “For safety reasons, the less on deck, the better.”

      He watched Cat exchange a look with Joan, an equally beautiful dark-haired woman. Just what he needed. Three gorgeous and spoiled women to cater to for a week. Marlin, the boat’s owner, couldn’t afford to turn down any booking, but family charters were so much easier.

      “We bought a lot of large garbage bags,” Cat said. “Maybe Deb could stuff everything inside a couple and leave the suitcase ashore.”

      Javi nodded. “That would work.”

      “Where?” Deb asked, looking around the dock.

      “I’ll ask the marina office if they can store it for a week,” Javi said. And then he realized something else. The blonde—Deb was her name—had obviously planned on putting that ridiculous suitcase on board. “Where are you ladies staying the night?” he asked. “The Marathon Motel?”

      Cat and Joan exchanged another look. Deb sat on her suitcase.

      “Well, since our food is already on board,” Joan said hesitantly, “we thought maybe we could stay with it.”

      Did you, now? “That’s an option if you arrange it ahead of time,” Javi said, struggling to hold on to his temper. “But I didn’t see that in your contract.”

      “But what would it matter?” Joan said. “We won’t be any trouble. The boat isn’t being used by anybody else.”

      Javi glared at Joan. No one but me. So this was his reward for accommodating these women. If he allowed them to sleep aboard tonight, he’d have to stay with Spree. Forget about going to the gym for one last rehab session for his leg. Why had he agreed to help Marlin?

      Because his friend was laid up in the hospital and would lose Spree—his home and livelihood—without the income from the already-booked charters. The old fool didn’t even have enough cash on hand to repay the deposits.

      “We won’t cook in the boat,” Cat said. “We’ll go out to dinner, return our rental car and be ready to leave when you are. We couldn’t get a reservation at any motel close by.”

      “Maybe we should forget the whole thing,” Debbie said, standing.

      “No. Come on, Debbie,” Joan said. “Besides, we’d lose our money.”

      “Couldn’t you bend the rules just this once?” Cat asked in her soft voice.

      Javi shot her a look, but bit back a comment, again caught by her flawless fair skin. Damn, and her eyes were a mesmerizing green. Red hair, green eyes. Must be Irish. She flushed again under his scrutiny, something she did a lot. What’s up with that?

      But the brunette was right. What did one night matter? If Marlin were here, he’d definitely give in to these three sirens.

      At least they didn’t have any special requests. Marlin claimed all they wanted was a week of R & R in paradise where they didn’t have to worry about driving home after too