Con would bring the diamond, so she had to get the scepter wrapped and hidden in a bag. In her room, she dragged her canvas zippered tote, then pulled out the mattress from the bunk where she’d hidden the scepter.

And stared at the empty spot, her heart lodging in her throat. “Oh my God.”

Con. It had to have been Con. Right? If not…

She didn’t even want to think about it. Grabbing a handbag, she marched back up to the salon where Flynn and Con were talking and eating.

“Change your mind on the pancakes?” Con asked, moving over to make room for her.

She noticed his khaki-colored, beat-up backpack on the floor… big enough to carry what she knew in her gut he had.

She gave him a look as she slid into the booth next to him, but he just replied with a surreptitious squeeze of her leg.

Lizzie was still unhappy about the turn of events when the three of them climbed aboard Flynn’s boat. She’d wanted to undertake this job on her own, without any prying eyes and opinions on how it should be done. And, damn it, he was swinging that bag like it contained his dirty underwear, not a priceless artifact.

But they never had a moment alone, so she never got a chance to ask him how he’d gotten into her room to take the scepter, or why.

Con stayed up on the bridge with Flynn until they reached the tricky waters of the Sebastian Inlet, a zigzaggy, white-water, man-made cut in the coastline meant for smaller boats that wanted to get into the wide, calm waters of the Indian River.

This shortcut was convenient, but required some skill to navigate the rocks. Con had plenty of that, standing on the bow of the boat, calling up to the bridge where Flynn was at the helm. Con’s instructions and guidance helped them round rocks and whitecaps, a monster hole of a sandbar drop-off that could flip a boat with one bad move, then through the shallows into the river that separated the barrier islands from the mainland.

The whole time, Lizzie watched him, drinking in his attitude, his confidence, his power.

Maybe it was in her blood to be attracted to dark, broody men straddling a bowsprit like a pirate, or maybe it was just that this man was a stunning figure of command. A strapping, strong leader who had already demonstrated he’d be as good in bed as he was at the bow.

Her lower half curled with arousal at the thought, the memory of his tongue sliding up her thigh, his warm breath on her skin still fresh enough to be recalled with far too much clarity.

The man obviously got whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted it. And he seemed to want her.

She’d never had a fling with a fellow diver, mostly because her father was on board nearly every boat she’d ever been on. Shipboard romances were as common as finding pieces of eight. They didn’t have to mean anything; they didn’t have to last. They could just be fun.

He turned his gaze toward her, her whole body responding to the way the wind pressed the T-shirt to his shoulders and how his jeans fit like a dream.

Did he know what she was thinking?

He lifted his sunglasses and revealed the direction of his gaze-locked on the bag next to her.

So he was thinking about the treasure, and she was thinking about… him.

She shifted her own attention to the water, determined to keep it there until they’d docked at the Sebastian Marina.

A half hour later, they climbed onto the wooden planks after tying up. Flynn was holding his bag with the medallion with a lot greater care than was Con, who flipped the backpack casually over his shoulder.

“What time do we need to be back here, Flynn?” she asked.

“Four o’clock, drop-dead latest,” he replied.

“We’ll see you back here long before four,” Con assured him. “You’ve got my cell if you need us.”

Lizzie let out a soft breath. “How come you get to have a cell phone out in the open and nobody else does?”

“It’s in my contract.”

“You have a contract?”

He just smiled and draped his arm over her shoulders, steering her toward the bait shop. At the door, he put a hand on her arm.

“Wait here, and watch where Flynn goes.”

Before she could question or argue, he disappeared inside, and in less than two minutes returned holding keys.

“Has he left the lot yet?”

“No, he’s over there, getting into an SUV. Why did you take that scepter from my room?”

“It wasn’t safe for you to have it. Let’s go.” He nudged her to a separate section of the huge lot. “Our ride’s over there.”

He steered her to a menacing black motorcycle tucked between two trucks, two black helmets clipped to the seat.

“Before we can go to your sister’s house,” he said as he unlatched the smaller of the helmets, “we’ve gotta follow Flynn.”

Her annoyance, already peaking, ratcheted up about ten degrees. “We are not.”

“Yes, we are.”

“On this thing?”

He shoved the helmet into her hands. “He won’t be looking for it, and we’ll have much better maneuverability for following. You need help with that? Hurry up, he’s about to pull out. Don’t worry, it’s a great little bike.”

“You are not going joyriding with the freaking scepter of the king of Portugal and one of the most valuable diamonds in the world on your back!”

“We’re not joyriding, Lizzie.” He took the helmet out of her hands and eased it over her head. “I want to know where he’s taking that medallion, and so do you.” He tucked some strands of her hair under the helmet and snapped the chin strap.

“Why do you care?”

“Because you do.” He threw a leg over the bike and started it up with a rumble. “You coming?”

She reached for the backpack straps, tugging hard enough to pull him back an inch. “Damn you, Con! You are not hijacking my plans again. I didn’t invite you on this trip. Give me this bag. Go follow him to the processing lab if you want, but I’ll go call my sister and she’ll pick me up, exactly as I’d planned.”

“This bag is coming with me, and so are you.” He revved the engine and patted the seat behind him. “Climb up, hang on, and I promise we’ll get to your sister with time to spare. We have to know what he’s up to.”

At the sound of squealing tires, she looked up to the street and saw the silver SUV peel out, headed south.

The opposite direction of the Paxton Treasures processing lab.

She slid her leg over the leather and scooted into him, pressing her chest against a priceless treasure and her legs against his rock-hard thighs. “Fine. Go.”

“Good girl.”

He took off and she held on, and suddenly didn’t feel like a very good girl at all.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CON MADE UP the delay easily, wending the Kawasaki the Bullet Catchers had arranged to be waiting for him through the light traffic, staying far enough back not to get on Paxton’s radar, but close enough not to lose him. Easy, since he stayed on A1A and kept a steady speed.

“We just passed the turnoff to where my sister lives,” Lizzie shouted in his ear.

He gave her thigh a solid pat. They’d get there. But if he didn’t find out what the hell Paxton was up to, he’d be remiss in his duties.

Paxton took a right when they reached the smattering of stores and restaurants of a tiny beach town, and Con slowed a little. It’d be tougher to follow without being seen, now that they were on side roads, but he could do it.

They weaved through some commercial areas, then backtracked north a few blocks, past several high-end gated communities. As he drove past an oversized manicured entrance flanked by marble slabs bearing the words St. Richard’s Island in gold, Con saw Paxton’s SUV at the gatehouse, his head out the window, speaking with a guard holding a clipboard. At the next intersection, he turned on a side street and stopped.