Full Exposure

Ariana stifled a gasp. If he were bluffing, a Naples native wouldn’t petition their venerated patron saint, San Gennaro. She uncurled and stretched stiff, sore legs. Dante had shown kindness during her captivity. Clean clothing. Books and magazines. Hot cappuccino at breakfast. Of course, he’d locked her in her room when he’d gone to fetch them. But yesterday when they’d been forced to flee the yacht, he had not only saved her life, he had expressed empathy over her fear of deep water and carried her.

“I am bound hand and foot. If you are able, talk to me, per favore. We need a plan.”

What should she do? Though Dante’s large, capable hands could break her in half, he had handled her with carefully tempered strength. He had touched her only when necessary, and with respect. A wise woman would choose him versus the coarse thugs who had trussed her up and tossed her into the bilge like fish bait, even if his interest in her welfare was only because he thought he could trade her for money. At least he was dedicated to safeguarding his investment.

Adrift and floundering, she was forced to rely on instinct. Those instincts screamed at her to answer him.

Pain ground her joints as she struggled to sit up. “I—” the word emerged as a croak, and she cleared her throat “—I can get up. Just my hands are tied.”

“Grazie a Dio!” He uttered a relieved sigh. “Then you must come to me.”

Decision made, she refused to second-guess herself. “Easier said than done. It’s as dark in here as the inside of the Trojan horse.”

“Beware of Greeks bearing gifts.” His wry chuckle was oddly comforting. “Follow the sound of my voice.”

He issued calm commands and she replied as she blindly navigated the rolling maze. After long, frustrating moments of stumbling, she bumped against him. He was sitting on a crate, and she maneuvered herself down beside him.

He was so warm. Cold and scared, she couldn’t help huddling against his hard shoulder.

“You’re trembling.” He swiveled so they were pressed body to body, her cheek resting on his chest. Beneath the smooth cotton of his T-shirt, his heart beat strong and steady. The softness of his full beard caressed her face as he brushed his cheek over her temple. “Are you hurt?”

“No.” She retreated from the intimate contact, but stayed close enough so his body heat radiated to her chilled, shivering limbs.

“Turn around so we can loosen each other’s ropes.”

They turned their backs to one another. The mutual exploration of his large, callused hands and sinewy arms jolted her system…reminiscent of the power surge that had once fried her laptop. She’d read about Stockholm syndrome. Over time, hostages sometimes fell for their captors. But the very first moment on the dig site when Dante’s eyes had locked with hers, her heart had leaped into her throat and pounded so hard she’d nearly choked.

The intriguing Italian possessed a primal gravitational force. Whenever he was in sight, her gaze was pulled to him and her pulse galloped. Now, weeks later, she’d jettisoned the attempt to convince herself her reaction was fear. Like everything else since her father had died, her involuntary attraction to Signor Dante made no sense. He was so far from her preferred cultured academic, he bordered on Paleolithic.

Not to mention that he was a criminal.

She fumbled with the ropes binding his thick wrists. “Are we prisoners on a ship that belongs to the Camorra?”

“If the Camorra had captured us, we would already be dead.” She had enjoyed the fresh aroma of his bay laurel soap lingering in the air after he’d showered, and now, in the icy blackness, his evocative scent conjured a vivid image of sun-warmed herbs growing wild on lush Mediterranean hills. His fingers tugged on her bonds. “I have no idea who is holding us. Or why.”

His efforts to free her sharpened the ache in her arms, and she stifled a whimper. “That’s reassuring.”

“Perdonami.” His quiet apology amazed her. She hadn’t betrayed her pain…she’d thought. “Don’t be afraid, Ariana. I will protect you.”

“Why, for the ransom? In any case, we’re in no position to put up a fight.”

He snorted. “A man’s worth is no greater than his ambitions.”

Her hands stilled. She had seen keen intelligence in his brown eyes. Who knew her kidnapper was well-read? “Marcus Aurelius, the ancient Roman emperor-philosopher.”

“I find him more helpful in such situations than George Clooney.”

In spite of the grim situation, she couldn’t help but smile. She’d seen rare flashes of il diavolo’s droll sense of humor before, but they always surprised her. “If you get into situations like this often, you might consider a new line of work.”

His broad shoulders moved against hers in a shrug. “Every profession has challenges. How aggressively you conquer them depends on how badly you wish to succeed.”

“Exactly how high do your ambitions reach, Signor Dante?”

“Let’s hope we are not pushed to find out.”

She didn’t need sight to know that the expression in his eyes mirrored the fierce resolve in his voice. She had spent almost as much time in the past weeks attempting to decipher him as she had her father’s encrypted notes. His bearded face rarely showed emotion. But his eyes gave away far more than he knew. As dark and rich as her favorite caramel espresso, the brown depths reflected a wealth of intriguing moods and emotions.

“Keep working at the ropes, Ariana.”

“The knots are too strong.”

“As you walked to me, did you feel anything that might sever them? Equipment or tools with sharp edges?”

“No, but I can go back—”

A door slammed open. A glaring halogen lantern blinded her, and she flinched. Two burly men swaggered in, boasting about their good fortune in a combination of broken English, Greek and Russian.

Ariana groped for Dante’s hands and clung to him. An uncertain anchor in the storm, he was all she had.

The lowlifes were big and muscular and scruffy. The Greek flipped open a large knife. She gulped, and Dante’s fingers tightened reassuringly. She and Dante were suddenly united by the common threat. The enemy of my enemy is my friend.

Though Dante was tied hand and foot, he quickly maneuvered her behind him on the crate.

Knife raised, the Greek stepped toward him. Dante pistoned his legs and rammed the man’s midsection. The knife clanged to the floor as the Greek flew across the hold.

The Russian swore and slugged Dante in the jaw, and the impact shoved her into the wall. Dante shook his head, but didn’t make a sound.

The Greek regained his feet, staggered forward and snatched up his knife. “You are wanted up top for questioning. Do not cause trouble, Napoletano. Only your mouth needs to be working. Your body can be broken into pieces.” His blade sliced the ropes at Dante’s ankles. Leaving his arms tied, his captors yanked him from the room.

The engines growled through the hull and the ship pitched. Ariana huddled alone in the icy blackness, stunned and trembling. When she was growing up, her parents had sheltered her. As an adult, she had ensconced herself in civilized academia. Violence confronted her daily, but in distant images from the newspaper or television. If it was too much, she could turn the page. Switch it off. She’d never been a helpless witness to brutality.

She couldn’t stop shaking. How could one human being cold-bloodedly abuse another? Your body can be broken into pieces. Nausea roiled in her stomach. Were they torturing Dante? She sucked in a quivering breath.

Was she next?

She forced her breathing to slow. Don’t panic. Think. She’d never been a scrapper. Brains trumped brawn in her world. As a librarian, she held fast to the belief that knowledge was power. Even when Dante had kidnapped her, she had hoped passive resistance would lead to negotiation. Her mother and the cruise line would be searching for her. She had planned to talk her way out, or stall until rescued. She bit her lip. Her usual weapons of logic and reason were useless against savages who brutalized first and asked questions later.

Ariana wriggled off the crate. Why meekly sit and wait? If she was about to be killed, she wouldn’t make it easy.

She needed a crash course in fighting dirty.

Squelching worry for Dante, she fumbled through a painfully slow investigation of the dark, swaying chasm. Horrifying images of what the barbarians were doing to him only made her weak and scared. The best way to help him—and herself—was to break free.

She had no idea how long she wandered in blackness before she stumbled over something and fell. Agony screamed through her limbs as she hit the floor. Every movement stabbed red-hot spears into her strained muscles. Panting, she curled into a ball, tempted to surrender.

The thought of Dante stoically enduring torture drove her to struggle to her knees. She cautiously felt behind her. She had tripped over a metal spool of chain. The rough edge might fray her bonds.

Battling the burning ache in her arms and wrists, she scraped her ropes on the spool’s edge. If she had been shown a preview before she began her ill-fated journey, would she have continued her crusade?