Page 52 of No One Aboard

Tia smirked. “Then let’s get going, shall we?” And she pulled away from him.

If Nico had been affected, he didn’t show it. He stretched and slipped out of bed, clicking his tongue. “Whatever would my captain think if he knew I was taking orders from his teenage daughter?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Tia said, opening the door for him. “When we’re through,I’llbe your captain.”

Nico paused in the doorway. He smoothed a hand through her hair and gave her a little push so she was flat against the door. “Aye aye,” he breathed, then stepped away and down the hall.

A bloom of heat swept through Tia as she hurried to close the door and follow behind him.

No one else was in the salon or the galley, so they reached the chart house in peace. Tia wondered where Rylan had gone—the anchor locker, maybe?

The chart house was neater than she had seen it a few days ago. The maps were folded and tucked away, the ship’s log shut with a pen tucked in its spiral binding. Tia flipped it open and went through it page by page.

“It was here somewhere,” she said. She could picture the coordinates written at an angle on the top of a blank page. While she searched, Nico unfolded some maps and retrieved a ruler.

Tia was getting near the back of the log. She hadn’t imagined the page with the red notes. But what if someone had torn it out? If only she’d known then how important it would be.

There. She stopped on a page. Two lines of letters and numbers in Francis’s handwriting.

“This is it.” She showed Nico, who immediately picked out a map. Tia peeked around his arm as he traced to find where the coordinates intersected. It was a map of southern Florida, the Bahamas, and below. So they must be continuing south of West Palm. Maybe just a resort in the Bahamas?

Then Nico stepped back. He had penciled in two neat lines that lay over each other, crossing in the middle of a swath of pure ocean.

“What?” Tia leaned closer. Had Nico traced these wrong? No... there was something. A tiny speck, no larger than a single grain of sand. That’s where Francis was taking them. Some random, minuscule, unlabeled island.

Tia grabbed a pen and copied down the coordinates on a fresh scrap of paper. She tore it from the ship log and shoved it in her shorts pocket.

They were headed somewhere isolated, uninhabited, and far from any other piece of land.

Why was Francis taking them there? What lay on that island?

And why had it been so important for him to keep it secret?

Chapter 26

Lila Logan Cameron

Call sign: Cassiopeia

Day 5 at Sea

Lila’s fingers traced Alejandro’s rib cage. He was dozing but would start every once and a while to cast a glance at his watch. Each time Lila soothed him. They still had over an hour until Francis was done with his shift.

The rhythm of Alejandro’s breath lulled Lila into a sense of calm that she hadn’t experienced sinceThe Old Eileenleft land. Alejandro Matamoros was sturdy. An anchor.

Her thumbnail paused over a freckle below his pectoral. She wondered if Alejandro afforded her the same amount of trust that she did him.

“Mi amor...” she purred, and he woke in an instant.

“You are not asleep,” he pointed out.

Lila’s fingers moved to his throat and the outline of his Adam’s apple. “I suppose I am not all tired out.”

“Mmm.”

Her other hand found the soft skin behind his earlobe. “And I’ve been thinking hard.”

Alejandro stretched and traced the curve of her leg. “Too hard... There is a simple solution for that, señora.”