Deep Blue by Kat Martin Page B

sea.
    “There she is!” Hope pointed toward the big, steel-hulled salvage boat anchored a little to the south, dipping and swaying in the waves. Even from a distance, she could see activity on the deck. When the speedboat pulled alongside, Joe Ramirez came over to the rail.
    “Man, I’m glad you’re back.”
    “What’s up?” Conn asked, climbing onto the boarding platform, then turning to help Tommy and Hope climb out of the boat.
    Joe grinned like a schoolboy. “You won’t believe it. Hurry up—you gotta see this.”
    Conn left to follow Joe without giving Hope a backward glance. It was as if the attraction that had sparked between them last night had never happened. It was just a dream, a little bit of island magic. The magic was gone now, as if it had never existed, and she had a job to do.
    As she and Tommy started for the chart room, following Conn and Joe, she tried to tell herself she was glad things hadn’t gone any further last night.
    But she wasn’t really certain that she was.

Chapter 6
    Trailing Joe, Conn descended the ladder to the chart room. Captain Bob was there, along with Andy Glass, and both of them were grinning. They hovered around the video camera, looking at the picture projected from beneath the sea. There was something on the screen, but mixed with snatches of plant life and covered with a dense layer of sand, Conn couldn’t tell what it was.
    “Check this out.” Joe pointed to the side-scan sonar. “What’s that look like to you?”
    The monitor sat next to the video camera, but the scanner itself hung from a cable below the boat. It was designed to recognize the shapes of objects lying on the ocean floor. Conn studied the screen. Though whatever was on the video screen was encrusted with corrosion and covered by a layer of sand, the object outlined on the monitor was clearly defined.
    And the shape on the screen sent a rush of adrenaline shooting through him.
    For the first time, he noticed the pinging sound coming from a few feet away and turned to look at the magnetometer reading. The equipment Talbot had provided was top of the line and this detector picked up both ferrous and nonferrous metals. The object on the ocean floor was definitely metal, the shape unmistakable.
    Conn started to grin. “By God, you found one of the cannons!” He slapped Joe on the shoulder. “I should have listened to you sooner. You always were a lucky son of a bitch.”
    For nearly a week, Joe had been trying to talk him into searching the area parallel to the coast south of the reef.
    “I got a hunch,” Joe had said.
    But Conn had been determined to be practical and stick with the grid, which moved them slowly across the reef.
    “You found the cannon?” Hope repeated excitedly from behind him. Conn ignored a jolt of heat at the sound of her voice. Last night was over. Nothing had happened and this morning he was glad.
    At least his brain was glad. After a sexually frustrating night and very little sleep, his body hated his guts.
    “Yeah, looks like we did.” He couldn’t help a smile. They had all worked long and hard for this. “Of course, we’ll need to bring it up, try to verify it actually came off the Rosa. ”
    Conn turned to read the fathometer, which showed the depth of the bottom. “Forty-three feet. We’re about half a mile offshore and three-quarters of a mile south of the western curve of the reef. Maybe she struck some coral heads near the edge, tore a hole in her hull, then drifted this far south before she sank.”
    “We’ve set buoys to mark the spot,” Joe said. “So far we haven’t found any sign of the ballast pile.” Ballast was weight carried in the hold to keep the ships stable in the water. The English often used pig iron. The galleons usually carried stones.
    “We’ll recalculate the grid, use the cannon as a starting point, and work around it all the way back to the reef.” He looked over at Joe. “Let’s go down and take a look. If we take the sled,